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Today would have been Juice WRLD’s 26th birthday and there’s no telling the heights he’d have taken his career to by now as one of his generation’s leaders and rap’s sui generis stars.
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There’s no perfect way to end Juice WRLD’s story but Grade A Productions CEO Brandon “Lil Bibby” Dickinson and Juice’s manager Peter Jideonwo approached the daunting task of putting a bow on the probable final studio album in the late rapper’s discography.
The long-awaited The Party Never Ends arrived on Black Friday (Nov. 29) — just days ahead of the fifth anniversary of Juice WRLD’s tragic passing (Dec. 8, 2019).
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“His legacy was decided from the first day to the last day,” Jideonwo tells Billboard. “Taking the negative and turning it into a positive. That’s the correlation to his music and the fan base he has, because he’s really been what 999 [his code for his overall lifestyle and message] stands for — which is helping people through depression and [helping] them see you’re not alone.”
Bibby and Jideonwo detailed the enduring process of digging through thousands of songs in different studio vaults and dealing with leakers, deciphering AI-generated tracks, navigating clearance issues, a rabid fan base demanding perfection and more leaks on the journey to The Party Never Ends.
“I wanted to close out the best way possible, and give the fans as much as they’re asking for,” Bibby adds. “A lot of the music been sad and I wanted to give them some type of uptempo, happy vibes to end it with.”
The duo wanted to honor Juice WRLD’s vision in various ways, like recruiting his favorite band (and fellow Illinois natives) Fall Out Boy for a rock-tinged “Best Friend” collaboration.
In the months before his death, Juice spent six figures on a private jet to meet Takashi Murakami, and they invited the Japanese contemporary artist to design the cover art for TPNE, which also drew backlash from fans.
While this is being billed as the final album, the Grade A executives aren’t ruling out more music in the future, and even a project that could possibly be tied to a Juice WRLD movie.
Check out the rest of the interview with Bibby and Jideonwo as they detail The Party Never Ends, the future of Juice WRLD music, favorite studio stories and more.
Billboard: How important was it to nail this as the final album for Juice? How did you go about piecing the album together and executing that vision?
Lil Bibby: Trying to find the right music is tough, because the fans leak them songs every f–king day. So it’s just going to the vault and finding some smashes the fans haven’t heard. It’s been kind of difficult. Every time I find a list of songs and they get to leaking those. The ones I find I gotta keep secure.
What does that entail? Is there a folder of Juice’s songs that you and a select number of people have access to?
Bibby: Nah, it’s the craziest s–t because he recorded in a lot of different places. He recorded a lot of his music with this one engineer Max Lord. I had to go pull up on Max and go through his vault, which — 90-something percent of it is leaked. I had to pick the best songs that weren’t leaked and go to other people. Everybody hitting me, “Oh, I got some songs that aren’t leaked.” I gotta pick through everybody’s s–t. A lot of the time they be leaked.
Has anyone hit you with AI tracks?
Peter Jideonwo: We’ve had a lot of AI. They will hear a snippet of a record and they’ll go finish it with AI and send it back like, “We got an unreleased song y’all need to put out.” The stuff is so good at this point you don’t even know, because Juice recorded so many places and studios. He was a studio whore everywhere he went. Last week, we had a studio say, “Somebody broke in trying to steal our hard drives for Juice WRLD’s music.”
The one particular AI memory is Adin Ross. This dude was sending us all the biggest songs and some we were looking for that snippets were out — and when we got them we were like, “Finally, we got the songs.” Then we listened to them and looked at each other and Bibby was like, “This is AI.” A lot of times, it’s the fans in leak culture paying $30,000 or $40,000 for a leak. These kids are paying money and they don’t even know if they’re getting a real song.
Do you guys have to litigate that and crack down on it? I’m assuming in the future you don’t want any part of Juice’s vocals being used.
Jideonwo: It’s hard because the internet is the wild, wild west. I can go to a public library and log into one of these AI sites and drag a 40-minute Juice WRLD interview and put another song on top of that and say, “Hey, make a song with this voice.” Then I could put it on Twitter and tag 10 Juice WRLD pages and say, “New Juice WRLD leak!” They’re gonna run it up. You don’t know where it comes from. It’s so many different parties doing it that you’ll be on the rat chase, and it’s a waste of money trying to find where it’s coming from.
How did you want to stay true to Juice’s vision — and did he ever say anything about a last album?
Jideonwo: I don’t think he ever came and said, “This is what I want my last project to be.” Juice was 21, so we never had those discussions. The quantity of music Juice made, he might be disappointed that this is his last project, to be honest.
Bibby: Just trying to remember some of the songs that he was most excited about — “Pills in the Regal.” A lot of the ones he made Instagram Lives too were ones he was most excited about. Giving them enough songs that were unleaked also.
Is it tough to finish certain records?
Bibby: It’s super tough, because Juice’s fans — once they hear a song, they want it to be the exact way they heard it. Even if you go in and mix or master it. A lot of times they hear a raw untouched song and they don’t realize it was gonna get mixed and mastered anyway.
Jideonwo: I think another way we did what Juice would’ve wanted, for example: the Murakami cover. Prior to Juice passing, a month or two before, in between his tour in Australia he booked a private jet for $200,000 and went and met Murakami. His goal was always to work with Murakami in any capacity. After he passed, we made it a priority to make sure Murakami had something to do with the final album, because it was that important to [Juice] when he was alive. He expressed his vision to him. Murakami’s just not out here doing album covers. We tried to do things like that he would’ve loved, to keep his legacy alive and aligned with what he’d want to do.
Hitting on the cover art, I saw a lot of backlash to it on social media. Was there anything you guys saw and thought to change it at all?
Bibby: Yeah, I saw a lot of the backlash, but Murakami did what he does. Can’t nobody tell him what to do with his art. A lot of fans said they didn’t like the cover. I think it’s okay. It gives me that feeling when Elon Musk released his Cybertruck and the same week Kanye did his dad shoes. People hated them at first then they grew to really like it. I hated how those shoes looked, but I ended up buying two pairs.
Jideonwo: With this album, there’s been so many leaks, and I think the universe formed a committee of leakers that were targeting the project from the cover to the songs to the Fortnite. When the original cover leaked, it was very low-definition. The first leak came from a phone screen. The fans were like, “I don’t like this. It’s not that good.” That started a trend. The environment we live in, nobody thinks for themselves anymore.
I think there’s a difference from the fans not liking it to somebody big saying, “Oh, this is fire.” If an HD one came out first and one of the big guys said, “This is the [most fire] s–t I ever seen.” They would’ve jumped on the bandwagon. I think all promo is good promo. A piece of art by Murakami lasts forever and I think in the long run it’s going to be very appreciated and be part of both fo their stories which makes it legendary.
How’d you secure the Em feature?
Jideonwo: Em has always been a longtime collaborator for Juice. They did “Godzilla” together. He’s always publicly acknowledged Juice. I think Em really cared about Juice. Bibby reached out and he said, “Whatever little bro wants, I’m gonna do it.”
I look at Em as someone who’s so hard to get into contact with and he’s just not gonna hop on any record.
Bibby: I wanted him on a few different records, but he was adamant on doing that one. He didn’t want to glorify the drugs and stuff. It’s tough [to get into contact with him] but we know some mutual people so it’s easier for me I guess.
Goodbye and Good Riddance had its biggest streaming day last week in nearly five years. What about that project has connected so well all these years later?
Peter Jideonwo: We put that in the category of classic. A perfectly put together album. That’s gonna span for generations. That’s like Michael Jackson’s Thriller. Juice is really Michael Jackson. That’s the Thriller of this generation. It’s gonna keep getting played and every five or 10 years it’s gonna have these moments where it’s spiking.
With this being the last album, is there any chance there could be guest verses or singles used in the future? Maybe something pops up on a soundtrack or is the pop kind of completely closed after this project?
Bibby: I think I want to get into making a movie. [An album] could probably be a soundtrack to the movie.
You mean like a Juice WRLD biopic movie, and his music would kind of soundtrack that?
Bibby: Yeah, I think we could probably put out a greatest hits album or something. As far as a studio album, I don’t know if I could keep [going]. I feel like it’s cheating. I don’t know if that’s the right word for it.
Jideonwo: If the right opportunity presents itself, you might see Juice here and there. It’s so crazy — I think what Bibby was trying to say was, what Juice is able to do five years later is almost unheard of. It should be almost impossible, that five years later with no promotion from the artist himself… That’s why Bibby says it’s cheating. Like, why not put out another project when the fans want it? This is too easy at this point.
Bibby: I wouldn’t say easy — it’s not fair. If I see crazy-enough engagement and they really, really want another one then maybe. I just don’t feel like it’s right to keep doing it.
It’s such a delicate situation — how do you make sure posthumous releases are done tastefully rather than feeling exploitative?
Bibby: I try to look at everything the fans are talking about. Juice’s mom always says, “What’s the meaning behind it?” Before I put out anything, I gotta think, “What is the meaning?” That’s what she would always say. So before we release something, it’s gotta mean something to me. Then I gotta come up with an idea and I gotta feel good about it.
Jideonwo: People are gonna say what they want regardless. They’re free to comment. I think we’ve done a good job. As far as tastefully, we haven’t overdone it where it’s OD. We’ve never sold a Juice WRLD verse to anybody. We’ve always tried to keep the integrity of the music. We’ve gone as far as keeping it tasteful where we haven’t put a random artist on a song just because. We try to keep everything in the ecosystem of people Juice looked up to or who he worked with in the past.
That’s how we keep the integrity of it. We haven’t chased numbers or the extras other people might do to make it something it’s not. I think Juice’s catalog has been treated pretty well. Even going back to what his mom does with the foundation and the charity and helping people with a mental health awareness program. We’ve tried to do the best job we can to keep his name in a good light.
Do you remember a time you were most impressed with Juice in the studio?
Bibby: The first day I saw him record it was crazy. It was me, my brother, G Herbo, Southside, Max Lord and his A&R Dash [Sherrod]. I saw him rap through the entire beat. I’m just listening, and when people freestyle they just say anything. But everything Juice was saying made perfect sense. He came out the booth and Herbo was like, “You gotta do this.”
He looked at me and I go, “I can’t tell you s–t! It sound like you been doing this longer than me. How long you been rapping?” I just knew that was some alien s–t. I was the only one freaking out when I heard that s–t. As soon as I heard him do it, I just never saw nobody do that. I spent a lot of time behind the microphone and I never saw nobody do no s–t like that. That s–t was insane.
What is yacht rock? In the new HBO movie, Yacht Rock: A Dockumentary, no one can agree on a definition.
For the comedian Fred Armisen, yacht rock is “a very relaxing feeling.” But for the writer Rob Tannenbaum, yacht rock is a space where singers “could declare not just your sensitivity but your torment at how sensitive you are, your sense of being ravaged by having feelings.” He calls this “fairly unique to yacht rock,” which would be true if soul music did not exist.
How about another, more specific, definition: “One way to know if you’re listening to yacht rock is [if you hear] the sound of Michael McDonald’s voice,” according to Alex Pappademas, author of Quantum Criminals: Ramblers, Wild Gamblers, and Other Sole Survivors From the Songs of Steely Dan. Then again, David Pack, lead singer of the band Ambrosia, calls McDonald’s style “progressive R&B pop,” while Questlove describes yacht rock as “utility more than it is music.”
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This all begs the question: If yacht rock is such a vague label, what makes it worth using?
J.D. Ryznar and Steve Huey helped coin this imprecise term in their 2005 mockumentary series Yacht Rock, long after the music it attempted to brand was out of style. Each episode traced the activities of goofy, fictionalized versions of McDonald, his contemporaries, and his collaborators — Hall & Oates love to dunk on “smooth music,” while Kenny Loggins’ character says pompous things like, “when a friend is drowning in a sea of sadness, you don’t just toss them a life vest, you swim one over to them.”
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As the yacht rock label caught on, it gave a set of younger listeners a way to explore and maybe embrace — even if ironically — music that had become a kind of cultural shorthand for uncool, the target of mainstream jibes in Family Guy and The 40-Year-Old Virgin. “For a long time, I thought Steely Dan, man, that’s just music for dorks and weirdos,” the critic Amanda Petrusich says in A Dockumentary. “You come to it jokingly,” Pappademas adds, discussing yacht rock. “But then you suddenly find yourself appreciating it sincerely.”
As yacht rock DJ nights and streaming playlists proliferated, this elevated the artists most closely associated with the style, helping to extend their careers. “I fully expected to be totally forgotten by the end of the 1980s,” McDonald says in A Dockumentary. Instead, the film shows him and Loggins collaborating with the bass virtuoso Thundercat in 2017 and performing at Coachella — one of the world’s most prominent stages.
That said: While the yacht rock label gave some artists a boost, it actually masks the lineage of the music it purports to describe. It serves as camouflage, rather than providing clarity.
Most notably, the term obscures the sizable debt that these records owe to contemporaneous Black music. Many of the tracks associated with the style are steeped in the language of 1970s R&B, conversant with Marvin Gaye‘s intricate, tortured funk, immaculate Quincy Jones productions, and the airy, wrenching ballads Earth, Wind & Fire and the Isley Brothers scattered like birdseed across the second half of the Seventies.
The dialog was facilitated by session musicians who moved easily between worlds. Chuck Rainey played bass with Steely Dan but also appeared on Gaye’s I Want You and Cheryl Lynn’s Cheryl Lynn. Greg Phillinganes handled keyboards for McDonald and Leo Sayer as well as Michael Jackson and Stevie Wonder. Horn player and arranger Jerry Hey hopped from Boz Scaggs and Michael Franks to Teena Marie and Janet Jackson.
A Dockumentary nods to yacht rock’s lineage. “Yacht rock is associated with white groups and white songwriters and producers, but I know more Black yacht rock than I do traditional yacht rock,” Questlove says, pointing to Al Jarreau, the Pointer Sisters’ “Slow Hand,” and George Benson’s “Turn Your Love Around.” That music doesn’t get much play in the typical yacht rock conversation, though — or in A Dockumentary.
What does it mean that one of the strands of white music that was most in touch with the Black music of the 1970s was reclaimed largely as a joke, even if it’s an affectionate one? Armisen believes that “there’s nothing greater, in a way, for any genre to be joked about, because it means that it’s relevant.”
This may be a sensible perspective for a comedian. It’s not surprising, though, that the subjects of the wisecracks don’t always feel the same way. “At first, I felt a little insulted, like we were being made fun of,” says Loggins. “But I began to see that it was also a kind of ass-backwards way to honor us.”
Unlike Loggins, Steely Dan’s Donald Fagen hasn’t reached this stage of acceptance. When the documentary’s director asked him about yacht rock, Fagen cursed at him and hung up the phone, an exchange that was recorded and included in the film. Steely Dan’s longtime producer Gary Katz expressed a similar disinterest in the yacht rock label — albeit using less-colorful language — this summer during an interview with the music manager Scott Barkham in Brooklyn Bridge Park.
It’s not unusual for artists to express hostility towards genre terms. In fact, they are constantly saying they don’t want to be “pigeonholed” or “put in a box.” When the critic Kelefa Sanneh published Major Labels, a book-length defense of musical genre, in 2021, he wrote that artists “hate being labeled. And they think more about the rules they break than about the ones they follow.”
There is certainly a case to be made against the whole idea of summing up a large body of art in a word or two. The result is, all too often, genre descriptors that are either all-encompassingly vague or simply inaccurate. Some labels, however, are at least fairly neutral — “post-punk,” “house music.” Some, on the other hand, have negative connotations, if they’re not downright sneering at the songs they claim to describe: Take “bro country” or “PBR&B.”
As A Dockumentary makes clear, “yacht rock” still reliably elicits chuckles. But even if that humor helped these musicians gain younger followers, it often runs contrary to the tone and themes of their songs. “The term emerged from what was essentially a comedy show,” which had “a really big impact on the way that the music is now ironically appreciated,” Petrusich points out. However, “the records that [these artists] were making were entirely sincere.”
Can those records — and the artists behind them — ever be taken seriously if they’re still being laughed at? Loggins is a surprisingly versatile songwriter with a sinuous delivery and a knack for unpredictable funk. McDonald’s voice stood out even during a time when commanding voices were ubiquitous; songs like “You Belong to Me” and “I Keep Forgettin’ (Every Time You’re Near)” are essential contributions to the soul canon. But when these acts are lumped into yacht rock, they are relegated to the minor leagues, stuck as purveyors of slick chill-out music for the aging and affluent.
“I’ve made peace with ‘yacht rock,’ but for the first few years, I just hated it,” Pack says in A Dockumentary. “I’m like, ‘Why did they pick our generation to make all of our music into a big joke?’”
Selena Gomez is cheering on Benny Blanco after the producer added a sexy new title to his already packed resume. In an interview with CBS Sunday Morning, the singer-actress gushed about People naming her boyfriend — whom she’s been dating since summer 2023 — one of 2024’s Sexiest Men Alive in a lineup that also […]
Many rappers have been the beneficiaries of the Drake stimulus package over the years, and Jay-Z believed J. Cole needed to align himself in that camp and get on the receiving end of a hit record with the 6 God. During a recent episode of Cole’s Inevitable audio series, the Dreamville boss and his manager […]
SEVENTEEN and Teddy Swims are the first performers announced for the 2024 Billboard Music Awards. Hosted by actress and comedian Michelle Buteau, the 2024 BBMAs presented by Marriott Bonvoy is set to air on Thursday, Dec. 12, at 8 p.m. ET/PT on FOX and Fire TV Channels, and on-demand on Paramount+, with performances also rolling out across Billboard.com, and via BBMAs and Billboard social channels.
Both artists have impacted the Billboard charts this year. Swims’ “Lose Control” topped the Billboard Hot 100 in March. His follow-up, “The Door,” reached No. 24 in October. His debut album, I’ve Tried Everything But Therapy (Part 1), reached No. 17 on the Billboard 200 in May. (Part 2 is due in late January.) SEVENTEEN has had six top 10 albums on the Billboard 200 since mid-2022. The K-pop group reached No. 1 on Billboard’s Artist 100 chart in May 2023.
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Both artists are finalists for BBMAs this year. SEVENTEEN is a finalist for top K-pop touring artist. Swims is a finalist for eight awards — top new artist, top song sales artist, top Hot 100 song, top streaming song, top radio song, top selling song, top Billboard Global 200 song, top Billboard Global (excl. U.S.) song
As previously announced, Zach Bryan, Taylor Swift, Morgan Wallen and Sabrina Carpenter are the leading finalists for the 2024 Billboard Music Awards.
This marks the show’s return to FOX, which carried the show from its 1990 inaugural broadcast through 2006. In addition, Paramount+ will provide on-demand streaming of the show, while the free Fire TV Channels app will provide one-click access to fans using Amazon devices (Fire TV smart TVs and streaming media players and Fire Tablets).
The BBMAs will celebrate music’s greatest achievements with exclusive original performances, artist interviews, and award celebrations taking place from global locations and in the midst of sold-out tours. Shaboozey will deliver a special performance from W Hollywood, part of the Marriott Bonvoy portfolio. Additional performers and special guests will be announced soon.
The BBMAs honors the year’s biggest artists, albums, songs, producers and songwriters across multiple genres, as determined by year-end performance metrics on the Billboard charts. The eligibility dates for this year’s awards are aligned with Billboard’s Year-End Charts tracking period, which measures music consumption from the charts dated Oct. 28, 2023, through Oct. 19, 2024.
The Billboard Music Awards are produced by dick clark productions, which is owned by MRC. MRC and Penske Media are co-parent companies of Billboard.
The show is presented by Marriott Bonvoy, Marriott International’s travel program and portfolio of more than 30 hotel brands. For more information, visit MarriottBonvoy.com
Camila Cabello knows C,XOXO wasn’t her most universally beloved album, but she’s choosing to take her cues from where it counts: namely, personal heroes Taylor Swift and Beyoncé.
In a new Nylon cover story published Monday (Dec. 2), the 27-year-old “I Luv It” singer opened up about how the Eras Tour headliner and “Break My Soul” singer’s validation of her work sustained her when she felt like most people “misunderstood” her latest LP. “Oh, f–k, now I’m going to sound name-drop-y,” she told the publication. “But Beyoncé told me she loved my album, OK? That’s the gold star.”
“And I walked away fully, like, tears brimming in my eyes,” Cabello continued. “She’s somebody I’ve watched from my childhood. Her and Taylor saying nice things about the album really meant a lot to me. Anytime an artist that I respect has said something to me like, ‘Hey, I really love what you’re doing,’ it recharges my battery. A lot of the time I felt so misunderstood.”
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The Cinderella star went on to say that people were “questioning [her] authenticity” throughout the C,XOXO rollout, something she thinks could be “because I’ve always been such a good girl.” “Being in the industry made me build that harder shell and harder exterior,” she added. “Like Rihanna, Beyoncé, Taylor — this kind of bravado happens in their later work. It’s building an armor. My previous albums were more clean-cut.”
Cabello’s fourth studio solo album dropped in June, debuting at No. 13 on the Billboard 200. From the beginning of its rollout, some critics tore into the vocalist’s exploration of other genres on the record — particularly C,XOXO‘s hyper-pop sensibilities, which some people wrote off as Charli XCX copycatting.
Of the comparisons to the “Von Dutch” musician, Cabello said, “People ran with this thing before the album was even out.”
“[Charli’s] one of my favorite artists, you know?” she continued. “[But] I can tell that people saying this weren’t even listening to the music. They didn’t do the reading. They didn’t do the listening.”
The “Havana” artist also gave an update on where she stands with former Fifth Harmony bandmate Normani, with whom she reunited at Paris Fashion Week in September to fans’ absolute delight. “With space, we can go back and tap into that,” Cabello said. “The past couple of times I’ve seen her, I say something and she laughs really hard. It doesn’t feel like we’re strangers. We’re getting back to the times when we [were] really close.”
See Cabello on the cover of Nylon and photos from the shoot below.
Keep your hands off Kacey Musgraves. The singer called out a handsy fan who appeared to try to grab her arm and pull her in for a hug at her show in Tampa, FL at Amalie Arena on Friday, saying the incident almost got Texas serious. “Last night, this Tampa b–ch,” Musgraves said between songs […]
Beginning Monday (Dec. 2), SiriusXM’s Billboard Music Awards Channel spotlights the year’s biggest Billboard chart hits, serving as an all-inclusive soundtrack leading up to the 2024 Billboard Music Awards.
The Billboard Music Awards Channel will air on the SiriusXM App for a limited time. It will also play on The 10s Spot (channel 11) beginning Dec. 6.
The channel will highlight 2024 Billboard Music Awards finalists, including No. 1 hits from the 2024 Billboard chart year, spanning genres from pop, rock/alternative and R&B/hip-hop to country, Latin, dance/electronic and Christian.
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Zach Bryan, Taylor Swift, Morgan Wallen and Sabrina Carpenter are the leading finalists for the 2024 Billboard Music Awards. Hosted by actress and comedian Michelle Buteau, the 2024 BBMAs presented by Marriott Bonvoy are set to air on Thursday, Dec. 12, at 8 p.m. ET/PT on Fox and Fire TV Channels, and on-demand on Paramount+, with performances also rolling out across Billboard.com, and via BBMAs and Billboard social channels.
The BBMAs honor the year’s biggest artists, albums, songs, producers and songwriters across multiple genres, as determined by year-end performance metrics on the Billboard charts. The eligibility dates for this year’s awards are aligned with Billboard’s year-end charts tracking period, which measures music consumption from the charts dated Oct. 28, 2023, through Oct. 19, 2024.
The Billboard Music Awards Channel marks the latest partnership between SiriusXM and Billboard. Recent airings include the Billboard Top 500 Summer Hits Countdown, the Billboard Women of Pop Countdown, the Billboard #2 Countdown Channel and the Billboard Top 500 R&B Countdown. Additionally, SiriusXM’s Big 40 Countdown, on ’80s on 8, and the Back in the Day Replay, on ’90s on 9, are based on historical weekly Hot 100 charts, with other current and classic charts counted down on channels including ’70s on 7, Prime Country and TikTok Radio.
Elton John made it to the opening night of his new musical in London on Sunday night (Dec. 1), but the pop icon admitted that he could hear the show, but could not see any of it.
According to the Associated Press, John, 77, said he struggled to watch the stage debut of The Devil Wears Prada because, as he told the audience, “I haven’t been able to come to man of the previews because, as you know, I have lost my eyesight.”
John added, “So it’s hard for me to see it, but I love to hear it and, boy, it sounded good tonight.” The singer wrote the score for the stage musical based on the beloved 2006 movie about an eager young journalist (Anne Hathaway) trying to make her mark at a fashion magazine lorded over by an imperial, demanding editor (Meryl Streep).
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The London production at the Dominion Theatre stars Vanessa Williams as lacerating editor — memorably played by Streep in the film — Miranda Priestly, with music by John and lyrics by Shaina Taub and Mark Sonnenblick and a book by Kate Wetherhead. Sunday’s gala opening night was a fundraiser for the Elton John AIDS Foundation and featured an A-list crowd, including designer Donatella Versace and former Vogue editor Anna Wintour, the rumored inspiration for the Priestly character. The famously exacting fashion figurehead gave a typically tart-tongued assessment of the musical, referring to it as “entertaining.”
John recently told Good Morning America’s Robin Roberts that he suffered an eye infection this summer that has turned into a complete loss of vision in his right eye, which has impacted his ability to work on new music.
“I unfortunately lost my eye sight in my right eye in July because I had an infection in the South of France,” said John. “It’s been four months now since I haven’t been able to see. And my left eye is not the greatest.” John teased a new album last year, but now that project is up in the air as the manages his poor vision.
“There’s hope and encouragement that it will be okay,” John said. “But I’m kind of stuck in the moment, because I can do something like this, but going into the studio and recording… I don’t know. Because I can’t see a lyric, for start.” John’s most recent album was 2021’s Record Store Day reissue of a shelved late 1960s album Regimental Sgt. Zippo.
AC/DC will hit the road next spring for the veteran hard rock band’s first U.S. tour in nine years. The 2025 Power Up North American tour is slated to hit 13 stadiums across the nation from April 10 through May 28.
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The outing is slated to kick off on April 10 at U.S. Bank Stadium in Minneapolis, MN, before moving on to Arlington, TX, Pasadena (CA), Vancouver, Las Vegas, Detroit, Foxborough (MA), Pittsburgh, Landover (MD), Tampa, Nashville and Chicago before winding down on May 28 at Huntington Bank Field in Cleveland.
Tickets for the tour will go on sale on Friday (Dec. 6) here.
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The North American swing in support of the band’s 2020 Power Up album is an extension of the 2024 European leg of the tour, which also filled stadiums. The band’s current lineup includes longtime singer Brian Johnson, founding member and lead guitarist Angus Young, as well as rhythm guitarist Stevie Young (who officially joined the band in 2014, replacing his uncle Malcolm Young, who retired due to dementia), drummer Matt Laug (who joined in 2023, replacing longtime drummer Phil Rudd) and former Jane’s Addiction bassist Chris Chaney, who also came on board this year replacing longtime bassist Cliff Williams.
Check out the dates for AC/DC’s 2025 North American spring tour below:
April 10 — Minneapolis, MN @ US Bank Stadium
April 14 — Arlington, TX @ AT&T Stadium
April 18 — Pasadena, CA @ Rose Bowl
April 22 — Vancouver, BC @ BC Place
April 26 — Las Vegas, NV @ Allegiant Stadium
April 30 — Detroit, MI @ Ford Field
May 4 — Foxborough, MA @ Gillette Stadium
May 8 — Pittsburgh, PA @ Acrisure Stadium
May 12 — Landover, MD @ Northwest Stadium
May 16 — Tampa, FL @ Raymond James Stadium
May 20 — Nashville, TN @ Nissan Stadium
May 24 — Chicago, IL @ Soldier Field
May 28 — Cleveland, OH @ Huntington Bank Field