Music
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Cyndi Lauper was listed among the 2025 Rock & Roll Hall of Fame nominees on Wednesday morning (Feb. 12), and the “Girls Just Wanna Have Fun” superstar shared her gratitude for the honor amid her global Farewell Tour.
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“It was amazing news to wake up to after last night’s show at the O2 in London,” she wrote in a statement to Billboard. “The audience showed me so much love, like all the audiences have all along this, my Farewell Tour.”
Lauper continued, “I am so grateful to my fans for my career. From the start, I’ve just wanted to make music that means something to people, that lifts them up and makes them feel seen. This honor, should I get in, is as much for them as it is for me. Thank you, Rock Hall.”
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Lauper is nominated for the Rock Hall’s Class of 2025 alongside 13 other nominees, including Bad Company, The Black Crowes, Mariah Carey, Chubby Checker, Joe Cocker, Billy Idol, Joy Division/New Order, Maná, Oasis, Outkast, Phish, Soundgarden and The White Stripes.
The Grammy-winning “Time After Time” singer was previously nominated for the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2023, but ultimately didn’t make the final cut for induction. Her Girls Just Wanna Have Fun Farewell Tour continues throughout Europe until the end of February, before Lauper heads to Australia and Japan in April.
The Class of 2025 will be revealed in late April, and this year’s Rock & Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremony will take place in Los Angeles this fall, with more details to be announced in the coming months.
The 74th NBA All-Star Game is back in California as basketball’s biggest weekend invades The Bay Area. In addition to the festivities on the court, there are plenty of parties and events taking place the weekend of Feb. 13-16 in San Francisco and Oakland. It’s the first All-Star Game at the Chase Center, and the […]
Pusha T showed love to Kendrick Lamar for his record-breaking Super Bowl Halftime Show performance in New Orleans. King Push took to his Instagram Story on Tuesday (Feb. 11) saluting K. Dot for a job well done with his Feb. 9 rap-heavy set at the Caesars Superdome. “Mission accomplished… Congrats,” he wrote. Kendrick and Pusha […]
The Contenders is a midweek column that looks at artists aiming for the top of the Billboard charts, and the strategies behind their efforts. This week, for the upcoming Billboard Hot 100 dated Feb. 22, we look at the multiple Kendrick Lamar songs that could have a shot at capturing the No. 1 spot following the rapper’s Super Bowl halftime performance.
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Kendrick Lamar, “Not Like Us,” “Luther” (with SZA) & “TV Off” (feat. TV Gunplay) (pgLang/Interscope/ICLG): Kendrick Lamar just electrified the music-listening world with one of the most-anticipated Super Bowl halftime shows of all time — coming not just one week after a Grammy sweep on Feb. 2 that saw Lamar win all five of his nominations (including record and song of the year), but a year-long run of one W after another that saw him earn our editorial staff’s Greatest Pop Star of 2024 title. The performance was the most-watched in the show’s history, according to presenter Apple Music and the NFL, with over 133.5 million people tuning in to see K Dot take the ultimate victory lap.
And of course, the song they were most interested in seeing him play was his 2024 Billboard Hot 100-topper “Not Like Us.” The already-legendary diss track, our editorial staff’s No. 1 song of last year, had been tied up in litigation in recent months, thanks to lawsuits levied by its target, fellow rap superstar Drake, who seemed intent on making it difficult for his opponent to play the incendiary cut on the world’s biggest stage. But Lamar indeed delivered the song as his performance’s centerpiece, even offering a conspicuous (and already much-memed) smile to the camera upon his first “Say Drake…” mention.
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Though “Not Like Us” has been out for eight months already at this point, and enjoyed two separate trips to No. 1 on the Hot 100 (the second coming after the release of its similarly headline-capturing music video in July), it should have a good chance of capturing the top spot again this week. The song, which has continued to linger on the Hot 100 (already rebounding to No. 15 this week, in anticipation of Lamar’s set and following his big Grammy night), shot back to the top of the Spotify Daily Top Songs USA chart, the Apple Music real-time chart and the iTunes chart following Lamar’s performance, as its performance on Sunday night remains at the center of all pop- and hip-hop-related discussion this week.
But it’s not Lamar’s only track threatening the No. 1 spot this week. Lamar has also seen big gains this week for his GNX single “Luther,” which he and collaborator SZA also gave a centerpiece spot during his halftime set, and which currently ranks just below “Not Like Us” at No. 2 on each of the aforementioned rankings. And right underneath them is the Lefty Gunplay-featuring “TV Off,” which Lamar offered immediately following “Not Like Us” as the closing part of his performance – with producer Mustard coming out to dance and silently rap along to the anthem. “Luther” and “TV Off” are also in prime position on the Hot 100 currently, ranking at No. 3 and No. 10 on this week’s chart, respectively.
Radio play will also be a major factor in which of the Super Bowl-boosted Kendrick tracks plays the biggest threat to the Hot 100’s top spot next week. “Luther” is currently leading there, as it bounds from No. 14 to 11 on the Radio Songs chart this week, and has already been up another 9% in audience impressions over the first four days of this tracking week (Feb. 7-10), according to Luminate. But “TV Off” is also gaining, and “Not Like Us” is now rebounding as well, up a whopping 35% over that same four-day period.
If “Not Like Us” can sustain across streaming, sales and radio throughout the week, it might have the best chance of jumping to No. 1 next week – which would make it the extremely rare non-holiday single with three different runs at No. 1, each separated by multiple months. And regardless, we should see a whole lot of Kendrick Lamar in the top 10 next week.
Lady Gaga & Bruno Mars, “Die With a Smile” (Streamline/Interscope/Atlantic/ICLG) & Lady Gaga, “Abracadabra” (Interscope/ICLG): “Die With a Smile” is officially the song to beat this early 2025, with the superstar duet returning for a fifth frame at No. 1 this week, after briefly being interrupted by Travis Scott’s pole position-debuting “4×4.” The song has even finally captured the crown on Radio Songs, after Shaboozey’s historic 27-week run atop that chart with “A Bar Song (Tipsy),” and should also reign for a second week on that listing – though it will likely soon face serious competition from another starry Bruno Mars teamup, with ROSÉ on “APT.”
Speaking of Bruno and Gaga providing their own competition – the latter now has a breakout smash entirely of her own. Her “Abracadabra” bows at No. 29 on the Hot 100 this week with just over four days of tracking, after debuting with its music video as part of a Mastercard commercial during the Grammys. The song got off to a white-hot start on streaming, and continued growing in the days after, even briefly capturing the top spot on the Spotify Daily Top Songs USA chart — though it has since gotten buried under an avalanche of Kendrick Lamar and SZA. Regardless, the song should make a big jump in its first full week on the Hot 100 – perhaps to the top 10, if it doesn’t get boxed out by Kendrick – and is already aiming to debut on Pop Airplay, as well.
Chappell Roan, “Pink Pony Club” (Amusement/Island): Don’t forget about the Grammys’ best new artist, who has been surging on the Hot 100 following her big win and show-stopping performance of what now appears to be the signature song of Roan’s early career, “Pink Pony Club.” Despite being originally released in 2020, the song is only now really catching on both streaming and radio, as it re-enters Streaming Songs at No. 24 and hits a new high of No. 32 on Radio Songs this week. It should continue climbing on both listings next week, and may also rise on the Hot 100, after hitting a new peak of No. 18 this week.
The NBA All-Star Game — where the greats from the league’s two conferences face off every February — has been a staple of every professional basketball season since 1951 (outside of 1999, due to the lockout-shortened season). But as Carlton Myers, the NBA’s senior vp/head of live production and entertainment points out, “The NBA is […]
It was a good news/bad news day for Grimes on Tuesday (Feb. 11) when the “Delete Forever” singer learned that her ex Elon Musk had taken the couple’s first-born son to a White House briefing. In response to a commenter who noted that four-year-old “Lil X” (born X Æ A-Xii) “was very polite today! You raised him well. He was so cute when he told DJT [Donald Trump] ‘please forgive me, I need to pee,’” Grimes criticized Musk for including their child in the photo-op.
Grimes did not find the seemingly uncleared appearance by her son quite so charming, responding, “He should not be in public like this. I did not see this, thank u for alerting me.” The preschooler spent some of his time in the Oval Office on his father’s shoulders as Trump signed an executive order giving the Tesla boss’ controversial Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) more power to continue its legally suspect slash-and-burn march through the federal beuracracy.
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“But I’m glad he was polite. Sigh,” Grimes added of the little one who at one point was seen picking his nose just inches away from a seemingly irritated Trump. X, dressed in a suit and tie, also pulled faces and seemed to imitate his father’s gestures, at one point mussing Musk’s hair and grabbing his ears in boredom during the daytime White House appearance.
Grimes has three children with Musk — who has a total of 12 children from three different women — and has often been at odds with the world’s richest man over the rearing of their children and his often-controversial public statements. Last month, when Musk made what was widely interpreted as a pair of vigorous Nazi salutes during an inauguration event for Trump, Grimes quickly distanced herself from the billionaire who in late January told a crowd of supporters of the far-right Alternative For Germany party that, “children should not be guilty of the sins of their parents, let alone their great-grandparents,” in an apparent reference to Nazi Germany just two days before Holocaust Remembrance Day.
“There is too much focus on past guilt, and we need to move beyond that,” Musk added, praising the anti-immigration, anti-cultural integration party as the “best hope for Germany.”
At the time of the salutes, Grimes wrote, “it is unhealthy that people are this upset when I have not even been online yet today and am only just learning about this controversy now. I don’t know what happened and I will not make a rash statement – I am not a citizen of this country.” She later made it clear that she did not approve of the seemingly fascist gesture many took as a version of the “Sieg Heil” gesture associated with Holocaust mastermind Adolf Hitler and the Nazi party.
“I am not him. I will not make a statement every time he does something. I can only send love back into a world that is hurting,” Grimes said. “To be clear i could go talk s–t and be on a bunch of magazine covers and be a feminist hero and get clout – but it would serve no purpose. I choose my children’s wellbeing. I promise you it doesn’t feel good to be hated all the time for things I don’t even know about, cannot predict and cannot control. But I also chose this path, I accept it. I make the best of it, and I simply wish happiness and health to all.”
Check out Grimes’ post below.
He should not be in public like this. I did not see this, thank u for alerting me. But I’m glad he was polite. Sigh— 𝖦𝗋𝗂𝗆𝖾𝗌 ⏳ (@Grimezsz) February 12, 2025
The Rock & Roll Hall of Fame has unveiled its 2025 nominees, and while every person and band on the list is more than deserving to be welcomed into the institution’s esteemed ranks, only a few can be.
As announced Wednesday (Feb. 12), the names on this year’s ballot include Mariah Carey, Oasis, Bad Company, The Black Crowes, Chubby Checker, Joe Cocker, Billy Idol, Joy Division/New Order, Cyndi Lauper, Maná, Oasis, Outkast, Phish, Soundgarden and The White Stripes. Eight of those acts — Bad Company, the Black Crowes, Checker, Cocker, Idol, Maná, Outkast and Phish — are first-time nominees, while the other six have been in RRHOF consideration in years past.
Those names will now be narrowed down by an international panel of more than 1,200 artists, historians and music industry players, with a fan-voted element factored in. That group’s selected nominees will be revealed in April, as well as whether they’ll be entering in the musical influence or musical excellence categories. An induction ceremony in Los Angeles will follow in the fall, coming one year after the 2024 class comprised of Mary J. Blige, Cher, Dave Matthews Band, Foreigner, Peter Frampton, Kool & the Gang, Ozzy Osbourne and A Tribe Called Quest was inaugurated into the hallowed Rock Hall.
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But while the list of nominees chosen for immortalization in the coveted hall of fame is largely up to panelists, Billboard wants to know who you would select from this year’s shortlist. Tell us who you most want to see inducted into the RRHOF by casting your vote below.
Coincidence or not, it was a full moon Tuesday (Feb. 11) in Rio de Janeiro. The sky was clear, without stars, as the biggest star got ready to shine at the Nilton Santos Stadium, also known as Engenhão. Accompanied by her army — correction: her pack — She-Wolf Shakira marched toward the stage focused on […]
Mandy Moore had a simple message for Amazon on Tuesday (Feb. 11): “Do better.” The singer/actress lashed out at the global giant in her Instagram Story after she said the company delivered a package to her in-laws’ house in Pasadena, which was totally destroyed by last month’s devastating wildfires.
“Do better, Amazon,” she wrote in the Story that has since timed out, alongside a photo of the charred home and an image of the package sitting amidst the destruction. “Can we not have better discretion than to leave a package at a residence that no longer exists? This is my mother and father in law’s home. Smh.”
According to TMZ, Amazon responded to Moore’s post, with a spokesperson saying, “We’ve reached out to Ms. Moore via Instagram to apologize for this and to ask for more information from her in-laws so we’re better able investigate what happened here.” The representative added, “For weeks, we’ve advised those who are delivering on our behalf in southern California to use discretion in areas that were impacted by wildfires – especially if it involves delivering to a damaged home – that clearly didn’t happen here.”
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Moore, who initially reported that her home was also partially destroyed by one of the half dozen fires that killed 29 and destroyed more than 16,00 homes and other structures, also posted an emotional chronicle of her own flight from the Santa Ana winds-fueled conflagrations. “We never got an evacuation notice. Sometimes in the quieter moments of processing the last month, I play the game of what would have happened if I didn’t have my phone next to me, playing my typical ‘piano for deep sleep’ mix as I nursed Lou before bed, so I could answer the call from my brother-in-law?” Moore wrote on Instagram on Tuesday along with an image of the damage caused by the fire.
“It was 6:45 p.m. and he told me he, his wife, and our niece were evacuating, grabbing my in-laws (his parents) and getting the heck out of Dodge and we should do the same,” Moore continued. “I calmly walked downstairs and relayed this to my husband and without skipping a beat, we promptly packed up the kids (in their pjs), our dog, and scrambled to find our 3 cats as the power went out. I’ll never forget Taylor trying to figure out how to manually open our two little garage doors (they’d just finished construction around Thanksgiving and we’d just started using them—) in the harrowing 60 mph winds, as the sky glowed a dark red and ash started to fall all around us.”
Moore described racing across town dodging fallen tress on the freeway on their way to the safety of a friend’s home and getting her three kids to bed before running to Target to buy a litter box and some water. She also chronicled obsessively refreshing the Watch Duty wildfire map all night as she watched the evacuation zone narrow in on the eight-block radius around her home.
“It took until 4 a.m. for it to turn red. All the while, tossing and turning with a stomach-churning anxiety I’ve never experienced before, both boys passed out between us in bed,” Moore wrote. “[Oldest child daughter] Lou slept on the floor in a travel crib, and the dog curled up protectively by the door.”
She said that they just found out this week that their house is still standing, but that because of the proximity to the fires around their home, everything inside of it was a “near total loss. Clothes, furniture, pretty much everything will have to be disposed of… maybe even the walls too. We won’t be there for a very long time as it and the neighborhood itself get sorted out and cleaned and the rebuilding starts. I say all of this because i’m struggling. Yes we are exceedingly lucky to technically still have the structure of a home. But also… do we still have a home? I think my definition is in flux. The physical space? No. It goes without saying that our sweet brood and our pets are ALL that matters and home is where we are together… but having a sanctuary and safe space to feel settled really goes a long way too.”
The singer described “stumbling” on the home in the early days of COVID, instinctively knowing it was where they wanted to raise their kids; she found out she was pregnant with youngest son Gus two weeks after they closed on the home. Moore said they painstakingly restored and remodeled the home to make it their own and were just weeks away from finally finishing the work when the fires hit.
“I’m not saying all of this because I’m asking you to feel more sorry for us than someone else. Like I said, I am grateful. We’re so lucky!,” Moore wrote of the loss of the home and its contents, as well as the destruction of Taylor’s home studio. “By the grace of god we found a place to stay in the meantime and the kids are happy and safe. We’ve even starting collecting the books and toys that they’ve lost. It’s not a competition of who lost what or more. Real human beings across this town, regardless of their jobs or socioeconomic status, lost the life they’d come to know and count on in an instant. My whole heart is with them. Every one of them. This place, our home and the town itself, was our dream and I hope in time it will feel like that again… just a slightly different one.”
Last month, Moore’s brother-in-law, Dawes drummer Griffin Goldsmith, revealed that Moore and her family were taking shelter with her friend Hilary Duff. He also noted that he’d convinced his whole family and some close friends to move to Altadena years ago, including the siblings’ parents, who lived around the corner from him. Both Griffin and the Goldsmith’s parents lost their homes, while Taylor and husband Dawes singer Taylor Goldsmith had to flee their home and former Dawes bassist Wylie Gelber and his wife and their first crew member and old friend Jake lost their homes as well.
It’s been nearly five years since Naya Rivera died at 33 years old in an accidental drowning incident while taking her son, Josey — who turns 10 in September — on a boat trip in Lake Piru, Calif. And now, the Glee star’s ex-husband, actor Ryan Dorsey, is speaking out about her death and raising their child alone for the first time in depth, sitting down with People for an on-camera interview posted Wednesday (Feb. 12).
Looking back on the day he first got the call that Rivera had gone missing in July 2020 — with authorities at the time finding then-4-year-old Josey sleeping alone on a boat rented by the singer-actress, who was nowhere to be found — Dorsey said he was full of confusion and fear. “I instantly said, ‘What do you mean? She knows how to swim,’” he told the publication. “I didn’t know what to think, but I feared the worst.”
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Rivera’s disappearance quickly made national headlines, with fans, friends and Glee cast members all joining together at the time to voice their fears and pray for her safe return. Dorsey said he immediately drove to Lake Piru from Big Bear, Calif., speeding and “chain-smoking cigarettes” the whole drive before reuniting with Josey as authorities embarked on a search for Rivera’s body.
“It was the worst five days of my life,” recalled the actor, who says it’s still difficult to see photos of his ex-wife, much less hear songs that remind him of her (such as Amy Winehouse’s “Valerie,” which she famously covered on Glee).
One day after Rivera’s body was finally found in a remote part of the lake — sparking an outpouring of messages of grief from those who knew her, including numerous Glee costars and ex-boyfriend Big Sean — examiners ruled her death an accidental drowning and posited that she had used all of her strength to push Josey back onto the boat before she succumbed to the strength of the water. According to Dorsey, Josey has since been able to recall heartbreaking moments from the tragedy, such as how he and his mom had jumped off the boat to take a swim before Rivera noticed that the boat was drifting away, after which she instructed her son to swim back toward it.
“He said that the last thing she said was his name, and then she went under, and he didn’t see her anymore,” Dorsey told People. “Something he’s said over and over is that he was trying to find a life raft, and there was a rope, but there was a big spider on the rope, and he was too scared to throw it. I keep reassuring him, ‘Buddy, that rope wasn’t going to be long enough.’”
“That obviously still sticks out in his head because he feels like he could have saved her,” Dorsey added. “I think she just got caught up in a brush — that or a weird undercurrent from the dam. It was just a freak occurrence.”
Rivera and Dorsey had an on-again, off-again relationship. After getting back together following a breakup, the pair tied the knot in 2014 and welcomed Josey the next year; the Sorry Not Sorry later filed for divorce in 2016.
Dorsey has now spent the last four and a half years raising Josey as a single dad, moving to West Virginia after Rivera’s funeral to escape paparazzi. The actor says the experience has affected his approach as a parent. “I treat him differently than I would a normal kid because of what he’s been through. … For me, it’s not a big deal if he hears a bad word or if he sees someone get killed on TV,” Dorsey told the publication.
Josey is also definitely “his mama’s son, because when he doesn’t get the answer he wants, he keeps talking,” Dorsey added, smiling fondly. “He likes to talk, and that’s Mama for sure.”
Watch Dorsey’s emotional interview about Rivera below.