Music

02 Mar 2023

How to Watch All the Billboard Women in Music 2023 Performances

Billboard’s 2023 Women in Music event took over the YouTube Theater in Los Angeles on Wednesday (Mar. 1), and the night was filled with love, support and celebration for the music industry’s most impactful women.

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Beyond honoring the 2023 Woman of the Year SZA and her many accomplishments — including her 10th week at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 chart with her latest album, SOS — artists like Rosalía, Lana Del Rey, Kim Petras, TWICE, Lainey Wilson, Doechii, Becky G and Latto were also honored with their own awards at the ceremony. Rosalía was the event’s first-ever Producer of the Year, Lana Del Rey was the night’s Visionary, Kim Petras took home the Chartbreaker award, TWICE was the Breakthrough artist, Lainey Wilson was awarded the Rulebreaker honor, Doechii was honored as the Rising Star, Becky G accepted the Impact award and Latto was 2023’s Powerhouse.

Additionally, a number of the star-studded honorees took the stage to deliver some incredible performances and celebrate their achievements.

If you happened to miss out on the official Women in Music livestream or you’re hoping to relive some of the night’s musical moments, we’ve got you covered. See below for all of the 2023 Billboard Women in Music onstage performances.

TWICE

Kim Petras

Becky G

Latto

Doechii

Lainey Wilson

02 Mar 2023

Can The Weeknd & Ariana Grande Recapture Their Chart-Topping Magic With ‘Die for You’ Remix?

Welcome to Billboard Pro’s Trending Up newsletter, where we take a closer look at the songs, artists, curiosities and trends that have caught the music industry’s attention. Some have come out of nowhere, others have taken months to catch on, and all of them could become ubiquitous in the blink of a TikTok clip. 
 
This week: The Weeknd aims to score a Hot 100-topper with an Ariana Grande remix for the second time in the last two years, Selena Gomez’s social media back-and-forth leads to a surge of streaming support, a golden-age rap hitmaker sells a whole lot of discounted downloads, and loads more.

The Weeknd’s “Die For You” Surges in Streams as It Eyes Hot 100’s Top Spot 

Could the Ariana Grande-assisted remix of The Weeknd’s “Die For You” help the years-old song vaunt to No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100? The slow-burning single, originally released on 2016’s Starboy album, has exploded over the past few months and reached a No. 6 peak on the Hot 100, thanks to a TikTok revival which then crossed over to streaming and pop radio. The last time Grande hopped on a remixed Weeknd track — two years ago, with “Save Your Tears” — the juiced-up version from the two Republic labelmates sped straight to the top of the Hot 100, and now they’re hoping lightning can strike twice with “Die for You.” 

And so far, the remix has helped the song surge across different platforms: daily total streams for “Die for You” were up 269% from Feb. 23, the day before the Grande remix was released, to Feb. 24 — rising from 1.77 million U.S. on-demand streams to 6.55 million, according to Luminate. That daily streaming total dipped a bit in the days following the release, but by Monday, “Die for You” was still collecting over 4.25 million daily streams.  

Digital sales for the track also rose considerably thanks to Grande’s addition, from a negligible amount pre-mix to 3,600 last Friday. “Die For You” faces stiff competition near the top of the Hot 100, with Miley Cyrus’ “Flowers” and SZA’s “Kill Bill” entrenched in the top two spots for multiple weeks — but early returns suggest that The Weeknd and Grande will at least be tightening the competition on next week’s chart. – JASON LIPSHUTZ 

Team Selena: Internet Drama Helps Give Selena Gomez a Catalog Bump 

While she hasn’t released a new album since Rare in early 2020, and her 2022 solo single “My Mind & Me” came and went without making a huge impact, Selena Gomez is off to a promising start in 2023. Her “Calm Down” remix collaboration with Afrobeats star Rema has been scaling the Hot 100, breaking into the top 20 this week. And now, fans are flocking to her back catalog to show her support in the midst of a long-simmering celebrity conflict.  

The drama stems from Gomez’s relationship with Hailey Bieber, the model/influencer married to Justin Bieber, who was famously involved with Gomez in the early 2010s. Their recent online back-and-forth has involved a mix of subtweets, deleted TikToks, resurfaced old TV clips and other intrigue that you practically need a doctorate in 21st century pop social media to properly understand. But it’s gotten Gomez back in the headlines over the past week and has resulted in some of her best streaming numbers of the young year. 

Gomez’s catalog – not counting songs in which she’s a featured or co-lead artist, like “Calm Down” – racked up over 2.5 million official on-demand U.S. streams on Monday (Feb. 27). That’s up 26% from her Sunday total of 2 million, and up 52% from her 1.6 million total the previous Monday (Feb. 20). Combined with her recent crossover collab and the recently teased upcoming third season of her hit Hulu series Only Murders in the Building, it’s looking like a good 2023 so far for the veteran multi-platform star. — ANDREW UNTERBERGER 

Loc-ed After Discount: iTunes Pricing Spurs Massive Tone-Loc and Young MC Sales Gains 

With digital song sales an ever-shrinking part of the music marketplace in the 2020s, you might think it quaint that something as simple as an iTunes price discount could generate huge sales boosts for a catalog hit. But we see evidence of it still being a factor every year – and this week, it’s the driving force between an explosion in numbers for a trio of songs from late-’80s hitmakers Tone-Loc and Young MC.  

Loc’s singles “Funky Cold Medina” and “Wild Thing” and Young MC’s “Bust a Move” were prominently featured as part of an iTunes sale on classic hip-hop staples last week, with the songs discounted from their usual $1.29 price point to 69 cents. The three songs – all of which were co-penned by Young MC, a.k.a. Marvin Young – saw gigantic sales gains, jumping from negligible numbers for the track week ending Feb. 16 to multiple thousands on the week ending Feb. 23, according to Luminate.  

The biggest gainer was “Medina,” up 4,817% to 5,800, followed by “Move” (up 3,159% to 4,800) and “Wild” (up 3,712% to 3,900). The three songs all debut on Billboard’s Digital Song Sales chart this week, at No. 5, No. 8 and No. 12. Their totals might not be as robust as the best-selling songs of a decade ago, but it’s still an impact worth paying attention to – you don’t need to go too deep into the math to know that selling thousands of a song at 69 cents is worth a little more than selling hundreds at $1.29 — AU 

Tune Into TV Girl’s Latest Viral Smash 

If you’re not plugged into new-school social media or artist streaming totals, you might not know that indie-pop trio TV Girl are absolutely enormous online. The California group’s dreamy, harmony-heavy tunes didn’t make too much mainstream noise upon the release of 2014 debut French Exit and 2016 follow-up Who Really Cares, but some of the singles from those albums — like the lilting, strings-heavy “Lovers Rock”; the shuffling, percussive “Not Allowed”; and the whirring clap-along “Cigarettes out the Window” — have now earned hundreds of millions of streams each, adopted by TikTok users and used to turn the still-active group into unwitting stars. 

Next month, they’ll play Coachella, most likely to a massive crowd; over the past month, however, they’ve added another viral hit to their growing collection. “Blue Hair,” a gentle, cymbal-riding lullaby from TV Girl’s 2018 third album Death of a Party Girl, has taken off on TikTok in a sped-up version, with users zeroing in on the melancholy lyric “And I guess I’ll just miss her / Even though she isn’t even really gone”; the line is soundtracking sing-alongs, bedroom tours and, in one poignant case, a photo collage from a trans TikTok user demonstrating their personal evolution. 

However it’s being hoisted up, “Blue Hair” is now booming at streaming: its weekly U.S. official on-demand streams are now 20 times what they were a month ago, from 107,000 for the week ending Jan. 26 to 2.12 million for the week ending Feb. 23, according to Luminate. The band has never earned a Hot 100 hit over the course of their nearly decade-long run together — maybe they’ll have one by the time Coachella rolls around. — JL 

Metro Boomin’s Star-Studded “Trance” Goes Viral After Missing Verse Revealed 

There’ve been countless examples of a Drake feature helping a song take off on the charts over the past decade and a half, but Metro Boomin, Young Thug and Travis Scott’s “Trance” might be the first example of a song exploding partly for its lack of a Drake feature. After a verse Drake submitted for the Heroes and Villains track leaked in January, Metro went viral on TikTok for a clip of him explaining to an understandably incredulous DJ Drama why the biggest rapper in the game ended up on his cutting room floor (“It just really wasn’t no room”).  

“Trance” had originally debuted at No. 42 on the Hot 100 during Heroes’ release week, spending three weeks on the chart before falling off around the new year. But listeners perhaps had to hear (or re-listen to) the song that was so perfectly complete that its creator had to give Drake a thanks-but-no-thanks response for his belated contribution. Official on-demand U.S. streams for the song started climbing back up in February, rising from 3.1 million on the week ending Feb. 9 to 5.8 million the week ending Feb. 23. The song even re-entered the Hot 100 at No. 76 this week, proving even Drake’s negative presence on a song guarantees a positive chart impact. — AU 

Q&A: Kevin Meenan, Music Trends Manager at YouTube, on What’s Trending Up in His World 

Which music trends from the first two months of 2023 have stood out to you the most? 

Regional Mexican has really been top of mind in these first two months of the year, with the diverse sounds of the genre having really broken through. The impact of the genre on our charts can hardly be overstated – this week alone it is responsible for over 15 entries on our US Top Songs chart. The rise of Grupo Frontera has been particularly inspiring – just a year ago the group was getting their start by uploading covers directly to YouTube, and now they regularly are landing multiple songs in the upper echelons of our charts. Their Fuerza Regida collaboration “Bebe Dame” even spent two weeks at No. 1 for us in the U.S.  

Sonically speaking, Jersey Club’s latest brush with the mainstream has also proven to be an interesting space to watch, with varying levels of its influence taking form across the pop landscape. Both Lil Uzi Vert’s “Just Wanna Rock” and Coi Leray’s “Players” (DJ Smallz 732 – Jersey Club Remix) have proven to be inescapable on YouTube Shorts and beyond, and now PinkPantheress and Ice Spice’s more loosely Jersey Club-inspired “Boy’s a liar Pt. 2” is just taking the platform by storm. And finally, the continued global takeover of BZRP Music Sessions has been a real early 2023 bright spot. The Argentinian producer has long been a charts mainstay for us, but his latest feat – BZRP Music Sessions #53 with Shakira – really lived up to the “broke the internet” cliché. The video earned 54.3M views for us in under 24 hours, and reached No. 1 in 20 markets.  

Which trends do you think will define the rest of the year? 

In recent years, we have increasingly seen that a hit on YouTube can really come from any time and any place, and I expect this to continue to be a real throughline for us in 2023. It has just been a super exciting phenomenon, with fans getting exposed to sometimes unfamiliar sounds – a throwback like City Pop, or a modern melting pot like Drift Phonk – and finding their new favorite artist or musical inspiration in the process.  

And increasingly, we are seeing artists really learn how to lean into these moments, embracing the user-generated content that might have sparked a viral moment while engaging fans with their own new touchpoints – Shorts, visualizers, music videos and everything in between – that just add further fuel to the fire. I see this as a real defining theme of 2023, with entry points like Shorts continuing to break both new releases and unexpected material, and artists finding ways to really own that moment and narrative via their own content. 

Which of your 2023 initiatives have most effectively amplified these trends? 

To me, it is ultimately all about the platform itself and its continued evolution. With YouTube, artists are really in control of creating multiple touch points to tease out a new release, spark a trend or lean into a viral moment. There are just so many ways to share new music and connect with the fans, be it via Premieres, After Party, Community posts, Shorts, chat in a live stream or the traditional video drop. Shorts in particular is the area that excites me the most – looking forward to a growing feature set there that will help fans and artists connect in exciting ways. 

Fill in the blank: in terms of maximizing audience, more popular artists should be thinking about… 

Getting creative across video formats. We just continuously see artists find new fans and chart success when they enhance their releases in that way. Take NewJeans as an example, who fans have speculated are behind a mysterious channel that compliments the lore they created with a pair of creative music videos (side a and side b) for their track “Ditto” – which itself had multiple performance videos, behind-the-scenes clips and related Shorts. Each of these creates a new touchpoint for the rising K-pop stars to engage with their fans and keep them coming back for me. 

There is no one size-fits-all approach, so I would just encourage artists to experiment – engage with Shorts, host a Premiere, have fun with creative teasers and visualizers and continue to make a moment with the time-tested music video drop. – JL 

02 Mar 2023

Billy Joel’s Madison Square Garden Residency Crosses $200 Million Milestone

Billy Joel kicked off a residency at New York’s Madison Square Garden in 2014 with the intention of playing one show every month as long as demand dictates. Nine years later, the concerts are bigger than ever as he crosses another major milestone. Joel’s Valentine’s Day show marked the 87th concert of the residency, pushing the entire run’s earnings past the $200 million milestone.

According to figures reported to Billboard Boxscore, Billy Joel at The Garden has grossed $201.5 million and sold 1.6 million tickets. That dates back to Jan. 27, 2014, running monthly, without break, through February 2020 before pausing for obvious reasons. The residency resumed in November 2021.

And even prior to the residency beginning, Joel had reported 28 shows at MSG in the decades prior, adding up to $32.6 million to his career venue total. On top of that, there was a pair of co-headline dates with Elton John for another $4.3 million.

Joel’s plan has been to play until these shows stop selling out, and sell out they have. Scaling and attendance has barely budged among all 87 shows so far, ranging from 17,900 to 18,800, or a differentiation of less than 5%.

But despite its humble beginnings as a sold-out arena residency, there has still been room for growth. Gross per show kicked off with $1.973 million on Jan. 27, 2014, and has stretched beyond $3 million for Joel’s first two shows of 2023.

Cheap seats for Joel’s shows started off at $59.50, and nearly a decade later, fans can still find tickets for almost the same price, having nudged up to $63.50 for the ’23 dates. But the range of ticket scaling has become more elastic, with top-tier prices growing from $119.50 to $159.50.

Year-to-year ticket prices and grosses were typically increasing between four and eight percent – until now. A post-pandemic surge of demand paired with new industry-standard practices of platinum ticketing and dynamic pricing has produced the sharpest one-year uptick since the residency began. After average grosses climbed by 5% in 2021 and 4% in 2022, the early ’23 shows are up by 14%, jumping from $2.7 million per show to $3.1 million.

The two 2023 shows of Joel’s residency are the highest grossing dates of the run so far. Concerts are scheduled, once a month, through August, with more likely to follow. For those who don’t live in the New York Metropolitan area, catch him elsewhere throughout 2023, joined by Stevie Nicks.

In all, Billy Joel has earned $1.05 billion and sold 14.2 million tickets across his career, dating back to early Boxscore reports in 1986.

02 Mar 2023

Skrillex Scores Historic Week on Dance/Electronic Album & Song Charts

Skrillex secures two new top 10s, Quest for Fire (No. 2) and Don’t Get Too Close (No. 6), on Billboard’s Top Dance/Electronic Albums chart (dated March 4). Quest, released Feb. 17, earned 14,000 equivalent album units, and Don’t, which arrived the next day, tallied 6,000 units in the week ending Feb. 23, according to Luminate.

Since the chart began in 2001, Skrillex is only the fourth act to debut two albums in the top 10 in the same week. The others: Robyn, Depeche Mode and Björk. Robyn doubled up with Body Talk (No. 3) and EP Body Talk Pt 3 (No. 7) on Dec. 11, 2010; Depeche Mode, with Remixes 81-04 [Limited] (No. 1) and Remixes 81-04 (No. 2) on Nov. 13, 2004; and Björk, with Greatest Hits (No. 2) and Family Tree (No. 6) on Nov. 23, 2002.

Skrillex, therefore, becomes the first act to debut two all-new full-length studio albums in the chart’s top 10 in the same week.

The new titles are Skrillex’s sixth and seventh Top Dance/Electronic Albums top 10s, a run that began in 2011 with EPs Scary Monsters and Nice Sprites (No. 3), More Monsters and Sprites (No. 5) and continued with three No. 1s: EP Bangarang (10 weeks on top, 2012), Recess (five, 2014) and Skrillex and Diplo Present Jack Ü, with Diplo (three, 2015).

Meanwhile, tracks from Quest and Don’t account for a sprawl of Skrillex activity on the multimetric Hot Dance/Electronic Songs chart, where he holds 20 of the tally’s 50 spots, including 14 debuts from the two LPs. The 20 titles mark a new one-week record for any act, surpassing the 16 that Kygo charted on the June 13, 2020, survey.

Skrillex has logged 55 career charted titles, the third most among all acts dating to the chart’s January 2013 inception, after David Guetta (74) and Kygo (61). Skrillex has six top 10s, including one leader, “Where Are Ü Now,” with Diplo and Justin Bieber (two weeks in charge, 2015).

Of Skrillex’s 14 Hot Dance/Electronic Songs debuts on the latest list, none comes in higher than his collab with Missy Elliott and Mr. Oizo, “RATATA” (No. 14). Elliott’s second entry and Oizo’s first, the song racked up 2.6 million U.S. streams and sold 1,500 downloads, also good for beginnings on Dance/Electronic Digital Song Sales (No. 4) and Dance/Electronic Streaming Songs (No. 18).

Other Skrillex Hot Dance/Electronic Songs highlights include his team-ups with Bobby Raps (who earns his first two entries): “Leave Me Like This” leaps 41-18, with 1.3 million streams, up 313% (nearing the track’s No. 15 high, achieved upon its Feb. 4 debut), and conversely in theme, “Don’t Leave Me Like This,” new at No. 48.

Plus, Skrillex reunites with Bieber on “Don’t Go,” also with Don Toliver, No. 43 (627,000 streams). The track gives Bieber his sixth appearance and first in almost six years, since “2U” (billed as by Guetta featuring Bieber; No. 4, 2017).

‘Trustfall’ Rises

Additionally on Hot Dance/Electronic Songs, P!nk returns to the top 10 with “Trustfall” (13-7, a new best). The track, which became her first top 10 upon its debut (No. 8, Feb. 11), surges as P!nk’s album of the same name starts at No. 1 on Top Album Sales and No. 2 on the Billboard 200.

“Trustfall” totaled 4.2 million streams (up 11%), 1.5 million radio airplay audience impressions (up 752%) and sold 5,000 downloads (up 81%) Feb. 17-23. It returns for a second week atop Dance/Electronic Digital Song Sales (7-1) and debuts at No. 94 on the Billboard Hot 100, where it’s her 36th career hit.

‘Escapism’ Found in Top 10

Redirecting to the Dance/Mix Show Airplay chart, RAYE rolls to her sixth top 10 with “Escapism,” featuring 070 Shake, who earns her first (13-10). The pop release, remixed by dEVOLVE and others, is receiving core-dance airplay on supporters including SiriusXM’s Diplo’s Revolution, KNHC (C89.5) Seattle and WCPY (Dance Factory FM) Chicago. (The Dance/Mix Show Airplay chart measures radio airplay on a select group of full-time dance stations, along with plays during mix shows on around 70 top 40-formatted reporters.)

02 Mar 2023

Which Was Your Favorite Performance at Billboard Women in Music 2023? Vote!

Billboard‘s 2023 Women in Music event took place at the YouTube Theater in Los Angeles on Wednesday (March 1), and brought out the several of the biggest and brightest stars who have cemented their impact within the music industry over the past year. In between acceptance speeches — Lana Del Rey, SZA, Rosalía were among the few to go home with an award — attendees were treated to performances from TWICE, Becky G, Kim Petras and more, but which was your favorite?

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After receiving the Breakthrough Artist Award, the K-pop stars delivered a stunning showcase of its second-ever English single, “Moonlight Sunrise,” expertly performing the track’s choreography in unison, much to the delight of ONCEs in the audience.

Becky G, recipient of the Impact Award, took to the stage to perform a solo rendition of her Karol G collab “Mamiii,” backed by a guitarist, percussionist and two backing vocalists. “Lo que no sirve, que no estorbe/ Te metiste autogol por torpe/ Te quedó grande este torque/ Ya no estoy pa que de mí te enamores, baby/ Sin visa ni pasaporte/ Mandé tu falso amor de vacaciones,” she sang in Spanish.

Kim Petras, who used her Chartbreaker Award acceptance speech to plead for women’s body autonomy, performed her recently released dark-pop banger “brrr” under a blanket of billowing fog.

Doechii, Latto and Lainey Wilson also graced the stage for Women in Music, but which performance was your favorite? Vote in our poll below.

02 Mar 2023

Beyonce, Billie Eilish & More Women Who Hold Awards Show Records

In honor of Women’s History Month, let’s look at records that women have set at awards shows. These aren’t simply instances of the first woman to do this or that; these are cases where a woman holds a record that isn’t gender-specific.

In some cases, women are absolutely crushing it in a particular category. Billie Eilish set a record in 2020 as the youngest person to win the Grammy for album of the year. She was just 18 when she won for When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go? The old record was held by Taylor Swift, who was 20 when she won for Fearless. Before that, it was held by Alanis Morissette, who was 21 when she won for Jagged Little Pill. And before that it was held by Barbra Streisand who was 22 when she won for The Barbra Streisand Album. Between them, these four women have held this record continuously since Streisand first set it in May 1964.

The all-time youngest winners in the three other Big Four Grammy categories are also women. Eilish is the youngest winner for record of the year, for “Bad Guy.” Lorde, 17 at the time, was the youngest winner for song of the year, for “Royals.” LeAnn Rimes, just 14 at the time, was the youngest winner for best new artist.

A total of 14 artists have received Grammy nominations in each of the Big Four categories — album, record and song of the year, plus best new artist — in the same calendar year. A whopping ten of those artists have been women, from Bobbie Gentry (1967) to Olivia Rodrigo (2021).

Women also rule at the MTV Video Music Awards. The four artists who have won the most Moon Persons (it still doesn’t roll off the tongue as easily as Moonman, does it?) are all women – Beyoncé (27), Madonna (20), Lady Gaga (18) and Swift (14).

In the history of the Academy Awards, just four people have been nominated for Oscars for acting and songwriting in the same year. Three are women: Mary J. Blige, Lady Gaga and Cynthia Erivo.

Here are 20 more awards show records held by women:

02 Mar 2023

Ray J Calls Off His Divorce From Princess Love for a Third Time

Ray J and Princess Love Norwood have called off their divorce for the third time. According to Los Angeles Superior Court documents filed Wednesday (March 1) and obtained by Billboard, the “Sexy Can I” singer has moved to dismiss his petition to split from Princess Love, whom he married in 2016.

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The filing requests for the divorce petition to be dismissed without prejudice.

This marks the third time the couple, who both starred on Love & Hip Hop: Hollywood and share 4-year-old daughter Melody and 2-year-old son Epik, have walked back their divorce plans. Their latest reconciliation comes more than a year after Ray J filed in October 2021 to divorce the 38-year-old Prella Cosmetics founder, citing irreconcilable differences.

Billboard has reached out to Ray J for comment.

“HAD TO GET MY WIFE BACK AND START FRESH,” he wrote on Instagram in January. “I LOVE MY FAMILY!! Ill FIGHT OVER AND OVER FOR LIFE FOR MY FAMILY AND KIDS!!”

In February, he shared videos from his romantic Valentine’s Day celebrations with Norwood.

The couple’s divorce trilogy dates back to May 2020, when she first filed for divorce months after welcoming her second child with the 42-year-old R&B star. A couple months later, she asked for a dismissal of the filing.

Then in September that same year, Ray J filed to end the marriage, asking for joint custody of their two children at the time. The couple’s second split was called off in March 2021, with Ray J saying a month prior in an interview that he and Norwood “care for each other.”

“We’re just respecting each other as human beings, as parents,” he said at the time. “We’re in a great place and who knows what the future holds.” Just a few months later, though, Ray J filed the now-resolved third divorce request in October 2021.

02 Mar 2023

EMPIRE’s Afrobeats Writing Camp: Fireboy DML, Asake & Olamide Get Together in the Bay

It was just over 18 months ago that Fireboy DML released the record that would change his life.

But the song — “Peru,” which, aided by a remix with Ed Sheeran, would ultimately reach No. 53 on the Billboard Hot 100, No. 2 on the UK Official Singles Chart and No. 1 on U.S. Afrobeats Songs — was almost never released at all. Standing in the lounge of EMPIRE’s studio space in San Francisco, where he originally cut the record in 2021 (memorialized by the line “I’m in San Francisco jamming”), he’s explaining how, if it wasn’t for the enthusiasm of EMPIRE founder/CEO Ghazi pushing him to release the record, he might never have put it out due to his own perfectionism. (Which, as an EMPIRE staffer standing nearby points out, is due to him being an Aquarius.)

But four hours later, that alternate timeline where Fireboy’s single didn’t break through into the U.S. and help Afrobeats’ global takeover seems implausible, even absurd. Shortly after 10:00 p.m., Ghazi leads Fireboy into the studio’s white marble lobby, where two dozen EMPIRE employees, songwriters, producers and managers, as well as fellow Nigerian Afrobeats artists Asake and Olamide, the latter of whom also runs their YBNL record label, are waiting to surprise Fireboy with an RIAA plaque of platinum certification for “Peru.” After a short bow and a swig from a bottle of champagne, Fireboy gives in to the calls for a speech, thanking everyone in the room and calling the plaque the “perfect definition of success,” to a round of applause.

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The impromptu ceremony is the highlight of another day at EMPIRE’s afrobeats writing camp, which the Bay Area-based independent music company initiated last month to bring together some of its leading African artists to record together at the ever-evolving studio space near San Francisco’s Mission District. It’s a space that currently boasts three studios and a live room, but one that is still being developed. When it’s finished, some time this summer, it will include two more recording studios, a pair of podcast studios, a gaming room with a massive, 30-foot LED screen along one wall and a swimming pool in the back yard, in addition to the lounge (which will eventually become a theater space with Dolby Atmos sound), kitchen and dining room, all of which is outfitted with EMPIRE logos, custom lighting and specially designed sound systems, which Ghazi has overseen.

“We’ll literally be able to create pieces of content around all these verticals, and then this becomes a hub of where you gotta visit,” he says, giving a tour of the space earlier in the afternoon. “There’s gonna be no way around it. It’s going to create too much energy, it’s going to be impossible to overlook.”

The studio serves as the center of the writing camp, with Fireboy, Asake and Olamide the resident stars of the show. It hasn’t all been work since the three Nigerian artists got to the Bay — over the previous few days, they sat courtside at a Golden State Warriors game, went to wine country in the Napa Valley and took in the sights on a tour around the city. But each day, starting around 3:00 p.m., it’s back to the studio to get back to business, building on the momentum of recordings from previous days and channeling the creativity that comes from working in an environment designed to let them simply exist as artists, with few distractions.

For us, however, this particular Tuesday started out with oysters and clam chowder at Hog Island Oyster Bar on the water (Shrimpy is the hookup; if you know you know) before braving the spitting rain to head to a photo shoot for Fireboy and the shoe company Clarks, where he’ll be part of a campaign that will result in a concert in the metaverse down the line. (In addition to the regular photo shoot, Fireboy was tasked with filming things like catching a rolled up magazine, which will be transformed into a microphone in the digital realm.) The shoot had been in progress since 10am, but the afternoon started to wear on, so soon it was into a sprinter van and off to the studio, where Asake and Olamide are holed up in Studio B, looping a section of a track that Asake is workshopping, with Olamide over Asake’s shoulder reading lyrics off his phone.

Forty-five minutes later, Olamide was holding court outside around an electric fire pit, while two engineers — one of them multi-Grammy winning mix engineer Jaycen Joshua, who EMPIRE flew up from L.A. for the occasion — worked on the mix to Olamide’s next single in Studio A, tweaking drums to get the punch just right. The room was still under construction just days before, and was finished just as the artists started to arrive in the city, having been rebuilt in just three weeks. In the lounge, Fireboy was talking about his new grill and his plans to dye his hair blue — while in the kitchen, a local chef, brought in to make okra soup, smoked mackerel, shrimp and garlic crabs and cornbread for the Nigerian contingent each night, was mid-cook, blasting Kevin Gates in the newly-remodeled space. But then it was back to work, with Asake and Fireboy disappearing into different studios, then swapping spaces a half hour later.

Shortly after 7:00, it was time to eat, with staff and crew at the long banquet tables and the artists sitting in the backyard, before EMPIRE’s regional head of West Africa, Mobolaji Kareem, brought a half-dozen of us into the live room to hear new Asake and Olamide records that the two have been working on over the past week. The songs are unmixed and only half done, he said, and I was the first non-EMPIRE person to hear them, and he danced through them and broke them down after each. We moved to Studio A — for the bigger speakers — to hear them again, as well as forthcoming records from Kizz Daniel, who is also working on his next release, albeit not in San Francisco at the moment. Eventually, EMPIRE’s senior vp of A&R Tina Davis kicked us out of Studio A — there was mixing to do, after all, and while listening to the records is exhilarating, there’s still work ahead.

Indeed, even as everyone gathers in the lobby for Fireboy’s plaque presentation, the celebration is short-lived; before long, Fireboy is back in Studio B, listening back to a song he had initially cut last night. It was after 10:00, but time hardly matters; the night before, they were in the studio until around 3 a.m., and the likelihood is that the evening will be trending in that direction again. But what comes of those late night hours will be the subject of another day, and another round of listening, tinkering and building, creating the next generation of records that will continue spreading the Afrobeats movement across the globe.

02 Mar 2023

Bad Bunny Scores Tenth Video to Hit 1 Billion Views on YouTube With ‘Soy Peor’

Bad Bunny has scored his tenth music video to hit one billion views on YouTube. One of Bunny’s earliest hits, 2016 trap anthem “Soy Peor” was one of the songs that helped put him on the map. The track — produced by the artist himself — peaked at No. 19 on Billboard‘s Hot Latin Songs chart.

The official visual for the song is Bunny’s tenth video as lead, featured artist, or collaborator to achieve this milestone. Elsewhere on YouTube, the chart-topping artist also has presence on the platform’s U.S. Top Songs chart thanks to the the swooning “Ojitos Lindos” video, which rises to No. 25 as “Titi Me Preguntó” takes No. 4 and his collaboration with Arcángel “La Jumpa” comes in at No. 81. Bad Bunny takes No. 2 on U.S. Top Artists and No. 5 on Global Top Artists. 

Since “Soy Peor,” Bunny has only catapulted to global success with albums YHLQMDLG, Las Que No Iban a Salir, El Último Tour del Mundo and Un Verano Sin Ti. The latter two of those debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard 200, making him the only artist to top the tally with a Spanish-language album — not once, but twice.

Most recently, Bunny’s Un Verano Sin Ti won the IFPI Global Album Award, becoming the first Latin artist to ever win an IFPI global award, according to the organization. The set spent a total of 13 non-consecutive weeks atop the Billboard 200 and became the first Spanish-language album to be nominated for album of the year at the Grammy Awards.

Revisit “Soy Peor” below.

02 Mar 2023

Wayne Shorter, Legendary Jazz Composer/Saxophonist, Dies at 89

Wayne Shorter, one of the most admired and singular American jazz composers and saxophonists of the modern era has died at 89. At press time no information was available about the cause of death, but a spokesperson for label Blue Note Records confirmed to Billboard that the 12-time Grammy winner had passed in Los Angeles on Thursday (March 2).

After brief runs with the Horace Silver Quintet and the Maynard Ferguson big band, Shorter’s career began in earnest in 1959 when he joined Art Blakey’s Jazz Messengers, a four-year tenure that found him graduating to musical director for the group while blossoming into a multi-faceted composer and master of the driving, hard bop sound.

“Visionary composer, saxophonist, visual artist, devout Buddhist, devoted husband, father and grandfather Wayne Shorter has embarked on a new journey as part of his extraordinary life – departing the earth as we know it in search of an abundance of new challenges and creative possibilities,” read a statement from a spokesperson for Shorter. “Always inquisitive and constantly exploring – ever the fearless and passionate innovator – Shorter was 89 years young and had just won his 13th Grammy Award in February.”

“Shorter was surrounded by his loving family at the time of his transition and is survived by his devoted wife Carolina, daughters Miyako and Mariana, and newly-born grandson, Max.  Most recently Wayne had been contemplating his next project, a Jazz ballet,” it continued.

He then moved on to a fruitful six-year run with jazz icon Miles Davis, first in his Quintet, where Shorter was able to stretch his musical wings and add layers to his already formidable talents, including on Davis’ landmark 1969 jazz fusion albums In a Silent Way and Bitches Brew.

A master on the tenor saxophone, by the time Shorter left the Davis orbit he had moved on to playing soprano sax in the 1970s and 80s with keyboardist Joe Zawinul, bassist Miroslav Vitous, percussionist Airto Moreira and drummer Alphonse Mouzon in the fusion supergroup Weather Report; other members of the group of the years included genre-defining jazz bassist Jaco Pastorious, beloved session drummers Steve Gadd and Omar Hakim and Sly and the Family Stone drummer Greg Errico.

Born on August 25, 1933 in Newark, N.J., Shorter studied music at New York University in the mid-1950s, developing a style influenced by such jazz pioneers as John Coltrane and Sonny Rollins. In addition to helping to pioneer the fusion movement — which encouraged improvisation and the folding in of rock, funk and R&B styles and the addition of electric guitars and keyboards — the deeply intellectual Shorter also released a series of beloved solo albums during his tenure with Davis.

Among those albums are Juju — which featured members of Coltrane’s quartet — and Speak No Evil — with some of his Davis bandmates — the latter considered by many jazz critics to be one of the finest examples of both Shorter’s compositional brilliance and a foundational text for students and lovers of the post-1950s jazz era.

In addition to his stints in those bands, Shorter also collaborated with folk icon Joni Mitchell on 10 albums, Brazilian composer/singer Milton Nascimento, fellow former Davis bandmember Carlos Santana (on 1980’s The Swing of Delight) and, in perhaps his most high-profile non-jazz collab, he played the extended solo on the title track to Steely Dan’s 1977 Aja album.

Shorter continued to record and perform into the 2000s, forming his “Footprints” acoustic quartet in 2000 with drummer Brian Blade, bassist John Patitucci and pianist Danilo Perez, with whom he released four live albums, including the 2006 Grammy-winning album Beyond the Sound Barrier. He also toured with the supergroup Mega Nova in 2016, which featured Santana and Hancock, as well as bassist Marcus Miller and drummer Cindy Blackman Santana.

In the statement, Shorter’s friend of six decades Hancock said, “Wayne Shorter, my best friend, left us with courage in his heart, love and compassion for all, and a seeking spirit for the eternal future. He was ready for his rebirth. As it is with every human being, he is irreplaceable and was able to reach the pinnacle of excellence as a saxophonist, composer, orchestrator, and recently, composer of the masterful opera ‘…Iphigenia’. I miss being around him and his special Wayne-isms but I carry his spirit within my heart always.”

After more than half a century on the road and in the studio, Shorter retired from performing in 2018 due to health issues. Over the course of his career, in addition to the dozen Grammy awards, Shorter received a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 2015, a Guggenheim Fellowship in 2016, the Polar Music Prize in 2017 and a Kennedy Center Honor in 2018.

Over his 70-year career, Shorter’s works were performed by a long list of orchestras and performers, including: the Chicago Symphony, Detroit Symphony, Lyon Symphony, National Polish Radio Symphonic Orchestra, Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, Prague Philharmonic and Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, as well as ensembles including soprano Renée Fleming and the Imani Winds; he also received commissions from the National, St. Louis and Nashville symphony orchestras, the Los Angeles Philharmonic, and the La Jolla Music Society.

Shorter released his final album, Emanon, in 2018.

Listen to Shorter’s “Footprints” below.