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Kid Rock abruptly cut a recent performance short after expressing frustration at the audience’s energy. The “All Summer Long” singer took the stage at JBJ’s Nashville as a special guest during Bon Jovi keyboardist David Bryan’s birthday celebration on Saturday (Feb. 8). In a clip of the incident circulating the Internet, Kid Rock begins to […]
Did you know that Pharrell Williams had another biopic planned? Following his Lego movie Piece by Piece last year, Pharrell was planning a live-action musical biopic under Universal called Golden.
Originally titled Atlantis, the scrapped film was helmed by Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind director Michel Gondry and was set to star Kelvin Harrison Jr., Halle Bailey, Da’Vine Joy Randolph, Brian Tyree Henry, Janelle Monáe, Missy Elliott, Quinta Brunson, Anderson .Paak and comedian Jaboukie Young-White.
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Williams and Gondry have decided to scrap the movie in post-production because the final product didn’t live up to their standards.
“When all of us got into the editing room we collectively decided there wasn’t a path forward to tell the version of this story that we originally envisioned,” they told Variety in a joint statement, which was also sent to Billboard. “We appreciate all the hard work of the talented cast and crew. While we’re disappointed we can’t deliver this film, we have incredible partners at Universal and will collaborate in a different capacity again soon.”
Pharrell spoke with Empire last November about the differences between the two movies. “Piece by Piece is about my life, whereas Golden is about a neighborhood that I grew up in,” he explained. “This is very different. It’s a musical expedition, set in the summer of 1977 in Virginia Beach, Virginia, with the spirit of the music [of that time].”
Adding, “You know how in Dirty Dancing and Grease, the music was almost a character? That’s what it’s like in this film. It’s a coming-of-age story about self-discovery and pursuing your dreams, but it’s so much more magical than that. It’s a celebration of Black life, Black culture, and most importantly, Black joy.”
According to Variety, Golden had a tentative May 5 release date, and Universal will take a $20 million hit in costs already spent.
On the music side, Pharrell has reunited with his old friends the Clipse for their highly anticipated album Let God Sort Em Out, which should be released sometime this year.
The Anti-Defamation League has spoken out against Ye, the artist formerly known as Kanye West, following the rapper’s bout of antisemitic posts on X over the weekend that recently escalated into the sale of swastika T-shirts on his website. In a statement posted to X Monday (Feb. 10), the ADL — which works to combat […]
Billboard JAPAN‘s “MONTHLY FEATURE” series presents various artists and works that have caught its eye. This month’s featured artist is Omoinotake, a three-person band that recently released their second major label album, Pieces.
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In January 2024, they released “Ikuokukonen,” which they wrote as the theme song for the TV series Eye Love You, which aired on TBS on Tuesdays. “Ikuokukonen” reached 2nd place in Billboard JAPAN‘s “JAPAN Hot 100” song chart. It became one of the big songs of 2024, staying in the charts and taking 3rd place for the whole year in the annual chart released in December. The band steadily expanded the scale of its activities, leading to its first appearance on NHK’s Kohaku Uta Gassen at the end of the year. Omoinotake had long vowed to create a hit song and perform in the Kohaku Uta Gassen, so 2024 was a tremendous year for the band—the year in which it achieved both of these dreams.
Their latest album, Pieces, contains 10 songs, including some previously released singles like “Ikuokukonen” and “Tsubomi,” the ending theme to the seventh season of the TV anime My Hero Academia. We talked to the three members of the band about this richly varied album full of songs that will make listeners want to dance and will bring tears to their eyes.
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Your goal in the past was to perform in the Kohaku Uta Gassen. What was it like actually standing on the Kohaku stage?
Leo Fujii (vocals and keyboard): We’d always talked about how we wanted to become a fixture in the Kohaku Uta Gassen, so it really meant a lot to us. I don’t usually get nervous during shows or TV appearances, but I have to say, I was super nervous during Kohaku. Having appeared on the show, my resolve to keep appearing year after year has only gotten stronger.
Before going on stage, did you talk to each other about what kind of performance to put on?
Fujii: The song we performed, “Ikuokukonen,” has a straightforward message, so we didn’t talk in particular about how to convey that message. We just wanted to do the song justice.
Tomoaki Fukushima (bass): I was so glad that this stage, which we’d longed to play on for so long, turned out to be such an excellent place. Taking that first step was a hard one, but it felt like I’d finally started moving forward with my life.
You achieved huge success in 2024, including the release of a hit song with “Ikuokukonen” and your appearance in the Kohaku Uta Gassen. How would you sum up the year?
Fujii: I’d say “whirlwind.” That’s really the only word for it. There was always this mountain of things that we needed to do in front of us, but personally, I was really glad about that. For a long time, the past 12 years, we’ve always had to take the initiative to get things going. We were able to maintain a high level of motivation through all of 2024, so it was a whirlwind year for us.
When did you start working on your latest album, Pieces?
Fujii: In around October.
Fukushima: Right. We’d first started talking about making a new album back in summer, though. We began by deciding on the album. Our basic concept was that, as a band, we can’t do anything if even one of us is missing. It’s when we each bring our own strengths together that we truly become Omoinotake, this solid, unified presence. That was really palpable in 2024, which is why we started out by deciding on the title Pieces.
So it’s an expression of the nature of the band.
Fukushima: There’s a lot of variation in the songs on the album, so we also looked at each of them as pieces. No matter what, we wanted to create a “Pieces” title track, and if possible we wanted to base the other songs on the album on the title, as well.
Fujii: We’ve focused on making songs you can dance to and songs you can cry to, so once we decided on the title Pieces, we wanted to make an album of songs to dance or cry to.
Hironoshin Tomita (drums): As one of the members of the band, I found the creation process really satisfying—I feel like I did everything I could in the making of the album. Everything from sound production to performing. When Leo made the demo, he left some space to work with. He was like “go ahead and do what you want with this.” I’m very satisfied with the riffs I wrote and how I performed them.
I know it may be hard to choose, but if you had to pick a song that you felt especially satisfied with, which would you pick?
Tomita: The part of “P.S.” before the second chorus.
You picked a really pinpoint spot (laughs). Did you start out planning for this to be the first song on the album?
Fujii: Yes, but we didn’t finish the lyrics until the very end. But, yes, we wrote it to be the first song.
How is it structured?
Fujii: We wanted to try something we’d never done before. We looked around a lot and came across this jungle beat, and were like, “Let’s try this.” Usually, jungle would have bass and synths and be more like dance music, but we didn’t want to do straight jungle. Instead Emoaki (Fukushima) played the root notes with a pick, rock-style, so we made it into Omoinotake’s own style of jungle. Then we were like, we should also mix in some pop-punk, which we’ve always been big fans of, so the last chorus has a pop-punk beat. It’s a really playful song.
The use of pop-punk in the song is really interesting.
Fujii: I was listening to Thundercat, and one of his songs had a kind of pop-punk beat. It really opened my eyes seeing someone who wasn’t from the pop-punk scene using this kind of rhythm in his music.
How did you write the lyrics?
Fukushima: We’d finished writing the title track, “Pieces,” and we wanted to write lyrics that connected to it, while at the same time conveying the concept of the album to follow. We wanted the song to be an introduction to the album, but just serve as a pointer of the direction it would take. Then that theme would really resonate with the last song, “Pieces.”
Of all the songs on the album, do you think ‘Pieces’ is the most tied to that theme?
Fukushima: I think so. For “Pieces,” we decided to start by writing the lyrics. We already had a few singles lined up, and we’d already decided on the album’s title, but we knew that we needed to write a song that expressed where the band is now to close off the album. I think we succeeded in making a song that conveys the message of the album’s title.
Fujii: Actually, “Pieces” is the only song on the album that we wrote the lyrics for before writing the music. A few of the songs are tie-ups, but when we wrote the lyrics, we wrote them based on aspects that we and the tie-ups had in common. “Pieces” was different, though. Emoaki wrote the lyrics focusing purely on us, just writing about the band. We wanted to really treat the song right, and since the song is about us, we wanted to directly communicate our message. So we wanted to take great care when writing the lyrics, and then set them to music.
Tomita: When Emoaki sent me the lyrics, I thought they were wonderful. And then when Leo added the melody and completed the song, I was impressed again by how difficult it must be to divide up the roles of writing lyrics and writing music between two people. That balance felt like a testament to our band’s history.
You started out as junior high school classmates, and you’ve been together for over a decade. Do you plan to keep this same style of having different people handle the lyrics and the music?
Fujii: Yes, I think that’s the best approach for Omoinotake. For example, at the start of “Pieces,” there’s a line that goes “In this ash-colored town/I saw a black-and-white dream.” Those expressions, “ash-colored town” and “black-and-white dream,” have this shared meaning, so just by looking at the lyrics, you can be like “well, then, the melody’s got to be like this.” I think this vision for the music based on the lyrics comes from the fact that we have this shared history.
I’d like to talk a little about “Better Half (feat. JEONGHAN of SEVENTEEN) -Japanese ver.” I’ve heard that this collaboration came about because JEONGHAN’s team reached out to you. What did you think when they contacted you?
Fukushima: It was totally out of the blue. We were like, “You mean, that SEVENTEEN?” But the timing was really important for JEONGHAN, so we were overjoyed.
What back-and-forth was there between you about the song itself?
Fukushima: At first, I wrote it as more of an emotional, Omoinotake-like song. They got back to us asking for it to have a brighter feel. I was like “Wow, I’m really a downer, huh” (laughs). But we wrote a song with a really strong protagonist, which is pretty rare for an Omoinotake song, so that was very new for us.
Fujii: JEONGHAN sings with a really sweet voice, which made me feel like I could try a new approach in the way I sing, too. There’s some interplay in the bridge, and I’m very happy with the song, because I was able to create a melody that wouldn’t have been possible had it not been for this collaboration. We also thought about JEONGHAN’s voice a lot during the sound production. The finished song has a mellow feel. We also went with a dry drum sound, creating a good balance.
Tomita: Like Leo said, the overall atmosphere of the song is soft, but the drums are kind of crisp. It’s the kind of song that you can’t afford to underestimate. The simplicity of the song is the reason we were able to perform so tightly. For a drummer, it required a surprisingly stoic approach.
JEONGHAN released his own version of the song, “Better Half (feat. Omoinotake),” in Korean.
Fujii: That’s right. I sang on it in Korean, too. I don’t know the first thing about Korean, so I got pronunciation training to sing it.
I hope the song will further grow your listener base. The last time we interviewed you, you said that your goal for 2024 was to get into the top 10 in the hit charts. Right after that interview, you broke into the top 10 of the “JAPAN Hot 100” song chart. What is your take on the business side of music, like hit charts and sales?
Fujii: We’ve only released one hit song so far, so there are a lot of people who know our song but don’t know Omoinotake. That’s frustrating. I’m confident that we’re writing lots of good songs, but they’re just not reaching listeners. So we still have this powerful desire to create a lot of hits and have people listen to a lot of our music.
—This interview by Takuto Ueda first appeared on Billboard JAPAN
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Kendrick Lamar put on a show during his Super Bowl LIX halftime performance. From surprise guests like Samuel L. Jackson and Serena Williams to more subtle shots at Drake, K. Dot had Caesars Superdome in New Orleans in a frenzy during his 13-minute performance. However, through all the viral moments, it was his outfit that has the internet really buzzing.
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Sporting Martine Rose (per usual), alongside a pair of trendy Celine flare jeans, a custom NAHMIAS tee, and Nike Air DT Max ’96 sneakers, the real MVP of the Super Bowl was Lamar’s stylist, Taylor McNeill.
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Shop Kendrick Lamar’s Super Bowl Outfit, At a Glance
The Grammy-winning rapper opted for a custom “Gloria” motorsport-inspired leather jacket made by Martine Rose. Kendrick is a big supporter of the British-Jamaican menswear designer and wears the brand quite frequently. He even shouted Rose out in the “Hillbillies” track rapping, “yeah, n—as know that I’m best-dressed. Wear Martine when I’m bored, yes.”
The jacket features the name “Gloria” written along the front, nodding to Lamar’s closing title track on his 2024 GNX album. Gloria (glory in Spanish) serves as a metaphor for Lamar’s pen game and craft. Here are a few Martine Rose jacket alternatives to shop that would also fit Kendrick’s Super Bowl look.
Martine Rose Sports Cropped Jacket
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Lamar styled the jacket with a custom NAHMIAS black tee with the phrase “keep them away from me” on the back, alongside a pair of light-washed flare jeans by Celine that the Internet is falling in love with. Is Y2K style fully back? These premium jeans definitely point to yes. For more affordable flare jeans, see below.
Celine Flared Surf Jean
NAHMIAS Logo-Embroidered Cotton T-Shirt
To conclude his halftime look, the rapper opted out of his usual Nike Cortez sneaker for a black and white pair of Nike Air DT Max ’96. He wore a backward cap with a Rahaminov Diamonds Angel Wing brooch, custom layered silver chain necklaces — including one with a lower-case “a.” Is this a subtle nod to the “A minor” lyric on “Not Like Us?” Shop his Nike sneakers below.
Nike Air DT Max ’96 Sneakers
The artist’s look was curated by Taylor McNeill, who’s also collaborated with Timothée Chalamet and Charli XCX, among others.
Looking to jump on the flare jeans trend? We’ve gathered a few more affordable options for you to shop. See below.
Levi’s 567 Relaxed Flare Jeans
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BDG Slim Fit Flared Jean

Kendrick Lamar called on his fellow Compton, Calif., native Serena Williams for an instantly viral moment during his Super Bowl LIX Halftime performance on Sunday night (Feb. 9), in which the tennis champion was seen crip walking and staring at the camera during the scathing “Not Like Us.”
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One of the many fans of the onstage moment was Serena’s sister, Venus Williams, who took to her Instagram Stories on Monday morning (Feb. 10) for some sibling love. “Lil sis killing it,” she wrote over a repost of Serena’s Instagram Reel of the moment. See Venus’ Story here.
While other guests during Lamar’s performance included Samuel L. Jackson and SZA, Serena’s appearance stood out as a moment fans online speculated was a dig at Drake — the famous subject of the “Not Like Us” diss track. Drake and Serena reportedly dated in 2015, and the rapper revealed that he wrote his 2016 hit “Too Good” about the athlete.
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In 2022, Drake fired shots at Williams’ husband and co-founder of Reddit, Alexis Ohanian, rapping on “Middle of the Ocean”: “Sidebar, Serena, your husband a groupie/ He claim we don’t got a problem but no, boo, it’s like you comin’ for sushi/ We might pop up on ’em at will like Suzuki.”
Ohanian was in attendance at the Super Bowl in New Orleans, watching his wife take the stage live. “Pretty fantastic halftime show,” he wrote of the event. He also reposted a tweet calling Serena’s cameo the “highlight of the Super Bowl.”
Williams fittingly referred to the Lamar-Drake feud at last year’s ESPY Awards during her hosting monologue. “If I’ve learned anything this year, it’s that none of us, not a single one of us, not even me, should ever pick a fight with Kendrick Lamar,” she noted.
Watch Lamar’s full Halftime Show performance here.
The U.S. Copyright Office posted a notice of inquiry on Monday (Feb. 10) in the Federal Registrar, requesting more information about issues related to American-based performance rights organizations (PROs).
More specifically, the Copyright Office is requesting public comment on “factors that may be contributing to the formation of new PROs”; whether there have been “increased financial and administrative costs imposed on licensees associated with paying royalties to additional PROs”; and “how to improve clarity and certainty for entities seeking to obtain licenses from PROs.”
The inquiry is a response to the House Judiciary Committee’s letter to the Register of Copyrights, Shira Perlmutter, six months ago, which requested an examination of “concerns” and “emerging” issues in the PRO sector. The letter was signed by the committee’s chairmen, Rep. Jim Jordan and Rep. Darrell Issa, and member Rep. Scott Fitzgerald.
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“It is difficult to assess how efficiently PROs are distributing general licensing revenue based on publicly available data,” the letter read. “For example, it is difficult to determine how accurately lesser known and independent artists as well as smaller publishers are being compensated compared to widely popular artists and major publishers.”
The letter added: “Licensees [like bars, venues, restaurants and small businesses] have reported receiving demands for royalties from new entities claiming to represent songwriters… Licensees are concerned that the proliferation of PROs represents an ever-present danger of infringement allegations and potential litigation risk from new and unknown sources.”
The Copyright Office’s notice of inquiry addressed this so-called “proliferation” of PROs as well, noting that for decades, ASCAP, BMI and the smaller SESAC were the only PROs in the U.S. However, in the last dozen years, this market has doubled in size with the introduction of Global Music Rights (or “GMR”) in 2013, PRO Music Rights in 2018 and AllTrack in 2019.
Around the world, most other countries only have one PRO representing all local rights holders’ interests — many also handle mechanical (or reproduction) rights as well — making the U.S. an especially unique and complex market for licensees.
Written comments concerning these matters must be turned in to the Copyright Office by April 11. After that, there will be a “reply comment” period that has a submission deadline of May 7.
It looks like Kai Cenat and Ye (formerly known as Kanye West) are back on the outs again. On Friday (Feb. 7), the popular streamer — who was on the cover of Billboard magazine in January — told his fans that he’s no longer going forward with a planned Japan stream with the troubled rap […]
Ariana Grande was put through the ringer as a young star — and now that she’s older, she’s advocating for change in the entertainment industry so that the people who follow in her footsteps have an easier time.
On the latest episode of WTF With Marc Maron posted Monday (Feb. 10), the singer-actress said that therapy should be a “non-negotiable” part of record-label contracts for young signees, while reflecting on the whiplash of finding fast fame as a Nickelodeon actress-turned-pop star in the early 2010s. “I was 19 when all of that nonsense started happening to me,” she began of the immediate public scrutiny she faced in the spotlight. “It started when I was so young with my body or rumors about my relationships or about my team or about my mom or about people I love. There was just no limit.”
“It’s so important that these record labels, these studios, these TV studios, these big production companies make [therapy] a part of the contract when you sign on to do something that’s going to change your life in that way, on that scale,” Grande continued. “You need a therapist to be seeing several times a week.”
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Adding that big entertainment companies “should be responsible for protecting” young creators from the mental turmoil that’s almost guaranteed when they become globally famous in a short period of time, the Wicked star again said that counseling “should be non-negotiable” in contracts. “To be an artist, you are a vulnerable person with your heart on your sleeve,” she said. “So the same person who is meant to do art is the exact same person who is not meant to deal with that s–t.”
Grande’s comments echo what she previously said on Penn Badgley’s Podcrushed in June, when she revealed that she was “reprocessing” her time on the shows Victorious and Sam & Cat after allegations of sexual harassment and toxic workplace conditions from other former child stars came to light in the documentary Quiet on Set. At the time, the Oscar nominee said, “I think that the environment needs to be made safer if kids are going to be acting, and I think there should be therapists … I think there should be parents allowed to be wherever they wanna be.”
The topic is also newly prevalent considering Chappell Roan’s much talked-about best new artist speech at the 2025 Grammys, which sparked debate between the Midwest Princess — whom Charli XCX, Halsey and Noah Kahan later backed up — and former music industry executive Jeff Rabhan. In her speech, Roan had called on labels to “offer a livable wage and healthcare” to signees, “especially for developing artists.”
Later, after Rabhan called her take “wildly misinformed” in an op-ed published in The Hollywood Reporter, Roan clapped back by donating $25,000 to funds for struggling artists and wrote on Instagram Sunday (Feb. 9), “Sharing my personal experience at the Grammys wasn’t meant to be a crowdfunded bandaid but a call to action to the leaders of the industry to step up, help us make a real change and protect their investments in a sustainable way.”
Listen to Grande open up about the importance of therapy for young stars below.
New York Dolls co-founder and punk icon David Johansen has revealed that he is battling a brain tumor and stage four cancer. The news came via a Sweet Relief Fund in his name seeking to raise money for the singer’s ongoing care in which his daughter, Leah Hennessey, revealed the extent of her 75-year-old father’s health issues.
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“Five years ago at the beginning of the pandemic we discovered that David’s cancer had progressed and he had a brain tumor,” Leah wrote. “There have been complications ever since. He’s never made his diagnosis public, as he and my mother Mara are generally very private people, but we feel compelled to share this now, due to the increasingly severe financial burden our family is facing.” She noted that in a further blow, the singer known for his outrageous, high-energy stage persona, fell down a flight of stairs after Thanksgiving and broke his back in two places.
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Following a week-long hospital stay and a successful surgery, Leah said her dad has been bedridden and incapacitated since then and “due to the trauma, David’s illness has progressed exponentially and my mother is caring for him around the clock.” Given the multiple health crises, Leah said that in order to continue treatment and give her dad the best chance at a full recovery he will need full-time assistance.
“As hilarious and wise as David continues to be, he is physically debilitated and his care exceeds what we are capable of providing without specialized professional help,” she wrote, adding, “David has worked continuously as a singer and actor for the better part of six decades, to the delight of his fans all over the world. However for the past five years, David has been unable to work as a performer. “
The non-profit Sweet Relief Musicians Fund was initially founded by singer Victoria Williams in 1994 to help her pay medical bills after a multiple sclerosis diagnosis and has since grown into a 501 (c)(3) that has helped raise funds for professional musicians in need of health or financial assistance.
In a statement, Johansen said, “We’ve been living with my illness for a long time, still having fun, seeing friends & family, carrying on, but this tumble the day after Thanksgiving really brought us to a whole new level of debilitation. This is the worst pain i’ve ever experienced in my entire life. I’ve never been one to ask for help but this is an emergency. Thank you.”
The organization’s executive director, Aric Steinberg, added in a statement, “Our Directed Artist Funds can provide a meaningful solution when the community rallies around the recipient, and we anticipate that David’s community will be eager to help here. His influence on the musical landscape with the New York Dolls is indelible, and his career as an actor and an artist has touched many people around the world. He’s been knocked down but we’re here to help him back up with the help of his family, friends and wider community of supporters.”
The family said that their most immediate needs are for full-time nursing, physical therapy and funding for day-to-day vital living expenses, aimed at helping Johansen regain “some mobility and independence.” Supporters can donate to the David Johansen Fund here, or buy a “luv” shirt benefitting Johansen’s fund here.
Johansen has long been a beloved figure on the New York scene, beginning with his time as the lead singer and provocateur of the gender-bending New York Dolls. That band — which also featured guitarists Johnny Thunders and Sylvain Sylvain, bassist Arthur Kane and drummer Jerry Nolan — emerged from the fertile underground New York rock scene in the early 1970s, releasing a pair of albums in 1973 and 1974 that helped set the template for the punk revolution and, later, inspired the lipstick and Aqua Net late 1980s hair metal scene.
After drugs and weak sales pushed the band’s members apart, Johansen went on to start his own solo band and then reinvent himself in the 1980s as the smarmy lounge lizard Buster Poindexter, through which he explored his love of the blues, jazz, swing and Latin music on such radio hits as “Hot Hot Hot.” He later formed the Harry Smiths, a group dedicated to early folk, blues and country music gathered by music historian Harry Everett Smith in the Anthology of American Folk Music.
In addition to the occasional reunion with the Dolls over the years, Johansen also hosted a freewheeling Sirius satellite radio show, David Johansen’s Mansion of Fun and acted in projects including the HBO series Oz and the movies Scrooged, Let It Ride, Freejack, Mr. Nanny and others.
Johansen was the subject of the 2020 Martin Scorsese and David Tedeschi-directed Showtime documentary feature Personality Crisis: One Night Only, which told the singer’s life story and chronicled one of his freewheeling shows at New York’s Café Carlyle.
“My mother’s favorite acronym for God is ‘Grace Over Drama,’” Leah Hennessey wrote. “Together we have endured crisis after crisis, but with the support of our community we hope to carry on laughing and loving our way through this most trying of times. Thank you for embracing our family, and for your love and generosity.”
Check out some of Johansen’s most beloved moments below.