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A few days after the Sept. 16 arrest of Sean “Diddy” Combs on racketeering and sex trafficking charges, a book said to be based on diaries and notes from his late girlfriend, Kim Porter, became a best-seller on Amazon. (It was a best-seller within a certain category, which probably means it sold well but not hardcover-bookstore-best-seller well.) What’s really impressive is that the book did so well despite the fact that Diddy and Porter’s children say she didn’t actually write any of it.
The 60-page book, Kim’s Lost Words: A Journey for Justice, From the Other Side, was self-published under the name Jamal T. Millwood by Chris Todd, whose real name is apparently Todd Christopher Guzze. Todd has said the book is based on the contents of a flash drive, which he allegedly received from two people close to Porter and Combs, but he “didn’t ask too many questions about how they got it,” according to Rolling Stone. “If somebody put my feet to the fire and they said, ‘Life or death, is that book real?’ I have to say I don’t know,” said Todd, who says he’s a producer and journalist and hopes the book will lead other sources to come forward. (Journalists generally tend to ask too many questions.) “But it’s real enough to me.”
It would be hard to find a more ridiculous quote to describe the very serious problem that big media platforms have created. I have no idea how the book was written, of course, but Todd knows that’s not the point and presumably so do readers — it’s real enough to me, he says, so it’s real enough for them. (The story behind the book actually sounds more interesting than the book itself.) This sounds harmless enough until you realize that — wait a minute — that’s basically what Republican vice-presidential candidate JD Vance says about the claim that Haitian immigrants are eating pets in Springfield, Ohio. He heard it, then justified it as a way to call attention to a problem. (There is no evidence that anyone is actually eating pets, and the whole idea sounds racist.) Like Todd’s book, it certainly went viral. It was real enough for people — to the point that it has become an actual political issue.
Stories about scandals, real and exaggerated, are hardly new. (Diddy faces unrelated criminal charges; Porter died in 2018 of lobar pneumonia.) What is new, though, is the way online platforms create incentives to create and spread them. Amazon now sells more than a dozen books about Porter, including a “Kim Porter Coloring Book” and several books that use “lost words” in their titles. The speed and ease of selling books on Amazon’s open system has made Porter’s death a cottage industry. It’s gross — does anyone want to be memorialized by a coloring book? — and you can’t blame her kids for being upset. There’s money in it, though.
It’s a useful metaphor for streaming fraud. The problem isn’t that Amazon or online music services stand behind conspiratorial books or useless music with streaming numbers pumped up by bots — it’s that they don’t stand behind anything. Open platforms like these let people distribute their own art, which is promoted as a feature but might more often be a bug — a lot of what’s online is neither professional work nor hobbyist creations but rather get-rich-quick schemes of various kinds. Which is funny until it could affect an election.
The most common argument against this in the music business is that fraud takes money from artists, which is true, but it can be hard to get horrified about schemes to steam millions of fractions of pennies from thousands of artists. (Most of the book business works very differently, but dubious books do take money and attention that more legitimate books need.) Another argument is that low-quality material undermines the integrity of the system — consumers who hear lousy music and read dubious books might be less inclined to spend more money on such legitimate products.
The argument that ought to get more attention is that these kinds of products simply aren’t good for the overall experience platforms offer. Streaming services used to promote their vast selection, but at this point some of what’s uploaded just makes more popular music harder to find. The same applies on Amazon. A search for “Kim” and “Lost Words” brings up a half-dozen books — and even those who find and buy the one they want may be disappointed. Kim’s Lost Words has 98 reviews, which average out at three stars. Others have none at all. This doesn’t affect the value of other books, of course, but it could make them harder to find.
Any serious solution to this will involve changing the incentives. The current level of curation and enforcement won’t work once AI is more widespread. It’s one thing to sell a book that may or may not contain Porter’s words, but Amazon already sells 12. Are we ready for 12,000?
Making platforms easier to use will mean making tough choices, then pushing them down to distributors who will in turn push them down to individual uploaders. There are options, however: Platforms could hold uploaders responsible for content that hurts the user experience or pay out more to companies who have a better ratio of content users engage with compared to their total. That’s what I think — unless this all came from a flash drive someone gave me.
Soul Asylum frontman Dave Pirner is a proud Minnesotan again after having spent 25 years living in New Orleans. So it’s not surprising he’s watching this year’s presidential campaign with even more interest since a home state horse, Gov. Tim Walz, is representing as Vice President Kamala Harris’ running mate on the Democratic ticket. (Pirner was born in Green Bay, Wisc., but grew up in Minnesota.)
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“I’m excited about it,” Pirner, who launched his music career in the North Star state drumming for the punk band Loud Fast Rules, tells Billboard from a stop during Soul Asylum’s recent Jubilee Tour with Stone Temple Pilots and Live. “There’s a certain amount of excitement in Minnesota going on. It’s funny to have a dude like that representing Minnesota ’cause he does remind you of a sports dad. There’s that, ‘Oh gosh’ kind of ‘aw shucks’ thing going on. I think it was a good choice because he seems like a nice complement to (Harris) in that good ol’ boy way or something. But he’s progressive and he’s well-liked.”
Pirner does not recall ever having met Walz, a music fan who signed a bill renaming a stretch of the state’s Highway 5 after the late Prince. But Pirner says he’s “ready to go out there and support the home team. Put my name in the hat.”
He’ll have to fit any support appearances into a busy schedule, however. Soul Asylum has concert dates booked into early November, including with the Juliana Hatfield Three, but most importantly the quartet’s 13th studio album, Slowly But Shirley, comes out Sept. 27. The 12-song set is the follow-up to 2020’s Hurry Up and Wait, its debut with Blue Elan Records, and reunites Pirner and company with Steve Jordan, the current Rolling Stones drummer who helmed Soul Asylum’s 1990 album And the Horse they Rode In On, a highly regarded set that was eclipsed two years later by the double-platinum Grave Dancers Union.
“When we first worked with Steve, we weren’t that great,” recalls Pirner, Soul Asylum’s only remaining founding member. “We were still learning how to play together. And since then I’ve sort of embraced most of the things that Steve had passed on to me from back then. So I kinda knew what he wanted and I wanted to give it to him, and I think it came together in a really organic sort of way that I think you can feel on the record — I hope you can, at least. It did mark a progression.”
Pirner adds that what Jordan and the band were looking for was “just excitement and not too much thinking about what you’re doing. It was more like capturing the band playing the songs off of each other and really listening to the other people in the band and trying to come across in a way that it felt new, fresh.” To that end Jordan had the group — Pirner, drummer Michael Bland, guitarist Ryan Smith and bassist Jeremy Tappero — tracking together in the studio to capture the energy and attitude of live music.
“We’ve tried just about every single way to record something over the years,” Pirner notes. “Working on the previous records the home studio became part of the picture, and you could also take things home and work on them. It depends on the song…but in this situation each song was approached with the same sort of method, which was ‘Get out there and play it!’ It was great ’cause watching Steve and Michael work together was one of those musical experiences I kinda live for. Steve is such a player’s player, and he’s such a vibe guy in a way that he understands the concept of trying to capture lightning in a bottle, and I think that’s what we were going for. We didn’t overplay anything and we tried to get things on the third take or so. It came together pretty quickly.”
Pirner says Slowly But Shirley‘s songs came together in a variety of fashions — some jammed out by the band in rehearsals, others that he “had been working in in ProTools and computers and messing around and cutting pieces of songs together.” One track, “High Road,” has been around “forever” before being finished off this time. The album is a mélange of Soul Asylum styles, from the jangle of “Freak Accident” to the punchy rock of “Freeloader,” “Trial By Fire,” “The Only Thing I’m Missing” and “Makin’ Plans,” to the cool groove of “Waiting on the Lord” and the mellow melodicism of “You Don’t Know Me.” There’s also a funky edge to “Tryin’ Man” and “Sucker Maker,” which Pirner credits to his time in the Big Easy and having Bland, who spent seven years playing with Prince, in the band.
“I think I was subconsciously trying to take things in a direction that was a little more funky or groovy or swingy or whatever — without forgetting that I’m dealing with a four-piece punk rock band,” Pirner explains. “That’s what’s always made punk rock so interesting is it does have this kind of ‘ignorance is bliss’ adventure to it, where it’s gonna come out sounding like your sh-tty band. But sometimes people try things they probably shouldn’t be trying, and something new comes out of that. It’s discovery, which is the beauty of music.”
Pirner is planning on a long cycle for Slowly But Shirley, including more headlining dates before the end of the year and into 2025. “We’ll play at the opening of a letter, as we used to say,” he notes. This year, meanwhile, also marks the 40th anniversary of Say What You Will…, Soul Asylum’s Bob Mould-produced debut album, and Pirner says that the passage of time has not been lost on him.
“It doesn’t get easier,” he acknowledges. “It feels exactly like 40 years. It’s kind of a grind. It’s different when you’re starting out because you’re just excited about everything and you have a much higher tolerance level because everything is new. You’re living a fairly miserable experience, but it’s an adventure. I’m grateful for all of it; it’s just what I do and what I’ve always done and what I love doing. Sometimes it’s not fun at all, but I’m like, ‘Well, this is what I wished for my whole life, so shut up.’ And I much prefer this to digging a hole, I’ll tell ya that.”
Stevie Nicks has returned with a rallying cry for women, dropping new single “The Lighthouse” Friday (Sept. 27) in hopes of reinvigorating the fight for reproductive healthcare. The track opens with a melodic pinging beat and anthemic sound effects as the Fleetwood Mac frontwoman sings softly, “I have my scars, you have yours/ Don’t let […]
Pink is speaking out about a rumor that’s spread online this week linking her to Sean “Diddy” Combs following his recent arrest. The rumor in question began with people noticing that the pop singer had wiped her account clean on X. In light of the Bad Boy Records founder readying himself for trial on charges […]
Canadian musician K’naan has been charged with sexual assault. A charge sheet was filed this morning (Sept. 26) in Quebec City for the musician and director, born Keinan Abdi Warsame, for a count of sexual assault dating back to 2010, The Canadian Press reports. The arrest warrant alleges that the assault took place between July 16 and 17 […]
Amid election season, Bad Bunny is making sure that the more than three million residents living in Puerto Rico know his political stance.
In a Sept. 24 tweet, the Puerto Rican artist shared a set of photos of billboards across San Juan that read: “To vote for PNP is to vote for corruption,” “Who votes for PNP doesn’t love Puerto Rico” and “Voting for PNP is voting for LUMA.” The latter of the three is a private energy company responsible for power distribution and transmission on the island.
“Announcements paid by Benito Antonio Martínez Ocasio,” he captioned the post. “A Puerto Rican who does love Puerto Rico.”
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Billboard has reached out to Bad Bunny’s rep for comment.
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The billboards are in protest of the Partido Nuevo Progresista (New Progressive Party), one of the major political parties in Puerto Rico that traces back to 1967 and currently holds both the seat of the governor and of the resident commissioner.
The powerful PSAs also come on the heels of Bad Bunny’s latest song, “Una Velita,” in which he reflects on the devastating aftermath of the Category 5 Hurricane Maria that occurred in 2017. “There were five thousand that they let die, and we will never forget that,” he chants in the track.
“Obviously the light will go out, God knows if it’ll come back,” he continues over an intense folkloric beat. “The bridge they took so long to build, the growing river will break. A few songs on the phone for when the reception goes out. The sign was sent and they don’t want to see it, it’s up to the Boricua to want to wake up … Remember that we’re all from here, the people will have to save its pueblo.”
Always passionate and vocal about the social issues that affect the Puerto Rican community, in 2022, Benito also released a 23-minute-long documentary for “El Apagón” in which he addresses blackouts and gentrification, among other topics, taking aim at the local government for its inaction.
Macklemore‘s “f–k America!” chant has drawn condemnation from a trio of the Seattle-bred MC’s hometown sports franchises. According to Fox 13 Seattle, The MLB’s Seattle Mariners have joined the NHL’s Seattle Kraken and MLS’ Seattle Sounders FC in calling out the “Thrift Shop” rapper for controversial comments he made at last weekend’s Palestine Will Live Forever concert in the city.
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“We are aware of the incident and agree with the other teams in town: Sports and music should connect, not divide us,” Mariners vice president of communication Tim Hevly reportedly said in a statement to the station. “We continue to monitor and research latest developments.”
Macklemore performed a new song at the event, “Hind’s Hall 2,” the sequel to his May song of the same name whose proceeds are meant to help the United Nations Relief and Words Agency (UNRWA), which provides assistance to Palestinian refugees. “Straight up, say it, I’m not gonna stop you,” Macklemore told the crowd in fan video from the show. “I’m not gonna stop you… yeah, f–k America.”
On Tuesday, Macklemore was dropped from the Las Vegas Neon City Festival lineup with no reason given for the scratch. In a lengthy statement on Wednesday, Macklemore — who has been a loud supporter of the Palestinian people in the midst of the yearlong war sparked by Hamas’ deadly Oct. 7 attack on Israel — explained his mindset at the show.
“Unfortunately, the historic event in my hometown that brought thousands of people together to raise awareness and money for the people of Palestine has become overshadowed by two words,” he said, adding that he hasn’t been “OK” in the months since the Israel-Hamas war broke out after the militant group’s murder of more than 1,200 Israelis and kidnapping of more than 250 others. ”I have been in utter disbelief with how our government is showing up at this moment in history. I don’t think I’m alone. Some days I don’t know how to love something that is hurting others so much. I don’t think I’m alone.”
In the wake of Hamas’ surprise attack almost a year ago, Israel has waged a relentless bombing campaign on Gaza that Palestinian health authorities say has killed more than 41,000 people and driven most of its two million-plus residents from their homes; Israel recently opened a second front in the war in Lebanon, where attacks on the Iranian proxy group Hezbollah this week have already killed more than 500 as the Pentagon fears a potential Israeli ground invasion that could lead to a devastating regional war.
Macklemore’s 2012 song “Can’t Hold Us” has been a staple of the seventh-inning stretch at Mariners games and the statement from Hevly comes after the Sounders and Kraken also distanced themselves from the rapper earlier this week; Macklemore and his wive, Tricia Davis, are among the minority co-owners of the Sounders and the Kraken.
“We believe that sports bring people together and unite us. We are aware of Macklemore’s increasingly divisive comments, and they do not reflect the values of our respective ownership groups, leagues, or organizations,” the Sounders and Kraken said in a joint statement on Monday. According to Fox 13, as the backlash over the comment continues to build, the Mariners, Kraken and Sounders are “evaluating their next steps regarding his involvement with their respective organizations.”
At press time a spokesperson for Macklemore had not returned Billboard‘s request for comment.
With Sean “Diddy” Combs sitting in jail on federal sex trafficking and racketeering charges, he faces an uncertain path ahead in the immediate future — with unresolved issues over his detainment and how quickly he’ll face trial.
Combs, who was arrested and charged last week, stands accused of sweeping criminal wrongdoing, including physical abuse, forced labor, kidnapping, arson and bribery. If convicted on all the charges, he potentially faces a sentence of life in prison.
After Judge Andrew L. Carter denied him bail on the grounds that Combs posed a flight risk and might intimidate witnesses, the music mogul’s lead attorney Marc Agnifilo suggested he would appeal that ruling to a federal appeals court. But he has not yet filed that appeal, and such a challenge faces long odds.
Until then, Combs will likely remain at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn — a federal correctional facility that has long been criticized for danger and dysfunction. In July, one of New York’s U.S. Congressmen called for an investigation, citing “chronic understaffing, perpetual solitary confinement and widespread violence.” Last month, a federal judge criticized “dangerous, barbaric conditions” at the facility.
In court filings, Agnifilo has called the MDC “horrific” and “not fit for pre-trial detention,” and he suggested at last week’s bail hearing that he would seek to have Combs transferred elsewhere. But Judge Carter told him that decisions on pre-trial jail placement were not within his purview, and in a court filing on Monday, Agnifilo declined to formally ask the judge for a change in jails.
How long will the embattled mogul be waiting at MDC? That depends on when his trial takes place, which is a harder thing to predict than you might think.
Anyone accused of a crime in the U.S. has a constitutional right to a speedy trial, which in federal cases means a jury trial must start within 70 days. Defendants often waive that right to give their attorneys more time to prepare a defense, since prosecutors usually have a head start. But Agnifilo declined to do so last week, saying he was “going to do everything I can to move his case as quickly as possible.”
“I’m going to try and minimize the amount of time he spends in very, very difficult and, I believe, inhumane housing conditions,” Agnifilo said at a press conference on Wednesday.
The demand for a speedy trial suggests that Diddy’s legal team believes there is more advantage to be gained from forcing prosecutors to quickly put their case before a jury, rather than spending more time preparing themselves or attacking the charges with pre-trial motions. The move could allow the government less time to find additional witnesses, and less time to sift through huge amounts of digital records and other evidence. “They’re going to have to accommodate me and him and give us a quick trial, and I’m going to be pushing for that,” Agnifilo said.
But prosecutors can, and very likely will, seek to slow down that timetable.
Under speedy trial rules, the judge can “exclude” certain time from the 70-day timer for a wide variety of reasons. Already, Judge Carter has said in court orders that he will exclude several weeks of time — starting with the Sept. 18 bail hearing and running to the next hearing next month — “in the interest of justice.” The next court date is a status conference currently scheduled for Oct. 9.
Another cause for delay would be if prosecutors filed so-called superseding indictments — an updated version of the case against Diddy. Such a filing could simply add new charges against Diddy based on newly-discovered evidence or testimony, or it could add new defendants to the case — not an unlikely outcome in a case that repeatedly references unnamed co-conspirators in Diddy’s alleged criminal enterprise.
At a press conference announcing the charges, U.S. Attorney Damian Williams suggested that could be exactly what prosecutors are planning. “I can’t take anything off the table,” Williams said. “Anything is possible. Our investigation is very active and ongoing.”
Don’t expect to see Lance Bass‘ name on the list of celebrities who’ve attended one of Sean “P. Diddy” Combs’ parties. The former *NSYNC singer and solo star told Andy Cohen on Watch What Happens Live on Wednesday night (Sept. 25) that after hearing something the disgraced Bad Boy mogul said when Diddy opened for *NSYNC on the group’s final tour in 2002 he had no interest in spending time with Combs.
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“I never had time to go to a Diddy party,” said Bass, who added that he’d totally forgotten that Diddy had warmed up the stage for *NSYNC until the rapper/producer was arrested in New York on Sept. 16 and accused by prosecutors of operating a criminal enterprise centered on his “pervasive pattern of abuse toward women.” Diddy was been denied bail twice while awaiting trial on the three felony charges of sex trafficking and racketeering that could land him a life sentence.
“It’s kinda horrible, but never kinda liked him because the very last show in Orlando I overheard him talking to Justin [Timberlake] being like, ‘You need to drop these… effers! You need to go solo! And I was like, ‘I don’t like you anymore Diddy.’ I’m like, ‘at my own show? What the hell?’” said Bass.
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Timberlake did, of course, go out on his own after *NSYNC went on hiatus in 2002 and has released six solo albums to date, including this year’s Everything I Thought It Was.
Diddy was hit with another civil sexual abuse lawsuit this week from Thalia Graves, who claimed that Combs and his head of security, Joseph Sherman, drugged and repeatedly sexually abused her at Diddy’s New York City studio in 2001 and filmed the attack, which they allegedly then showed to others. Combs, who has denied all the allegations, has been hit with at least nine other similar civil suits over the past year, with each one accusing him of sexual abuse and other wrongdoing.
The Diddy story was ironic because elsewhere in the interview, Bass was asked by a caller about rumors of a possible *NSYNC reunion tour. “I can finally say we’re in talks right now, we’re actually talking,” Bass said to wild applause about the possibility that he will once again hit the stage with Timberlake, JC Chasez, Joey Fatone and Chris Kirkpatrick.
He added that the renewed interest has been sparked by the beloved boy band’s studio reunion last year for the Trolls Band Together soundtrack song “Better Place” — and Timberlake’s EITIW album track “Paradise” — as well as the catalog bump for the band thanks to the inclusion of the *NSYNC classic “Bye Bye Bye” in the opening credits sequence of Deadpool & Wolverine.
“We’d be stupid not to do something… just hold your breath just a little longer,” Bass teased. “It’s gonna take a little time, but I think something’s coming.”
Watch Bass talk Diddy and potential *NSYNC reunion tour below.
Alejandro Fernández is setting the record straight over a “false” Latinos for Donald Trump ad that features a photo of his father, the late legendary Vicente Fernández, stamped on it. On Thursday (Sept. 26), the Mexican star slammed the advertisement on social media, while also reminding his millions of followers the values his father stood for.
“My father was not only the best representative of Mexican music and culture, but he was also a fervent defender of the dignity and rights of our countrymen around the world,” he wrote in Spanish.
“Vicente Fernandez would never have supported a politician who denigrates Mexicans and mistreats migrants. During all the tours I did with my father, and the ones I continue to do now in the United States, we were able to confirm that our fellow countrymen are the lifeblood of this country,” he continued. “Mexicans who are characterized by being honest, hardworking and dignified human beings who are looking for better opportunities to help their families. People who do not deserve to be mistreated or discriminated against. We should not allow anyone to underestimate us by saying that we are criminals, murderers, rapists and thieves.”
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During the 2016 presidential election, Trump kicked off his presidential bid by insulting Mexican immigrants, saying, “They’re bringing drugs. They’re bringing crime. They’re rapists. And some, I assume, are good people.”
Following his then and now infamous remarks about the Mexican community, a number of artists, including Vicente Fernández — who died in 2021 — expressed their support for presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, endorsing her through a corrido. Meanwhile, during the 2020 presidential election, Alejandro Fernández’s “Decepciones” soundtracked a Joe Biden ad that aired in Arizona.
This time around, the “Nube Viajera” singer isn’t directly endorsing a candidate, but asks that those eligible to vote in the upcoming Nov. 5 election do what’s right for them and their families. “It is not my intention to recommend or endorse any candidate or party, but on behalf of myself, my children and the memory of my father, we ask you to reason your vote and think about what is best for you, your families and the rest of the Mexicans and Latinos who, like you, have migrated in search of a better life.”
Read his post below: