News

01 Nov 2022

Cody Simpson Belts Out Australia’s National Anthem at Melbourne Cup 2022

Cody Simpson just might be Australia’s renaissance man. The 25-year-old Queenslander has enjoyed a pop career (with five appearances on the Billboard 200 chart), pivoted into the ranks of elite swimming, and he’s thrown what energies he has left into an eco-clothing business.

Explore

Explore

See latest videos, charts and news

See latest videos, charts and news

On Tuesday (Nov. 1), Simpson brought his love of music and sport together when he performed the national anthem at the Melbourne Cup at Flemington Racecourse.

Wearing a pin-striped three-piece suit, Simpson delivered a mature rendition of “Advance Australia Fair,” with a packed crowd of 80,000 race-fans watching on.

He’s no stranger to performing the anthem for the big occasion. On Australia Day 2016, he delivered it during the Cleveland Cavs’ home game against the Minnesota Timberwolves, the first time “Advance Australia Fair” had rung out prior to an NBA contest.  

Speaking ahead of the so-called “race that stops the nation,” Simpson admitted he hasn’t considered hanging up the guitar and mic.

“Music’s still a massive part of my life and I train full time, but everybody needs something to help balance them out, and music for me is just that,” News.com.au quotes Simpson as saying.

“I still play guitar pretty much every single day to relax, and I certainly will be jumping around back to music once I’m done with the pool.”

A butterfly specialist, Simpson collected Commonwealth Games gold earlier in the year, as part of the men’s 4x100m freestyle relay, along with silver in the 4x100m medley. His efforts earned him selection to Australia’s squad for the 2022 Duel in the Pool against the U.S.

In August, the Gold Coast native unveiled Prince Neptune: The Label, and its range of eco-wear, from tees to hoodies, shirts, bandanas and more — all stamped with the freshwater god’s trident.

Simpson also found time in April to release a fourth album, via Coast House Collective, a self-titled studio set containing singles “Nice to Meet You” and “Let Go” as well as the Ben Harper collaboration “It’s a Dream.”

In 2019, he won the inaugural Australian edition of The Masked Singer.

01 Nov 2022

Sony Music Revenues Improve on Streaming, Strength of Releases

Sony Music increased its annual forecast for revenue and operating income on Tuesday (Nov. 1) as it reported quarterly revenues were up 5.9% on the strength of its subscription streaming income and chart-topping hits.

Releases from artists including Beyoncé, Harry Styles, Future and Doja Cat helped Sony dominate Spotify’s Top Songs Global chart, with an average of 48 out of top 100 coming from the music major’s artists so far this year, executives said. That is up from an average of 36 songs in 2021.

Total Sony Music revenues rose 5.9% year-over-year to $2.58 billion (¥359.3 billion) for the second fiscal quarter ending Sept. 30. Operating income rose 23.9% to $570 million (¥78.7 billion) over the same period compared to a year ago.

Recorded music revenue rose 14.2% to $1.62 billion (¥224 billion). Within that segment, streaming for recorded music revenues rose 6.8% (in US dollars), physical revenues declined 4.2% (in US dollars) and “other” revenues, which includes sync licensing, merchandise and touring revenues, rose 33.4% (in US dollars) as the industry rebounded from a pandemic-led slowdown.

Publishing revenues overall rose 24% in US dollars. The visual media and platforms segment’s revenues declined 9% due to a softening in the Japanese company’s anime business.

Sony Music’s parent company believes the risk of a global economic slowdown is increasing due to rising tensions with China, high energy costs, persistent inflation and interest rates hikes in various countries. “We are taking steps to prepare for further deterioration of the business environment in each of our businesses,” said Hiroki Totoki, Sony’s executive deputy president and chief financial officer, during the earnings call.

However, Totoki is less concerned about the prospects of its music division. Sony Corporation raised Sony Music’s revenue target for the full fiscal year by ¥90 billion yen to ¥1.37 trillion ($9.8 billion at Sony’s assumed exchange rate for the second half of the fiscal year). Executives also raised Sony Music’s operating income target by ¥35 billion to ¥265 billion ($1.9 billion at the assumed exchange rate). “Streaming is very successful and we don’t really have that much of a concern,” he said when asked by an analyst about what risks the music segment faces.

In addition, the company’s recorded music and publishing segments’ operating income benefitted from a one-time benefit of $41.2 million (¥5.7 billion) in the quarter from settlements of multiple copyright infringement lawsuits.

Volatile foreign currency markets in the quarter negatively impacted Sony’s sales and operating income, executives said, and caused a divergence in the company’s earnings as reported in Japanese yen versus the U.S. dollar. This positively impacted Sony Music’s earnings as calculated in yen – about 61% of the yen-denominated gain came from the impact of foreign exchange rates – and negatively impacted the company’s earnings when converted to dollars.

The company’s operating income margin rose 22%, or 3.3 points year-over-year, while its EBITDA margin, a key measure of company profitability, was up 26.5%, or roughly 3 points.

01 Nov 2022

‘The Voice’ Contestant Kique Puts His Own Spin on OutKast’s ‘Hey Ya’

No one but OutKast could make us shake it like a Polaroid picture. Kique, however, shakes it with his very own style.

Robert “Kique” Gomez, a Miami-based Cuban singer, stepped into the Knockout Round of NBC’s The Voice on Monday night (Oct. 31), for a reboot of OutKast’s classic 2003 single and nine-week leader on the Billboard Hot 100 chart.

The teen did it his own way, inserting a new groove, style and some low, low notes.

Explore

See latest videos, charts and news

See latest videos, charts and news

Just 18 years of age, Kique opened Team Gwen’s three-way knockout, going up against Destiny Leigh (performing Christina Aguilera’s “Impossible”) and Rowan Grace (Billy Joel’s “Vienna”).

“One of my favorite things to do is change songs,” Kique remarks. “I really want Gwen to see that I’m not just a singer. I’m also a musician. I like to create compositions and make music and change things and make them my own.”

With his switcheroo, he got the place jumping and created for himself a good chance of staying the distance in this competition.

John Legend enjoyed what he heard. “For you to take that song and do what you did with it was so audacious,” the EGOT star says. “Truly one of the most compelling performances we’ve seen in three rounds on this show.”

“If this was a video game,” Camila Cabello notes, “you just skipped 20 levels today. For you to do a cover that was on the cutting edge of a song that was on the cutting edge was, like, Inception. I felt like a star was born. It was beautiful to watch.”

Stefani was left with a “very hard decision” decision to make. In the end, she sent Kique through to the live rounds.

“Kique is just a very unique type of singer, and I can’t wait to see what we do together next,” she explains.

It’s not all over for Rowan Grace, a student at Rapid City Central High School, who earned Blake Shelton’s steal.

Watch below.

01 Nov 2022

Mariah Carey Gets the Christmas Spirit Flowing In New Clip: ‘It’s Time’

Halloween is officially done, now it’s time for the Queen of Christmas to shine.

As the calendar flipped to Nov. 1, Mariah Carey let us know what time it is with a seasonal social post.

The clip opens in black and white with Carey on a stationary bike, dressed as a witch and surrounded by jack o’lanterns and CG bats.

Then, with a sucker punch of color, we’re thrust into Mariah’s winter wonderland. “It’s time,” she squeals. And, of course, “All I Want for Christmas Is You” rings out.

Carey is the undisputed Queen of Christmas, with her 1994 holiday original topping the Billboard Hot 100 multiple times over the last few years and ranking as the most popular song of all time on the Billboard Holiday 100.

Explore

Explore

See latest videos, charts and news

See latest videos, charts and news

Her gift of Christmas spirit continues to grow in the U.K., where “All I Want for Christmas Is You” finally hit No. 1 in December 2020 — 26 years after its release. That long journey to the summit set a new chart record. Several weeks later, the record was broken again, when Wham’s “Last Christmas” finally claimed the crown, 36 years after its original release.

In Australia, where Christmas is peak summer, and a time for hitting the beach, “All I Want for Christmas Is You” took 24 years to reach No. 1, finally doing so in December 2018.

Carey will get into the swing of things next month with a four-performance run celebrating her “repertoire of classic holiday songs.” Her “Merry Christmas to All” dates, presented by Live Nation, will take place in December with performances in New York and Toronto.

For the record, it’s not time yet. Christmas is 54 days away, but who’s counting.

01 Nov 2022

Ex-WMG Innovation Chief Scott Cohen Named CEO of Music Investing Platform

Former Warner Music Group executive and the Orchard co-founder Scott Cohen said on Tuesday (Nov. 1) he is taking a new job as chief executive officer of a fintech platform aimed at selling fractional shares in song catalogs.

Cohen, who stepped down from his role as chief innovation officer at WMG in September, said the aim of the new venture is to “fractionalize ownership of music royalties.”

Fractional shares are a familiar concept in finance, and brokerages like Robinhood and Fidelity Investments sell them as a way to buy a slice of a share for less than the price of the whole stock. The market for buying and investing in music publishing rights has traditionally been open to only the world’s largest music companies and, more recently, money managers.

Introducing fractional shares could change that by making it possible for more smaller investors to participate alongside the deep-pocketed private equity funds and major labels.

In an email to Billboard, Cohen said has already secured rights from major artists and catalogs, and his team is now working to build the platform’s technology.

“We have a very aggressive timeline,” said Cohen, declining to provide a specific date when the venture would launch to outside investors.

Prior to joining WMG in 2019, Cohen founded the Orchard with Richard Gottehrer in 1997 and built it into the largest independent distributor on iTunes when the download platform launched in 2003. Cohen and Gottehrer sold the Orchard to Dimensional Associates, the private equity arm of JDS Capital Management, the same year, and subsequently expanded into video, music licensing, marketing & analytics, royalty collections, sports media, neighboring rights and more.

In 2015, Sony Music Entertainment bought out Dimensional Associates for $200 million, and in 2017 merged it with RED into a single global distribution entity operating under the Orchard brand.

While Cohen’s new venture has not yet settled on a name, he described its aspirations and potential as “transformational” for the music industry.

“I am only interested in doing things at scale,” Cohen wrote.

01 Nov 2022

The Beatles Challenge Taylor Swift For U.K. Chart Crown

Taylor Swift has another titanic battle on her hands, as the U.K. albums chart race enters the final straight.

Last week, Swift’s Midnights (via EMI) saw off the challenge of Arctic Monkeys and their seventh studio album The Car (Domino Recordings). This time, it’s the Beatles with Revolver (EMI).

A special deluxe rerelease of the Fab Four’s 1966 album blasts to No. 2 on the midweek chart, behind Midnights.

Explore

See latest videos, charts and news

See latest videos, charts and news

Swift last week landed her ninth U.K. chart crown – and snapped several records — as Midnights surged to No. 1 on the Official U.K. Albums Chart with more than 200,000 chart sales, easily a career-best week for the U.S. pop superstar.

With that effort, Swift sailed past Kylie Minogue for outright second place in the list of female artists with the most U.K. No. 1 albums, with nine, all consecutive.  Madonna leads that particular ranking, with 12. And the leader among all acts? The Beatles, with 15 U.K. No. 1s, a tally that includes Revolver, which led the survey following its original release.  

Behind Swift and the Beatles on the midweek chart is Michael Ball and Alfie Boe’s Together In Vegas (Decca), which is set to become their fourth consecutive top 3 as a duo. It’s new at No. 3 on the Official Chart Update, while the top 5 is completed by DJ Fred Again’s Actual Life 3 (Atlantic), and Massive Wagons’ Triggered (Earache), respectively.

Also eyeing top 10 starts are Foo Fighters’ new hits retrospective The Essential (No. 6 via Sony Music CG), Tom Odell’s Best Day Of My Life (No. 7 via Urok Mtheory), Paul Weller’s triple-album Will Of The People (No. 8 via Universal Music Recordings) and Blue’s Heart & Soul (No. 10 via TAG8).

Over on the singles chart blast, Swift maintains her lead with “Anti-Hero.” If it holds its position, and its parent album does the same, Swift will make it a second chart double in as many weeks.

At the halfway point in the chart cycle, “Anti-Hero” leads Sam Smith and Kim Petras’ “Unholy” (EMI) and Rihanna’s new release, “Lift Me Up” (Def Jam), respectively. Rihanna’s comeback track, which will appear in Marvel’s Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, had trailed just “Anti-Hero” earlier in the week.

All will be revealed when the U.K. singles and albums charts are published Friday (Nov. 4).

31 Oct 2022

Post Malone Helps Couple Have the Sweetest Gender Reveal at Concert

Post Malone is known for greeting his fans at concerts and signing autographs, but he took his fan interactions up a notch when he helped a couple reveal the gender of their baby on the way.

Explore

Explore

See latest videos, charts and news

See latest videos, charts and news

In a clip shared to TikTok from the “Congratulations” star’s show in Tulsa, Okla., on Friday night (Oct. 28), Post is seen signing a poster that was handed to him by a couple, who begin asking him to open the envelope taped to the poster, and reveal the gender of the baby.

“You want me to just tell you?” Post asks them, before confirming, “You didn’t see it? Y’all didn’t see it?” He then opens the envelope, and immediately, his jaw drops. He excitedly holds up the piece of paper, which reads, “It’s a girl!”

“You’re going to be a girl dad!” the star sweetly tells the father-to-be.

Post Malone himself is also a girl dad, as he welcomed his first child — a daughter — with his longtime girlfriend earlier this year. In an interview with Apple Music’s Zane Lowe before the baby’s birth, Post said he’s “pumped beyond belief” to be a father, something he’s been dreaming about since he was a kid who walked around with a baby doll all the time. “I thought that was the coolest thing,” he said of his doll. “I would take him around everywhere. And I don’t know how long that lasted. But my mom still has it. And I guess, Zane, I’m so pumped up. I’m going to be a hot dad.”

Watch the adorable gender reveal below.

31 Oct 2022

K-Pop Star AleXa Holds Minute of Silence for Itaewon Crowd Crush Victims at Los Angeles Tour Stop

As the world and the Korean entertainment industry react to the crowd-crush tragedy in Seoul’s Itaewon neighborhood in South Korea, AleXa took a moment of her tour to remember those lost.

At her concert Sunday at Los Angeles’ Avalon Hollywood, the final date in AleXa’s First Meet & Live Tour in U.S. tour, the star asked for a minute of silence to pay respect to the victims.

“I’m saddened and quite devastated to hear what happened in Itaewon recently in Korea,” the 25-year-old told the audience. “Many bright, young stars, many young lives were lost in this tragedy that will forever go down in history as one of the worst things to happen in modern times in Korea. It’s forever going to change the lives of people they knew, friends, family, and loved ones. I kindly ask that we altogether observe a minute of silence here together out of respect for all the victims and all the lives lost in the tragedy.”

The stage then went dark, minus a video screen with the phrase “Pray for Itaewon” glowing throughout the moment.

AleXa’s Korean record label ZB Label also announced on Sunday that they would temporarily postpone the planned promotional schedule for the singer’s forthcoming Girls Gone Vogue EP. Earlier this month, Billboard revealed that the new EP, along with the new single “Back in Vogue,” would be released on Nov. 10 as the first new music since the Oklahoma-raised star won the inaugural season of NBC’s American Song Contest. There’s no clear indication if the release date will change at press time, but ZB Label shared that “detailed schedule changes will be announced through a separate notice.” The company added, “our deepest condolences to the victims, bereaved families, and those affected by the heartbreaking tragedy.”

AleXa joins the likes of PSY, ENHYPEN, Jessi and more K-pop stars who have shared their condolences with victims of the tragedy that’s left more than 150 dead and led to a weeklong national mourning period in South Korea. AleXa and ZB Label are also joining the dozens of artists and labels opting to hold or cancel promotional plans and new music in light of the tragedy.

31 Oct 2022

Nicki Minaj Dresses Up as Cheeky Cinderella for Halloween

She’s got a princess face, a killer body, samurai mind. Nicki Minaj showed off her Disney princess fantasy in a new social media post on Monday (Oct. 31).

For Halloween, the rapper decided to dress up as a high-fashion Cinderella… or Chunderella, according to her fairy tale rewrite of a caption. “And as she heard the whispers…Chunderella snickered,” she wrote. “The ugly/evil step sisters had EVERY RIGHT to bicker (through their blisters!) After all, deep down inside…they knew…they’d never fit the glass slippers… The END.”

In the slideshow, Minaj poses in a blond wig, tiara and an architectural take on Cinderella’s classic blue gown. However, the Harajuku Barbie proved once she turned around that her version of the princess is quite the “Super Freaky Girl,” complete with two rather NSFW cutouts carved out of the backside of the dress.

Earlier this month, Nicki linked up with NBA YoungBoy on their new collaboration “I Admit,” which is featured on the latter’s brand-new album Ma, I Got a Family.

Meanwhile, she’s also been bumping heads with the Recording Academy over “Super Freaky Girl” being moved from the rap category into the pop category for voting at the upcoming 2023 Grammy Awards — that is, when she hasn’t been busy feuding with Latto on Twitter over whether her own “Big Energy (Live)” should (or shouldn’t) be facing the same categorization at the awards show.

In other awards news, Minaj recently landed five nods at the MTV EMAs, including best artist, best song and best video (both for “Super Freaky Girl”), best hip-hop and biggest fans.

Get a look at Nicki as “Chunderella” below.