State Champ Radio Music
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The easy thing for Rosalía would have been to follow up 2022’s successful Motomami, which placed her on the brink of superstardom, with a quick album that walked that same path: Songs that treaded the line between her flamenco Spanish roots and Latin and reggaetón influences. It was a formula that yielded hits like “Despechá,” Rosalía’s take on merengue, and “La Fama,” her take on bachata alongside The Weeknd. The set provided an unlikely segue from her stunning but niche-appealing El Mal Querer, to a broad audience who embraced Rosalía and her sound with cult-like passion.
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It stands to reason, then, that something along those lines would follow in quick succession.
Instead, fans waited for two and a half years for LUX, an album that not only breaks parameters for Rosalía, but for the musical landscape as a whole. Recorded with the London Symphony Orchestra, it’s an ambitious, complex, sprawling orchestral and operatic ouvre of 18 tracks, performed in 13 different languages, where Rosalía pushes her vocal prowess into untested waters. This isn’t your tried-and-done collection of pop songs set to symphonic arrangements, but rather a new take on pop (or is it classical?) that tests the limits of what genre is and where it falls in the spectrum of musical production and consumption especially in an era of fast-food music that’s quantified and discarded with grim abandon.
“Sexo, violencia y llantas” (Sex, Violence and Tires), the provocatively titled opener to Lux, starts with a piano intro that evokes a classical piano étude — a cross between Bach and Chopin — then gives way to Rosalía’s vocals set to a sustained acoustic bass line that final crashes in choruses and full string orchestra. The track ebbs and flows in rhythm, pacing and BPM’s, full of rubattos and crescendos, sounding every bit like a classical music composition, except it quite isn’t. The opening line – “Quién pudiera vivir entre los dos, primero amaré el mundo y luego amaré a Dios” (How nice it’d be to live between them both, first I’ll love the world, then I’ll love God) — establishes the foundation of an album and an artist tied to the terrestrial but aspiring to the spiritual and sublime, and actually reaching them more than once.
Lux keeps you on your toes. Divided into four movements, yet another nod to its classical ground, it nevertheless doesn’t adhere to the tradition of a single tempo or mood per movement, but instead veers from arrangements and styles in dizzying manner. Listen carefully, though, and you’ll find the “intentional structure” Rosalía sought to create throughout the album. “I was clear that I wanted four movements,” she told Billboard in her cover story. “I wanted one where it would be more a departure from purity. The second movement, I wanted it to feel more like being in gravity, being friends with the world. The third would be more about grace and hopefully being friends with God. And at the end, the farewell, the return.”
Does Lux follow the rules of classical composition? It doesn’t mean to, and sometimes, it runs all over the place (we can only imagine the Grammys and Latin Grammys discussing what category to place the album and tracks into). “Porcelana,” for example, sounds like four different segments glued together without much rhyme or reason. But Rosalía’s voice is irresistible, capable of going through pianissimos to forte with ease and support. Only a trained voice could deliver this tour de force, and you keep listening, rivetted, until the very end, moving from “Porcelana,” with its traces of reggaetón, urban and flamenco, to “Mio Cristo Piange Diamante,” a bona fide aria performed in Italian.
There are decided commercial nuggets here. “La Perla,” performed with Mexican trio Yahrtiza y su Esencia (with Yahritza’s soprano voice beautifully rising to the task of singing with Rosalía), is a deliciously naughty dis track aimed at a former lover and arranged as a waltz, both quaint and incisive. And “Dios Es Un Stalker” is as catchy and rousing as a mid tempo pop hit can be.
But this is an album that defies convention, arrangement and structure. Challenging but exquisite, we hope it forces others to delve deeper into their art, and make us wait just a little bit more if it means making us listen again and again — not because we’re immediately hooked, but because we want to discover more.
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The 2026 edition of MUSIC AWARDS JAPAN (MAJ), one of the country’s premier international music honors, is set for June 13 next year.
The Grand Ceremony, including the red carpet and presentation of the major categories, will be held that evening at TOYOTA ARENA TOKYO, while the Premiere Ceremony, which covers additional categories, will take place earlier that day at TOKYO DREAM PARK. The MAJ week, running from June 8 to 13, will also include artist performances alongside seminars and showcases featuring music industry professionals from Japan and abroad.
At a press conference held in Tokyo on Wednesday (Nov. 5), organizers revealed mid-year standings based on data from January through August 2025, covering the current entry pool of eligible works and artists. Nominees for Artist of the Year include some of the year’s most prominent acts: timelesz, HANA, Gen Hoshino, Mrs. GREEN APPLE, and Kenshi Yonezu, among others. For New Artist of the Year, the list includes CANDY TUNE, CENT, TENBLANK, HANA, Brandy Senki, MON7A, and ONE OR EIGHT.
The Song of the Year field features many of the year’s defining releases, such as AiNA THE END’s “On the Way,” Sakanaction’s “Kaiju,” JENNIE’s “like JENNIE,” Snow Man’s “CHARISMAX,” and multiple tracks from HANA (“Burning Flower,” “Blue Jeans,” “ROSE”), BE:FIRST’s “Muchu,” and Mrs. GREEN APPLE (“KUSUSHIKI,” “Darling,” “Heaven”), as well as Kenshi Yonezu (“BOW AND ARROW,” “Plazma”).
Meanwhile, Album of the Year contenders include acclaimed works such as Southern All Stars’ THANK YOU SO MUCH, Snow Man’s THE BEST 2020 – 2025, Fujii Kaze’s Prema, BABYMETAL’s METAL FORTH, and Mrs. GREEN APPLE’s 10.
Eligible works include songs and albums whose full official versions were first released between Jan. 1 and Dec. 31, 2025, either on public digital services or in physical form (with some category exceptions). Winners are determined through voting by members of the music community.
The award categories have been restructured since the inaugural MAJ with 14 new categories added. To reflect the diversity of Japan’s music landscape, new Dance & Vocal categories (Group/Solo) and separate Boys Idol Culture and Girls Idol Culture Song awards (Group/Solo) have been introduced. In response to the rise of long-running hits and renewed attention on catalog music, a Back Catalog category has also been created to honor works that continue to be embraced over time. In addition, with vinyl experiencing a resurgence, an Analog Record category has been established. The Largest Live Audience (International) award and Best Music Video Director award have also been newly added.
Founded under the theme of “Connecting the world, illuminating the future of music,” MAJ was established by five major organizations in Japan’s music industry. At the inaugural event held in May, music professionals voted — with some category exceptions — to determine winners across 62 categories (including six major awards) from a pool of approximately 3,000 entries.
Mrs. GREEN APPLE took Artist of the Year, Creepy Nuts won Song of the Year with “Bling-Bang-Bang-Born,” tuki. earned New Artist of the Year, Fujii Kaze won Album of the Year with LOVE ALL SERVE ALL, YOASOBI took Top Global Hit From Japan with “Idol” and aespa won Best Song Asia with “Supernova.” The ceremony at ROHM Theatre Kyoto was streamed worldwide on YouTube.
Ceremony Date: Saturday, June 13, 2026
MAJ Week: June 8 (Monday) – June 13 (Saturday), 2026
Venue: TOYOTA ARENA TOKYO, Tokyo
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When Bob Dylan arrived in New York City in January 1961, he was a 19-year-old from Minnesota armed with an acoustic guitar and a head full of Woody Guthrie songs. His early recordings from that period — many featured on the just-released The Bootleg Series Volume 18: Through the Open Window, 1956-1963 — reveal a young artist still finding his voice, often mimicking the melodies and vocal styles of his heroes.
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Within a few months, Dylan would go through a transformation. The young singer-songwriter became an interpreter of others’ works, imbuing them with a unique character missing on earlier recordings. “The story of Volume 18 is Bob Dylan becoming Bob Dylan,” Sean Wilentz tells Billboard’s Behind the Setlist podcast. Wilentz, author of the 2010 book Dylan in America, wrote Volume 18‘s detailed, often fascinating 125-page liner notes that provides historical context for the expansive eight-CD set. “It’s about his coming of age, his maturation — first as a performer and then as a songwriter — to become the person that we think of [today].”
With Dylan surrounded by folk, blues, jazz and comedians such as Lenny Bruce, his artistic growth began immediately upon arriving in the Village in early 1961. By the time he was recording his self-titled debut album in November, Dylan had gained an ability to transform somebody else’s song and make it his own. “People will either imitate or they’ll just do a kind of a superficial rewrite,” says Wilentz, a professor of history at Princeton University. Dylan was an imitator when he moved to New York. Just a year later, who would write “Blowin’ in the Wind” and change the course of American music.
Dylan spent these formative months working relentlessly on his craft, writing songs just about anywhere he could. “He can be in the middle of a subway car and he’s writing a song,” says Wilentz. “He’s always writing songs — but he’s doing more than that. He’s learning how to play the guitar. He’s learning how to emote. He’s learning all kinds of things, and he’s working very hard at it. He’s also learning the entire spectrum of American song in a way that most kids just didn’t.”
This wasn’t just artistic growth — it was a metamorphosis. Dylan was no longer mimicking the artists who came before him; he was reshaping songs in his unique style. Wilentz points to Dylan’s recording of the Guthrie’s “Ramblin’ Round,” an outtake that appears on the first CD of Volume 18 as being emblematic of this evolution. “It’s fantastic,” Wilentz says. “You listen to it closely and it’s not Woody Guthrie at all, but it is Woody Guthrie. [Dylan] has turned it into his own song.” “Ramblin’ Round” doesn’t just pay homage — it reimagines Guthrie. Like many of the tracks on Volume 18, it’s a glimpse into an artist who would eventually reshape the American songbook.
Listen to the entire interview with Bob Dylan historian Sean Wilentz using the embedded Spotify player below, or go to Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music, iHeart, Podbean or Everand.
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A ripped piece of paper floats in front of EJAE’s face as she giggles with her castmates Rei Ami and Audrey Nuna over a video call. “My manager gave me a list of adjectives to use,” she says over Zoom, unable to stop herself from cackling.
Nuna immediately smirks. “Read them for us,” she shouts. The catalog includes gems like “incredible,” “humble,” “privileged,” and “accomplished,” but all three women immediately lock onto the inclusion of “breathtaking” on this list. “‘Breathtaking’ is good,” Ami laughs.
They’re all accurate words to describe exactly how the three members of the semi-fictional girl group HUNTR/X feel on Friday (Nov. 7), considering that EJAE, Ami and Nuna have just earned four Grammy nominations for their work together on the breakout hit Netflix film KPop Demon Hunters.
Alongside two standard nominations related to music for film — “Golden” earned a nod for best song written for visual media while the movie’s soundtrack notched a nomination for best compilation soundtrack for visual media — HUNTR/X also received two major category nominations, for best pop duo/group performance, and for song of the year, both for “Golden.”
So yes, “breathtaking” feels like a good word to describe the trio’s feelings. “The breaths have been snatched from our bodies,” Nuna says. “Our hearts are being pulled in so many different directions. But above all, I think we’re just very, very, very grateful to be a part of what feels like a very cultural and historic moment, and something that as kids we would have we craved so bad to see. Being a part of it is just really surreal.”
The nominations are just the latest piece of what has been a cultural takeover for KPop Demon Hunters. Not only has the film become Netflix’s most-watched movie in the platform’s history, but the music from the soundtrack — written primarily by EJAE, Mark Sonnenblick and a host of other well-established K-pop songwriters — has dominated the charts. “Golden” spent a whopping eight weeks at the summit of the Hot 100 and remains steady at No. 2 this week. The entirety of the soundtrack, meanwhile, earned two weeks at the top of the Billboard 200, and remains at No. 2 today.
For EJAE, who spent the last decade writing hit songs for K-pop acts like aespa, Twice and others, earning a Grammy nod specifically for her songwriting in the song of the year category is a fulfillment of a lifelong dream.
“It means so much, because I [was asked] in an interview once, ‘What’s a goal that you have?’ And mine was to get an award as a songwriter,” she says. “I don’t see many Asian women or Korean women in this industry, it’s hard to find, songwriter-wise. And so I hope that this can inspire others to keep going, because it felt impossible.”
The group’s nominations don’t only make history as a film-music crossover — they also make history for K-pop as a genre. With their four nominations, HUNTR/X becomes the first K-pop girl group to earn Grammy nominations, and one of two acts (alongside ROSÉ of Blackpink) to earn nominations in the same year, another first for the genre. Previously, only BTS had scored major nominations at the annual ceremony.
That lack of representation in the past is part of why many in the industry have begun asking whether or not K-pop should be represented with its own categories at the annual ceremony. For their part, all three members of HUNTR/X agree that K-pop does deserve to have space created for it at the Grammys. “It’s been proven that this is a genre that can really stand its own in the U.S. space, so it would make sense for this genre to be represented alongside so many other genres that are important to culture,” Nuna says.
With a soundtrack that has dominated music spaces around the globe for the past four months, KPop Demon Hunters has repeatedly defied expectations — which is in no small part why Ami feels particularly proud to be representing her community at the biggest music awards in the world. “As Korean women, from a very young age, we are taught to be quiet, to not be seen,” she says. “That really causes some weird cognitive dissonance early on, as Korean women who we are pursuing the art self expression where we have to be seen. We have to be loud and bold.”
But the singer makes it abundantly clear that while she, EJAE and Nuna remain incredibly grateful for their success, all three of them worked incredibly hard to earn these four nominations. “[KPop Demon Hunters] took nine years to create, there were endless demos, we have a legendary songwriter who has gone through the work of the industry, we have Audrey Nuna out on her own being an independent artist, we have the struggle that comes with being a solo Asian artist in America,” she says, her voice slowly rising. “We’ve had every door shut. We’ve been told, ‘You’re not good enough. You need to do more. You’re too Korean. You’re not American enough.’ So we deserve this. We worked very hard for this, and we are honored to have earned it.”
Trending on Billboard As nominations for the 2026 Grammys pour in, so are new music releases from artists who just might earn Recording Academy recognition for it next year — including Rosalía, Katy Perry, Kehlani and more. The buzziest release of the week might just be Lux, the long-awaited followup to 2022’s Motomami. The sprawling, […]
Trending on Billboard Five years after Cody Johnson first recorded his version of The Chicks’ hit “Travelin’ Soldier” during a livestream performance session, and three years after he released an acoustic performance rendition of the song, he has finally released his official version of the track. Explore See latest videos, charts and news In a […]
Trending on Billboard Daft Punk is making contact. As part of the new collaboration with Fortnite, the French duo has released a new video for track “Contact,” the epic closer of its 2013 Grammy-winning album, Random Access Memories. The new animated clip finds the robots careening through space and borrows imagery from Interstella 5555: The 5tory […]
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After winning his first Grammy this year for best R&B song with SZA’s “Snooze,” Leon Thomas could sweep almost every R&B category at the 68th annual Grammy Awards, as the nominations were announced Friday morning (Nov. 7).
While the continued success of his Billboard Hot 100 top 10 hit “Mutt” has proven Thomas is no underdog anymore, its “Live From NPR’s Tiny Desk” version is up for best R&B performance. (The original version was commercially released on Aug. 8, 2024, during the eligibility period for the 2025 Grammy Awards, and it was submitted for consideration then. Thomas released the 5-song Mutt (Live From NPR’s Tiny Desk) EP on Aug. 15, 2025, which qualifies for next year’s ceremony.) Its parent album, which shares the same title, is nominated for best R&B album, while its tracks “Vibes Don’t Lie” and “Yes It Is” are up for best traditional R&B performance and best R&B song, respectively.
Following Thomas, Durand Bernarr has the second most nominations in the R&B field with three: best traditional R&B performance (“Here We Are”), best R&B song (“Overqualified”) and best progressive R&B album (Bloom). He only scored his first Grammy nod ever this year in the best progressive R&B album category. “Folded,” arguably the biggest song of Kehlani’s career to date, has earned her her first Hot 100 top 10 hit and No. 1 on Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs and Hot R&B Songs (charts dated Nov. 8), and now two Grammy nods for best R&B performance and best R&B song. While Kehlani has yet to win a Grammy, they’re poised to take home the gold for the first time next year.
“I’m not big [on letting] any award validate how great your art is. But it’s nice when the system in place or the hierarchy of what you’re doing in art recognizes that what you’re doing is great,” Kehlani told Billboard earlier this year while reflecting on her debut commercial mixtape You Should Be Here, which earned the star her first Grammy nod 10 years ago for best urban contemporary album.
Ledisi could snag her first best traditional R&B performance win in five years with “Love You Too,” the lead single from her 12th studio album The Crown, which is up for best R&B album. After the deluxe edition of 11:11 won best R&B album this year, Chris Brown returns to the best R&B performance field one year later with “It Depends,” featuring Bryson Tiller, which is also up for best R&B song. This week, “It Depends” rose to the No. 1 spot on R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay and spends a fifth week atop Mainstream R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay. And one week before Summer Walker’s third studio album Finally Over It drops, its lead single “Heart of a Woman” earns two nomination for best R&B performance and best R&B song.
Five years ago, Teyana Taylor called out the Recording Academy for the male-dominated best R&B album category after she dropped her third studio album The Album. “Y’all was better off just saying best MALE R&B ALBUM cause all I see is d–k in this category,” she wrote on X. Now, she’s up for her first Grammy ever in this female-dominated category, with Escape Room coming alongside Ledisi with The Crown and Coco Jones with her debut album Why Not More? Bilal’s first album in nine years, Adjust Brightness, earns the dynamic singer/songwriter/musician his first Grammy in 10 years for best progressive R&B album. After their “Peaches” collaboration with Daniel Caesar scored Justin Bieber and Giveon a hefty sum of nominations at the 2022 Grammy Awards, where both lost in every category they were up in, both could avenge themselves in the R&B field, as Bieber is up for best R&B performance (with “Yukon”) for the first time since “Peaches” and Giveon is up for best R&B album (for Beloved) for the first time since Take Time scored a nod in 2021.
U.K. R&B acts like kwn and Odeal have made a lot of noise from across the pond this year, but FLO is the only one nominated for a Grammy next year, as the girl group earns its first nod for best progressive R&B album with its debut album Access All Areas. And after five songs from SZA’s blockbuster 2022 album SOS earned Grammy nods at the 2024 awards ceremony, where SZA was the most-nominated artist with nine total nods, one more is added to her collection: “Crybaby,” from the deluxe Lana edition of SOS, is up for best traditional R&B performance.
While Recording Academy CEO Harvey Mason jr. welcomed The Weeknd back with open arms during the ceremony earlier this year, where he performed “Cry for Me” and “Timeless” with Playboi Carti, Grammy voters did not. His repeat shut out includes “Baptized in Fear” from his sixth studio album Hurry Up Tomorrow not being included in the best R&B song slate. Ravyn Lenae also surprisingly received zero nominations despite her R&B/pop crossover hit “Love Me Not” reaching No. 5 on the Hot 100 and, as Billboard’s awards editor Paul Grein put it, being “played on every pop radio station in America every hour on the hour during the voting period.” While “Love Me Not” competed in the pop field, “Love Is Blind” from the same Bird’s Eye album was submitted for best R&B song, and received no love.
Drake and PartyNextDoor’s “Somebody Loves Me” is nominated for best melodic rap performance, but its parent album $ome $exy $ongs 4 U isn’t up for best progressive R&B album as some might’ve expected. Mariah the Scientist’s breakthrough year isn’t captured by the 2026 nominations either, as “Burning Blue,” her first Hot 100 top 40 hit and first Rhythmic Airplay chart-topper, is looked over for both best R&B performance and best R&B song, and its parent album Hearts Sold Separately, her highest-charting Billboard 200 album (No. 11), isn’t up for best R&B album.
The 2026 Grammy Awards will be held on Sunday, Feb. 1 at Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles, California, airing live on CBS and Paramount+ Premium at 8 p.m. ET/5 p.m. PT.
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Not much rocked the Caribbean in October like Hurricane Melissa.
The historic storm made landfall in Jamaica (Oct. 28) and Cuba (Oct. 29), wrecked parts of Haiti, and caused heavy rain that resulted in fatal flooding across New York City. With a death toll of 75, as of Tuesday (Nov. 4), the devastation of Hurricane Melissa has spurred immediate action and support from some of Jamrock’s biggest stars. Shenseea, Beenie Man, Sean Paul and Spice have all documented their respective relief efforts via their respective social media channels, and, on Monday, Shaggy spoke with Billboard about what he saw on the ground in the immediate aftermath of the storm.
“We got [to Jamaica] early enough to reach the people, because it took me around six hours to get from Kingston to St. Elizabeth in Black River, which is normally a two-and-a-half-hour drive at most,” the reggae icon told Billboard. “We had to chop [tree] limbs down, move things out the way, and drive through high puddles of [runoff], so we got there in the middle of the night. At that point, all we could do was pass water out, so we had to regroup and drive six hours back to Kingston. The next day, we went to the Junction side of St. Elizabeth, which took us four hours. The square itself was shut down. It was ground zero because it wasn’t livable anymore. Nobody could stay there.”
In addition to Shaggy’s efforts alongside the Global Empowerment Mission, verified aid channels include World Food Programme, Project HOPE, GiveDirectly, American Friends of Jamaica, Food for the Poor and Friends of Caritas Cuba.
In lighter news, Trinidadian soca star Mical Teja made headlines after he shared a picture with his locs cut off, A$AP Rocky once again stoked marriage rumors by referring to himself as Rihanna’s “loving husband,” and Chronixx returned with Exile, his first new album in eight years.
Naturally, Billboard’s monthly Reggae/Dancehall Fresh Picks column will not cover every last track, but our Spotify playlist — which is linked below — will expand on the 10 highlighted songs. So, without any further ado:
Trilla-G & V’ghn, “Take Me as I Am”
The genre proves to be very much alive and well with The Recording Academy unveiling the 2026 Grammy nominations on Friday (Nov. 7).
11/7/2025
