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K-pop boy band ENHYPEN will look to keep their chart winning streak going next month when they drop their second studio repackage album, ROMANCE : UNTOLD -daydream-. The collection due out on Nov. 11 from singers Jake, Jay, Heeseung, Jungown, Sunghoon, Sunoo and Ni-ki is the follow-up to July’s ROMANCE: UNTOLD, the group’s second full-length […]
Chris Brown’s headed to South African for a pair of concerts in December, but a women’s rights advocacy group has launched a petition seeking to ban him from taking the stage due to his history of alleged abuse.
Women for Change started a petition Oct. 2 on Change.org that boasts more than 28,000 signatures as of press time, hoping to stop Brown — who pleaded guilty in 2009 to assaulting then-girlfriend Rihanna, and was sentenced to probation and community labor — from performing in South Africa, which the BBC reports has a long history of abuse and one of the “highest rates of femicide and gender-based violence in the world.” According to the petition, the group wants the promoters, the South African government and organizers to “reconsider” allowing the artist to perform at Johannesburg’s FNB Stadium in mid December.
“His concert is scheduled just days after the global commemoration of the 16 Days of Activism Against Gender-Based Violence, making this event a direct insult to the millions of women and girls affected by violence in South Africa and worldwide,” reads the petition.
“When I saw the news that Chris Brown was coming to South Africa, I was shocked and deeply disappointed,” Women for Change executive director Sabina Walter told the BBC. “The petition was started to send a strong message that we will not tolerate the celebration of individuals with a history of violence against women.”
She continued: “When someone like Chris Brown is given a platform in a country where GBV is at crisis levels, it sends a damaging message — that fame and power outweigh accountability.”
Billboard has reached out to Brown for comment.
The fan demand for Brown’s initial concert at FNB Stadium was so overwhelming — tickets sold out in under two hours — that a second show was added at the 94,000-capacity stadium.
Brown has faced issues for performing in the past due to his legal history in countries such as New Zealand, Canada, Australia and more. The pair of South Africa shows are currently set for Dec. 14 and Dec. 15.
A documentary surrounding Chris Brown’s alleged history of abuse is coming to the Investigation Discovery network later this month. Chris Brown: A History of Violence will land on ID on Oct. 27 as part of the network’s “No Excuse for Abuse” campaign, which will further explore his legal issues. The doc features an unidentified victim who is coming forward to tell her story of alleged abuse from Brown for the first time.
Megan Thee Stallion’s Hotties will have another reason to celebrate Hottieween this spooky season. Amazon MGM Studios announced on Monday (Oct. 14) that the feature length documentary Megan Thee Stallion: In Her Words documentary will be released on Amazon’s Prime Video on Oct. 31. In Her Words will offer fans “unprecedented” behind-the-scenes access into the […]
Billboard Latin Music Week kicked off Monday (Oct. 14) at the Fillmore Miami Beach with back-to-back business panels, one of which was “The Power of Viña” presented by Viña del Mar.
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Moderated by Alfredo Alonso, director of entertainment, Bizzarro Live/producer of the Viña Del Mar Festival, the 15-minute panel revealed how the Chilean event became a must-stop for all major Latin acts, and how you can score an invitation to perform.
Below, learn more about the festival that is celebrating more than 64 years and has served as an important platform in the earlier years of some of the biggest Latin and international acts, such as Julio Iglesias, Luis Miguel, Shakira and The Police, to name a few.
What Is Viña del Mar?
“In the ’60s, it started as a competition to pick the most important song at the time. As the years went by, it became a big platform for artist exposure, and the competition became more and more relevant,” Alonso said. The format is a six-day live event that lasts five hours each night and includes music, competition and humor. “The stress and excitement that comes with this festival is huge,” he noted.
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How to Be a Part of the Festival
It’s important that you achieve a connection with an audience by having them know your name, know your music, and know your image. Any artist or composer can be part of the festival if they have an unreleased song, and they can submit their song in the folk section and represent their country. For example, Shakira participated in 1994 and represented Colombia. You can also be invited as an emerging artist (either as an opening or closing act), or you can form part of the jury.
The Monster
“El Monstruo” is the name given to the passionate Viña del Mar audience — one of the most demanding and ruthless audiences in entertainment that’s critical and not easily impressed. From comedians to artists, everyone faces the challenge of conquering the monster and few have been able to leave their mark on Vina.
Over the past 35 years, Latin Music Week has become the foundation of Latin music in this country, becoming the single most important — and biggest — gathering of Latin artists and industry executives in the world. Initially named Latin Music Seminar, sponsored by Billboard, the event traces back to 1990, where it kicked off as a one-day event in Miami featuring a two-artist showcase and awards show.
Throughout the years, it has taken place in Miami, Las Vegas and Puerto Rico, returning to Miami Beach for a fourth consecutive year in 2024, and has welcomed some of the biggest Latin acts including Celia Cruz, Selena, Ricky Martin, Chayanne, Jenni Rivera, Daddy Yankee, Karol G, Bad Bunny, and Romeo Santos. Latin Music Week coincides with the 2024 Billboard Latin Music Awards set to air at 9 p.m. ET on Sunday, Oct. 20, on Telemundo. It will simultaneously be available on Universo, Peacock and the Telemundo app, and in Latin America and the Caribbean through Telemundo Internacional.
Ariana Grande was working late on Saturday Night Live this weekend, ’cause she’s a singer — not that you would’ve been able to tell from her hilarious spoof of Sabrina Carpenter‘s “Espresso” during the live comedy show Saturday (Oct. 12).
And one day after the sketch — which featured the Wicked star stumbling through parody lyrics set to the tune of the summer smash as part of an awkward bridesmaid tribute — the “Please Please Please” musician shared her reaction. “Very nice and on pitch,” Carpenter sarcastically joked on her Instagram Story, reposting a clip of the skit and adding a couple heart emojis.
The Girl Meets World alum also tagged Grande and the SNL cast members who played bridesmaids alongside the “We Can’t Be Friends” artist in the wedding reception-themed sketch: Heidi Gardner, Sarah Sherman and Ego Nwodim. While toasting a bride played by Chloe Fineman in front of her groom, played by Andrew Dismukes, the quartet reveals through their rendition of “Espresso” that their bachelorette party trip wasn’t exactly innocent.
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“Now we’re back in the house in the hot tub/ She’s there with Domingo,” the bridesmaids sing to the chorus melody of Carpenter’s Billboard Hot 100 top 10 hit as Dismukes watches in horror. “Asks us to leave, get a hotel/ She’s vibing with Domingo.”
Sharing the “Feather” singer’s appraisal on her own Instagram Story, Grande replied, “tysm we tried.”
The “Espresso” skit was just one of several hilarious moments in the Grande-hosted episode Saturday. Though she made a concerted effort not to show off her usually fabulous vocals in the bridesmaid toast, the three-time Grammy winner did get to put her talents to use in a couple other scenes — despite Stevie Nicks appearing as musical guest instead of her.
In her opening monologue, for instance, Grande belted out a few runs in front of a kick line moments after pledging to keep her appearance on the show low-key. Elsewhere, the pop star impersonated Celine Dion, sang an ode to the singular scent of one’s best friend’s house and flexed her opera chops while portraying a young Italian music prodigy named Antonio.
Grande’s second time hosting comes eight years after she first led the show in 2016, and seven months after she appeared as musical guest earlier this year to perform tracks from her Billboard 200-topping album Eternal Sunshine. In May, Carpenter made her SNL debut, singing “Espresso” and “Please Please Please” on the Jake Gyllenhaal-hosted program.
Watch Grande’s “Espresso” spoof on SNL below.
Billboard Latin Music Week kicked off Monday (Oct. 14) morning at Fillmore Miami Beach with a 15-minute crash course on how artists can collect their royalties. In a panel called “Global Wealth: How to Collect Your Neighboring Rights Around the World,” speaker Fernando Prados, members area manager of AIE, revealed information on the topic.
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“AIE collects the neighboring rights of its members in 59 countries and it helps the reputation and recognition of the musical work,” he said.
“Neighboring rights” is the term used to refer to the public performance rights associated with a sound recording, which generates public performance royalties for artists and the sound recording copyright owner(s).
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Prados explained that the beneficiaries are “artists on the recording of songs that are hits, as well as the main musicians who formed part of the session.” He also emphasized that “the role of producer does not apply to the rights, only if the producer is featured as an artist.” It’s also possible to do a joint venture with the owners of the master, for example Warner Music.
At the end of the panel, he also encouraged all the artists at Latin Music Week to continue making music because “the repertoire doesn’t generate much at first, but it’s important to have it for when you get that hit.”
Over the past 35 years, Latin Music Week has become a steady foundation of Latin music in this country, becoming the single most important — and biggest — gathering of Latin artists and industry executives in the world. Initially named Latin Music Seminar, sponsored by Billboard, the event traces back to 1990, when it kicked off as a one-day event in Miami, featuring a two-artist showcase and awards show.
Throughout the years, it has taken place in Miami, Las Vegas and Puerto Rico, returning to Miami Beach for a fourth consecutive year in 2024, and has welcomed some of the biggest Latin acts, including Celia Cruz, Selena, Ricky Martin, Chayanne, Jenni Rivera, Daddy Yankee, Karol G, Bad Bunny and Romeo Santos. Latin Music Week coincides with the 2024 Billboard Latin Music Awards, set to air at 9 p.m. ET on Sunday, Oct. 20, on Telemundo. It will simultaneously be available on Universo, Peacock and the Telemundo app, and in Latin America and the Caribbean through Telemundo Internacional.
Shawn Mendes has been at this half his life, but it wasn’t until he hunkered down in the studio post-COVID to work on his upcoming fifth studio album, Shawn (Nov. 15) that the 26-year-old singer said he really found his true self.
In a chat with old pal and mentor John Mayer for Interview magazine, Mayer suggested that Shawn “doesn’t sound like an artist trying to impress him or herself to their friend,” but instead one that finds its own way to the finish line in exactly the way the artist intended, even if, initially, it felt a bit, well, “boring.”
Mayer described what he imagined as Mendes listening back to the album opener — which he initially thought was boring — and layering on a few instruments, a couple more top harmonies and realizing, as Mendes noted, “‘This is exactly what I wanted.’” In fact, Mendes said after a few weeks of “pushing through this gunk” in the studio, he got to a place where things were “so beautiful and deep. I was like, ‘Wait, this is medicine.’”
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According to Mayer’s four-step rule for music: Is it good? Do I like It? Is it me? and Can I replicate it live and have a good time doing it?, his friend killed it this time around. “Dude, I never thought that the most stripped-back art I’ve made would return the most to me,” said Mendes. “It’s already given me more than any of my albums by so much, and I haven’t even shown anyone.”
He has shared the album with his folks though, and in the most important sign-off, his mom, who usually doesn’t really weigh in, listened to the single “Isn’t That Enough” and proudly told her son, “‘Oh you found yourself.’” Mendes agrees, adding that thanks to therapy and the experience of being “burned and frozen,” he’s not as extreme as he used to be, both in his relationships and in his professional life.
In general, Mendes told Mayer, he’s “a lot more secure” in who he is these days, adding, “it feels really nice to put something out that’s going to portray me that way.” And while he’s feeling more self-assured and centered, Mendes said he’s also still on the fence about how much he wants to be “in the conversation” all the time.
“It’s always on my mind, like, how are people going to react? I delete Instagram, because I’m like, “’I’m not going to read the comments and be like, have any celebrities commented on this photo?,’” he said. “And then I redownload it and I’m immediately looking again. I have a lot of acceptance and patience for my humanity, but at the same time, I really want to exist in a more authentic way.”
Mendes canceled his Wonder tour in 2022 to focus on his mental health. “Understanding how setting boundaries does not make you an unkind person has really changed my life,” Mendes said in early 2023 “And also understanding that it’s not easy to do. It’s a difficult thing to do. It feels uncomfortable. It makes other people feel a little uncomfortable for a moment, but ultimately it’s a very powerful and helpful thing to do for every relationship. So yeah, boundary-setting is not mean, it’s actually very important. It’s very kind, actually.”
Mayer notes at one point in the interview that not only is there that song called “Isn’t That Enough” but another track features the lyric “isn’t that enough,” leading him to wonder if Mendes has finally found that balance of too much versus just enough. “If you’re asking for enough success, it’s never going to be enough. But I think I’ve learned to have enough come from more places in my life,” Mendes said, with the additional caveat, “I think that’s an extremely important thing to pass to the next generation, is that this sacrifice for pouring all of yourself into your art is immense.”
Mendes will preview songs from Shawn a day before its official release during a one-night-only screening of the concert film Shawn Mendes: For Friends and Family Only (A Life Concert Film), which will hit screens across the country on Nov. 14. So far, Mendes has released the singles “Why Why Why,” “Isn’t That Enough” and “Nobody Knows.”
The American Music Awards 50th Anniversary Special, which aired on Oct. 6 on CBS, achieved a major milestone, reaching over 12.9 million viewers.
The star-studded special, celebrating five decades of iconic performances and fan-favorite artists, ranked as CBS’s top entertainment program for the month of October, outperforming major sports events such as the MLB Playoffs and NASCAR.
Averaging 6 million viewers, the AMAs became the second most-watched entertainment program of the day, trailing only the NFL. Social engagement added another layer of success, with over 65 million views across social platforms, making it the most-streamed AMAs in the show’s history.
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It also saw a +54% year-over-year growth from the previous show in 2022, and marked the largest year-over-year growth for any music special or award show in 2024.
The broadcast was packed with performances from legendary names including Jennifer Lopez, Mariah Carey, Gloria Estefan, Green Day, and Gladys Knight.
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The show opened with a clip package from the first show, including Stevie Wonder playing “Superstition” and Gladys Knight & the Pips performing “Midnight Train to Georgia.” Both songs were No. 1 hits on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1973 and remain top-tier classics. The show then cut to Knight performing the song live, with three female backup singers taking the place of Gladys’ beloved Pips.
Emerging talent also shared the stage, including Stray Kids and RAYE, adding a contemporary edge to a night that honored five decades of music.
One of the standout performances came from EGOT recipient Jennifer Hudson, who honored 22-time AMA winner Whitney Houston by recreating a medley Houston performed on the 1994 AMAs, a pairing of “I Loves You, Porgy” from Porgy & Bess and her own smash “I Will Always Love You” from The Bodyguard.
With its fan-voted format, the AMAs have long been a reflection of popular tastes, and the 50th Anniversary Special made it clear why the awards have remained relevant for half a century.
The American Music Awards will return in 2025, live from Las Vegas over Memorial Day Weekend, with an ambitious tribute to America’s veterans and a celebration of the year’s most popular artists.
Robert’s Smith’s songwriting in The Cure has long focused squarely on melancholy and dark themes. But on the band’s long-awaited upcoming album, Songs of a Lost World (Nov. 1), he takes on a bit of real-life heartache that he said inspired him to pay tribute to his late brother. In a nearly two-hour interview with British journalist Matt Everitt — which can be unlocked by flipping to the album’s release date in Roman numerals here — Smith explains the origins of “I Can Never Say Goodbye.”
“I wrote this song a lot of different ways, until I hit on a very simple narrative of what actually happened on the night he died,” he said of the song dedicated to his late older brother, Richard, while also copping to the Cure’s songs always having an edge of the “fear of morality” in them. “It went all around the houses and I went everywhere with this song to sum up how I felt. In the end, it turned into a reasonably bleak little vignette.”
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The singer said he struggled to balance the “outpouring” of emotion he felt at the time with the need to write a coherent song, admitting that some earlier versions of the tune were “too overwrought” for general consumption. For the record, he loved them, but other people suggested they night be “too much.” In fact, when Smith, 65, performed “Goodbye” live on the Cure’s 2023 tour, he said he had trouble not going over the top and being overcome by emotion in concert.
Smith continued, “I wrote the song about it, and the music itself was what I wanted to breathe. I didn’t want the words to dominate the song, in a way that the music can become a backdrop to what you’re singing. In this, I think the music is more important than what I’m singing in a way. It’s a very difficult song to sing. People say ‘cathartic’ too much, but it was. It allowed me to deal with it, and I think it’s helped me enormously.”
Realizing he hasn’t got “that many more albums” in his future, Smith said he wanted his new songs to “mean something,” as opposed to some older Cure songs he said were not as personal. “On this album they all matter [to me],” he said of songs such as “I Can Never Say Goodbye,” which finds him singing, “Something wicked this way comes/ To steal away my brother’s life/ Something wicked this way comes/ I could never say goodbye.”
“When you’re younger, you romanticize [death], even without knowing it. Then it starts happening to your immediate family and friends and suddenly it’s a different thing. It’s something that I struggled with lyrically: how to put this into the songs? I feel like I am different person than I was when we last made an album. I wanted that to come through.”
Songs of a Lost World is the Cure’s long-awaited follow-up to 2008’s 4:13 Dream; so far the group has previewed the LP with the songs “A Fragile Thing,” as well as “Alone.”
Neil Young has made it clear he’s no fan of Donald Trump. The “Keep on Rockin’ in the Free World” guitar hero has threatened to sue twice impeached convicted felon Trump before for playing his songs at campaign rallies, and over the weekend Young made it clear that he does not want to give the former President a second chance in Washington.
“Kamala Harris — She is an honest forthright truth teller who is experienced in the White House, free from ambiguity or evasiveness, who goes straight to the point,” wrote Young on his Archives site on Friday about the sitting Vice President, who is less than a month away from possibly becoming the nation’s first female President.
“Clear headed, young enough to hold the office for a couple of bright future terms, Kamala Harris is a good person who is unafraid to take on criminals and uphold the law of the USA. She’s my candidate for the future of this country,” he continued.
Toronto-born Young, 78 — who became a naturalized American citizen in 2020 — has been very vocal about his disdain for Trump, who continues to peddle the false narrative that he won the 2020 election over President Joe Biden, while over the weekend hurling his latest insult at his opponent when he referred to former Senator and California Attorney General Harris as “retarded.”
“Kamala Harris will take on the billionaire class and make them pay their fair share of taxes,” Young concluded. “She will not owe them favors. She is a kind, considerate American. Cast your vote for a beautiful future for your family. Kamala Harris for President.”
After years of threatening to sue Trump for using his music at campaign rallies without permission, as well as penning a scathing open letter to the former reality TV star in which he referred to Trump as “a disgrace to my country,” Young’s endorsement is a double-down on his August decision to let Harris’ VP pic, Gov. Tim Walz, officially use his song “Rockin’ in the Free World” during campaign events.
Young joins a growing list of A-list stars who’ve stepped up to support Harris since she unexpectedly jumped into the race in July when President Biden agreed to not seek a second term. Among the artists proudly supporting Harris are: Beyoncé, Charli XCX, Billie Eilish, Barbra Streisand, Taylor Swift, Megan Thee Stallion, P!nk, Bon Iver, Bruce Springsteen, Olivia Rodrigo, Ariana Grande and many more.
