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As September wraps up, the new music from today’s biggest stars continues to flow in.
To kick things off, Lady Gaga unveiled Harlequin, her new 13-track album themed after her character Harley Quinn from the upcoming film Joker: Folie à Deux. The album “celebrates a figure who thrives on danger, who lives for the undefinable, and who embraces the beautiful chaos of her own dreams,” according to a press release.
Meanwhile, The Weeknd teamed up with Playboi Carti for “Timeless,” the second official release ahead of The Weeknd’s Hurry Up Tomorrow album, which is the third and final installment of his After Hours/Dawn FM trilogy. The LP’s first single, “Dancing in the Flames” debuted at No. 14 on the Hot 100 this week on the chart dated Sept. 28.
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Stevie Nicks stood up to injustice with “The Lighthouse,” revealing that she “wrote this song a few months after Roe v. Wade was overturned” in June 2022. “It seemed like overnight, people were saying, ‘What can we, as a collective force, do about this…,’” she continued in her note. “For me, it was to write a song.”
Tommy Richman dropped his debut album Coyote, with songs including Elephant in the Room,” “Whitney,” “Temptations,” “Whisper in My Ear,” “Give It All,” “Tennessee” (with Trevor Spitta and Zachary Moon), “Thought You Were the One” and more.
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That’s only the beginning of these week’s awesome music drops, and we want to know your favorite. Check out our Friday Music Guide here, and let us know by voting here.
For the four devout Midwesterners that make up Minnesota indie pop-rock band Hippo Campus, touring through major cities like New York wasn’t always as comfortable as it is for them now more than 10 years into their careers — but they’ve always had their ways of coping.
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“I love coming here now,” 30-year-old guitarist Nathan Stocker tells Billboard backstage at the Bowery Ballroom in lower Manhattan, where he and his bandmates were hours away from performing an album-release show Tuesday (Sept. 24). “It used to scare me until I was well into the night, a couple beers deep, just chain smoking. And then it was like ‘Yeah, I love New York!’”
After years of heavy drinking on show nights, Stocker is sober now – and so is the rest of the band, for the most part. There’s still room for some balance; at one point in the show later that night, 29-year-old frontman Jake Luppen asks the crowd to send a shot of whisky to the stage, and when two arrive at the same time, he downs them both as 28-year-old bassist Zach Sutton shakes his head with gentle disapproval. But the quartet’s overall tamer approach to life on the road is just one of many things that’s different about the cult-favorite group in the age of their latest album, Flood, which dropped Sept. 20 via new label Psychic Hotline, having departed Grand Jury Records after their original record deal expired.
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Luppen and 29-year-old drummer Whistler Allen, for instance, both own homes back in their home state, and all four members are in committed relationships (Luppen got engaged over the summer). The group is far from the early 20-somethings who dropped Billboard 200-charting debut album Landmark in 2017 and slept on dirty van floors on tour, and even farther from the Saint Paul Conservatory for Performing Artists classmates who first started releasing music together in 2013. Now all pushing 30, Hippo Campus is finally coming out on the other side of years of growing pains, spawned by the natural push and pull of four people who’ve been best friends, bandmates and business partners for more than a decade.
Early in the writing sessions for Flood, they started going to therapy as a group to help parse the big questions – around the same time as which Stocker quit drinking – and a lot of that introspection bleeds into the 13 tracks on the finished product. On the thrashing ode to anxiety “Paranoid,” Luppen sings, “I wanna give this life all that I havе in me,” and on optimistic album closer “I Got Time,” he muses, “If this is as good as it gets I’ll be more than fine.”
But even as they were each evolving in their personal lives, they found that it was difficult to let go of the songs they were making in the two-year period between their last album, 2022’s LP3, and now. On a self-designated mission to make the best Hippo Campus record ever, they got stuck in an endless loop — writing more than 100 songs, recording them over and over, and arranging multiple versions of their fourth album just to scrap them soon afterward. They thought they might’ve cracked it last summer while on the road, until Luppen declared to the rest of the group that, again, it simply wasn’t good enough.
Realizing they couldn’t keep going as they had been, Hippo Campus left Minnesota to record yet another version of the album, this time at Sonic Ranch Studios in Tornillo, Tex. They set a 10-day deadline and, with the help of producers Caleb Wright and Brad Cook — and using everyone from Phoenix to Big Thief, Tom Petty and the Red Hot Chili Peppers as reference points — forced themselves to record their parts simultaneously as they would on stage. No listening back to takes. No repeated attempts. Only forward motion.
The result was a set of existential, self-conscious tracks with the same luminous energy and unpredictable melodies Hippo is known for, reinvigorated by the ease with which the analog instrumentation they adhered to in the studio translates to the stage. As much was evident at their New York show Tuesday night, where they played Flood front to back for a palpably excited audience that was already screaming along to the words of songs that had come out just four days prior. At one point, Luppen stops singing to cough — he recovered from COVID-19 last week, but not before having to cancel the band’s scheduled hometown release shows — but their passionate fans have no trouble taking over lead vocals in his place on anthemic single “Everything at Once.”
With touring serving as their main source of income, the group will stay on the road through February, playing theaters and auditoriums across North America and the U.K. along with one festival show in Bangkok. And their fans will follow. One 22-year-old listener, Abby, was camped outside the 9:00 p.m. Bowery performance since the early afternoon to get as close as possible to the stage for what would be her 52nd Hippo Campus show; the next day, she said she’d be traveling to Washington, D.C. to catch her 53rd.
“It’s so rad,” Luppen says of their fans’ devotion. “It always surprises me that anyone would be down to do that for us. That’s a big reason why we keep going, you know? Those people really believe in it, and that allows us to believe in it.”
Below, Billboard catches up with Stocker and Sutton backstage before their show at the Bowery — followed by Luppen and Allen on Zoom the next day – about growing up, ditching bad habits and the messy beauty of starting over:
What were your initial reactions to Jake saying you needed to scrap years of work and start over on Flood?
Sutton: He was the first to verbalize an emotion we were all feeling. We had to be honest about where we were in the process and where we wanted to go from there. But there was a lot of arguing about what to throw away.
Stocker: Jake’s expression of that concern is valid … once that’s brought to our attention, it’s our job to attend to it. But also, it’s like, “God dammit dude — can’t we just say goodbye to this thing and move on?”
Allen: I remember listening to it and feeling excited for the songs, but deep down, I was like, ‘It just needs to get mixed right or something.’ Which tends to be an excuse for something else that’s lacking.
What was missing?
Luppen: It just didn’t sound like we were having fun playing music. We went into the record wanting to make the best Hippo Campus record ever. It immediately put a lot of pressure on the thing. The stakes were so high that, personally, I was stressed out the entire time — second-guessing songs, second-guessing the performances.
Sutton: We were too zoomed in. We’d been chasing these 100 songs for a year in a half. We were like, “We have lost the f–king plot.”
What needed to change for Flood to finally come together?
Allen: We were just so separated most of the time at home. It was rare at a certain point that we were all in the same room. At Sonic Ranch, we were all there — we had to be there. We had to make ourselves experience it, whether we wanted to or not.
Luppen: Hippo Campus, when it’s at its best, is us playing music together in a room. To make the best Hippo Campus record is to capture the feeling that our live shows capture. The best way to do that was to track all together at the same time.
Allen: Doing what we did at Sonic Ranch is proof that [recording live] is a crucial thing for us, to make ourselves be in an isolated space and just get s–t done. Otherwise, we just get too relaxed or comfortable or lazy.
Will fans ever hear those other 100 songs?
Sutton: I f–king hope so. Those are some of my favorite songs.
Stocker: The large majority of them, probably not.
Sutton: Once a song is considered so heavily and inevitably shelved, it’s hard to go back to that shelf. It’s shouldered with all the disagreements that we had about the song.
Stocker: “You used to f–king hate this one, you want to release it now?” [Laughs.] All the songs we have in the back room collecting dust, those tear at us in a lot of different ways. Because they’re still ours.
What is Flood about for you personally?
Stocker: It’s a line of simple questioning: Am I good enough? Do I love you? Am I a phony?
Sutton: The motif seems like redefining where you are, especially as a group. This is our fourth record: Who are we now? Where do we want to go?
Luppen: Flood is like being naked in a lit room with a mirror held up to you, and being like, “Embrace this.” It’s a testament to all the things we need to be doing to take care of ourselves and live better. Now that we’re into our 30s, we wanted Flood to be the start of the music we make in those years, where you’re not driven by this youthful crazy energy.
How does touring look different for you as you get older?
Stocker: We usually cap it at three weeks now. It’s the longest we’ll go out without a break, just so we can maintain a level of sanity.
Allen: It’s chilled out so much. With [Nathan’s] new sobriety over the last couple of years, that was a big shift on the whole group. 2022 was the grand finale of what it used to be for us on the big LP3 tour. I just remember being at the end of that tour feeling f–king wiped. That was definitely a wakeup call.
Sutton: At our worst, we’d get up at noon, have a beer, then not eat anything until the show. You do what you think you’re supposed to do – “Oh, it’s a party!” — there was a culture that was set by all of us.
Luppen: It was like partying in a Midwestern way, where we’d just get wasted on the bus and watch Harry Potter.
Allen: Now everybody’s chilling, getting in their bus bunk by 11:00 p.m.
Why was sobriety important for the band?
Luppen: We were using alcohol, I think, to numb fatigue or nerves. I have the life that I’ve always dreamed of, and I want to be present and there for it, even if that means I’m riding the waves a little deeper on the ups and the downs. It’s better than just sleepwalking your way through life.
Stocker: With not drinking and having a newfound clarity within my personal life … I became obsessed with fulfilling this vision of myself that I had, which was, ‘If you are going to do this thing, you have to do it the best that you can.’ That meant showing up every day and writing a song if I could. I felt like I had to make up for lost time from being perpetually wasted for 10 years.
Other than sobriety, what did you need to discuss in band therapy?
Sutton: I couldn’t talk to anyone in the band without seeing all the f–king baggage. The biggest disagreement is defining what Hippo Campus is. We all have different answers about the music — mainly how the music’s made — and what the music’s saying.
Stocker: We needed to have conversations about how things had been and how not to go back there, because that was dark and harmful. It was really affirmative in, like, “Okay, yes, we’re still friends, we haven’t done anything to each other that’s irreparable damage or anything like that.” We can reestablish these healthy lines of communication so that, moving forward with this record as friends, individuals, human beings and business partners, we can do this in a healthy way.
Luppen: It was us paying to force ourselves to talk to each other. We all changed a lot over the pandemic in our personal lives, with our partners and everything. On top of that, we’ve been friends since we were 14. In a lot of ways, we were still communicating with each other like we were still in high school. Therapy allowed me to see everybody for where they’re at now.
Why did you change labels to Psychic Hotline when your deal with Grand Jury Records ended?
Luppen: We wanted to try something different this time around. We kind of shopped [Flood] around to a lot of different labels. We talked to majors, we talked to indies. Frankly, it was pretty disappointing. There were a lot of major labels that passed on it, which was confusing for us. We’ve spent 10 years working our asses off building a very organic, sustainable business.
Allen: We were told that they loved the record, but there’s just not enough “virality” in the band. It’s proof that they’re not interested in the actual success of a band, they’re just interested in the little spike in numbers that bring in royalties and syncs or whatever the f–k. Then as soon as that band doesn’t provide that same accidental moment, it’s all over.
Luppen: Psychic Hotline is run by our manager [Martin Anderson]. It was the option that allowed us the most freedom and cared the most about the project. It was clear they loved the music and they really understood us on a deep level. We were like, “Let’s just bet on ourselves like we’ve done our entire career and grassroots this motherf–ker.”
Stocker: Having the management side of things already taken care of and having them already be so close to us throughout that creative process, it made sense to bring them in on the label side as well.
What are your goals for the band? Are you actively trying to expand?
Sutton: It would be stupid to say, ‘Still not there yet.’ Like, this is it. To say I want anything more would be so ungrateful. I do always feel very competitive about being the best version of ourselves. I want to be in the same conversation as all the people that influenced me.
Allen: There are still some things we would like to do. We’ve never done a Tiny Desk, or some talk shows.
Stocker: We still have this idea that we want to be the biggest band in the world, but that is not something we’re interested in at the cost of our integrity and our friendships.
Luppen: It’s about preserving what we have at this point and not burning out. When I was younger, I was constantly trying to climb this hill that had no end. The biggest goal we could ever imagine was selling out Red Rocks [in Colorado] when we started the band, and we did that. Playing arenas … that doesn’t sound attractive to us. We’re happy with where we’re at. If more people come in, I’m always grateful for that.
I think there’s a record we have yet to make that really captures everything. We thought maybe it was going to be [Flood], and this one gets closer. But for me it’s about cracking a perfect Hippo record. Every Hippo record we’ve kind of had to learn to love.
But isn’t that kind of the same thought process that got you into the endless writing cycle with Flood?
Luppen: It’s a blessing and a curse. We’re always sort of hungry for something that’s just past what you’re capable of doing. But I do think that is a driving force of what makes Hippo rad. Maybe we’ll never make that record, or maybe we already made that record. Who the f–k knows?
You raise a good point, though. I’m gonna reflect on that.
NBA star Jaylen Brown has revealed his pick for the worst song of all-time, and Ice Spice should cover her ears. The Boston Celtics forward and A$AP Ferg sat down with Complex recently for an episode of GOAT Talk, where he begrudgingly disclosed that he’s not a fan of Ice Spice’s “Think U the Shit […]
On Sept. 28, 2002, Diamond Rio’s “Beautiful Mess” began a two-week run at No. 1 on Billboard’s Hot Country Songs chart, marking the group’s fourth leader.
The song was written by Sonny LeMaire (of Exile), Clay Mills and Shane Minor. It was released as the lead single from Diamond Rio’s album Completely, which also generated the act’s fifth and most recent No. 1 single, “I Believe.”
In April 1990, Diamond Rio (formerly known as The Grizzly River Boys, then The Tennessee River Boys), signed with Arista Records Nashville. The group then was comprised of lead vocalist Marty Roe, Gene Johnson, Jimmy Olander, Brian Prout, Dan Truman and Dana Williams.
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In June 1991, Diamond Rio’s debut Hot Country Songs entry, “Meet in the Middle,” hit No. 1 – making the act the first group to reign with a rookie single. The band has notched 19 career top 10s, including its other leaders “How Your Love Makes Me Feel” in 1997 and “One More Day” in 2001. The group has tallied 29 top 40 entries, through the No. 30 hit “God Only Cries” in 2006.
Said Oleander to Billboard in 2014 of Diamond Rio’s early ‘90s breakthrough, “I see these guys in these fantastic coiffed mullets and I remember the idealism that we had — ‘We’re going to do this. We’re going to reinvent that’ — and all that stuff. I’d do the same all over again.”
In 2022, Diamond Rio underwent its first lineup change in 33 years, as drummer Prout retired and was replaced by Micah Schweinsberg (formerly of gospel act The Crabb Family). Later that year, vocalist/mandolinist Johnson announced his departure from the group to focus his efforts in bluegrass.
Currently on the road, Diamond Rio makes its next stop in Wharton, Texas, on Sept. 29.
Just as Young Miko and her team, which includes Mariana López Crespo — her best friend and manager — and her longtime producer Mauro (López Crespo’s brother) were getting her career off the ground in 2019, they decided to launch 1K.
Described as a creative collective, 1K is something the Puerto Rican hitmaker is most proud of and hopes that it one day, it can become an empire. “Think Death Row Records,” she explained in her Billboard cover story.
Today, the collective is comprised of nearly 20 individuals who are all also part of Miko’s team. “I don’t want to eat alone at the table,” she said. “We’re very passionate about growing 1K by signing and investing in new artists and content creators. We’re all in it to learn, grow and help others.” Young Miko even has 1K tattooed on her hand, which she shows off proudly.
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The intention of the collective, the “Rookie of the Year” singer explained, is for everyone who is part of the group to build their own empires while still contributing to each other’s projects. “We are musicians, creatives, producers, executives, and we want to support other projects – in music or beyond – that excite us from other artists that have a future,” Miko said.
“I am super proud of every member of our collective,” Mauro, who started producing for Young Miko in 2020, added. “We’ve built this from the ground up and we all contribute ideas, even outside of our area. My role is to produce, but I go to the team and talk to them about visual effects, and they take it into account. Sometimes they accept my suggestions and sometimes not. We’re allowed to explore other areas of creativity and that’s important.”
Furthermore, the collective aims to create safe spaces for each team member and future collaborators who join the group. It’s something that, even onstage, Young Miko makes sure to remind her fans. “I decide who can enter this space that is so vulnerable,” she said during the last show of her XOXO U.S. Tour earlier in September. “Your heart and space are in your hands; nobody should have any type of control over you.”
Read Young Miko’s Billboard cover story here.
Young Miko will speak at the 2024 Billboard Latin Music Week, taking place Oct. 14-18 in Miami. For tickets and details, visit BillboardLatinMusicWeek.com.
With acting stints on Victorious and Insecure and a Grammy win for co-writing SZA’s monster R&B smash “Snooze” in his rearview, Leon Thomas is ready to level up. As he prepares for the full release of sophomore studio album, Mutt, on Friday (Sept. 28), the virtuosic multihyphenate artist declares, “It’s war outside.”
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As the first signee to Ty Dolla $ign’s EZMNY Records – an imprint launched in 2022 through his joint venture deal with Motown – Thomas gets a routinely up-close look at how one of 2010s R&B’s greatest movers and shakers transitioned from an ever-dependable supporting star to a lead artist with Billboard 200-topping albums and Billboard Hot 100-topping singles of his own. Those studies have resulted in a notable shift in headspace for Thomas; “It’s a blessing to have these talents. I worked hard on them, so I gotta treat them right, and these songs are definitely a representation of that,” he tells Billboard days after our Ice Spice-hosted R&B/Hip-Hop Power Players Week afterparty (Sept. 6).
Mutt finds Thomas fully stepping into his love for rock music – from the influence of his parents while growing up in Brooklyn to his recent obsession with Black Sabbath’s 1970 Paranoid LP. Featuring collaborations with Ty Dolla $ign, Masego, Wale, Baby Rose, Axlfolie and Freddie Gibbs, Mutt brings Thomas to the frontlines of another kind of war. A 21st-century specific battle of the ebb and flow of relationship arcs uniquely informed by dating apps and shifting generational perceptions of marriage and love. Back in June, Thomas told Billboard that he was “happy being single and wanted to document that.” Now, the R&B maestro offers up Mutt as a sort of musical anthropologic survey on the state of love and courtship in the 2020s.
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In an expansive conversation with Billboard, Leon Thomas breaks down the making of Mutt, muses about a return to acting and sings the praises of microdosing psychedelics.
How do you find growing up in Brooklyn has influenced your sound and approach to music?
It’s interesting! Growing up in Park Slope, the kids on my block [were] multicultural. We had the Spanish homie down the block and this white girl I used to skateboard with all the time [who] was putting me onto rock’n’roll and grunge and punk. Going to school in Cobble Hill, I was down the street from the Gowanus Projects, so I’m also tapping in with Dipset and the whole Uptown sound of hip-hop from that era. I [was] a student of the world growing up in New York. I got to hear everything.
Do you feel like any of those influences really shined on Mutt in particular?
For sure. My parents were part of the Black Rock Coalition out here. They was playing at rock clubs like CBGB, my mom used to have dyed hair and shit, my pops had the Jheri Curl and he was playing all the solos. Growing up, rock has been a big influence and there’s a couple of records [on Mutt] where I play with those themes. I like to blend genres on certain songs. I never like to go full-blown The Strokes or anything, because I don’t want to confuse my fan base. But just know it’s always there.
Is that something that weighs on your mind as you make each new project? Trying not to confuse your fan base while still staying true to your artistic development?
I don’t want to say this and sound like a d–k, but I really create selfishly. I’m chasing shit that feels good for me, man. The whole reason I was really excited to be an artist is because when I’m working with other artists, they’re just so stressed about TikTok and singles and shit. For me, when I’m an artist, it’s like a break from the boundaries and the borders. I can actually paint freely and do what the f—k I want to do. And I want to win. I’m lucky to have really talented friends who are down to do features and build with me, but I’m definitely just rocking with my taste buds, because I’m usually pretty early on shit.
Why was “Mutt” the right choice for both a title track and the lead single?
Well, they’re giving me a month to promote this f—king album, bro. [Laughs.] So I’m thinking about it like this: “That’s the title track, it’s got a little tempo, it’s funky as hell… a win is a win!” We can tell people about the album at the same time that we push the single. I’m just doing my best to fight through the clusterf—k that is the Internet right now and not get swept away by Ice Spice beefing with [Cleotrapa].
In so many ways, the online world feels even more overstimulating than it already is. How do you not lose your mind trying to make sure you and your art are heard and seen?
There’s all these echo chambers and like… I’m f—kin 31, bro. I’m not doing TikToks everyday! Making music means a lot to me, and my music deserves promotion. I’m doing my best to stay tapped in, and I’m just finding my own special way to let people know what I’m on and what I’m doing. There’s always things I can do better, but I think sit-downs like this are really important to help make it tangible and real for people.
We last spoke in Nashville earlier this summer and you were telling me about the process of creating Mutt. What were some of those experiences on your single journey that helped put this record together?
Materialism is a constant theme that flows in and out of this album. Living in L.A., it’s interesting, because everybody’s searching for the next best thing on both sides of the fences. The girls are doing that and the guys are doing that. Everybody’s really confused and there’s a reason that these podcast mics are well-used. [Laughs.] It’s f—king insane being single right now. It’s diabolical, bro. The way I see it, I’m gonna at least document my process. There’s been no other generation that had to deal with Tinder, Instagram, Snapchat, all this other shit – our grandfathers don’t know what the f—k that is! I can’t ask my dad for advice, this is a whole different pocket! I’m really showing my experience through modern technology, and how it influences the way we interact now when it comes to love.
A lot of these songs are about the ups and downs. These songs have been written a million times over from different perspectives and different generations, but I like how specific and detailed I’m getting with the lyrics on this one.
Was most of the album written in L.A.?
L.A. and Florence, Italy, which is random. I was out there working with Ty Dolla $ign and Ye on Vultures 1 for two and a half months. It was right after I put out my first album [2023’s Electric Dusk]. I was finally feeling free again to start thinking about new concepts. One of my favorite joints, I wrote walking through the Ritz Carlton Garden, which is like the Medici estate. Beautiful statues, everything is art, and I was super frustrated that day. That’s why the song’s broody as shit, but having those experiences really helped me round out the end of this album.
But most of [Mutt] was made in my house. I just bought a crib in Mid-City, and I set it up to be a creative zone for myself. I bought some paintings and art to just really capture my essence.
Do you find the different locations bring different things out of you in the songwriting process?
For sure. “Mutt,” in particular, I wrote on my living room floor – shoutout to Polkadot and Silom, those two companies sponsored me randomly. I was microdosing a little bit, and it was an interesting study [about] how it connects the neural pathways in your brain if you go on one day, off two days. I was doing that while I was writing a lot of like tail-end of this album. “Mutt” was inspired by my dog fighting with my cat, and him looking all sad after he got told off by my cat. I saw the similarities between us two and how we have good intentions, but we don’t always do the right thing.
How do you balance having those conversations about us as men not always upholding our best intentions without making it feel like you’re glorifying those choices?
That’s the whole thing. If you really listen to the verses, I’m talking about being vulnerable and actually wanting to love: “You can break my heart if you want to.” I’m super down, but you might have to train his dog because it’s been a while. I feel like toxic R&B isn’t new or special right now, but I think it’s important to really highlight the nuances of what we’re going through. There’s a reason a lot of people aren’t married at 25 or 24 right now. There’s a lot of options and that creates turbulence.
It’s not about being good or bad, it’s about being a person. This whole thing was an internal journey of really figuring it out. We all have that yin and yang, so it’s important to talk about that and and hold myself accountable in ways that I could have done better and talk about the things that some of the girls who were dealing with me could have done better.
“Answer Your Phone” is a knockout ballad. Talk to me about cutting that vocal.
That one was written by Diane Warren. She’s done some huge records, and that’s probably the only song I didn’t have a hand in writing. I was just trying to show off for a legend, man.
She sat me down in the studio at the piano and played me the song by heart like we was in the f—king ‘60s. It was such a moment. I locked in with Freaky Rob and he came through on guitar, drums and bass and we kind of Quincy Jones’d that shit out till it felt really good. To see a legend like [Warren] be amazed and happy and excited and watching her inner child come out while she was listening to it for the first time was amazing. I’m a huge fan of hers. I’m a student of the game, I know she’s written like 20 No. 1s or something!
What’s your favorite Diane Warren song?
“Have You Ever” by Brandy.
On “Dancing With Demons,” you sample some dialogue from Miyazaki’s Howl’s Moving Castle. Why did that feel like the right texture to add to the song?
I set up like a three-week session at my house. I set up lights all over my crib; I was really living life in [pajamas] with a lot of UberEats. I had some psychedelics going on, but I can’t watch live action films when I’m microdosing. So, I watched anime and that film was on. I found some similarities to what I was writing about at the time and it just made sense to me. [Film composer Joe Hisaishi] is really amazing, and I just liked how cinematic that track came together. It was really a spiritual moment. I’m glad it all flowed and people are talking about it because it’s one of my favorites.
Do you find that you get inspiration from movies a lot?
Hell yeah. Coming from the world of acting, sometimes I miss it, man. I miss the process of losing yourself in the character. A lot of my free time is just me watching really good old-school films. I’m into a lot of film noir. I also like tapping into the genres that I hadn’t gotten into as much when I was younger. Film is the thing that I need. I need a movie on when I’m cooking, it just helps my brain a little bit when I’m searching for something.
Do you want to return to acting in the future?
Yeah, but I don’t like the “pick me, massa!” moment [of the audition process]. It’s insane. Being around Issa Rae on Insecure and seeing her power as a Black woman, that’s what I want. Donald Glover, too, I’m a huge fan of him. I really look forward to having a moment where I come up with a TV show or a movie that encompasses my crazy brain.
The cast of characters on Muttt and Electric Dusk are pretty similar. Why was keeping a consistent set of collaborators important to you?
The way my label set this up, I had to do two albums in one cycle. I’m really like to work with my friends, bro. I like vibe out. I like it to feel organic and natural. After the first album, a lot of people are like “Alright! Let’s call in Metro Boomin and all these n—as we do not know who do not came about us and will charge $40,000 for a track.” [Laughs]. I was vibing with my homies and people I had a real relationship with. Throughout the album, I got really close with Freaky Rob and D. Phelps. There’s a reason that Ty’s back, I’m always with him because I’m signed to him. It definitely made a lot of sense to do another record for this album.
Were there any moments where you felt a little bit of anxiety knowing that this is your first project since “Snooze?”
Nah, that ain’t got shit to do with me. It does, but it doesn’t, you know? SZA worked really hard to get there. Before she put out [Ctrl], I was working with her a little bit with my boy Childish Major. I see the similarities between like her being super f—king tight and people not really knowing yet. This game is very political and it’s also about having real fans and that’s why I’m building an actual fan base that understands me and that wants to rock with me and buy the vinyls and the merch and the rest of it.
I’m just being patient with myself, and not putting unbelievable amounts of pressure on what I do, just because I did hit records with other people. It took a while for me to start doing that in writing and production as well. I’m definitely not afraid of building something that’s sturdy instead of having a crazy record that blows out of nowhere with no real fan base to follow it.
I loved the chemistry you and Masego cultivated on “Lucid Dreams.” How did that collaboration come together?
My boy, Jesse Boykins, he’s one of the original hype beast cool kids. I remember when I was in high school, I used to see him and Theophilius London and all the cool kids in in New York running around, taking pictures and just being fly as s—t. When he came to LA, I was one of the first people he kicked it with. He’s really tight with Masego, so we invited me to the studio with him – it was very Zen, incense burning and s—t. Sego was in there are we have two hours to write the record because I had another session right after, but me and Masego became instant homies. To this day, we’re working on a new project together. That original session was just two really talented guys having fun, but it was a conversation too.
After the break-up, my ex left mad clothes at the crib! [Laughs.] Literally a whole wardrobe of s–t; chicks would come over like, “Why do you have heels in your f—king closet?” and then I’d have to explain the whole thing. It turned into this really cool conversation about your significant other leaving things after a breakup… it’s almost like a totem of the relationship not being over.
The concept of marriage gets some airtime on Mutt as well. Were there any other moments in your life where you weren’t thinking about marriage?
When I was younger and broke and s–t, I just felt like the idea of marrying somebdoy and being that guy is insane. You want to be a provider and support your significant other. It’s not about gender roles or anything, it’s just about wanting to kill s—t. I feel like I had so much to figure out – I still do – but I love where I’m at right now. It even helps me sing records like “I Do” a little bit better. I’m still making it work, but I feel more comfortable supporting somebody else outside of myself now.
From an artistic and business standpoint, how would you compare your approach to this album versus Electric Dusk?
I learned a lot being on being in the Motown Universe and hanging around Ty a lot. He’s big on hits, he’s big on “Let’s get the number on, baby!” He has this competitive energy to it and I’m very “flower child” about it all. As I got into this new album, I was like, “Oh shit, it’s war outside.” I’m really going for blood. I’m very confident, I’m f—king nice. Now I’m like, f—k all the humble s–t, but not in a bad way. I’m ready to shift into another gear.
As we get closer to the album drop, what’s the one song on the record that you’re most excited for day one Leon Thomas fans to hear?
I feel like the Shade Room aunties are really going to like “Yes It Is.” I feel like they gonna f—k with me, it’s just body roll ready. They can dig into that one. I gave ‘em one, because I’m wilding on the rest [of the album], you don’t even know what genre I’m in in. But that one is straight up and down R&B with some church chords. The day ones are going to like that.
There are some other ones like “Used To” (with Baby Rose) that I think will resonate well. It’s cool to have that male-female back and forth.
What are your touring plans looking like?
I’m opening up for Blxst for [about] 20 dates and I’m also doing a headline tour too. That’s when I get to bring the whole band and shit. Man, touring…. Oh my God! Can I make some money, please?! [Laughs].
When you were in the trenches of your Mutt era, what was the soundtrack?
This is random as hell, but I was really obsessed with Ozzy Osbourne. Black Sabbath had this album called Paranoid and I was just really rocking with it. Lots of Rolling Stones, David Bowie and Marvin Gaye. I was also working with George Clinton randomly on some record that he was doing, and I really started digging into P-funk and researching all the different artists that he had locked in under his labels. A lot of that dog stuff came from that too, paying homage to the funk legend that is George Clinton.
Are you still in your Mutt phase?
I don’t even really think there was like a solid phase or anything. I just think when you get out of a relationship, it’s like, “Oh! I can talk to people again.” I was just documenting that. Now, I’m just chilling, bro. I don’t really have too much time to frolic around the world and get messy. It’s important right now for me to focus and I wish I could have a real significant other that I was building with prior to this, so it could just be more status quo and chill. But for now, I’m keeping my life as simple as possible.
Do you feel like you hear the call of the status quo the older you get?
Yeah, man. All the homies is getting married. I got a bachelor party to go to in a couple months. I do get a little FOMO. Everybody’s doing the adulting thing, but I’m just busy. It’s not even fair to a significant other right now. It’s nice to maybe flirt with the idea of it, but to be honest though, I don’t know.
Who have you been in the studio with recently?
Me and Giveon have been working a bunch. That’s my brother, we got the same management, so it’s always nice locking in with him. I got some great songs that we’ve worked on together. I’m really excited for the world to hear. Masego, like I said before. Me and Aminé have been really close too, and he’s just so dope. It’s cool to make beats and not be pigeonholed to the same 12 pockets. He’s down to explore and he can rap his ass off. He’s writing like crazy in the studio. Big Sean just put out his new project, so I was working with him and he put Uncle Charlie [Wilson] on the joint I was on, which is amazing. And with Ty, I’m definitely little bro when it comes to him. I’m always in the studio rocking with him and writing records. It’s been cool to see his process and his journey to No. 1s.
I’m really looking forward to just continuing to shoot my shot for myself. It’s been a lot of work on me because I have to be selfish in that way right now. It’s war outside. I gotta get out there and make this s—t happen, man.
Here’s how nostalgic Brad Paisley is: “I find myself before an amazing event is even finished thinking, ‘Oh man, this is really gonna be a bummer when it’s over!’,” he says.
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So it should come as no surprise that the country star decided to look back at a historic chapter in his life and career when creating “Truck Still Works,” his new single that drops today on EMI Music. The song serves as a companion of sorts to 1994’s charming, uplifting “Mud on the Tires,” which became one of his biggest hits.
The catchy, mid-tempo tune, which Paisley premiered on the People’s Choice Country Awards Thursday night (Sept. 26) as a medley with “Mud on the Tires,” questions if he and his female companion can turn a truck that’s been sitting dormant for years into a wayback machine that can transport them back to an earlier, care-free time. As the lyrics ask, they can “see if them miles of corn still got that shade of green” or “find out if that dogwood limb is still there to hang our shirts.” “It’s no more complicated than the nostalgia of it,” Paisley says of the song. “We all want to recapture certain aspects of life.”
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When “Truck Still Works” co-writers Rodney Clawson, Will Bundy and Hunter Phelps first approached Paisley and DuBois, who co-wrote “Mud on the Tires,” about revisiting that song in some manner, the trio expressed apprehension about stepping on the Paisley/DuBois classic. However, Paisley says, “Chris and I were like, ‘Oh no! Lean in!’ This is truly a sequel.”
Brad Paisley ‘Truck Still Works’
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It felt right and good to revisit that time again, Paisley says. “I look back on the Mud on the Tires era as an album and a time period where everything did sort of launch in a bigger way for me. ‘Mud on the Tires’ was a call to action, a metaphor, it felt like a lifestyle.” For Paisley, the title track became his fourth No. 1 on Billboard’s Hot Country Songs chart and the album’s fourth Top 5 hit and further catapulted his career. To this day, Paisley ends his shows with “Mud on the Tires.” “If I don’t do it, people want their money back,” he says. “I can’t imagine my identity as an artist without that, so it’s really fun to kind of lean into this.”
Once they “leaned in,” the five co-writers had a blast planting Easter eggs in “Truck Still Works” that hark back to “Mud on the Tires, ” while still creating a song that felt “entirely new,” Paisley says. In addition to the lyrical references, Paisley even threw in musical reminders, such as using similar guitar patterns and chord inversions.
Those musical cues were enough for ardent fans, including Jelly Roll and Post Malone, to guess the song was a “Mud on the Tires” sequel based on a small snippet Paisley posted on Instagram and X earlier this week. “It’s fun to think back when Jelly was a young’un, he might have even bought ‘Mud on the Tires,’” Paisley says.
The throwbacks extend to the single artwork, which features the truck that Paisley had when “Mud on the Tires” came out and serves as his farm truck now.
The song intentionally doesn’t answer if the truck does, indeed, still work, leaving it up to the listener’s imagination. “That wouldn’t be cool,” he says, to bring the song back to reality. “It’s still the metaphor of it, the idea of can you recapture that thing when everything’s [now] different,” he says.
The song shifts sonic gears for Paisley who last September released Son of the Mountains: The First Four Tracks, an EP of a quartet of songs in part inspired by his growing up in West Virginia. The album tackled such serious subjects as the opioid crisis, which has hit his home state particularly hard, on “The Medicine Will.” It also looked at the ways we are all alike no matter where we’re from with “Same Here,” which featured a spoken word passage by Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
That album is now on hold. “I ended up getting really excited about a few of these things that I started to write, and we came up with an entirely new project,” he says.
Given the weightiness of some of the topics on Son of the Mountains, Paisley wanted to take a break. “There’s a lot of it that’s very heavy. A lot of [the album] exists to deal with things and I don’t know if anybody really wants to deal with things right now. I don’t. And if I’m going to put the rest of that album out, I have to be willing to sort of discuss some very heavy things. I don’t know that I would even want to do that right now.”
Instead, he says the lighter fare on Truck Still Works is what “I think people really want to hear right now.”
The new album, which will likely come out in early 2025, will be his first full-length album since 2017 and his first since moving from Sony Nashville’s Arista imprint to Universal Music Group Nashville’s EMI Records. Paisley says “Truck” is a good indicator of the album’s direction.
“The project has some deeper things on it but, like the song itself, is really about creativity and nostalgia and you know the themes that you want to hear right now,” he says. “Sometimes, like in these times, it’s great to give people something they just want to turn up and takes them to a place where they feel good.”
Billboard’s Friday Music Guide serves as a handy guide to this Friday’s most essential releases — the key music that everyone will be talking about today, and that will be dominating playlists this weekend and beyond.
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This week, Lady Gaga puts on her Joker makeup, The Weeknd joins forces with Playboi Carti and Stevie Nicks meets the moment. Check out all of this week’s picks below:
Lady Gaga, Harlequin
Although Harlequin is not exactly a new Lady Gaga album — the 13-song project is largely a mix of covered show tunes and rearrangements that serves as a companion piece to next week’s big-budget film sequel Joker: Folie à Deux — the original track “Happy Mistake,” a breathtaking ballad in the same sonic universe as Gaga’s A Star is Born work, more than justifies this stopgap before the next official full-length.
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The Weeknd with Playboi Carti, “Timeless”
Two weeks after The Weeknd and Playboi Carti separately returned with highly anticipated solo tracks “Dancing in the Flames” and “All Red,” respectively, the pair of A-listers have linked up on “Timeless,” which will appear on The Weeknd’s upcoming album Hurry Up Tomorrow but pushes the superstar more towards Carti’s synth-heavy futuristic rap, courtesy in part of co-producer Pharrell Williams.
Stevie Nicks, “The Lighthouse”
Stevie Nicks wrote new single “The Lighthouse” following the overturning of Roe v. Wade last year, but the legendary singer’s voice resonates regardless of the historical context, as she sings, “I have my scars, you have yours / Don’t let them take your power.”
Tommy Richman, Coyote
Tommy Richman could have coasted on new-school R&B bangers like “Million Dollar Baby” and “Devil is a Lie” through the rest of 2024; instead, debut album Coyote (which stunningly contains neither of his first two hits on its track list) is decidedly a more bold affair, refracting funk, synth-pop, New Jack Swing and hip-hop through the lens of Richman’s singular croon.
Rosalía feat. Ralphie Choo, “Omega”
While a fair share of Rosalía’s fantastic 2022 project MOTOMAMI boasted combustible rhythms and dance hooks, “Omega,” a new team-up with Ralphie Choo, serves as a potent reminder of the singer’s vocal might, with handclaps floating her melisma here and each syllable of the chorus delivered with piercing emotion.
Luke Bryan, Mind of a Country Boy
A press release for Luke Bryan’s album describes Mind of a Country Boy as “the culmination of a career spent studying songs and living the hunting, fishing, and loving everyday lifestyle he sings about”; indeed, there’s an authenticity intrinsic to Bryan’s latest that separates the longtime star from his country brethren, particularly on tracks like “Kansas” and “Country On.”
The Cure, “Alone”
The Cure’s first new song in 16 years is essentially a best-case scenario for longtime fans of the all-time greats: “Alone” is a gorgeous, nearly 7-minute rock epic, with a sweepingly mournful arrangement and Robert Smith sounding like he never stepped away from the recording studio.
Linkin Park, “Heavy is the Crown”
If “The Emptiness Machine” reasserted Linkin Park’s rock-solid songwriting and introduced new co-vocalist Emily Armstrong into the mix, follow-up “Heavy is the Crown” fully unleashes the newly reformed band, recalling the bruising rap-rock of “Faint” and “Bleed It Out” while allowing Armstrong to unveil her own extended scream.
Editor’s Pick: SOPHIE, SOPHIE
In her too-brief time in the spotlight, SOPHIE reconstructed the very fabric of dance and electronic music with a singular verve and boundless talent; SOPHIE, a bittersweet posthumous album which her family helped cross the finish line, honors her brilliance with wondrous moments that recall her career peaks, and glimpses of what could have been.
As their third album arrives, New York collective MICHELLE is leaning into boy bands and girl groups for inspiration.
It’s not that their latest, Songs About You Specifically out today via Transgressive Records, particularly sounds like One Direction, Spice Girls or Fifth Harmony, but examples of modern pop with four lead vocalists are hard to come by outside those groups.
“When you’re trying to learn vocal arrangements and trying to reference music that also has this many vocals, the only music you can find are these girl bands,” says Julian Kaufman, who, along with Charlie Kilgore, handles much of the production in the band. “There are girl bands like The Shirelles from the ‘50s and ‘60s that are a singing a little more vintage pop and that’s great. But in the last 30 years, all you really get is the *NSYNCs and the Fifth Harmonies of the world.”
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On Songs About You Specifically, tapping into those inspirations has led to all the voices of MICHELLE singing out in crisp clarity on songs collectively written in the small town of Ojai, Calif. outside of Los Angeles.
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Unlike their previous releases (2018’s HEATWAVE and 2022’s After Dinner We Talk Dreams), their third studio album does not divvy up songs by each singer and features multiple vocalists on each track, which adds a richness to the sextet’s unique brand of indie pop.
“We try very hard to make sure everybody sounds different,” says Kaufman, adding they have the vocalists (Sofia D’Angelo, Layla Ku, Emma Lee, and Jamee Lockard) sing on different mics and took inspiration from mid 2010’s hip-hop where features took on extremely different resonances when they were recorded separately and stitched together in a studio. “[We were] making sure that each singer has a slightly different sense of harmony. The first verse of ‘The Dropout’ and the second verse of the song have the same melody, but one is sung by Layla and one is sung by Jamee and the harmony stacks they sing are different… Can you hear any of this stuff? No, but it all adds up to subtle things in your brain.”
While some contemporary artists might scoff at the bubblegum pop comparisons, D’Angelo loves it. “Wait, so when you listen to MICHELLE, are you like, ‘Oh my god, that’s Emma. Oh my god, that’s Jamee. Oh my god, that’s Layla. Oh my god, that’s Sofia’? Hell yeah,” she says. “I’m freaking out about this, because this is what I would do with One Direction.”
MICHELLE is also leaning into the stage presence of the major pop acts. While a MICHELLE show has never lacked energy, Ku says people can expect more elaborate choreography. “Shout out to overlord Lee. She choreographs everything with great intent,” Ku says. “We’ve been putting so much work into this dancing element of our performance. It’s become very visually pleasing. I see videos of us dancing and I’m like, ‘Yeah, we ate that up.’”
Audiences can also expect live drums, coordinated outfits (not matching just yet, but they tease the possibility) and lots of hairography.
“The last two shows we did [on the Still Woozy tour] we had wind machines or fans at the edge of the stage. Oh boy, did that make a difference,” says Lee. “You’re like, this is just where I stand to sing and then you see a video and…it’s life changing.”
“Those experiences when the fan was in my hair made me realize this is what I’ve always wanted to do for my whole life. This is what I would do with the hair dryer in my bathroom when I was a kid singing Miley Cyrus or Britney Spears or Beyoncé or whatever,” says D’Angelo. “The hair is really the fifth vocalist, the fifth dancer in the band.”
When the group was recording the new record in Ojai, they would split up into writing groups of two or three and whichever group finished their track first would make dinner for everyone else. Having six writers, all from varying backgrounds, genders, sexualities and styles gives MICHELLE the rare ability to create honest music from many perspectives.
“It’s so exciting that we can write about queer relationships or maybe an experience that only two of the members have had, but we can present it under [MICHELLE],” says Lee. “We have this vessel to constantly be tons of different things that are true to different parts of the group.”
MICHELLE has successfully avoided being pigeonholed as just a queer band or just a pop group over the past six years, as their sound has evolved and changed. For their latest, direct inspiration is extremely difficult to pinpoint. There are the ‘90s R&B sounds on “Akira” and the beachy breeziness of “Cathy.” There are traces of late 2000s and early 2010s indie like Phantogram and Phoenix, alongside consistently strong basslines and danceable drumbeats.
“Sonically, it is not very clear what genre this [album] is. That is something we were going for,” says Kaufman. “We were trying to have that thing where you put on this album and it’s not exactly just another pop album. This is MICHELLE. That’s the intention.”
“When we went into writing we wanted to experience catharsis and really express ourselves,” says D’Angelo. “With this record, it was anything goes in terms of what we were bringing into the room. The focus was just crafting great music, helping each other. If someone had an idea, being there for them.”
The group has always billed themselves as a predominantly queer collective and, as the culture embraces LGBTQIA+ artists like Chappell Roan, MUNA, Reneé Rapp, Janelle Monáe and more, MICHELLE sees this as a turning point for queer representation.
“Queer people aren’t going anywhere. Lesbians aren’t going anywhere,” says Lockard. “We finally reached a moment in pop culture where queer people feel comfortable sharing who they are and it’s being well received. It’s just going to continue to grow as younger queer listeners are hearing these artists and writing their own stories.”
“The only element of this moment that I’m looking forward to ending….” Ku adds — pausing while her bandmates laugh, in order to reassure, “Everyone’s going to be like, ‘I feel that’ at the end of my sentence. Don’t worry.
“Whenever there’s rumblings of a cultural shift with young people, there is a quick [instinct to] vulture, to prey, swarm, that companies hop on,” she continues. “The music industry is a huge perpetrator of that — and I look forward to when the commodification of queer aesthetic and art comes to a close. So many of our queer musical predecessors did it in anonymity for so long, and I look forward to when it’s just music and stories being told by these people are accepted and understood to be regular rather than something to profit off of.”
Chappell Roan has dropped out of All Things Go, sharing that she needs to prioritize her health in a statement posted one day ahead of her first of two scheduled performances.
In a message on her Instagram Story Friday (Sept. 27), the 26-year-old wrote, “I apologize to people who have been waiting to see me in NYC & DC this weekend at All Things Go, but I am unable to perform.”
“Things have gotten overwhelming over the past few weeks and I am really feeling it,” Roan continued. “I feel pressures to prioritize a lot of things right now and I need a few days to prioritize my health. I want to be present when I perform and give the best shows possible.”
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“Thank you for understanding,” she added. “Be back soon xox.”
Billboard has reached out to Roan’s rep for comment.
In a statement shared with Billboard on behalf of All Things Go, the festival‘s spokesperson said they were “heartbroken” to see Roan pull out. “While we know how much you were looking forward to the performances, it’s important to remember that health and well-being always comes first,” the statement continued. “All Things Go strongly supports artists prioritizing their well-being and we ask our community to rally around Chappell Roan with love and understanding.”
Roan had been slated to perform at both the New York City and Maryland iterations of the festival, which will occur on back-to-back days this weekend. Featuring headliners Laufey, Bleachers, Janelle Monae, Conan Gray, Renee Rapp and Hozier, the original schedule had the “Hot to Go!” artist scheduled for Saturday (Sept. 28) in New York followed by a second performance in the D.C. area Sunday (Sept. 29).
The VMA winner’s departure from the festival comes amid some backlash from fans unhappy with her recent comments about the 2024 presidential election, which began when she told Rolling Stone she doesn’t “feel pressured to endorse someone” in the race between Democrat Kamala Harris and Republican Donald Trump, as she sees “problems on both sides.”
When some people took issue with her choice not to publicly back Harris, with many seeing the VP as the safest choice for LGBTQ issues — something Roan has long been vocal about in her support — the “Good Luck, Babe!” artist responded with a Sept. 24 TikTok video saying that her comments had been “completely taken out of context” and encouraged followers “to use critical thinking skills, learn about what they’re voting for, learn about who they’re voting for, and ask questions.”
When the TikTok sparked even more debate, Roan again posted to the platform Sept. 25. “I’m voting for f–king Kamala,” she said. “But I’m not settling for what has been offered, because that’s questionable … “Obviously, f–k the policies of the right — but also, f–k some of the policies on the left! That’s why I can’t endorse.”
Roan has been open about how overwhelmed she’s felt this year as her stardom has skyrocketed. In June, she paused one of her concerts to level with the audience. “I think my career is just kind of going really fast and it’s really hard to keep up,” she said at the time, appearing emotional. “I’m just being honest … I’m having a hard time today.”
A couple months later, the Missouri native made headlines for speaking out against toxic fan behavior, with Roan detailing experiences with stalking and crossed boundaries she’s faced over the past few months. “I’ve been in too many nonconsensual physical and social interactions and I just need to lay it out and remind you, women don’t owe you s—t,” she wrote at the time in an Instagram post. “I chose this career path because because I love music and art and honoring my inner child, I do not accept harassment of any kind because I chose this path, nor do I deserve it.”