State Champ Radio Music News
Trending on Billboard Yungblud’s 2026 Australian tour dates will move ahead as scheduled, even as the U.K. singer halts all remaining performances for the rest of 2025 due to medical advice. Explore See latest videos, charts and news The Doncaster-born artist revealed over the weekend that recent vocal and blood test results prompted doctors to […]
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Aaron Nichols secured one of the most coveted spots in The Voice Season 28 Knockouts on Monday night (Nov. 17), earning Team Reba’s “Mic Drop” selection after a commanding performance that cut through an already stacked episode.
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The Knockouts continued with matchups from Teams Reba McEntire, Michael Bublé, Snoop Dogg and Niall Horan, with mega mentors Joe Walsh and Zac Brown stepping in during rehearsals. The format remains high-stakes: no steals, no saves — just three head-to-head battles for a place in the Playoffs, plus one Mic Drop pick per team. The Mic Drop nominee performs at the Rose Parade, with the final decision left to viewer votes.
This week, that honor went to Nichols, whose rugged tone on “Hurricane” by The Band of Heathens immediately grabbed Reba’s attention. Walsh encouraged Nichols to be more present in the room — “I can’t quite see your eyes,” he said — while Reba noted his command felt seasoned beyond the show.
Nichols faced off against Cori Kennedy, who delivered Lady Gaga’s “You and I” with intense, full-bodied power. Walsh suggested slight phrasing changes, while Bublé praised her natural force: “You walk out and you just destroy.” Snoop Dogg highlighted her dynamic build (“you started off mild then got real hot”), and Horan compared her energy to Stevie Nicks.
But Nichols’ emotive grit ultimately won the round. Reba called him “a seasoned veteran up on the stage” and hit the Mic Drop button, cementing him as her nominee for the Rose Parade performance slot.
This marks the third Mic Drop nomination of the season. In earlier episodes, Bublé selected 14-year-old Max Chambers after his smooth run through Stevie Wonder’s “Don’t You Worry ’Bout a Thing,” and Horan chose DEK of Hearts following their harmony-rich take on Lady A’s “What If I Never Get Over You.”
The Knockouts continue next Monday at 9 p.m. ET/PT on NBC.
Check out the performance below.
Swift recorded namesake songs for seven of her 12 studio albums.
11/17/2025
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Europe’s largest music market will soon be announcing a ban on ticket resale for profit, elating music fans while roiling investors in secondary ticketing companies like StubHub and Vivid Seats.
Multiple outlets in the United Kingdom are reporting that the Labour Party government of Prime Minister Keir Starmer will announce a plan to crack down on ticket scalping this week. Outlets like The Guardian are reporting that Starmer’s government had considered capping resale at 30% above a ticket’s original face value, but ultimately opted to ban the resale of tickets above face value following significant pressure from artists and industry groups.
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According to The Guardian, ticket holders for popular concerts like Coldplay and Dua Lipa will be able to resell tickets on sites like StubHub and Viagogo, but not charge more than they paid for the tickets. Resale sites would be allowed to charge fees on top of that price, but the fees would be limited and set by regulators. The resale ban would also cover social media sites, which some resale site operators have claimed would serve as fraud-heavy alternatives if markets like StubHub were shut down.
The new regulations will also include purchasing limits on tickets and mandates from the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) that resale sites like StubHub will be responsible for policing their own platforms.
The news sent the share price for StubHub’s U.S. company, StubHub Holdings, tumbling on Monday (Nov. 17); the stock ultimately closed down 13.8 percent. StubHub has endured a brutal November, with shares down a combined 33% after the company failed to provide a financial forecast for the current quarter.
The publicly traded StubHub Holdings — which owns Viagogo — is a different company from the U.K. StubHub brand. The Competition and Markets Authority forced the firms to split into two companies following the merger of Viagogo and StubHub in 2020.
Representatives for Live Nation applauded the deal, telling Billboard in a statement that “Live Nation fully supports the UK government’s plan to ban ticket resale above face value. Ticketmaster already limits all resale in the UK to face value prices, and this is another major step forward for fans — cracking down on exploitative touting to help keep live events accessible. We encourage others around the world to adopt similar fan-first policies.”
Earlier this month, more than 40 British artists, including Sam Fender, Radiohead and The Cure, sent a public letter to Starmer urging the U.K. prime minister to “stop touts [scalpers] from fleecing fans” and cap the price of resale tickets at face value. The pressure campaign followed a recent CMA study that found U.K. tickets sold on resale sites were typically marked up 50 percent.
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The Game Awards, which celebrates achievements in the video game industry, revealed its 2025 nominees on Monday (Nov. 17). Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 leads the way with 12 nominations, making it the most nominated game in the show’s 12-year history.
This year’s game of the year nominees are Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 from Sandfall Interactive; Death Stranding 2: On the Beach from Kojima Productions; Donkey Kong Bananza from Nintendo; Hades II from Supergiant Games; Hollow Knight: Silksong from Team Cherry; and Kingdom Come: Deliverance II from Warhorse Studios.
Over the past year, several popular video games and franchises have crossed over into television and film. The following films and streaming shows are nominated for best adaptation: A Minecraft Movie, Devil May Cry, The Last of Us: Season 2, Splinter Cell: Deathwatch and Until Dawn.
Sony Interactive Entertainment is The Game Awards’ most nominated publisher in 2025 with 19 nominations across its combined portfolio, followed by Kepler Interactive with 13 nods, and Electronic Arts and Microsoft, each with 10. The nominees for The Game Awards are selected by a global jury of more than 150 media publications and creator outlets.
From today through Dec. 10 at 6 p.m. PT, fans will be able to help choose the winners in all categories via authenticated online voting on the Game Awards site. In China, fans can vote for their favorites on a variety of platforms including Bilibili.
The Game Awards will air live from the Peacock Theater in Los Angeles on Thursday, Dec. 11, with awards, world premiere new game announcements, and musical performances by The Game Awards Orchestra, conducted by Lorne Balfe. The Scottish composer, 49, won a Grammy three years ago for best compilation soundtrack for visual media for Top Gun: Maverick and has been nominated for two Primetime Emmys.
Tickets to attend The Game Awards in-person can be purchased on the AXS site. At press time, available tickets ranged from $251 in the upper mezzanine to $1,506 for loge seats.
This year’s show will stream live on Prime Video for the first time and will once again stream for free across more than 30 digital video platforms including Twitch, YouTube, Steam, X (formerly known as Twitter), Facebook and TikTok Live. The Game Awards 2024 broke viewership records with an reported 154 million global livestreams, up 31% over 2023’s record-setting showcase, which reached 118 million livestreams. In addition, more than 15,000 individual content creators and online influencers co-streamed the show to their audiences, according to show organizers.
The Game Awards is executive produced by Geoff Keighley and Kimmie Kim. Richard Preuss is the director, LeRoy Bennett is the creative director, and Michael E. Peter is co-executive producer.
Here are nominees in seven key categories for the 2025 Game Awards. For the full list of nominees, visit the Game Awards site.
Game of the Year
Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 (Sandfall Interactive/Kepler Interactive)
Death Stranding 2: On The Beach (Kojima Productions/Sony Interactive Entertainment)
Donkey Kong Bananza (Nintendo EPD/Nintendo)
Hades II (Supergiant Games)
Hollow Knight: Silksong (Team Cherry)
Kingdom Come: Deliverance II (Warhorse Studios/Deep Silver)
Best Score and Music
Christopher Larkin, Hollow Knight: Silksong
Darren Korb, Hades II
Lorien Testard, Clair Obscur: Expedition 33
Toma Otowa, Ghost of Yōtei
Woodkid and Ludvig Forssell, Death Stranding 2: On The Beach
Best Audio Design
Battlefield 6 (Battlefield Studios/EA)
Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 (Sandfall Interactive/Kepler Interactive)
Death Stranding 2: On the Beach (Kojima Productions/Sony Interactive Entertainment)
Ghost of Yōtei (Sucker Punch Productions/Sony Interactive Entertainment)
Silent Hill f (NeoBards Entertainment/KONAMI)
Best Performance
Ben Starr, Clair Obscur: Expedition 33
Charlie Cox, Clair Obscur: Expedition 33
Erika Ishii, Ghost of Yōtei
Jennifer English, Clair Obscur: Expedition 33
Konatsu Kato, Silent Hill f
Troy Baker, Indiana Jones and the Great Circle
Best Family
Donkey Kong Bananza (Nintendo EPD/Nintendo)
LEGO Party! (SMG Studio/Fictions)
LEGO Voyagers (Light Brick Studios/Annapurna Interactive)
Mario Kart World (Nintendo EPD/Nintendo)
Sonic Racing: CrossWorlds (Sonic Team/Sega)
Split Fiction (Hazelight Studios/EA)
Best Adaptation
A Minecraft Movie (Legendary Pictures/Mojang/Warner Bros)
Devil May Cry (Studio Mir/Capcom/Netflix)
The Last of Us: Season 2 (HBO/PlayStation Productions)
Splinter Cell: Deathwatch (FOST Studio/Ubisoft/Netflix)
Until Dawn (Screen Gems/PlayStation Productions)
Content Creator of the Year
Caedrel
Kai Cenat
MoistCr1TiKaL
Sakura Miko
The Burnt Peanut
Trending on Billboard YoungBoy Never Broke Again returned to deliver his “Zero IQ Freestyle” over the weekend, and the Baton Rouge rapper didn’t mince words when addressing some of his exes — and possibly sent a few shots in NLE Choppa’s direction. YB released an accompanying video shot from the comforts of his Utah mansion. […]
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Omarion has spoken about the few years he spent practicing celibacy as part of a spiritual experience.
The B2K singer opened up to Boyz II Men’s Shawn Stockman on his On That Note podcast and said that as a young man, being celibate was an intense experience because of how he was “spiritually searching for strength and personal control over myself and my body.”
“I did it for three years. Now I look back, I be like, sheesh,” he says around the 45-minute mark below. “‘Cause I love women. I love women in all [their] splendor, friendships, best friends, lovers, all that.”
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He continued, “I think that that’s when I was being introduced to a form of telepathy. Feeling closer to someone even when they’re away. I just had the power to say no to anything. Like yo, if I don’t want to do something, I could stop today. And I think that that’s the power of discipline — [it] really turns your life into just another level. … So I think more than anything that I was just really just practicing discipline of self, and it really served its purpose. I always say I’m one of the few guys that I could turn my discipline on and off, and it’s like it’s a cheat code for certain things. … I really know how to focus and commit to something because of that discipline.”
Omarion has been very open about his intense celibacy experience in the past, previously discussing it last summer during a sit-down with the Know Thyself podcast. “‘Do you want to have a career? Or do you want to be out here making babies?’” Omarion said of his peers at the time allegedly asking him. “And we’re like, ‘Huh?’ You know 15, 16, we’re not thinking about that, but it’s a real thing.”
In other news, Omarion caught up with Zoe Spencer & Jerah Milligan at Billboard’s R&B/Hip-Hop Power Players 2025 back in September and said his new album O2 is on the way.
“I’m so excited, I just announced my collaboration with Create Music Group,” Omarion said. “I got a new album titled O2, and I’m ready to give the world some new music…vibes all the way.”
Check out the full conversation below.
Trending on Billboard Disney has finally dropped the official teaser for its live-action remake of Moana, giving fans a long-awaited glimpse at how the once-animated scenery and characters come to life. What can they except you’re welcome? Posted Monday (Nov. 17), the minute-long trailer waits until the very end to show Catherine Lagaʻaia — the […]
Trending on Billboard Chappell Roan might be a midwest princess, but Mexico City just stole her heart. In a new post on Instagram, the pop star reflected on headlining the Corona Capital festival over the weekend and revealed that — despite feeling anxious ahead of the show — the city welcomed her with open arms. […]
Trending on Billboard Two hands on the steering wheel, because Tate McRae’s sports car is about to drop off a four-pack of brand-new songs. The pop star revealed the track list for her upcoming So Close to What deluxe edition on Monday (Nov. 17), which is set to arrive later this week. In addition to […]
