News

04 Nov 2022

Breakout Artist JVKE Is Raking In Major Label Offers, So Why Does He Want To Stay Independent?

Last summer, Ethan Curtis of the firm Plush initiated a management conversation with an unknown artist named JVKE (pronounced “Jake”), whose unfinished song had just been used in a TikTok video by influencer Charli D’Amelio. It quickly went viral, and Curtis was eager to move just as fast. He reached out to the 21-year-old Cranston, R.I.-based singer, challenging him to flesh out the song in just one day.

“I spent the next 24 hours nervously hoping the song didn’t suck,” recalls Curtis, who had previously launched the TikTok marketing agency PushPlay, “but it was great.” The resulting hit was “Upside Down,” a bouncy, hip-hop-inflected pop song that has garnered 48.8 million streams, according to Luminate. What followed was even bigger.

JVKE

COS t-shirt, Acne denim jacket.

Nicole Nodland

After officially signing with Plush’s Curtis and Aton Ben-Horin for management, the artist born Jake Lawson turned in his next song, the unabashedly romantic “golden hour.” Underpinned by a sweeping piano and violin melody over which Lawson sings about a lover with “glitter for skin,” the ballad similarly took off on TikTok — only this time, it raised the stakes to unexpected highs.

In September, “golden hour” scored JVKE his first hit on the Billboard Hot 100, soon sparking a major-label bidding war with offers in the multimillion-dollar range — all of which the artist rejected. And while many considerations came into play (including a desire to reap a bigger cut of his earnings), his decision to remain indie ultimately came down to accountability. “I’m a little scared that if I were to bring on a big team that I wouldn’t be as tenacious, or if I got a really big check that I would slack off a bit,” he says.

Even so, he notes that his eventual decision to remain unsigned, despite the flashy offers, “was against the counsel of some people.” Curtis and Aton-Horin admit they were less certain. “Obviously, long term, we don’t know what’s going to happen. But our job as manager is to always support our artists’ vision, whether or not we agree with it,” says Aton-Horin.

JVKE has shown a rare knack for promoting his music through TikTok ever since he launched his account in early 2020 — and that sort of knack is becoming increasingly valuable to record companies as the platform balloons. Now, with over 8 million followers on the platform, he and his older brother/co-writer Zac have been churning out a steady stream of content to promote the remainder of his relatively small catalog, which includes streaming hits like “this is what falling in love feels like” and the Galantis collaboration “Dandelion.” The former opened JVKE’s debut album, this is what __ feels like (Vol. 1-4), which arrived on AWAL in September.

JVKE got his start playing music in church growing up, exclusively listening to contemporary Christian artists before later discovering hip-hop on his brother’s iPod. Though he played piano, drums and guitar as a preteen, it wasn’t until he began using Logic Pro to create his own songs at age 14 that his desire to pursue a career in music took root.

Now, with his debut album behind him, JVKE is already working on new music and linking up with collaborators he won’t name yet but hints are well-known. In the live space, he and his management team are looking to take a cue from TikTok by architecting “viral elements” for in-person performances. Curtis teases that fans can expect “a scaled-down version” of a JVKE tour early next year before hopefully bringing on partners for a bigger outing later on. Already, he has teamed with MTV on a Push campaign in October, and in December, he’ll be American Airlines’ artist of the month, with his music given prime placement on in-flight entertainment screens.

JVKE

KENZO sweater, COS T-shirt and pants.

Nicole Nodland

One thing JVKE is sure he won’t be doing, however, is releasing another conventional full-length. “The way that people consume music is a lot different nowadays … so we need to change how we release music,” he says. Instead, he plans to consistently tease song snippets on TikTok to get input from fans on what he should release next — which he sees as key to connecting with them as an independent artist. “I think if you’re going to go independent, you really do need to … listen to the [fans] because that’s where you’re going to find the most success,” he says.

And though “golden hour” has climbed to No. 28 on Billboard‘s Pop Airplay chart, Curtis says that radio promo is one area they may need help in to scale even higher. “We can spark our own fires, but the question becomes, ‘How capable are we at keeping them burning? For how long?’ ” he says. “To be clear, we’re not saying we’ll never need a label. But I know Jake wants to see how far we can push it on our own.”

JVKE

JVKE photographed October 20, 2022 in London. Kenzo vest, COS pants, H&M socks, Reebok sneakers.

Nicole Nodland

This story will appear in the Nov. 5, 2022, issue of Billboard.

04 Nov 2022

Inside Downtown Music’s Big Pivot

High above Broadway near the southern tip of Manhattan, perched atop what’s known as the Standard Oil Building, sits a particularly privileged slice of Old New York history. The top two floors of the 31-story structure once served as sanctuary for the Rockefeller oil tycoons: The lower has 360-degree panoramic views of New York Harbor, the Statue of Liberty and Governors Island and used to house an executive conference room; the upper, known as the Tower Club, was once home to John D. Rockefeller Jr.’s squash courts, with some ball marks still scoring the walls. In the stairwell connecting the two hangs a sign: “IF WE SEE SMOKE AROUND YOU WE’LL ASSUME YOU’RE ON FIRE AND DRENCH YOU WITH WATER.” It appears to have only recently been taped to the wall.

It’s a clear mid-June morning and the place, rather than a shrine to opulence, looks more like a construction zone amid a teardown. Sun streaming in through the bare windows illuminates stripped gray walls and exposed concrete floors, with architectural renderings and white chalk outlines hinting at what’s to come. The space is being transformed into a state-of-the-art recording studio owned by Downtown Music Holdings, the umbrella group that handles distribution, publishing administration, royalty collection, neighboring rights, and label, publishing and artist services; and houses the digital rights management platform Songtrust and recently acquired companies CD Baby, FUGA, AdRev, Soundrop and DashGo. The studio — where the former squash courts will turn into one of the few loud rooms in the city large enough to accommodate a Broadway cast or symphony orchestra — will eventually become Downtown’s latest flag planted in its New York home.

But this is just a preview. About 50 people — Downtown executives, New York municipal employees and a few members of the media — mill around, slugging coffee and taking in the views as Downtown’s chief engineer, Zach Hancock, gives tours and explains the company’s vision. “As prices have skyrocketed in historic neighborhoods where recording and music making has happened, we have lost the vast majority of venues for making music,” says Manhattan borough president Mark Levine in one of the speeches made to those assembled. “To take a space that could have been vacant for years and to turn it into this hub of creativity, it’s going to become iconic in the music industry.”

Downtown outstripped its New York roots long ago to become a global company, and now has 22 offices around the world. But its home ties run deep: Founder and chairman Justin Kalifowitz grew up delivering food from his father’s luncheonette in downtown Manhattan and co-founded advocacy group New York Is Music in 2014 to promote government support of the business and culture of music in the city and state; longtime general counsel, COO and current CEO Andrew Bergman is a product of the New York public school system and has lived in every borough but the Bronx. So, having a studio in the city — and in such an iconic location — means a lot.

“The music industry has been centered in New York for more than a hundred years, and I think a lot of people took for granted, and take for granted, the fact that it is the largest music industry in the world,” says Kalifowitz. “If you’re running a business here and you don’t invest here and you’re seeing people leave for other places, I think it’s just going to be harder — harder to run your business, harder to enjoy what you’re doing here.”

Justin Kalifowitz photographed on October 19, 2022 at Downtown Music in New York City.

Justin Kalifowitz photographed on October 19, 2022 at Downtown Music in New York City.

Wesley Mann

It’s ironic, in a sense, that Downtown got to this moment by divesting from the business on which it originally staked its name: owning publishing copyrights, which helped it become one of the most successful indie publishing companies of the past 15 years. But as the city, and the music business, have changed, Downtown has, too. And, over the past two years, the company has undergone its biggest transformation yet, morphing from a traditional publisher with 145,000 owned copyrights — including shares in songs such as Maroon 5’s “Moves Like Jagger,” Beyoncé’s “Halo,” Sam Smith’s “Stay With Me” and Lady Gaga’s “Shallow” (from A Star Is Born) — into a full-suite company that owns no rights and aims to help creators at all career levels navigate the music industry’s choppy waters.

But shifting from the traditional business — where ownership was king and hit songs could paper over any cracks — into a new digital world where scale and support are key isn’t easy, and the company’s current status is the culmination of a yearslong transition that’s not yet complete. In the process, Downtown found itself caught in some of the murky corners of the business that the digital revolution created, while trying to remain true to its service-minded core. The path hasn’t been linear, even if the goal is clear — and the transition is a true gamble on the future.

“I’d like Downtown to be this ubiquitous service provider that anyone could tap into, that’s best in class, that’s transparent and that’s easy to port in and out — that’s what we’re trying to build,” says Bergman. “That’s what everything that we’re doing is geared toward. So that all those services are available to you and that anyone, any company or individual, would want to work with us, because we’re filling a need that they have.”

The story of Downtown begins, in a way, with the story of Gnarls Barkley.

In summer 2005, Josh Deutsch and Terence Lam started indie label Downtown Records and quickly signed and starting working the duo’s single “Crazy.” Released in March 2006, “Crazy” reached No. 2 on the Billboard Hot 100 and was nominated for record of the year at the Grammys, ultimately winning for best urban/alternative performance — and giving Downtown the type of early success indies rarely see.

It also fueled a desire to expand, and in 2007, Kalifowitz joined and founded Downtown Music Publishing. Initially, the company signed a few acts affiliated with the label — Santigold, Cold War Kids, Miike Snow’s Andrew Wyatt — along with the writers behind Miley Cyrus’ Hannah Montana album and the producers of Mims’ No. 1 hit, “This Is Why I’m Hot.” But signing writers wasn’t the company’s main focus.

“The majority of what we were doing at Downtown Music Publishing was building a global, independent music publishing company,” Kalifowitz says. “The premise really was, there needed to be a young, nimble company that thought technology-first, but also had a creative hat in the business, and a more bespoke solution would make sense.”

Over its first few years, Downtown built its publishing business traditionally: writer by writer, catalog by catalog. But several early investments and partnerships also helped it grow its administration business. Downtown was an early investor in indie publisher PULSE Music, which has writers like Starrah, Brent Faiyaz and Kehlani on its roster; it also became the U.S. administrator for Trevor Horn’s Perfect Songs, a U.K.-based publisher with hits by artists like Seal, Frankie Goes to Hollywood and Marsha Ambrosius in its catalog. Rather than rely solely on an owned, or inherited, catalog, Downtown took a partnership and investment approach early on, which gave it both insight into other businesses in its sphere and a diversified income stream.

In 2011, Downtown launched Songtrust, a tech-based global administration platform to help songwriters and producers get paid for the exploitation of their works. The service soon began cutting direct deals with collection societies — today totaling 65 deals across more than 245 countries and territories, with clients in 173 countries — that allowed its clients to receive publishing royalties directly and much quicker than traditional admin deals. “When we started Songtrust it was like, ‘How come those mid-tier artists or earlier aspirational artists can’t have access to the same kinds of service that a more prominent artist would have?’ ” says Bergman, who joined Downtown as general counsel in 2008, rose to COO in 2012 and became CEO in September 2021. “We started to build that technology out as more egalitarian, and today it is essentially the backbone for all of our publishing administration activities.”

Andrew Bergman photographed on October 19, 2022 at Downtown Music in New York City.

Andrew Bergman photographed on October 19, 2022 at Downtown Music in New York City.

Wesley Mann

Songtrust, in its early days, was essentially a Downtown side hustle, co-founded by Kalifowitz and Downtown’s chief strategy officer, Joe Conyers. But it would become important in the company’s evolution as the first true service-first, nonownership-based offering it launched. In 2013, Downtown sold its record label back to founders Deutsch and Lam and, the following year, forged a partnership between Songtrust and CD Baby to provide publishing administration and royalty collection in the same way that the indie distributor collected royalties on master recordings.

That deal was when “we started to deal with creators en masse, thousands of clients as opposed to dozens, and it fundamentally changed how we thought about the service we were offering,” says Kalifowitz, who transitioned from CEO to executive chairman in August 2021. “That was also somewhat of a watershed era for us; we started to really expand to other markets — we opened in the U.K., we opened in Amsterdam, we opened an L.A. office — and we picked up the rights to the John Lennon and Yoko Ono catalogs. It really very much cemented our plans of being a stand-alone business. That partnership taught us a tremendous amount about the growing artist services space.”

It also led the company to expand what it could offer creators, often through acquisitions. In 2015, Downtown introduced Neighboring Rights — public performance rights for sound recordings — through the purchase of London-based Eagle-I Music, and now represents artists like Justin Bieber, Ryan Tedder and Ella Fitzgerald in that area. The company also executed direct licensing deals with YouTube, Apple, Amazon and Pandora, and through Songtrust’s expansion, began aggressive international growth, buying local repertoire in Europe and Japan while inking admin deals for the Wu-Tang Clan, the Miles Davis and George Gershwin estates, Shaggy, Tori Amos and Big Yellow Dog Music, publishing home to Meghan Trainor and Maren Morris. In all, according to Kalifowitz, Downtown worked in some form with over 36 million songs, through distribution, administration, royalty processing or other offerings.

“They made really smart deals; I think Justin Kalifowitz is still regarded as probably the smartest guy in publishing,” says one manager of the company’s success as a publisher. “They were really profitable in that sense. I don’t think they overspent for anything. Just a really smart company.”

By 2019, Downtown began to shuffle the decks. Molly Neuman — the onetime drummer for riot ­grrrl groups Bratmobile and The Frumpies who went on to various roles in the indie music community — was promoted from head of business development to president of Songtrust. She started turning the “side project” that sat “in the back of our Soho loft space, kind of in the corner, with less than 20 people” into an educational platform for music publishing at a time when the Copyright Royalty Board rate trial and the Music Modernization Act were dominating industry headlines.

“There were all these things about publishing as a required understanding starting to accelerate, while we were marketing Songtrust with education at our core,” Neuman says. “Because it’s fundamentally confusing, people don’t know why they would need it, so we kind of peeled it back as part of our strategy.”

Molly Neuman photographed on October 19, 2022 at Downtown Music in New York City.

Molly Neuman photographed on October 19, 2022 at Downtown Music in New York City.

Wesley Mann

The same year, Downtown spent around $200 million to purchase AVL Digital Group, the umbrella company that housed CD Baby, AdRev, DashGo and Soundrop, which were collectively responsible for distributing and monetizing over 10 million tracks from nearly 1 million artists. The acquisition dramatically expanded Downtown’s offerings into digital distribution (CD Baby), YouTube monetization (AdRev), social video support (Soundrop) and digital marketing and label services (DashGo) and swelled Downtown’s headcount to north of 300 employees. Less than a year later they brought on FUGA, a business-to-business tech and distribution platform for labels that gave Downtown a twin-engine service offering — one aimed at creators themselves, the other at music business clients — and doubled the size of its staff. Steadily, Downtown had begun to morph from traditional publishing toward a more services-oriented model.

The final piece of the puzzle came in April 2021, when Downtown announced it had sold its 145,000 owned copyrights to Concord in a deal worth $350 million, according to Billboard estimates. (Billboard estimated the owned catalog generated around $30 million per year; Downtown is still in the publishing administration business.) Its remaining businesses, the company said, would pull in $600 million in revenue and collections in 2021 alone. (The company declined to disclose its 2022 revenue projections, but said it is profitable.) Just as money was flooding the catalog acquisition space, Downtown was out. But it had a different vision for its future.

“[The owned catalog] was a small minority of the revenue of the company, it was a very significant cost to run, and it was a business model — the acquisition and ownership of rights — that was incongruous with a fast-growing services business,” Kalifowitz explains. “Our view was, there’s this one aspect of our business that is very crowded, has a tremendous amount of capital and is willing to accept very low returns, and it’s quite distracting to this other thing we’re doing, which is so much bigger and growing so much faster, and that we think, as a business, has a lot more potential, and as a product-market fit, there are so many more people who need what we’re building.”

In a way, Downtown was jumping from one boiling-hot segment of the business — catalog ownership — to another: distribution and services. And it was hardly alone. In the past two years, a slew of record labels — all three major groups, in addition to Republic, 300, Interscope, Capitol, Virgin and others — either started or bolstered their distribution offerings, while companies like SoundCloud, Tencent and TikTok shifted their business models toward services or added distribution capabilities.

It’s a plan with a forward-looking view of how the music business seems to be developing. In February 2021, Spotify’s global head of music, Jeremy Erlich, said that 60,000 tracks per day were uploaded to the platform, or some 1.8 million each month. (Recent reports now put that daily number at 100,000.) Earlier this year, Spotify said that in 2021 it had 72,700 DIY artists, and that 28% of artists who made more than $10,000 per year on the service alone — a total of 15,140, up 171% from 2017 — self-distributed their music to Spotify using CD Baby, TuneCore or Distrokid.

“Catalog decays over time; granted, there’s been exponential sales on a Phil Collins or a Bob Dylan, but it feels like that bubble is beginning to burst,” says one former distribution executive. “So to invest in an infrastructure that supports the emerging, new music industry, which is the DIY music industry, which in aggregate will represent more market share than the three majors combined in the future — that’s a spot I’d want to be in. And if you have a company where you have a flat fee upfront, and you don’t have to worry about if it sells, it becomes a numbers game. Some will pop and take off and you can find different ways to upstream those through administration or label services, and you can create a very robust and lucrative business.”

With more and more companies entering that business, success becomes about differentiation. “Getting your metadata out to the [digital service providers], that’s been commoditized; it’s about everything else that you do,” says Bergman of Downtown’s philosophy. “We probably have the broadest service offering already and we’re really just getting started on that front. Instead of looking to see what’s the next catalog we can buy, it’s about, what’s the next improvement in the service offering, whether that’s international expansion, or localizing the offering, or a service we don’t currently provide or an enhancement of a service we are providing? That’s how we think about the world going forward.”

Downtown has also forged relationships and partnerships across the industry spectrum. Through its various services, the company works with labels like Sub Pop (Songtrust, Neighboring Rights); Beggars, Epitaph and Domino (FUGA); artists like Phish (publishing), Maggie Lindemann (Songtrust), Lindsey Buckingham (Neighboring Rights), Cheat Codes (distribution) and Atticus Ross (publishing); and companies like Secretly Publishing (Songtrust), Symphonic Distribution (publishing for its catalog and its clients), Concord (publishing in Africa) and Hipgnosis (video monetization). What sets it apart from other services-based companies isn’t just the range of what it offers to individual creators, but to the industry at large, allowing them to plug in to its various outlets without having to go the major-label route.

“Organizations like Downtown, through services like CD Baby and FUGA and their admin business, make it possible for independent companies to grow globally without being put into that local bucket that the majors scale, but are unable to deliver the services on, because it’s a 1-inch pipe with 8 inches of water going through it,” says Allen Kovac, CEO of Better Noise Music, label home to artists like Five Finger Death Punch and AWOLnation, and a client of FUGA, Downtown Music Services and Downtown Neighboring Rights. “They offer a workaround — the ability for an indie company that may not have offices to be able to get focus from another independent company.”

Adding these capabilities through acquisitions is one matter; incorporating them into a broader company structure — one that grew fivefold in just a few years — is another. So Downtown underwent a major restructuring in the past few months, aligning itself into two distinct divisions, one business-facing, the other for creators. Neuman was promoted to chief marketing officer, in charge of spreading the gospel of what Downtown offers to the masses; FUGA chief Pieter van Rijn was named president of its new business unit, which includes FUGA, Downtown Neighboring Rights, AdRev and Downtown Music Services’ artist, label services and publishing administration units. Its remaining businesses, including CD Baby, Soundrop and DashGo, fall under its creator unit, overseen by the Downtown Holdings executive leadership team. Currently, Downtown says it works with 1.7 million creators and businesses across 30 million tracks and 14 million YouTube assets and continues to be a strategic investor, most recently in the $34 million funding round for alternative funding platform beatBread, and opened a $200 million fund intended for artist advances for the indie community in partnership with Bank of America in March.

“We have everything already there through various operating companies, and successful businesses, profitable businesses, but because of the acquisition spree that Downtown went on, there is room for opportunity to really create a few very clear business lines that determine how we’re going to go to market,” says van Rijn. “Over time, we want to be the best and most reliable and most forward-thinking service provider for the professional music industry, combining music DNA — which we all have — with technology and services. And understanding that we are a services business means you really have to understand your clients and how to develop with them, how to be innovative, but at the same time be practical about what are today’s needs of our clients.”

Peter van Rijn photographed on October 19, 2022 at Downtown Music in New York City.

Peter van Rijn photographed on October 19, 2022 at Downtown Music in New York City.

Wesley Mann

“Downtown was always seen as a good, have-their-sh-t-together publishing administrator: They seemed very like-minded in caring about the sector that they were in, caring about the artists and putting together an infrastructure that put the artist and the songwriter first, as opposed to an ROI,” says the label-services executive. “And it allowed the company to grow in a very fastidious, credible way.” But growth can also, in turn, reveal unexpected problems. “It’s happened so recently — the catalog sale wasn’t that long ago,” the manager says. “So I think Downtown 2.0 has a lot to prove.”

In just a few short years, Downtown had completely transformed its model and its staff, if not its core philosophy, from the relatively stable publishing world to the constantly evolving services realm. But such rapid growth, as well as the rapid evolution of the digital music business, isn’t always smooth — and Downtown soon ran into a particularly rough speed bump.

In August 2022, Billboard published an investigation into MediaMuv, a company that took advantage of a loophole in YouTube’s royalty collection system to defraud artists and songwriters of $23 million in unclaimed royalties for which it did not own the rights. MediaMuv claimed these royalties between May 2017 and November 2021, when its owners were indicted by the IRS, and used AdRev to claim the money.

Investigators charged the two owners with 30 counts of conspiracy, wire fraud, money laundering and aggravated identity theft, and while neither YouTube nor AdRev were charged with wrongdoing, the story was met with incredulity by some who questioned how AdRev could allow fraud of that scale on its platform. In a plea deal, one of MediaMuv’s founders admitted to falsifying several documents submitted to AdRev “for the purpose of deceiving [them],” and sources tell Billboard that the complexity of the fabrications helped MediaMuv skate through AdRev’s regular monitoring processes.

Much of the fraud — though not all of it — took place prior to Downtown’s acquisition of AdRev, but its scale still put Downtown on the defensive. AdRev’s longtime president, Noah Becker, left the company, though Downtown said the move predated the indictment. In some respects, AdRev’s issues in this particular case reflect the increasingly complicated nature of royalty collections online, particularly on user-generated content platforms like YouTube, and point to real concern the business model presents to services-oriented companies: the sheer number of artists and copyrights companies are dealing with, and the cost-benefit analysis and likelihood of fraud that comes with that much volume.

“It’s an activity that’s growing quickly and the people who are committing the fraud are getting much more sophisticated,” says one distribution executive, who stresses it will take an industrywide campaign to shut down, or just get ahead of, the practice. “It’s not as easy to catch them anymore; their tactics are not as obvious anymore. Unfortunately, we’re playing catch-up with the technology that the people who are committing the fraud have access to, and a lot of what the aggregators do today is reactive.”

Downtown has moved to be proactive in combating this type of fraud: In April 2020, it acquired Simbals, a France-based audio fingerprinting company whose technology Downtown uses to better track its copyrights across the digital spectrum. Downtown has also developed a continuously evolving quality control program over the past several years, which is involved in both onboarding and continual checks for red flags, and in the spring implemented an assurance process to help codify that quality control process across its business units. It has internally developed tools to check for fraud patterns in streaming data prior to distribution, in-house data teams and fraud examiners to monitor for fraud patterns and third-party tools to prevent fraud at scale. (The company also notes that it began working with MediaMuv on a recommendation from YouTube, which referred it to AdRev.)

MediaMuv’s fraud, however, evaded several of those protections, while other safeguards have been strengthened since AdRev was acquired and the fraud was exposed. And it is unlikely to be the only or last issue that Downtown has to deal with in the services space, where fraud can be rampant and rights not always clear. But in a sector of the business where relationships and trust are paramount for adding and retaining clients, it’s been a tough storm to weather.

“We’re a known quantity in the business, so I think that the bulk of the industry will recognize that Downtown and its constituent businesses and people are known as ethical, well-run businesses that are all about trying to connect creators with their rightful share of the pie,” Bergman says. “That is why we exist. So I’m not naive about this sort of stuff, but I expect that our reputation for all the good work that we do — our attention to detail and all the systems and the technology that we provide to do that — will remind people that that’s what Downtown is.”

Moving forward, Downtown plans to continue to build out additional services to help clients navigate the ever-changing digital ecosystem, with social music and Web3 constantly evolving and new platforms continuously reshaping music consumption online. Predicting how the world will look in five years is not always simple, and certainly not static. But creating tools for the future — whether a simplified global publishing admin business, an all-in-one suite of services or even a new, state-of-the-art studio high above Manhattan — has always been in Downtown’s DNA.

“I’ve always believed that we were building a forever company,” says Kalifowitz. “I think the future for us is a continued streamlining of what we do and continued expansion of what we do, primarily geographically. And then continue to build out our platform. That’s critical. One of the things you learn as a service provider is that there’s no ‘build it and you’re done.’ It’s continuous improvement. So I think the future holds continuous improvement.”

This story will appear in the Nov. 5, 2022, issue of Billboard.

04 Nov 2022

Femme It Forward Sets Inaugural Give Her FlowHERS Awards Gala: Exclusive

Trailblazing Black women in entertainment will be celebrated with an annual ceremony, the Give Her FlowHERS Awards Gala, Billboard can exclusively reveal.

An initiative of Femme It Forward, the Give Her FlowHERS Awards is set for next Friday, Nov. 11 at the Beverly Hilton Los Angeles, with funds raised on the night supporting Femme It Forward’s mentorship program, Next Gem Femme.

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Femme It Forward, the female-led music and entertainment platform, launches the event to fete trailblazing Black women in entertainment who “empower, uplift, and inspire change.”

First-time Special Awards honorees include breakthrough hip-hop star Latto (“The Big Femme Energy Award”); songwriter and artist Jozzy (“The Pen It Forward Award”), R&B singer and songwriter Muni Long (“The Bloom Award”); Lashon Jones, mother of rapper Lil Baby (“Moms I’d Like to Follow” or M.I.L.F. Award); singer-songwriter Victoria Monet (“The Visionary Award”); and high-profile couple Ciara and Russell Wilson (“The Black Love Award”)

Also, organizers will today announce honorees who have made “an invaluable impact as mentors” as part of the Next Gem Femme program. The list of 22 mentors to be honored — as voted on by their mentees — includes Baroline Diaz (Interscope), Dimplez Ijeoma (Capitol Music Group), Madeline Nelson (Amazon Music), Nicole Wyskoarko (Interscope Geffen A&M), Valeisha Butterfield Jones (Google), Alex Maxwell (Live Nation) and Diana Dotel (MTW), among others.

Emerging artists will also get time in the spotlight on the night, from Baby Tate, Mapy The Violin Queen, Joyce Wrice and Alex Vaughn, while Jasmine Solano is booked to DJ at the afterparty.

The gala “is a realization of the work we do year-round with Femme It Forward to champion, empower, and celebrate the women who are pushing our culture forward every day,” comments Heather Lowery, president and CEO of Femme It Forward.

Lowery and her team “wanted to take it a step beyond a traditional awards show and create a special experience that truly represents everything our culture is about: family, love, sisterhood, entrepreneurial spirit, innovation and artistic brilliance,” she continues.

Initially launched under the Live Nation Urban banner, Femme It Forward is now a joint venture with parent Live Nation Entertainment. Its mission, to celebrate, educate, and empower the industry’s “most creative and accomplished female visionaries through multi-format, multi-market consumer experiences,” according to a statement.

Additional details for the inaugural gala will be announced ahead of showtime.

Visit GiveHerFlowHERS.com for more and buy tickets at femmeitforward.com/gala.

04 Nov 2022

Taylor Swift Adds More Dates to 2023 ‘Eras’ U.S. Stadium Run

If you were bummed that your city wasn’t on the initial list of dates for Taylor Swift‘s massive 2022 Eras Tour, Friday morning (Nov. 4) brought some good news. After announcing earlier this week that she will embark on a 27-date U.S. tour that will celebrate all 10 of her studio albums released since 2006, the singer dropped another handful of stadium dates that adds eight more stops to what has already proven to be an out-of-the-box blockbuster run.

“UM. Looks like I’ll get to see more of your beautiful faces than previously expected… we’re adding 8 shows to the tour,” the singer tweeted on Friday morning.

The new stops include an April 14 gig at Raymond James Stadium in Tampa, a May 5 stop at Nissan Stadium in Nashville, as well as gigs at Lincoln Financial Field in Philadelphia (May 14), and gigs in Foxborough, MA, East Rutherford, NJ, Seattle, Santa Clara, CA and an Aug. 3 show at SoFi Stadium in Los Angeles.

Swift hasn’t hit the road since 2018, when she launched her best-selling Reputation Tour. She had planned on performing again after the release of her 2019 record Lover in a concert series called Lover Fest, but canceled the shows due to the COVID-19 pandemic. For those keeping score at home, this means that Tay has six albums-worth of new material that she’s never played live — if you include the previously unreleased vault tracks on 2021’s Fearless (Taylor’s Version) and Red (Taylor’s Version). Studio albums Folklore, Evermore and, of course her latest, Midnights, which have all also been released in the time between Lover and the Eras Tour.

Check out the new dates and opening acts and Swift’s tweet containing all the dates below.

April 14 – Tampa, FL @ Raymond James Stadium (beabadoobee, Gracie Abrams)

May 5 – Nashville, TN @ Nissan Stadium (Phoebe Bridgers, Gracie Abrams)

May 14 – Philadelphia, PA @ Lincoln Financial Field (Phoebe Bridgers, Gracie Abrams)

May 21 – Foxborough, MA @ Gillette Stadium (Phoebe Bridgers, Gracie Abrams)

May 28 – East Rutherford, NJ @ MetLife Stadium (Phoebe Bridgers, OWENN)

July 23 – Seattle, WA @ Lumen Field (HAIM, Gracie Abrams)

July 28 – Santa Clara, CA @ Levi’s Stadium (HAIM, Gracie Abrams)

August 3 – Los Angeles, CA @ SoFi Stadium (HAIM, Gracie Abrams)

04 Nov 2022

Megan Thee Stallion Calls Out Drake For ‘Circo Loco’ Lyric: ‘Stop Using My Shooting For Clout’

Megan Thee Stallion wasted no time Friday morning (Nov. 4) calling out Drake for a line from his new song “Circo Loco.” Shortly after Drizzy and 21 Savage‘s Her Loss joint album dropped, Meg took to Twitter to air out her feelings about the 6 God seemingly suggesting in a “Loco” lyric that the Houston rapper lied about allegedly getting shot by Tory Lanez.

“This b—h lie ’bout getting shots, but she still a stallion/ She don’t even get the joke/ But she still smiling,” Drake raps on the song, in which he doesn’t mention Meg by name. He then appears to double-down a short time later with the line, “Shorty say she graduated, she ain’t learn enough/ Play your album, track one, ‘kay, I heard enough.”

Megan graduated from Texas Southern University in 2021 and in a June interview she talked about the excruciating, lengthy recovery she went through from the physical and emotional injuries from the July 2020 incident in which Lanez allegedly shot her in the feet after an argument. During a CBS Mornings interview in April, Megan reaffirmed testimony she gave during a pre-trial hearing in December 2021 that Lanez yelled “Dance, bitch!” as he opened fire around her feet. Lanez was charged with one felony count of assault with a semiautomatic weapon and another count of carrying a loaded, unregistered firearm in a vehicle; Lanez has pleaded not guilty and a trail is set to begin on Nov. 28.

“Stop using my shooting for clout b–h ass N—-s! Since when tf is it cool to joke abt women getting shot !,” she tweeted early Friday morning in a series of heated comments which did not call out Drake by name, but which appeared to be a reaction to the “Loco” lines, which The Daily Beast described as a “vile, misogynistic” attack. “You n—-s especially RAP N—-S ARE LAME! Ready to boycott bout shoes and clothes but dog pile on a black woman when she say one of y’all homeboys abused her.” At press time a spokesperson for Drake had not returned requests for comment.

Megan kept going, adding, “People attack me y’all go up for it , i defend myself now I’m doing too much … every time it never ends and this did NOT happen until I came out and said I got shot … y’all don’t fwm okay cool f–k it bye,” she wrote after opening the tweet spree with a hard shot at people who don’t believe women, noting that “a stallion is slang for a TALL THICK WOMAN.”

“I know I’m very popular but y’all gotta stop attaching weak ass conspiracy theories in bars to my name lol N—-s nor hoes EVER address me or @ me WITH a fact or receipts. I AM CLOUT B—H keep sucking my p–y.” She continued weighing in with another a few additional comments, including a warning that the truth will be revealed in court.

“And when the mf facts come out remember all y’all hoe ass favorite rappers that stood behind a N—a that SHOT A FEMALE,” she wrote. At press time it did not appear that Drake had responded to Megan’s tweets.

See Megan’s tweets below.

04 Nov 2022

Executive Turntable: Moves at Warner Records’ Urban Promotion Department; HarbourView Names MD

Warner Records promoted Ron Stewart to senior vp of urban promotion and hired Cory Sparks as vp of urban promotion. Stewart’s duties will expand, with the executive now leading promotion strategy and campaigns for all urban artists on the label’s roster. Based in New York, he reports to executive vp of promotion & commerce Mike Chester. The Atlanta-based Sparks, who reports to Stewart, joins the label from Epic Records, where he was vp of promotion.

Sherrese Clarke Soares‘ global alternative asset management company HarbourView Equity Partners hired Palisa Kelley as managing director and head of legal and business affairs. Kelley joins HarbourView from Selverne Kelley Bradford, PLLC, a boutique law firm serving the music industry where she served as partner.

David Gorman was hired as creative director at Exceleration Music. In the role, he will oversee the direction of Exceleration’s consumer-facing digital and physical art, as well as packaging and video projects for the company’s label and artist partners. Gorman joins Exceleration — which supports artists, creators and entrepreneurs in the independent music space — from Amazon Music, where he worked as global catalog programming lead.

Howard Price was named head of media at Bucks Music Group. Reporting to managing director Simon Platz, Price will maintain and develop the company’s relationships with composers, broadcasters and production companies and manage publishing interests in music composed for film, TV and media. He most recently served as senior vp of visual & media rights at Sony Music Publishing. Price can be reached at hprice@bucksmusicgroup.co.uk.

Britt Lovejoy and Elana Nightingale Dawson were promoted to partner at the law firm Lathan & Watkins. Both are members of the firm’s connectivity, privacy & information practice and the litigation & trial department, representing clients including digital media companies, music broadcasters and internet platforms in copyright and related matters. Lovejoy can be reached at britt.lovejoy@lw.com and Nightingale Dawson can be reached at elana.nightingale.dawson@lw.com.

Secretly Group hired Laura “Lau” Frías as A&R director on the label side and Tony Messina-Doerning and Trinity Hood as A&R and A&R associate, respectively, at Secretly Publishing. Based in Brooklyn, Frías will serve A&R duties for Secretly labels Dead Oceans, Jagjaguwar, Saddest Factory Records and Secretly Canadian. She joins the company from Kobalt Music Group and reports to Secretly Group vp of A&R Jon Coombs. Messina-Doerning and Hood, both based in Los Angeles and reporting to Secretly Publishing’s senior director of A&R Eddie Sikazwe, join from Nice Life Recording Company and UTA, respectively.

Erin Mackay, who departed his role as executive vp of global digital strategy at Warner Chappell Music at the beginning of the year, has started imbr, a fintech company designed to simplify global rights payments for songwriters. Those interested can join the waitlist and receive updates by visiting imbr.co.

Sophia Margerison was named global business development director at YMU. Based between London and Los Angeles, Margerison joins the artist management company from Pollen, where she served as head of live music partnerships. In her new role, she will recruit new artist managers, look to broaden and diversify YMU’s roster and help oversee the global representation of the company’s clients. Margerison can be reached at Sophia.Margerison@ymugroup.com.

ASM Global named Patrick Lynch senior vp of private events in the U.S; he joins the company from e-commerce and marketing platform Mercato. In the role, Lynch will work with ASM Global’s national sales force to focus on new business opportunities for the company’s private event portfolio. He can be reached at plynch@asmglobal.com.

Perkins Publicity founder Trevor Perkins relaunched management firm Sincerely Music Group and signed artist Nathan Wilson ahead of the release of the singer-songwriter’s next single, “Meant for You,” on Friday (Nov. 4). Perkins can be reached at info@thesincerelymusicgroup.com.

BBR Music Group promoted Caroline Fields to director of publicity and hired Camryn Scharnhorst as manager of publicity. Fields, who was previously manager of publicity, will continue to handle media relations, asset creation and strategy development and implementation while serving as the day-to-day point person for several artists. Scharnhorst, who most recently worked as the account manager for four large-market country radio stations in Kansas City, Missouri, will manage the day-to-day publicity needs of artists on the roster. Both Fields and Scharnhorst will report to senior vp of publicity Jay Jones; they can be reached at caroline@bbrmusicgroup.com and camryn@bbrmusicgroup.com, respectively.

Folk Alliance International hired Neeta Ragoowansi as its new executive director, succeeding Aengus Finnan in the role. Ragoowansi, who most recently served as senior counsel of legal & business affairs at Global Citizen, will look to expand the organization’s global reach and partnerships and further expand its programs for education and access to networks and finances, among other goals. She will continue to serve in a volunteer capacity as president of Music Managers Forum – U.S., global co-chair for Women in Music and co-chair of the diversity, equity & inclusion task force for the American Bar Association’s forum on the entertainment & sports industries.

The Academy of Country Music announced its newly-elected board of directors for the 2022-23 term. They include Scot Calonge, Jackie Campbell, Charlie Cook, Cyndi Forman, Margaret Hart, Deana Ivey, Chandra LaPlume, Chris Lisle, Cindy Mabe, Lee Thomas Miller, Curt Motley, Kristie Sloan, Adam Weiser and Rachel Whitney. In addition, director-at-large positions were appointed by ACM board of directors chair Chuck Aly, vice-chair Ebie McFarland and vp Randy Bernard. Appointees include George Curi, Benson Curb, Beville Dunkerley, Becky Gardenhire, Shannan Hatch, Jeremy Holley, Frank Liddell, Jon Loba, Shawn McSpadden, Austin Neal, Brian O’Connell, Rod Phillips, Kelly Rich, Tim Roberts, Scott Scovill, Sally Seitz, Laura Veitz and Candice Watkins. All directors will serve two-year terms aside from Shannan Hatch and Austin Neal, who have been appointed to one-year terms to fill a previous vacancy.

04 Nov 2022

Every Song Ranked On Drake & 21 Savage’s ‘Her Loss’ Album: Critic’s Picks

Drake and 21 Savage delivered their anticipated Her Loss joint project after a week’s delay on Friday (Nov. 4).

After teaming up for Billboard Hot 100 chart-topper “Jimmy Cooks” to close out Drizzy’s Honestly, Nevermind album earlier this year, the “Knife Talk” duo decided to go ahead with a full collab album.

It’s been a deceiving yet fascinating rollout for Her Loss as Drake and 21 cooked up a fake Vogue magazine and teased a Tiny Desk Concert that won’t be debuting on NPR anytime soon. The 6 God even joked about his porn fetishes in a sham interview with radio legend Howard Stern, which led to his bizarre hentai posts on his Instagram Story hours before showtime.

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Drake is certainly no stranger to the art of collaboration as he’s been dishing out assists like an NBA point guard for more than a decade. Her Loss is a rollercoaster ride, boasting 16 tracks with a lone credited guest appearance sprinkled in from Travis Scott.

Pour up and run through our song rankings below.

16. “Privileged Rappers”

Being a “privileged rapper” is a label Drake is tired of hearing about. He calls out those walking around the industry with their head high even though they haven’t made a hit in years while 21 uses his 16 bars to get raunchy about a certain love interest. Either way, this isn’t going to be anyone’s favorite record.

15. “Treacherous Twins”

There’s not enough bromance in rap. The Atlanta-bred rhymer and Drake show love to each other as “Treacherous Twins” — or they might be talking about other people altogether. Regardless, there are times when simplicity wins. That was the case for 21 Savage when he gets off a cheeky bar about how he never gets ID’d at night clubs because they already know he’s 21.

14. “Hours In Silence”

The pace is slowed down for a six-minute intermissions of sorts. Drake refills his glass of wine and recalls some of his mishaps in romantic encounters. “Hours in Silence” finds Drizzy running into the same toxic women issues that plagued him on Take Care while essentially boxing 21 Savage out of the marathon. Whether it’s the regret of buying her a Rolex or even a condo within the first month, that’s simply a reality most listeners can’t relate to.

13. “Broke Boys”

21 Savage finally gets the best of Drizzy on a record by a unanimous decision. The “Sneakin” duo won’t talk to broke boys, but unfortunately for fans, that’s about 99.99 percent of listeners compared to Drake and 21. They both flip the middle finger to adidas while proudly wearing their Nike stripes, which should make Kanye happy. “Broke Boys” sits toward the back of the line when it comes to album favorites though.

12. “I Guess It’s F–k Me”

First off, what a song title for a worthy album closer. Drake is always calculated and precise with what message he wants to leave fans with before heading into the next era of music. Here, Drizzy gets evocative about a certified lover girl where he painfully admits at times he has no choice but to avoid the truth even if that’s followed up with a flex about how his Air Drake plane couldn’t even land in the small Hamptons airport. “Truth or dare, I’ma take a double dare/ Truth is a suicide/ I would rather live a lie, keep you on the outside,” he raps.

11. “Pussy & Millions”

The solo credited feature comes to the rescue on “Pussy & Millions” giving the album a different texture thanks to the Houston rager. Travis Scott heats up while leaving fans feigning for more as UTOPIA‘s landing shortly awaits.

10. “More M’s”

Metro Boomin’ reuniting with 21 Savage is always a dangerous yet welcomed combination. “More M’s” adds to the list of Metro-21-Drake collabs that includes “No Complaints” and “Mr. Right Now.” The 6 God invades the beat “skating like a Montreal Canadien.” Drake confidently claims a Verzuz match with his catalog is an unfair advantage as no opponent is worthy of his time.

9. “Jumbotron S–t Poppin”

Drake on a F1LTHY beat is the upset of the year. Although, Drizzy doesn’t embarrass himself while trying to find his pocket inside the distorted sound where the likes of Playboi Carti and Destroy Lonely call home. We’re even letting Drake get away with referring to himself as a Vamp at 36 years old because he’s the 6 God.

8. “Major Distribution”

Drizzy’s pompous singing about success leads the listener astray before the dark beat makes a hard left turn off the road. The OVO boss stick shifts up a gear and tries to match the acceleration with the fastest he’s rapped all year. He hands the baton to 21 for one of his more forgettable verses on the album outside of somehow name-dropping NBA players Steve Francis and Andrew Wiggins in back-to-back bars.

One of the many headline-snatching lyrics comes when Drake references a beautiful girl trying to rap, but he’s not impressed “She a 10 tryna rap, it’s good on mute,” he admits. Many fans tried to connect the dots to emerging “Munch” rapper Ice Spice, whom Drake unfollowed on Instagram after an initial meet-up in the 6. The first solo venture is a bullseye for Drizzy.

7. “Spin Bout U”

While Her Loss might be the album title, Drizzy stands up for women while jabbing U.S. politicians fumbling decisions about their reproductive rights. He then flexes on broke boys who can’t get reservations at Italian hotspot Carbone while he’s got the last table any night.

Savage also gives out free game when admitting he asks girls for their “Finstas” to find out who they really are instead of their actual Instagram accounts. However, it’s almost halftime and Drake has shined while bringing 21 along for the ride to this point of the album.

6. “On BS”

The tag-team champions pass the baton back-and-forth with one looking to outdo the other. The braggadocios rhymes reach a crescendo when the Slaughter Gang CEO and Drake flex about their feature prowess. 21 admits he has no issue turning someone else’s song into his own while the 6 God boasts about how his simple presence will have labels blowing up an artist’s phone.

“I jump on your song and make you sound like you the feature,” 21 raps over OZ’s ethereal production before Drizzy hops in. “I jump on your song and make a label think they need ya, for real!”

5. “Backoutsideboyz”

Lil Yachty tags in for 21 and provides ad-libs across the horn-tinged record. Drake is back to his bragging ways while simultaneously second-guessing his romance decisions. It’s rare to hear the king of Canada comment on politics where he admits he’s never voted, but if he did adult film star Teanna Trump has his ballot.

4. “3 AM On Glenwood”

With Drake not breathing down his neck, 21 Savage enjoys another bona fide moment defining Her Loss. It’s usually Drizzy blacking out over pitched-up samples, but 21 shows that two can play this game as he took a page out of the 6 God’s book by making use of a time stamp song title, which is usually reserved as a Drake specialty, but the OVO captain even had to be impressed.

21 displays his matured lyrical sparring ability with Steph Curry and Stephon Marbury references and then disses Mase’s artist relations. He even gets candid about turning to Kim Kardashian to get his brother out of jail while taking listeners on a journey of what’s going on in his turbulent life.

3. “Rich Flex”

Drake takes his intros very seriously and he and 21 don’t miss here by setting the tone for the project. The 6 God steals the show on the menacing Tay Keith beat switch in the second half where Drake interpolates T.I.’s classic “24’s” flow while flexing on the industry, which he then shrewdly flips into an homage to the late great Kobe Bryant.

2. “Middle of the Ocean”

This is peak Drake in his Goyard bag. A pitched-up sample and plenty of space to breathe — just give Drizzy enough room on the tarmac to take off like LeBron James in 2008. Drake opens up about his opulent life of luxury eating food most people can’t even pronounce and in the same sentence takes a snipe at Serena Williams’ husband, Alexis Ohanian, letting him know they still got beef. That’s the type of versatility lacking in hip-hop.

He even checks the box for hip-hop nerds with the shrewd AZ and Nas “Mo Money, Mo Murder” sample. Isn’t that what Drake does? He checks every box as a rapper. Receiving a Birdman TED talk was a nice touch for the outro too.

1. “Circo Loco”

A certified standout from Her Loss. Sampling a classic like Daft Punk’s “One More Time” can easily go corny — which it did on DJ Khaled’s “Staying Alive” — but Drake bottles this up into greatness. He wants smoke with everybody and even admits he only agreed to stand alongside Kanye West at the Larry Hoover concert last year because of his admiration for industry titan J. Prince. Megan Thee Stallion has already responded to a bar Drake possibly targeted her with when referencing the shooting case she’s entrenched in.

Drake used this album as the chance to reassert himself as the top dog on the rap food chain once again with Her Loss serving as a stark reminder for fans who may have been distracted by his dance-leaning Honestly, Nevermind album from earlier this year that he is not to be played with.

04 Nov 2022

Taylor Swift Completes Another Chart Double In Australia

Taylor Swift remains queen of Australia’s charts, as Midnights (Universal) is crowned for a second consecutive week and “Anti-Hero” holds at No. 1 on the national singles survey.

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Swift’s all-conquering 10th studio album has smashed records everywhere, including Australia where the collection set new marks for streams and vinyl sales in its first week, and nine of its 10 tracks flooded the top 10 of the ARIA Singles Chart.

The Midnights reign continues on the singles tally, landing no less than seven tracks in the top 10.

Meanwhile, Rihanna’s comeback to music is rewarded with a top 5 debut on the ARIA Chart. “Life Me Up” (Universal), which is lifted from the new Marvel film Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, starts at No. 5 for the highest debut on the latest singles survey, published Nov. 4.

Also enjoying a top 20 arrival is Meghan Trainor’s “Made You Look” (Epic/Sony), while SZA’s first music release in two years, “Shirt” (Epic/Sony), begins its chart journey at No. 20.

With Midnights retaining top spot on the ARIA Albums Chart, TayTay beats a resurgent Beatles. The Fab Four reenter the survey at No. 2 with the classic 1966 album Revolver, thanks to a special reissue including five discs of outtakes, rehearsals and more.

The Beatles’ remarkable recording career has yielded 16 No. 1 albums in Australia and 27 No. 1 singles, ARIA reports.

There’s a psychedelic look about the latest albums chart, as King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard score three spots in the top 20, led by the No. 4 debut of Changes (KGLW/UMA), their Australian band’s 23rd LP. The prolific act also reenter at No. 6 with Ice, Death, Planets, Lungs, Mushrooms And Lava (Universal) and Laminated Demin (VMA/UMA) debuts at No. 11.

Meanwhile, Foo Fighters’ hits retrospective The Essential (Sony), their first major release since the death earlier this year of drummer Taylor Hawkins, starts at No. 5; British record producer Fred Again bags a top 10 debut with Actual Life 3 (January 1 – September 9 2022) (via Atlantic/Warner); and Sly Withers’ bows inside the top 10 with Overgrown (Dew Process/Universal), the Perth, Australia rock band’s third studio album. It’s new at No. 10.

04 Nov 2022

Harry Styles Concert In L.A. Postponed ‘Due to Band Illness’

Harry Styles’ scheduled concert Friday night (Nov. 4) at the Kia Forum in Los Angeles has been pushed back by two days, after a bandmate became unwell.  

“Out of an abundance of caution,” reads an official statement from the venue, the date is rescheduled to Sunday (Nov. 6) “due to band illness.”

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All previously purchased tickets will be honored for the new date.

The message continues, “All additional show dates will play as scheduled,” noting an email from Ticketmaster will be sent directly to ticket holders with more information.

Styles has made the Forum his house for a weeks-long mini residency, spanning 15 shows and wrapping Nov. 15. The British pop singer kicked off the North American leg of his trek in August, and moved into the Forum in Inglewood, Calif., on Oct. 24.

Styles’ Love On Tour is in support of Harry’s House, his third solo album release after One Direction split. Harry’s House has been a critical and commercial hit. The album logged six weeks at No. 1 on the Official U.K. Singles Chart, and its single “As It Was” dominated the national survey for an impressive 10 weeks. It’s not just the fans who tuned in. Harry’s House was also shortlisted for the Mercury Prize, which spotlights the year’s best albums from the U.K. and Ireland.

In the United States, Harry’s House checked in for two weeks at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 chart (all three of his LPs have hit the summit), and “As I Was” rules the Billboard Hot 100 for a whopping 15 weeks. Along the way, he made history with three tracks in the Pop Airplay Chart’s top 10.

Central and South America Love On Tour dates come next, then Styles returns to Australia and New Zealand in February-March 2023 for a run of stadium shows, followed by more dates across the U.K. and Europe.

04 Nov 2022

Drake and 21 Savage Drop Joint Mixtape ‘HER LOSS’: Stream It Now

After the most creative media(less) rollout of the year– a Vogue cover and NPR Tiny Desk included–Drake and 21 Savage finally unleashed their joint album, HER LOSS, on Friday (Nov. 4).

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The 16-track offering was originally slated for Oct. 28, but according to Drizzy was postponed due to his righthand producer and engineer Noah “40” Shebib contracting COVID shortly before the release date. “Our brother [Shebib] got Covid in the middle of mixing and mastering the crack,” the Toronto rapper wrote on an Instagram story. HER LOSS marks Drizzy’s second collaborative project, following his cult-favorite 2015 mixtape alongside Atlanta-made powerhouse Future, What a Time to Be Alive.

Holding a little more experience in that arena, HER LOSS is 21 Savage’s fourth collaborative project. He released three others alongside Metro Boomin, one of which included the Migos rapper, Offset.

Considering Drake and 21 Savage’s undeniable synergy, fans welcome HER LOSS with open arms, ready to be re-upped after the pair’s tease in June with “Jimmy Cooks,” the only rap track on Drake’s house album, Honestly, Nevermind. “Jimmy Cooks” debuted at No. 1 on the Hot 100 chart and foreshadowed the collaborators’ latest offering.

Ahead of the album, Drake and 21 Savage didn’t do too much talking, instead letting their marketing strategy speak for them. They let loose rapid-fire content after announcing the project on Oct. 22, including a Vogue cover story that wasn’t, a deepfake interview with Howard Stern about porn, love and dating, and their own mock-Tiny Desk set up.

On the topic of settling down, Drake told Stern, “I’m sure I could. I think that eventually once all this is said and done for us, that addiction of work and success and forward movement is over, I feel we’re all going to need something real. Hopefully it’s not too late.”

What’s real when you’re Drake? Combining the best of four or five women, which seems to be what keeps the lover boy rapper within the grips of serial dating.

Previously, Drake and 21 Savage joined forces on “Knife Talk” from Drizzy’s Certified Lover Boy, “Mr. Right Now” from 21 Savage’s Savage Mode II collab album with Metro Boomin in 2020, Drake’s stand-alone release “Sneakin’” in 2016 and more.

Listen to HER LOSS in full below now.