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From career milestones to new music releases to major announcements and those little important moments, Billboard editors highlight uplifting moments in Latin music. Here’s what happened in the Latin music world this week.
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Los Tigres del Norte Honored in New York
Los Tigres del Norte Way is officially a street in New York, named after the legendary norteño group. “As of today, a street in Brooklyn bears the name of Los Tigres del Norte. Thank you for walking with us, today and always,” the group posted on Instagram. See the photos from the street naming presentation here.
During their stop in New York — where they are set to perform at Madison Square Garden today (May 24) — Los Tigres also honored the fallen Mexican Navy cadets, América Yamilet Sánchez and Adal Jair Marcos, who died after crashing into the Brooklyn Bridge on May 17. “Honor and eternal memory,” the Mexican band posted with a video from the vigil alongside New York’s Mayor Eric Adams.
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Rauw Alejandro & Dad
During one of his Cosa Nuestra shows in New York, Rauw Alejandro and his father shared a special moment onstage. “I want to introduce you to my dad, Raul Ocasio on the guitar,” he told the crowd. The moment was particularly special given that his father was born in Brooklyn and the Cosa Nuestra tour concept pays homage to the Nuyorican diaspora.
See the sweet moment onstage below:
Billboard Latin Music Week Dates Unveiled
Billboard Latin Music Week will return to Miami from Monday, Oct. 20 to Friday, Oct. 24, with the Billboard Latin Music Awards set for Thursday, Oct. 23.
Set once again at the historic Fillmore Miami Beach, ticket and lineup information for Billboard Latin Music Week 2025 will be announced in the coming weeks. Pre-register now for the latest information at billboardlatinmusicweek.com.
More than 10,000 people attended Latin Music Week last year, including the live shows by Fuerza Regida with Majo Aguilar; a reggaeton night with Omar Courtz, Dei V, and Saiko; and LMW’s 35th anniversary party with Young Miko, Tito Double P, Belinda, Elvis Crespo and more, among other events.
Myke Towers’ New Soccer Initiative
Myke Towers’ Young Kingz Foundation and soccer star David Villa’s DV7 Academy officially kicked off their global partnership earlier this weekend. The event, held in Madrid, marked the start of a series of joint initiatives with projects underway in Puerto Rico, Colombia and Spain that include free sports clinics, exchange programs, urban space revitalization and educational support for vulnerable youth.
“I’m not doing this expecting it to blow up like a song,” Towers told Billboard Español then. “It’s more about leaving a legacy. Creating a habit. Inspiring those who can help to do so, in their own way.”
Get more details on the partnership here.
Roger Nichols, best-known for co-writing such Carpenters hits as “We’ve Only Just Begun,” “Rainy Days and Mondays” and “I Won’t Last a Day Without You” with lyricist Paul Williams, died on May 17. He was 84.
Williams confirmed Nichols’ death in an extended, and deeply affectionate, post on Instagram. Williams didn’t list a cause of death, though he reported the basic circumstances of the death. “Roger Nichols passed away peacefully four days ago, at home with his beautiful family …his wife Terry and the daughters he was so proud of, Claire and Caitlin at his side.” (See full text of Williams Instagram post below.)
Nichols signed as an artist to A&M Records in 1968, a year before Karen and Richard Carpenter were signed to the Los Angeles-based label. His debut album Roger Nichols and the Small Circle of Friends was produced by Tommy LiPuma, engineered by Bruce Botnick, and featured session contributions from Van Dyke Parks, Randy Newman and Lenny Waronker. Although the album failed to crack the Billboard 200, A&M co-founder Herb Alpert thought there was something there and recommended that Nichols be hired by A&M’s publishing company as a staff songwriter. It was during this period that he was introduced to Williams.
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That was a characteristically astute call on Alpert’s part. Williams and Nichols were one of the hottest pop songwriting teams of the early 1970s.
Williams and Nichols took off as songwriters in the fall of 1970, when they had two songs in the top 15 on the Billboard Hot 100 at the same time. On the charts dated Oct. 17 and 24, Carpenters’ version of “We’ve Only Just Begun,” a ballad which had originated as “soft-sell” commercial for Crocker-Citizens National Bank, was in the top five (on its way to a No. 2 peak). Three Dog Night’s “Out in the Country” was holding at its No. 15 peak.
The Carpenters smash, an instant standard, was lushly romantic. The Three Dog Night hit was a fresh-sounding mix of pop, rock and folk. Having two simultaneous hits by two different acts in two different styles caught the industry’s attention. “We’ve Only Just Begun” went on to receive two Grammy nominations – for song of the year and best contemporary song — at the first live Grammy telecast in March 1971. (It lost both awards to Paul Simon’s “Bridge Over Troubled Water.”)
Williams and Nichols continued writing songs for the Carpenters, including “Rainy Days and Mondays,” a superb and remarkably adult ballad which reached No. 2 (it took Carole King’s letter-perfect “It’s Too Late” to keep it out of the top spot), “Let Me Be the One” (another first-rate ballad that the duo never got around to releasing as a single), and “I Won’t Last a Day Without You,” a 1972 album track that was finally released as a single in 1974, when it climbed to No. 11.
Barbra Streisand covered “I Won’t Last a Day Without You” on her ButterFly album later in 1974. On her following album, Lazy Afternoon, she recorded another Williams-Nichols song, “I Never Had It So Good.” Both of those albums went gold.
Art Garfunkel recorded a tender Williams-Nichols song, “Traveling Boy,” for his first solo album, 1973’s Angel Clare, which made the top 10 on the Billboard 200. The song was released as the third single from the album, and bubbled under the Hot 100.
Nichols also had some successes with other collaborators. He teamed with William Lane to write “Times of Your Life,” which Paul Anka recorded in 1975. Like “We’ve Only Just Begun,” this song was also adapted from a popular TV commercial – for Kodak. Anka’s recording reached No 7 on the Hot 100 in February 1976.
Nichols retired soon afterwards, but his songs live on. R.E.M. covered “Out in the Country” as a B-side for their 2003 single “Bad Day.” Rumer covered “Traveling Boy” on her 2012 album Boys Don’t Cry.
Nichols was honored during Florida Chapter Presents The Recording Academy Honors 2006 at Loews Miami Beach Hotel in Miami.
He was nominated for the Songwriters Hall of Fame on Nov. 12, for the class that will be inducted on June 12. He wasn’t elected (the competition is fierce every year), but the ballot listed the five songs that are probably his most famous and enduring: “We’ve Only Just Begun,” “Rainy Days and Mondays,” “I Won’t Last a Day Without You,” “Out in the Country,” “Times of Your Life”
In a comment on Williams’ Instagram post, Nichols’ daughter Claire wrote, “My mom, Terri, and my sisters, Caroline and Caitlin, are all so proud of the man he was, and are in awe of the legacy he leaves.”
Here’s the full text of Williams’ Instagram post announcing Nichols’ death.
“The first song, Roger Nichols and I wrote was called “it’s hard to say goodbye. “… Sadly, we hit the nail on the head. Roger Nichols passed away peacefully four days ago, at home with his beautiful family …his wife Terry and the daughters he was so proud of, Claire and Caitlin at his side. They were his dream come true. His greatest joy“Roger was my writing partner and my music school… a collaboratorfor years and a friend for life. I was an out of work actor looking for a career in music when I was signed by A&M records publishing. They were looking for a lyricist for Roger Nichols. An industrial strength, lucky break that changed my life.“We wrote almost every day for several years. He was as disciplined as he was talented. I had the attention span of a sea otter… I was ready for a break after three hours and Roger would plunge ahead for another four or five. The words were born of the beauty in his completed melodies.I wrote what I heard, note for note…word for word. The lyrics waiting in the emotion already in his music. He made it easy.“After many wonderful productive years, I wanted us to write songs for movies. He had another dream. He said I wanna go fishing … wanna go back to Montana. He smiled and said something about having a family and maybe making a home by a nice little river… it was clear that he was already gone. A few years ago, I visited him and met Terry and the girls at the house by the river …and I knew he found his dream.“One last story. Roger was really excited when his daughter Caitlin was getting married last September. He chuckled and asked, “can you picture me wheeling down the aisle in my wheelchair, holding my daughter’s hand?”“Of course, I said yes then …. and right now Roger, I can picture thousands of proud dads and their beautiful daughters that walked down the aisle to your gorgeous music or danced their father and daughter dance to We’ve only just begun… picture them standing and applauding what you brought to their lives and to mine. You brought love and beauty into this world, and we will never forget you.In gratitude with much love… Paul”
Mexican star Julión Álvarez has postponed his Saturday show at AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas, after not being able to enter the United States, according to the artist’s team.
Álvarez — alongside the show’s promoter CMN and his management/booking company Copar Music — issued a statement Friday (May 23) explaining that, “Due to unforeseen circumstances,” he was “unable to enter the United States in time for the event.”
Adding, “With nearly 50,000 tickets sold, this sold-out show was set to be an unforgettable night for fans. Both CMN and Copar Music, along with Julión’s team, are actively working to reschedule the performance as soon as possible. Julión Álvarez extends his heartfelt thanks for your patience and continued support, and he looks forward to reuniting with his Texas fans very soon.”
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In April, the regional Mexican star, known for hits like “Póngamonos de Acuerdo” and “Te Hubieras Ido Antes,” made his grand return to the United States with three historic sold-out shows at SoFi Stadium in Los Angeles.
The shows in L.A. saw Álvarez perform in the U.S. again, eight years after a legal process that began Aug. 10, 2017, when the U.S. Treasury Department singled out the singer for alleged money laundering and links to drug trafficking. This caused the closure of his social media accounts and the rejection of U.S. companies to work with the Chiapas-born singer, and kept him away from stages in this country.
In May 2022, the charges were dropped and Alvarez announced in a press conference that everything had been “cleared up.” The three shows in L.A. and the one in Texas this year were setting him up for his upcoming 4218 Tour in the U.S., although the tour dates had yet to be announced.
While it’s unclear why Álvarez was not able to enter the U.S., the news comes at a time when international artists have faced a visa situation that has impacted a handful of regional Mexican acts and events. Earlier this month, Michelada Fest in Chicago was canceled over artists’ visa uncertainty.
Today’s press statement mentions that previously purchased tickets “will be honored for the new date,” but if unable to attend the rescheduled concert, “refund details will be provided.”
Every year, over half a million music fans flock to the Las Vegas Motor Speedway for three nights to dance under neon lights to tunes spanning almost every imaginable dance music subgenre. While Electric Daisy Carnival just wrapped its 29th year, it somehow still finds ways to reinvent itself and grow — not just grow in crowd size, but in cultural and physical reach.
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Just before opening the gates to the festival on May 16, the event’s producer Insomniac invited select guests to Hotel EDC at the Virgin Hotel to celebrate their latest international expansion. Partygoers celebrated with Gorgon City to highlight Insomniac’s next international destination, Medellín, where EDC Colombia will launch in October 2026.
Inside the festival, we saw more representation on the lineup via the Ubutu stage, which created a dedicated space for Afro-house for the first time in the festival’s 29-year run. This year the fest also added a dinner theater activation where guests were treated to a cocktail hour with an acrobatic showcase, followed by dinner featuring a dance troupe and ending with dessert and live singing.
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With the festival approaching its 30th year, Billboard spoke to a handful of DJs, from legendary headliners to this year’s first-timers, to hear from their perspective on how EDC continues to grow and how they personally make each year better than the last.
Here are seven takeaways from their words of wisdom.
Even Legends Can Reach New Heights
Courtesy of Insomniac Events
Tiësto is without a doubt one of the biggest names in dance music. He’s played EDC every year since the festival moved from California to Las Vegas in 2011. You would think he’s turned every possible stone the fest has to offer, but this year, the legend was excited to play Circuit Grounds, a fan-favorite stage, for the first time. Circuit Grounds offers more screens to visually bring the audience into new and unexpected tracks like Tiësto’s upcoming collaboration with Sexyy Red on the F1 soundtrack, “OMG!” Backstage the artist rhetorically asked us “Who would have thought Tiësto would have collabed with Sexyy Red?… No one. Absolutely no one. And it’s an amazing track.”
Also bringing the unexpected this year was EDM titan Kaskade. He brought his b2b act with Alison Wonderland to the Cosmic Meadow stage after the artists debuted as a duo at EDC Orlando last year. This time around, they expanded their sound to include some of Wonderland’s signature trap tunes. “For me, it’s just about playing stuff we love and trying to figure out that bridge in between,” Kaskade told us. “We’ve only played a handful of shows so we’re still discovering that as we play out more together.”
Everything Old Can Be New
Koen Ten Holter
When you’ve played EDC for as long as Tiësto and Kaskade, who’s performed at the festival for two decades, you have to continue making changes to your solo sets. Tiësto reserved a special set for the mainstage, closing out the three-day festival with a set that saw a return to his trance roots. Rising German producer Marlon Hoffstadt introduced “The Godfather of Trance” before his In Search of Sunrise Set, named after his legendary 1999 compilation album.
Tiësto told us the time was finally right for such a moment, saying “I reconnected with the sound I started with back in the day, and I feel like it’s a full circle moment. When [Insomniac Events founder] Pasquale [Rotella] asked me ‘Will you do a sunrise set?’ and I thought ‘Yeah, the time is right now.’”
For Kaskade, his solo set was sprinkled with pieces of his decades-old hits. Many DJs’ styles evolve over time, and Kaskade says he still struggles trying to resurface his former fan-favorites but admits, “People online will like this. There’s sometimes when there’s somebody hitting me up like ‘You haven’t played this song in 10 years!’ and I’m like ‘Oh yeah. That is a good song. I should remember to bring that out.’” So, if you’re waiting for more tracks from his 2008 album Strobelite Seduction to make it into his next set, like us, keep posting.
The Bright Lights Never Dull
The electric sky still shines just as bright, if not brighter, almost 30 years later. Alison Wonderland is still amazed at the impact that EDC has had on her and her friends after playing the festival 10 years later. She reflected on her first time playing at the Las Vegas Motor Speedway and crying, telling the audience “I started in my bedroom and now I’m here.”
A decade later, she’s still humbled by her EDC experience saying that she can’t believe she is sharing the stage with Kaskade. But there’s nothing that could prevent her from taking the stage at the Electric Daisy Carnival. “In fact, I actually love EDC so much that at 9 months pregnant I played main stage,” she said of this set that happened in 2023.
The Power of Planning
With over 500,000 people attending the festival every year, it’s the perfect opportunity for an artist to not only reach their fans but also expose themselves to a group of people who have potentially never heard their sound. Just ask Ben Nicky.
We caught up with the British producer 10 minutes after his first set at Kinetic Field on Saturday night before he made his way to Neon Garden for a b2b set with Maddix. Walking into his trailer, he was already on his computer working on a track because he’s aware of how every set offers its own opportunities.
“I’m like a DJ’s DJ,” he said. “I’m always changing something. Mainstage you’ve got your big fanbase there, but you’ve got another fifty to sixty thousand people who might not know you or be more into commercial stuff. So, you have to tailor and play more well-known vocals. Whereas in the trance tent, I can get away with more dark and underground stuff.”
Koen Ten Holter
Ben meticulously tweaks every element to fit the crowd he’s trying to appeal to, and the crowd at EDC is some of the most knowledgeable when it comes to dance music. Brazilian star Alok told Billboard that means you can’t phone it in.
“I feel like people here each year are more and more educated,” he said, “so, it’s not easy to please them. So you really have to bring stuff that makes sense and not obvious.” He knows a thing or two about keeping an audience on their toes. He just had a buzzed-about Coachella performance, for which he hired dancers with two-tone arms to create eye-catching live visuals.
Don’t Forget to Live in the Moment
While some DJs meticulously plan their sets, others prefer to “just rip it” in the words of Tape B. He started playing EDC in Orlando while doing his undergrad in Florida. Now that he’s worked his way up to EDC Las Vegas, he attended a programming meeting for the first time ahead of his solo set on Friday. When it came to his joint set with dubstep super DJ, Crankdat, they planned to start their set with their unreleased collab but keep it loose otherwise.
He told Billboard about the planning that went into the set saying, “Met up with Crankdat. Worked on our back-to-back for a little bit. Got songs kinda together. We’re mainly freestyling it tonight. So, it’s going to be very interesting, but very fun.”
Koen Ten Holter
Unreleased Tracks Make Everyone Happy
One of the most exciting aspects of attending EDC Las Vegas is the massive amount of unreleased music you’ll hear. REZZ said she was most excited to give fans a taste of what direction she’s taking her project next. “I’m super excited for this year. I’m playing like, seven new songs, more than half of which I’ve never played before.” Check TikTok to see fans’ live reactions to some of this new music.
Julian Bajsel
It’s become customary for DJs to head to Las Vegas with a ton of unreleased music. Riot Ten used it as a chance to treat his most dedicated fans to an early listen of his new album, Requiem For a Riot, before it drops in a week. Other artists may opt to test out some tracks they’re workshopping to see how the crowd reacts, like DJ Snake who played his upcoming song “Paradise” for the audience at AYU dayclub, not once, but twice, to make sure it went off every time.
There Are No Small Opportunities
With this year’s addition of the Ubutu stage, Afro-house had a major presence at the festival for the first time. Francis Mercier noted that EDC is “the home to different types of music from hip-hop to dubstep to house to now Afro house. It’s a place where you can hear all different types of music.” This new stage opened the door for artists like Karaba, who hails from Montreal, Canada, to play a stage at EDC Las Vegas for the first time.
Making the most of these opportunities is key, according to Morten. His first time playing the fest was in 2016 when he thought no one would see him spinning at one of the art cars. When he took the stage he was surprised by the energy. “It doesn’t matter what stage you’re at, the party and the crowd is incredible.” Since then, he’s played solo sets, b2b with David Guetta and this year played Kinetic Field with Artbat.
If you really want to see how quickly you can ascend to greatness, you just have to look at Cloonee’s trajectory. He admitted that EDC wasn’t really a festival you thought about as someone who grew up in England. After living in the States for a few months, he found himself nervously playing the Stereo Bloom festival back in 2022. This year he played Circuit Grounds right after Tiësto,z who said he wasn’t going to play Cloonee’s hit song “Stephanie” with InntRaw and Young M.A because it would be this year’s most played song and you don’t play the most played song before its creator takes the stage.
Meanwhile, the advice Cloonee would give himself before playing Stereo Bloom in 2022 is, “Calm down because you’ve got bigger ones to do.”
Catch more of Billboard’s EDC Las Vegas coverage on Billboard’s Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube Channels.
Jamie Foxx suffered a serious medical emergency in 2023, which he later confirmed to be a stroke. During the time of uncertainty surrounding the mystery illness, plenty of rumors swirled on social media, including Diddy’s alleged involvement.
Foxx shut down the rumors that Diddy tried to have him killed during an interview earlier this week for The Hollywood Reporter with Hasan Minhaj, Chelsea Handler, Roy Wood Jr., Seth Meyers and Sarah Silverman.
“I’m in f—ing perfect shape. [I saw things like,] ‘Puffy tried to kill me.’ No, Puffy didn’t try to kill me. When they said I was a clone, that made me flip,” he said. “I’m sitting in the hospital bed, like, ‘These b—h-a– motherf—ers are trying to clone me.’”
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The 57-year-old admitted he was heavily sedated with drugs during his hospital stay — and he says he doesn’t recall weeks of it — and he snuck in a cell phone, which saw him indulging in the salacious rumors around his health.
“I was doing so many jokes in the hospital,” he continued. “That’s the only way I could get through it. I’m a comic, so even when I was heavily sedated, and they gave me OxyContin, Dilantin and morphine at the same time.”
Foxx previously addressed the rumors of Diddy having him killed and his friendship with the Bad Boy mogul during his What Had Happened Was Netflix special in December.
“The internet said Puffy was trying to kill me, that’s what the internet was saying,” he said. “I know what you thinking, ‘Diddy?’ Hell no, I left them parties early.”
Combs’ reps dispelled the rumors of Diddy having any involvement in Foxx’s health crisis in October, which they said were “outlandish, ridiculous and baseless.”
In April 2023, Foxx’s daughter revealed that her father was hospitalized for a “medical complication” while filming the Netflix movie Back in Action in Atlanta with Cameron Diaz.
Jamie Foxx eventually explained that a “brain bleed” led to him having a stroke after only saying he had a “bad headache.” A nurse said he only had a five percent chance of surviving the medical crisis.
The Oscar-winning actor spent nearly a month in the hospital as doctors ran a myriad of tests and watched his condition closely. He told the audience at his Netflix special that he came “within an inch of his life” while battling the health scare.
As for Diddy, Combs is currently on trial for his sex trafficking and racketeering case, which is expected to last into July. He potentially faces life in prison if convicted on all charges.
After spending much of his young life in and out of detention centers, Jelly Roll is giving back.
While on his Big Ass Stadium Tour with Post Malone, the country star recently stopped by the Adult Detention Center at Hennepin County Sheriff’s Office in Minnesota for a surprise visit. While there, he interacted with the officers and spoke to some of the inmates, sharing with them, “I have no lies to tell.”
Jelly also reflected on his own experiences behind bars, sharing that he was eventually motivated to get his act together so that he could go home and to “be the dad I didn’t have.” “I knew that if I squeaked out of this one, there was no chance with my history that I caught another case,” said the “Son of a Sinner” singer, who completed his GED while in jail. “Even now I’m petrified of it.”
In photos posted by HCSO on Facebook, Jelly shakes hands and poses with the staff and holds up an honorary key to the jail, which Sheriff Dawanna Witt presented to him in front of the detainees. “Jail time shouldn’t be wasted time,” Witt said, according to the post. “Jelly Roll is a great example of how jail programs can change lives.”
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Jelly has long been open about his criminal history. At one point, he served over a year with seven months of probation for an aggravated robbery he committed when he was 16, years after which he was incarcerated again for drug dealing at age 23. While he was locked up for the latter charge, he learned from a guard that his now-17-year-old daughter, Bailee, had been born, and the Tennessee native vowed to turn his life around.
“I’ve never had nothing in life that urged me in the moment to know that I had to do something different,” he told Billboard of the epiphany in 2023. “I have to figure this out right now.”
After initially having to work toward a relationship with his daughter after his sentence was up, Jelly and his wife, podcaster Bunnie XO, now share full custody of Bailee. The musician is also Dad to 8-year-old Noah from a prior relationship.
Following stops in Minneapolis and Chicago, Jelly and Posty will next take their trek to Toronto, Miami, San Francisco and more cities. It follows the “Need a Favor” musician’s album Beautifully Broken, which reached No. 1 on the Billboard 200 in October.
The instrumentation of the song “Tiempos Violentos” reminds the listener of the James Bond saga. But when the unmistakable voice of the Chilean-Mexican alternative star Mon Laferte appears in it — adding melancholic nuances and a dramatic air, and then merging with the soft and powerful singing of the American St. Vincent — this new bilingual version of the song “Violent Times” reinvents itself.
Released Friday (May 23) on digital platforms under the Virgin Music Group label, the new collaboration between St. Vincent and Mon Laferte not only translates into the language of Cervantes one of the most outstanding tracks from this year’s Grammy winner for best alternative music album, All Born Screaming (2004), but also transforms it into something new through two languages and two visions that connect in a masterful piece.
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“Collaborating with Mon gave the song new shape, new blood, new depth,” St. Vincent told Billboard Español on Thursday in a video call. “Like a dream falling into another dream.”
“Tiempos Violentos”, the Spanish-language adaptation of “Violent Times,” was originally included in the translated edition of All Born Screaming, titled Todos Nacen Gritando, which singer/songwriter and guitarist Annie Clark, better known as St. Vincent, released last November as a “humble tribute” to her Hispanic-American fans who go to her concerts and sing her songs in perfect English without it being their native language.
“I just think she’s so powerful and incredible and I thought that her voice would be so well suited to this song because she has all of that jazz standards in her body, but also an edge to her voice,” Clark explains. “So yeah, I initially reached out seeing if she might want to cover the song or reinterpret it and then she made her own translation of it and then we made it this duet really between us, which I think has ended up being just interesting and beautiful.”
Meanwhile, Mon Laferte says that when she first heard the Spanish version of “Violent Times,” she felt “a deep pull.”
“It was beautiful and haunting. I wanted to give it my own voice, to make it mine too — and to do it alongside an artist I’ve long admired,” recalls Mon Laferte, according to a statement from Virgin Music Group shared with Billboard Español.
And that is precisely what she did. On “Tiempos Violentos,” the Chilean-Mexican singer/songwriter delivers a poignant and intimate verse in Spanish that reframes the emotional meaning of the song, while St. Vincent’s English refrains resonate like distant memories, creating a raw, cinematic version.
“Tiempos Violentos” was recorded in a studio in Bogota at the end of last March, when both artists were in the Colombian capital to participate in the Estéreo Picnic music festival, where the friendship blossomed.
“Her voice is just fire,” St. Vincent notes about the Chilean-Mexican artist. “It’s emotional. It’s pure. It has an edge. And I’m just very honored to get to be on the same track with.”
Part of the experience of learning and improving her Spanish also includes listening to music in that language, and in Portuguese, so St. Vincent’s Ibero-American playlist naturally includes Mon Laferte, but also artists such as Bomba Estéreo, Caetano Veloso and Rosalía, according to the artist.
Regarding the relationship between Latin America and Spain, St. Vincent points out that it has become closer. She confesses that Mexico is one of her favorite places to perform, but she also feels a great affection for her fans in South America, where next week she will play concerts in Chile, Argentina and Brazil, with former Sonic Youth bassist Kim Gordon as opening act.
“I just think what’s so incredible is just the way that people love music,” says Clark of her Latin followers. “It just feels so authentic and true. It just feels like music isn’t some other extra commodity. It’s like it is life itself. It is as essential as like food and air.”
Camila Cabello took to social media on Friday (May 23) to mark her hit single “Never Be the Same” joining the Spotify Billions Club. “Never be the same is my 4th song to hit a BILLION STREAMS !!!!!!!,” she wrote on Instagram alongside a video of her performing the opening track from 2018’s Camila on […]
Can house music on an opulent vessel for a private members club cut through the noise at the Cannes Film Festival?
This week, Billboard boarded a superyacht with Kismi, a new nightlife venture that bills itself as “a sonic sanctuary for music lovers,” and spoke with the event’s performers, Haitian producer Francis Mercier and German artist Marten Lou, to find out.
Amid its namesake film festival, Cannes attracts individuals of high net worth and influence and, with it, a host of splashy parties. Artists, celebrities, tastemakers and more tee up a tight schedule of appearances at exclusive premieres, gatherings, clubs and more, seduced by the spotlight and invitations to the hottest events. Among them was Kismi, a private, members-only experience soundtracked by the scene’s most current iterations of house music.
When guests exited their black cars at Port de Cannes on Wednesday (May 21), they were greeted with a stunning sight: the distant view of the city, with its lights breaking up the darkness, and the waves of the Mediterranean lapping against the spotless sides of Cannes’ famous lineup of yachts.
Just days before, this same ship saw a slew of celebrities who boarded for the afterparty of the premiere for A$AP Rocky’s new film Highest 2 Lowest, but this night was set to be far more discreet. “We’re not targeting everyone,” said Kismi chairman Paul Martino, a longtime tech entrepreneur who is also the managing general partner and co-founder of Bullpen Capital, a San Francisco-based venture capital fund. “Our members are stylists, founders, artists, collectors, tastemakers who care deeply about the details: the sound, the setting, the crowd. They’ve already seen what traditional nightlife looks like. They want something quieter, more elevated, and rooted in great music.”
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A general view of the “This Is It Yacht” during KISMI founder Christine Becker’s brand’s international debut aboard “This Is It Yacht” during the Cannes Film Festival, with special performances by Marten Lou and Francis Mercier on May 21, 2025 in Cannes, France.
Hoda Davaine/Getty Images for Kismi
To wit, the lineup for the evening featured headliner Francis Mercier, the steadily rising Afro house producer who’s been making his name on the global circuit from Coachella to Burning Man to Ibiza, where he’s launching a residency this summer at Club Chinois. The night’s opener was Marten Lou, who is German-born but residing in Paris and who shared his Euro-forward interpretation of the genre, along with German favorite Jan Blomqvist, who appeared for a surprise set and skillfully layered his vocals over his moody and melodic signature sound.
Mercier shared his excitement for bringing his set to a smaller crowd than he normally plays for. “You get a bit of every culture closer to you. You get a sense of the wider European energy, in the sense that during Cannes Film Festival, there’s a lot of internationals from Italy, a lot of internationals from East Europe, a lot of internationals from France, from the U.S. and whatnot,” he told Billboard, motioning to the surroundings. “So at the end of the day, it gives me the capacity to really connect with people on a closer level.”
Mercier also commented on the current Afro house boom, which he’s a part of alongside a host of other acts who’ve made their name on the sound, turning it into a global trend and massive draw.
“I think right now, Afro house has become quite mainstream, where I would say a lot of artists have used the genre and its popularity to kind of infiltrate and kind of like commercialize it and Westernize it,” says Mercier. “But I think the authentic Afro house is gonna grow some more. I think the original Afro house artists are yet to gain stardom. I think it’s still underway.”
While Kismi keeps trends and individual talent in mind for bookings, founder Christine Becker insists that intuition is key. “Some of the artists we’ve booked happen to be at the edge of something bigger, but that’s not the reason I chose them. It’s usually instinct, when something feels honest and precise, I know it fits.” Previous Kismi event bookings by Becker include Hugel, Moojo and Keinemusik’s &ME.
As Lou, Blomqvist and Mercier went back-to-back, they gave a heartbeat to the event. Their rhythms swayed the partygoers on a dance floor that was small, but never packed to the point of discomfort. The guestlist included actors Ian Bohen (Yellowstone) and Tyler Hoechlin (Superman); reality TV personalities including Jason Oppenheim (Selling Sunset), Lenny Hochstein (The Real Housewives of Miami), and Porsha Williams (The Real Housewives of Atlanta); contemporary artists, directors, photographers, models and more; but the crowd felt both present and surprisingly egalitarian – especially when, with limited options, everyone waited together for the few available bathrooms.
Kismi’s Cannes party painted a picture of what’s to come – but what does the future hold for the event? “Growth for Kismi won’t look like expansion in the traditional sense. We’re focused on deepening the brand, not widening it,” Martino explained. “That means three to four core events a year in culturally significant locations, two off-calendar pop-ups, and a set of very specific brand and artist partnerships.”
The price tag to get into these parties run the gamut from $1,000 member’s guest tickets to $50,000 member tables, with Kismi also offering $100,000-plus membership tiers, which Martino calls “a way to be part of shaping that energy from the inside.”
As Kismi sets its eyes on a future of electronic music parties for the elite, the genre itself continues its own perpetual forward march. “Many people talk about, ‘Oh, now [House] is getting burned or it’s too commercial, it’s too big.’ I think that’s just natural development, you know?” Lou reflects. “I think that’s a great development and everyone has to adapt, develop new things, try to find new sounds.”
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