Music News

03 Sep 2024

Alabama Barker Shares Sweet Montage of Dad Travis Barker’s Video Messages: ‘Cried Making This’

Alabama Barker is proving that, when it comes to her dad Travis Barker, it’s all the small things that count the most.

In a recent TikTok, the 18-year-old influencer pieced together multiple examples of the video mail she receives from the drummer every time she misses one of his FaceTime calls. In three of the clips, he tells the camera, “I’m going on stage, I love you!” while in others he tells Alabama, “I miss you, baby. Just getting ready to go to sleep. Just saying I love you.”

In all of the clips, Travis blows his daughter kisses. “Baby, I love you so much … getting ready to take off,” he says in one video message filmed from a plane.

“My dad is my hero, i couldnt ask for a better man to be my father,” Alabama captioned the post. “I cried making this he is my everything.”

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The Blink-182 band member is also dad to son Landon and stepdaughter Atiana — whom he shares with ex-wife Shanna Moakler — and recently welcomed a fourth child with Kourtney Kardashian, who has three kids with ex Scott Disick. A year and a half after tying the knot, the couple added a baby boy named Rocky to their blended family in November.

Barker is currently gearing up to play a slew of festival dates with Blink this fall, including Oceans Calling this month and Austin City Limits in October. The band recently announced that an eight-track project titled One More Time… Part-2 is coming Friday (Sept. 6), dropping singles “All in My Head” and “No Fun” a few weeks ahead of time.

Watch Alabama’s montage of video messages from her dad below.

03 Sep 2024

Lil Wayne Announces Hot Boys Reunion at Lil’ WeezyAna Fest

After a false start at this year’s Essence Fest, the long-rumored Hot Boys reunion is finally happening (hopefully).

On Tuesday (Sept. 3), Lil Wayne announced on his X account that the reunion will take place at his annual Lil’ WeezyAna Fest later this year. The festival will take place Saturday, Nov. 2, at the Smoothie King Center in New Orleans and presale tickets are already available. The Hot Boys, Mannie Fresh and Rob49 are the only listed acts, with fans in attendance to expect some surprise guests.

The reunion rumors started heating up when Juvenile revealed in May that the former group consisting of himself, Lil Wayne, B.G. and Young Turk were going to perform at Essence Fest and were working on a new album. “Hot Boys is back together, man. What you talkin’ about put the Hot Boys back together? Show y’all ain’t keeping up with sh–,” he said on Instagram Live. “Turk gonna be with me tonight, I’m gonna be with B.G. next week. Me, Wayne, Turk and B.G., all of us gonna be on stage in New Orleans with Mannie Fresh and Birdman. And we already done started working on a Hot Boys album. Any other f—ing questions? Keep on askin’ put the Hot Boys together. Have some f—in’ patience.”

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However, fans were disappointed when the reunion at Essence Fest never happened. While Birdman, Mannie Fresh, Juvenile and B.G. hit the stage together, Wayne decided to perform his own solo set after they left the stage and Turk was nowhere to be found.

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The Hot Boys haven’t dropped an album since 2003’s Let ‘Em Burn.

03 Sep 2024

Tyla Goes On the Cutest Karaoke Date in Japan in ‘Breathe Me’ Music Video: Watch

Guess we know what Tyla‘s go-to karaoke song is, according to her new “Breathe Me” music video that dropped Tuesday (Sept. 3).

Picking up where her “Truth or Dare” music video left off seven months ago and featuring the same love interest, the “Breathe Me” visual takes place on a random late night in Osaka, Japan. The lovebirds are all smiles while headed to their private karaoke room for a sweet (and at times steamy) session where Tyla serenades him. The Nabil-directed video might’ve been filmed earlier last month when the South African singer did a signing at Tower Records Shibuya, since her man in the music video is rocking the store’s merch.

“Breathe Me” is featured on her self-titled debut album Tyla, which was released in March via FAX and Epic Records. It reached No. 24 on the Billboard 200 and No. 8 on Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums.

Tyla is up for best new artist, best R&B and and best Afrobeats with her Billboard Hot 100 No. 7 smash “Water” at the 2024 MTV Video Music Awards next Wednesday, Sept. 11. The “popiano” star won best new artist and best international act at the 2024 BET Awards in June, when she performed “Jump” alongside Gunna and Skillibeng.

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“The South African genre of amapiano just started bubbling, and I’m so proud that South Africa has a genre that people are enjoying and paying attention to. I’m super proud of my country and where our sound has gone,” she told Billboard in her cover story earlier this year.

Watch Tyla’s “Breathe Me” music video below.



03 Sep 2024

From ‘Hawk Tuah’ to ‘Talk Tuah’: Haliey Welch Nabs Podcast Gig

Haliey Welch may have started out with a spontaneous viral video, but she’s making sure she gets more than just 15 minutes of fame.

On Tuesday (Sept. 3), the 21-year-old Tennessee native — who’s perhaps better known as the “Hawk Tuah” Girl — announced that she’s launching her own podcast, Talk Tuah. The show joins Jake Paul and Joey Levy’s Betr Media family, which also includes BS w/ Jake Paul, Twin Talk With Hanna and Haley Cavinder, Bo Nickal’s Nickals and Dimes and Adam Tabatchnick and Jack Parodi’s Caps Off.

With its first episode going live Sept. 10, featuring special guest Whitney Cummings, Talk Tuah will find Welch facilitating conversations, sharing her opinions and flexing the same comedy genius that brought the “Hawk Tuah” phenomenon to the world in episodes every Tuesday. “Y’all kept asking ‘What’s next?’ Well this is it!” she said in a statement. “I’m so thankful to have my own podcast where you’ll discover the real Haliey Welch.”

“My show will have a little of everything – great guests, laughs, relationship pointers, and, of course, some down home southern charm,” she added.

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The influencer also shared a trailer for Talk Tuah on Instagram, showing off her new life in the fast lane — joining Zach Bryan onstage, riding jet skis, etc — after finding fame in a viral NSFW Tim & Dee TV on-the-street video. It also teases a few of the other guests she has in store for listeners, including Paul and TikTok star Josh Richards.

“Y’all really thought I was done?” she says in the clip. “I’m just getting started, baby.”

“This is a major addition to the Betr Media family as we continue to strategically differentiate ourselves in the market,” said Betr head of media Mike Denevi in a statement. “Haliey Welch is a bona fide superstar, and her charisma, unique perspective and innate connection with her audience make her the perfect fit for our platform. Talk Tuah will bring a fresh and dynamic voice to our content lineup, and we can’t wait for our audience and brand sponsors to connect with Haliey in an authentic way that embodies the ethos of Betr Media as a whole.”

See Welch’s Talk Tuah teaser below.

03 Sep 2024

50 Cent Reflects on ‘Wild’ First Meeting With Eminem in a Bulletproof Vest

Before the days of “Patiently Waiting” and “Crack a Bottle,” there was an initial meeting between 50 Cent and Eminem that laid the foundation for one of the most fruitful partnerships in all of hip-hop.

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50 sat down with the hosts of Million Dollaz Worth of Game over the weekend and took a trip down memory lane to recall his first encounter with Eminem, which he described as “wild.” The Queens legend even wore his signature bulletproof vest, as he wasn’t going to be taking any chances on the West Coast.

“It was wild,” he said. “Remember that show they had, Punk’d on MTV? I thought they had cameras and they was gonna come out and say, ‘You’ve been Punk’d.’ I was in California. He flew me to L.A. I came out, I was so bugged out from the experience that I came through the airport with the [bulletproof] vest and sh– on. I’m lucky I took the shock plate out the front of the joint because when I came through it [didn’t go off].”

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50 continued: “I get there, he’s like, ‘Yo!’ Hugs me, feel the vest and sh– and was like [shocked expression]. [I said,] ‘Yo, this is going to be the biggest sh– ever, right?’ He’s like, ‘Yo, so excited.’ It made me question whether what was happening was happening was right. It felt so good that it couldn’t be right. I’m like, ‘Yo, nah.’ When I left that meeting, I didn’t want him to feel like he bought a problem so I wouldn’t say anything about Ja Rule and them.”

The G-Unit honcho couldn’t process how excited Em was to meet him and potentially collaborate while he was already dominating the industry and coming off the fresh release of his iconic The Marshall Mathers LP.

“When I met him, the first night I met him, he had an event. The Marshall Mathers LP just came out,” 50 went on to provide more context to the initial meet-up. “The first week he sold 1.7 million records. And he was so excited about me that I’m looking like, ‘[Are] you serious?’”

50 would end up signing a joint venture deal in June 2002 to Eminem’s Shady Records and Dr. Dre’s Aftermath Entertainment. “Wanksta” served as the first single out of the partnership in November 2002, which landed on the 8 Mile soundtrack and peaked at No. 13 on the Billboard Hot 100.

“In Da Club” arrived in January 2003 and set the stage for 50 Cent to make the quantum leap to superstardom with his Get Rich Or Die Tryin’ album in February 2003. The glass-shattering debut LP launched at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 with 872,000 album units sold in the first week.

Watch the interview below. Talk of 50 meeting Em starts around the 51-minute mark.



03 Sep 2024

Travis Kelce Says Taylor Swift Suggests Football Plays for Him: ‘She’s a Little Biased’

Taylor Swift is slowly becoming a football mastermind.

Travis Kelce recently sat down for an interview on The Rich Eisen Show, where the Kansas City Chiefs tight end revealed that his pop superstar girlfriend has learned so much about football, that she started making play suggestions. “She had just been so open to learning the game. She didn’t know much about the rules and everything,” he explained. “I think what makes her so good in her profession is that she’s so detailed in every aspect of it, from the words to her music and even the releases and the music videos and everything. She’s just so detailed and apart of it, that I think she was just curious about the profession. I know none of the plays have gotten to Coach [Andy] Reid yet. If they ever do, I’ll let everyone know it was her creation.”

He added with a laugh, “She’s a little biased and just creates plays for me.”

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The athlete made his Eras Tour stage debut at the start of “I Can Do It With a Broken Heart” in London. Kelce carried an exhausted Swift to the couch on set in the over-the-top final act of her Tortured Poets extravaganza. “Taylor knew that when the lights are on, I’m just going to have some fun. She put me in a position to which I didn’t have to do much to be a success,” Kelce told Eisen. “I was just there not to screw anything up. I just didn’t want to drop there when I was on the stage. That would have been the most embarrassing thing I’ve ever done.”

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He continued, “I’m always down to have some fun onstage with Tay Tay.”

Beyond the start of the football season, Kelce has a string of entertainment gigs coming up this fall. Prime Video confirmed earlier this year that Kelce is slated to host its upcoming game show Are You Smarter Than a Celebrity?, a spin-off of Are You Smarter Than a Fifth Grader? The series will feature contestants using celebrities to help with 11 elementary-school-level questions as they compete to win $100,000.

He’s also set to appear in Ryan Murphy’s upcoming drama series, Grotesquerie, which hits FX and Hulu starting on September 25.

03 Sep 2024

Halsey Sends Fans on 5-City Scavenger Hunt to Reveal ‘The Great Impersonator’ Album Covers

Halsey just revealed a new trick up her sleeve, but it’s the pop star’s fans who will be doing the magic this time.

Ahead of their upcoming album The Great Impersonator, Halsey announced plans to send fans on a scavenger hunt through five cities across the world in a cryptic video posted Tuesday (Sept. 3). “My next trick is not mine at all,” she says in a voice-over in the clip. “It’s yours.”

Kicking off Wednesday (Sept. 4), the hunt will challenge listeners to track down time capsules — each filled with items representing a different decade — in London, New York, Toronto, Los Angeles and Sydney based on clues posted by Halsey on social media. In the process, fans will uncover The Great Impersonator‘s album cover as well as four variants of the project’s artwork.

“You must work together, as the next city’s clues will not be revealed until the previous city is found,” the About-Face Beauty founder adds in the video. “Don’t blink … or you’ll miss it.”

Halsey’s website also now features a countdown to the beginning of the scavenger hunt, as well as five tiles for each of the cities included in the game. So far, the Great Impersonator rollout has found the “Closer” singer embracing magician aesthetics while dabbling in different decades in her singles; for instance, July’s “Lucky,” which sampled Britney Spears’ hit of the same name, found Halsey channeling the early 2000s.

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“What if I debuted in the early 2000s? The ’90s? The ’80s? The ’70s?” the three-time Grammy nominee asks in a trailer for the album posted Aug. 27. “Am I still Halsey every time? In every timeline, do I still get sick? Do I become a mom?”

Halsey has also dropped singles “The End” — with which the star announced their Lupus and rare T-cell disorder diagnoses to the world for the first time — and “Lonely Is the Muse” ahead of The Great Impersonator. Next up, she’ll release “Ego” on Friday (Sept. 6), as announced on Instagram last week.

See Halsey’s scavenger hunt teaser below.

03 Sep 2024

Tito Double P Makes Billboard Album Charts Debut With ‘Incómodo’: ‘Wow, I’m So Honored’

A little over a year after Tito Double P made his maiden Billboard chart appearance as an artist, the corridos singer-songwriter bursts onto the album charts with Incómodo, his debut LP, bowing at No. 2 on the Top Latin Albums and Regional Mexican Albums charts. Plus, he secures a first entry on the all-genre Billboard 200, at No. 20 (all charts dated Sept. 7).

“Wow, I’m so honored to be debuting so high with my first album,” Tito Double P tells Billboard. “I didn’t expect this but I’m so grateful that the fans are embracing my project like this.”

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Incómodo, released on Peso Pluma’s Double P Records, checks in on all three charts with 26,000 equivalent album units earned in the U.S. in the tracking week of Aug. 23-29, according to Luminate.

“Peso really pushed Tito to take the leap from composer to artist,” George Prajin, Manager and co-founder Double P Records, tells Billboard. “He got him out of his comfort zone and Tito killed it. The whole album is a beautiful work of art, and we are really proud of him.”

Streaming activity contributes most of the 21-track set’s first-week totals. That figure equals to 36.1 million official on-demand audio and video streams for its tracks. It registers the second-best weekly streaming count among regional Mexican albums for the tracking week, just behind Peso Pluma’s Éxodo, with 42.6 million. (A negligible amount of activity for Incómodo stemmed from traditional sales and track-equivalent sales).

On Top Latin Albums, one unit equals one album sale, 10 individual tracks sold from an album, or 3,750 ad-supported or 1,250 paid/subscription on-demand official audio and video streams for a song on the album.

Second-Highest Debut Week for a Regional Mexican Album in 2024: As Incómodo debuts with 26,000 units, it registers the second-largest opening week in terms of units for a regional Mexican album on Top Latin Albums in 2024, trailing only Iván Cornejo’s Mirada which debuted at the summit with 34,000 units on chart dated Aug. 3. Fair to add that while Peso Pluma’s Éxodo logged 3,000 units in its first week (opened at No. 41 on Top Latin Albums in June with only one day of activity) the set generated 64,000 units in its second week.

Artist & Songwriter charts performance: Despite clocking a first entry -and top 10- on any Billboard albums chart, Tito Double P, born Roberto Laija, is no stranger to the charts. To date, April’s Billboard/Latin Artist on the Rise has scored nine career entries on Hot Latin Songs (dating back to his first visit in June 2023) including two top 10s, both team-ups with cousin Peso Pluma. Of those, one nearly missed the No. 1 slot: “La People II,” with Joel De La P as the song’s second collaborator, debuted and peaked at No. 2 in April.

Rewind to 2022, to when Tito Double P logged his first entry on any Billboard chart as songwriter for Peso Pluma. The global star’s wingman had proven himself a capable songwriter, penning songs like Peso’s breakthrough cut “El Belicón,” with Raúl Vega, that took him to his Billboard charts debut on Hot Latin Songs.

In sum, Tito Double P has managed 18 Hot Latin Songs visits as a songwriter, including the No. 4-peaking “PRC” by Peso Pluma and Natanael Cano (April 2023).

Hot Latin Songs Impact: As Incómodo sees its first chart impact, six tracks from the album light up the multi-metric Hot Latin Songs chart. In addition to the new arrivals, one previously released song has appeared on the tally, the album’s first single, “Linda,” with Netón Vega. The song pushes 25-18, for a total of seven simultaneous songs on the streaming-, airplay-, digital sales-blended chart.

“El Lokeron is one of my favorites!” Tito Double P adds. “It’s also one of the songs on the album with just me and it talks about all the crazy things we experience in life.”

Here’s a full recap of the album’s placement on Hot Latin Songs:

No. 11, “Dos Días,” with Peso Pluma (debut)
No.18, “Linda,” with Netón Vega (climbs from No. 25)
No. 34, “El Lokeron” (debut)
No. 39, “Primo,” with Natanael Cano (debut)
No. 42, “Ay Mamá,” with Grupo Frontera (debut)
No. 43, “5-7,” with Junior H (debut)
No. 46, “Chino,” with Netón Vega (debut)

All charts (dated Sept. 7, 2024) will update on Billboard.com tomorrow, Sept. 4 (a day later than usual due to the Labor Day holiday Sept. 2). For all chart news, you can follow @billboard and @billboardcharts on both X, formerly known as Twitter, and Instagram.

03 Sep 2024

VTuber Hoshimachi Suisei Announces First Tour

Virtual YouTuber Hoshimachi Suisei recently announced her first concert tour, set to kick off in November.

The hololive VTuber with over 2.4 million subscribers on her YouTube channel teased that an “Important Announcement” would be shared on her show streamed on Saturday (Aug. 31). The latter half of the program was also shown on the Shinjuku Alta Vision, where the “BIBBIDIBA” artist told fans she would be embarking on a domestic tour at the end of the year.

Hoshimachi Suisei Live Tour 2024 “Spectra of Nova” will kick off on Nov. 14 at the Saitama Super Arena, then travel to Osaka’s Ookini Arena Maishima on Dec. 10 and on to Fukuoka Sunpalace on Dec. 28. Tickets for each venue are now on sale, and tickets for the livestream of the concerts on SPWN and ZAIKO are also available.

The Specter star also announced a new project called Hoshimachi Suisei New Music Video Project “Hoshimachi Graffiti,” inviting fans to send in Hoshimachi Suisei fan art through X (formerly Twitter) to be incorporated into her future music videos.

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03 Sep 2024

Elton John Reveals a ‘Severe Eye Infection’ Has Caused ‘Limited Vision in One Eye’

Elton John is on the road to recovery.

The “Benny and the Jets” singer took to social media on Tuesday (Sept. 3) to reveal that he has been struggling with a “severe eye infection” that left him “with only limited vision in one eye.” He continued in his statement, “I am healing, but it’s an extremely slow process and it will take some time before sign returns to the impacted eye.”

John then thanked the doctors and nurses that have been caring for him, noting that he’s “been quietly spending the summer recuperating at home, and am feeling positive about the progress I have made in my healing and recovery thus far.” He signed the note with his name, “with love and gratitude.”

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This month, the Toronto International Film Festival will premiere Elton John: Never Too Late. Directed by John’s husband David Furnish, as well as R.J. Cutler, the new documentary will show “never-before-seen concert footage of him over the past 50 years, as well as hand-written journals and present-day footage of him and his family,” per IMDb.

John wrapped his Farewell Yellow Brick Road tour in July 2023. During its four year run, the icon’s final tour became the first in history to cross the $900 million mark, making it the highest grossing tour in history by the time it wrapped in July 2023.

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