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After working it out on the remix with Charli xcx, Lorde knew she had to work even harder on her own album to match the level of creative ingenuity her collaborator demonstrated on Brat.
In an interview with BBC Radio 1 posted shortly after the New Zealand native finally announced her fourth studio album, Virgin, on Wednesday (April 30), Lorde explained how the British pop star’s critically acclaimed 2024 project — for which the two teamed up on a remix of “Girl, So Confusing” — lit a fire under her when it came to finishing up her own LP. “Brat coming out really gave me a kick in a lot of ways,” Lorde began.
“It forced me to further define what I was doing, because Charli had so masterfully defined everything about Brat, and I knew that what I was doing was very distinct to that,” she continued, speaking to radio host Jack Saunders. “It’s an amazing thing when a peer throws the gauntlet down like that, you’re like, ‘OK, I’ve got to pick it up.’ I’ve spoken to a lot of peers who’ve all had the same feeling.”
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Released June 7, 2024, Brat was the album that finally propelled Charli into the mainstream. After the project debuted at No. 3 on the Billboard 200 — her highest position on the chart to date — the Essex-born artist kept the momentum going by dropping a companion remix album in October, featuring Lorde’s version of “Girl, So Confusing,” which the pair recently performed together during Charli’s Coachella set in April.
On the remix, the two artists candidly address a rift between them while making peace with their differences, a level of honesty that reaffirmed to the “Royals” singer how rewarding her own vulnerability on Virgin could be. “I had been trying to express in this very naked way, and then Brat came out, and she was kind of doing that from the other side of the coin,” Lorde told BBC Radio 1.
“Doing the remix together and meeting her in that place of rugged vulnerability and kind of cracking open the thing …,” she added. “[When] people responded really well to that, I was like, ‘OK, cool, this is a good thing to be doing.’”
The interview comes as fans are still processing the news about Virgin, which Lorde announced would be arriving June 27 while sharing its thought-provoking cover art on Wednesday. The project was preceded by lead single “What Was That,” which dropped April 24 alongside a music video filmed in New York City, featuring footage from the Kiwi star’s pop-up in Washington Square Park two days prior.
“THE COLOUR OF THE ALBUM IS CLEAR,” Lorde described Virgin in a statement at the time of the announcement. “LIKE BATHWATER, WINDOWS, ICE, SPIT. FULL TRANSPARENCY. THE LANGUAGE IS PLAIN AND UNSENTIMENTAL. THE SOUNDS ARE THE SAME WHEREVER POSSIBLE. I WAS TRYING TO SEE MYSELF, ALL THE WAY THROUGH. I WAS TRYING TO MAKE A DOCUMENT THAT REFLECTED MY FEMININITY: RAW, PRIMAL, INNOCENT, ELEGANT, OPENHEARTED, SPIRITUAL, MASC.”
Watch Lorde open up about feeling inspired by Charli below.
The countdown to Jackboys 2 is on. Travis Scott released a trailer for the Cactus Jack label compilation’s film on Wednesday night (April 30), featuring unreleased music from La Flame. Directed by Harmony Korine, the two-minute clip finds Scott heading to the countryside as he flexes his purple Lamborghini Aventador in the fields next to […]
It’s lights out and away they go for Ed Sheeran, ROSÉ of BLACKPINK and several more stars, with Atlantic Records announcing the full lineup for its F1: The Album Thursday (May 1). In addition to the “Azizam” singer and K-pop star, Tate McRae, RAYE, Burna Boy, Roddy Rich, Dom Dolla, Chris Stapleton, Tiësto, Sexyy Red, […]
With just 64 days left until Oasis kick off their eagerly anticipated 2025 reunion tour, we still know next to nothing about who will take the stage with the Gallagher brothers or what songs they plan to roll out on their first outing in 16 years. What we do know is that, as usual, singer […]
Get your Nextel i710s out: Quavo has announced a posthumous collaboration with his late nephew TakeOff titled “Dope Boy Phone.” “Dope Boy Phone” is slated to arrive on Friday (May 2), and follows his “Legends” single with Lil Baby as he jet-sets into his next solo LP. Huncho set the tone for the new track […]
Pitchfork festival co-founder Mike Reed and his cultural nonprofit Constellation Performing Arts have launched Sound & Gravity, a Sept. 10-14 festival set in Chicago.
Sound & Gravity will be spread out across Chicago’s Bricktown and Avondale neighborhoods with seven venues hosting the festival — Constellation, Hungry Brain, Judson & Moore, Beat Kitchen, Guild Row, and Rockwell on the River. Reed, who is known for curating challenging and contemporary artists through the now defunct Pitchfork Music Festival, is reportedly shaping Sound & Gravity into an “ambitious” event and “unique adventure for music enthusiasts” featuring 48 artists across a spectrum of genres including jazz, experimental, contemporary classical and indie music.
Performers include American singer-songwriter Bill Callahan, who has also recorded and performed under the band name Smog; Nigerian guitarist Mdou Moctar; American experimental electric guitar duo Kim Gordon and Bill Nace, American musician Helado Negro and many, many more.
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Reed said he chose the Bricktown/Avondale area of Chicago, known for its fast-growing creator community and small businesses, due to it small intimate size, noting Sound & Gravity “capitalizes on the neighborhood’s walkability with all venues a 5-15 minute walk from each other,” according to a press release.
“Sound & Gravity offers attendees the opportunity to experience the local culture during five days of cutting-edge performances,” the release continues.
Sound & Gravity also serves as a fundraiser for Constellation Performing Arts, a 12-year-old not-for-profit organization that “has become a cornerstone of Chicago’s forward-thinking music scene,” according to the release. Constellation “has filled a crucial void in Chicago’s cultural landscape by providing a reliable, high-end platform for avant-garde and experimental music.”
Tickets go on sale on Wednesday, May 7 at 11am CT, and can be purchased here. Ticket options include an all-event four-day pass at $240, a single-day pass at $95, and a Wednesday opening night pass at $45. More info here.
Sound & Gravity
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Bruce Springsteen continued to preview his upcoming expansive box set Tracks II: The Lost Albums on Thursday (May 1) with the haunting ballad “Faithless.” The song is described as the title track from a “long-lost soundtrack to a movie that was never made.” Like so many of The Boss’ iconic songs, this one takes us down to the river, where love is found.
“Well, I work by the rocks of the river/ Faithless, faithless, faithless/ Then I met you,” Springsteen sings in a hushed voice over gentle, high desert-style acoustic guitar backing. “I walked ‘neath the eaves of the garden/ Faithless, faithless, faithless/ Then I saw you,” he adds with a chorus of female voices echoing his own.
In a release announcing the song, it is called a “meditation on purpose, belief and acceptance” that was originally intended to accompany a “spiritual Western” film that never got made. Springsteen recorded much of the Faithless album between the end of the November 2005 Devils & Dust tour and the April 2006 release of the We Shall Overcome: The Seeger Sessions album.
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The Faithless LP — one of seven previously unreleased albums included in the set due out on June 27 from Sony Music — has four instrumental songs that were written as interstitials for the film on a collection that is said to explore Springsteen’s “unique vision of spirituality in the mythic American West, while working inside of his uncharted artistic medium.”
“This was a really unusual collection of songs,” Springsteen said in a statement of the score album that was composed in a “prolific” two weeks in Florida before a single frame of the movie was shot. “You could recognize details and maybe a character or two. But for the most part, I just wrote atmospheric music that I thought would fit,” he said. Mostly recorded as a solo effort, Faithless features appearances from producer Ron Aniello, touring members of The E Street Band Soozie Tyrell, Lisa Lowell, Curtis King, Jr., Michelle Moore and Ada Dyer and the singer’s wife and fellow E Street Band member and solo performer Patti Scialfa, as well as the couple’s two adult sons, Evan and Sam Springsteen.
“Faithless” joins the other two pre-release songs previewing the Tracks II collection, the beat-heavy “Blind Spot” from the 10-track Streets of Philadelphia Sessions and the turbulent, “Rain in the River.”
The 83-track collection will “fill in rich chapters of Springsteen’s expansive career timeline — while offering invaluable insight into his life and work as an artist,” according to the initial release announcing the set, which noted that some of the albums got to the mixing stage before being shelved.
Among the other albums included are the lo-fi LA Garage Sessions ’83, the country-leaning Somewhere North of Nashville and the border tales LP Inyo, as well as the “orchestra-driven, mid-century noir” Twilight Hours. The box set covers the years 1983-2018 and will be issued in a limited-edition 9-LP set , as well as 7-CD and digital formats, with distinctive packaging for each. A 20-track compilation, Lost and Found: Selections From The Lost Albums, will also be released on June 27 on two LPs and one CD.
Listen to Springsteen’s “Faithless” below.
What’s the greatest leading role in Broadway history? Based on Tony nominations, which date to 1947, the answer is Rose in Gypsy.
Every actress who has played the part on Broadway has at least been nominated for the Tony for best actress in a musical – from Ethel Merman, who originated the role in 1959, to Audra McDonald, who stars in the current revival, and whose nomination was announced Thursday (May 1) morning.
Angela Lansbury, who starred in a 1974-75 revival, and Tyne Daly, who starred in a 1989-90 revival, both won Tonys for their performances. (Linda Lavin, who replaced Daly, wasn’t nominated, but replacements in a production aren’t eligible.) Bernadette Peters, who starred in a 2003-04 revival, was nominated, and Patti LuPone, who starred in a 2008-09 revival, won.
No other lead character – across both musicals and plays – has led to six Tony nominations. Here are the runners-up: Five actors have been nominated for best actor in a musical for playing Tevye in Fiddler on the Roof. Five actresses have been nominated for best actress in a play for playing Josie Hogan in A Moon for the Misbegotten.
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In addition, actresses who have played Rose on both large and small screens have won Golden Globes for their performances. Rosalind Russell won actress in a leading role – musical or comedy in 1963 – for the previous year’s film. Bette Midler won best performance by an actress in a limited series, anthology series or a motion picture made for television in 1994 for playing the role in a 1993 TV movie for CBS. Midler also received a Primetime Emmy nod for her performance.
It’s easy to see why the role of Rose has led to so many awards and nominations. The actress who plays the role gets to sing some of the greatest songs ever written for a Broadway musical, including “Some People,” “Everything’s Coming Up Roses,” “Rose’s Turn” and “Small World” (the latter a Grammy nominee for song of the year in 1960). Jule Styne and a young Stephen Sondheim collaborated on the song score.
The 1959 original cast album to Gypsy has been voted into both the Grammy Hall of Fame and the National Recording Registry.
Gypsy also includes one of the greatest featured roles in Broadway history – Rose’s daughter, Louise. Six actresses have been nominated for playing her, more than any other featured role. Sandra Church was nominated for originating the role. Joy Woods was nominated for the latest revival. In between, Zan Charisse, Crista Moore, Tammy Blanchard and Laura Benanti were nominated. (Benanti won.)
The latest revival of Gypsy was nominated for best revival of a musical. It’s the fourth time the show has been nominated in that category (or in a predecessor category, best revival). No other musical has been nominated four times in that category. Sharing second place, with three nods each, are Cabaret, Company, Fiddler on the Roof, Guys and Dolls, Peter Pan and Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street.
Only one play, Arthur Miller’s A View from a Bridge, has been nominated four times for best revival of a play.
McDonald, 54, is Broadway royalty, having won six Tonys in competitive categories, more than any other performer. She won featured actress in a musical for both Carousel and Ragtime; featured actress in a play for both Master Class and A Raisin in the Sun; actress in a musical for Porgy and Bess; and actress in a play for Lady Day at Emerson’s Bar and Grill.
This is McDonald’s 11th nomination, which is again more than any other performer. She pulls ahead Julie Harris and Chita Rivera, who landed 10 each. (Harris died in 2013; Rivera died in 2024.)
The eligibility period for the 2025 Tony Awards was April 29, 2024 through April 27, 2025. The 78th Tony Awards, hosted by Cynthia Erivo, will be held on June 8. The ceremony will be held at Radio City Music Hall in New York City, airing live coast-to-coast on CBS.
Stop me if you think that you’ve heard this one before. Billy Corgan‘s suburban Chicago tea shop, Madame Zuzu’s was hit by a car for the second time. Six months after a vehicle smashed through the front window of the Highland Park tea spot and injured Corgan’s mother-in-law, the shop revealed that it had been struck again.
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“Earlier today, there was an accident outside of Madame Zuzu’s involving a vehicle that struck the front of the café,” read a statement on Madame Zuzu’s Instagram page on Wednesday (April 30). “Thankfully, no one was injured. Thank you to everyone who checked in and offered support.”
According to WGN, Smashing Pumpkins leader Corgan’s wife, Chloe Mendel Corgan, said the crash was an “honest accident” and no one was hurt, but the building did suffer some “exterior damage.” The outlet posted a picture of the aftermath, which appeared to show some damage to the bricks on the facade of the building.
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Corgan also posted a picture of the damage on X on Tuesday (April 29), writing, “thankfully no one was injured. Just more damage to the exterior/interior but the shop is open for the rest of the day.
Back in October, Corgan posted a note from his wife in which she said that a car had jumped the curb and smashed into the front window of the shop that opened in its current location in Sept. 2020. “This afternoon at Madame Zuzu’s, a car (in circumstances which remain under investigation) drove over the curb and into Madame Zuzu’s and sadly injuring one person — my mother, Jenny; who was spending the day and lunching with my son Augustus,” wrote Chloe Mendel Corgan after the first crash. “Thankfully, he was able to leap out of the way and was not injured.”
The Corgans welcoming their third child in March. Daughter June Corgan joins their son Augustus Juppiter, 9 and daughter Philomena Clementine, 6. Corgan will launch his 16-date solo tour with his new band, the Machines of God, on June 7 in Baltimore. The outing will celebrate the 30th anniversary of the Smashing Pumpkins’ Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness and the 25th anniversary of the 2000 albums Machina/The Machines of God and Machina II/The Friends & Enemies of Modern Music.
Check out Madame Zuzu’s statement below.
Mike Van, who was appointed the first CEO at Billboard earlier this week, has been named to Gold House’s annual list of the 100 most impactful Asian Pacific leaders, it was announced Thursday (May 1).
Van will be celebrated alongside the other honorees on this year’s list, known as The A100 List, during a slate of events taking place in New York on May 9 and May 10. Those include the A100 Celebratory Reception (co-hosted with the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures and East West Bank); the A100 Honorees Dinner presented by OpenTable, which will host past and present A100 honorees and judges; the Gold Gala, where A100 List honorees known as “A1s” — described as “the most impactful in their respective categories” — will be honored; and the Billboard x Gold House Founders Party, during which DJ Anderson .Paak is set to perform.
In celebration of the A100 and to kick off Asian Pacific Heritage Month, the Nasdaq stock market and Gold House partnered on a half-day Gold Power Summit on Wednesday (April 30) that culminated with Gold House CEO/co-founder Bing Chen and several A100 honorees, including Van, ringing the Nasdaq closing bell, an event broadcast across multiple financial networks. Van also served as a featured speaker on a Gold Power Summit panel on Wednesday.
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Others included on this year’s A100 list include Wicked director Jon M. Chu; Pachinko author Min Jin Lee; comedian and actor Ronny Chieng; K-pop group aespa; Goodwater Capital co-founder/managing partner Eric Kim; and multiple individuals listed under the banner “Los Angeles Wildfire Heroes.”
As part of the celebration of the A100 List and the Asian Pacific community, landmarks across North America will light up in gold lights. Participating cities and landmarks include: Atlanta (Mercedes-Benz Stadium), Chicago (Willis Tower), Honolulu (City Hall), Los Angeles (City Hall & Paramount Tower), Las Vegas (LV City Sign), Ontario (Niagara Falls), New York City (Empire State Building, Nasdaq Tower & The Edge), Seattle (Columbia Center Tower), Toronto (CN Tower), and Vancouver (BC Place & Olympic Cauldron).
Wednesday’s Gold Power Summit marked the second annual edition of the event, which first took place last May. Attendees at the inaugural summit included executives from Citibank, Netflix, McKinsey & Company and EMPIRE.