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The Billboard Family Hits of the Week compiles what’s new and worth your family’s time in music, movies, TV, books, games and more. Forget the mind-numbing scrolling and searching “what to watch for family movie night” … again. The best in family entertainment each week is all in one place, in this handy guide. Isn’t it satisfying to […]
Ryan Reynolds is his pal Taylor Swift’s biggest fan! The Deadpool actor took to Instagram on Thursday (Oct. 31) to share a series of photos and videos from one of Swift’s shows at New Orleans’ Caesars Superdome, which he attended with his wife Blake Lively and Rufus Wainwright. “When I’m 95 yrs old and my […]
As one of 2024’s most promising K-pop rookies, BABYMONSTER is closing out a stellar year with the girl group’s long-awaited full-length album DRIP that’s packed with globally appealing pop hits. The LP further positions the septet as a force in K-pop’s expanding international influence, blending genres and languages to create a universal pop experience.
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Led by the two singles “CLICK CLAK” and “DRIP,” the tracks make BABYMONSTER’s intentions of world domination clear with the multilayered linguistic and genre approach: “CLICK CLAK” is an English rap cut, where even the group’s powerhouse vocalists prove they can spit, while “DRIP” is a powerhouse K-pop jam incorporating dance music, hip-hop, EDM and powerhouse pop. G-Dragon (who also recently made his comeback to the K-pop scene) co-producing the latter and adding another level of sophistication and excitement, marking a significant co-sign from one of K-pop’s most iconic figures.
Both singles were accompanied by music videos that dropped this week with “CLIK CLACK” boasting more than 24 million views since its release on Wednesday (Oct. 30), while “DRIP” currently has a whopping 14 million views since its premiere less than 24 hours ago. Watch below:
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Another prominent K-pop figure, Mino of WINNER, also contributed to the album, co-writing the throwback hip-hop/pop hybrid “Really Like You.” At the same time, BABYMONSTER also showcased their own creativity as members Asa and Ruka wrote on several tracks, including the special duo song “Woke Up in Tokyo,” which weaves Japanese lyrics into the mix.
Deeper into DRIP, listeners will also be treated to the acoustic cut “Love, Maybe” and the 2000s-tinged “BILLIONAIRE” (both sung entirely in English), and a standout in the emotional dance anthem “Love in My Heart.”
With the physical release of DRIP in the U.S. coinciding with the album’s global drop, BABYMONSTER has a strong chance of making a splash on the Billboard 200 chart later this month — a feat few K-pop rookies can achieve on first try. But until the charts feel BAEMON’s impact, fans can enjoy streaming DRIP, and check out the “CLIK CLAK” video below:
November is here, and with 2024 coming to a close soon, music stars are hardly slowing down with their new releases. The Weeknd and Anitta finally delivered their “São Paulo” collaboration from his upcoming album Hurry Up Tomorrow. The two debuted “São Paulo” in the titular city’s Estádio MorumBIS on Sept. 7 during a special one-night-only show that was livestreamed. “We knew it was […]
Incredibly, it’s been twenty years since JC Chasez released his debut solo album, Schizophrenic — his first and only solo foray following his time in *NSYNC. But after all that time — during which Chasez has explored various creative outlets, from judging America’s Best Dance Crew to, more recently, reuniting on two songs with his former bandmates — Chasez is back with an unexpected release.
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Playing With Fire is the concept album for a musical based on Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, which Chasez co-wrote with longtime collaborator Jimmy Harry — and the singer stopped by Billboard News to discuss the project and how it pushed him creatively.
“We knew we wanted to write a musical, we just didn’t know what about,” says Chasez of the seeds of the project. “[Jimmy and I] come from pop music — we write different styles of pop music, but essentially our strengths are in pop music. [But] we’re more mature, we have more ideas than just the typical pop song, and this gave us the opportunity to express those ideas — to do something that’s bigger than three minutes and is a bit more focused but allows us to dream in different ways.”
Chasez is a deep theater fan who admits, “I could go to a show every night if I was lucky enough,” and he says Jesus Christ Superstar was their biggest inspiration for Playing With Fire. “They started with a concept album, and that’s kind of what inspired us to release it as an album first. If someone as smart and talented as Andrew Lloyd Webber thinks [it’s a good idea] is to release the music for a show first, why don’t we give it a shot?”
He also opens up about reuniting with *NSYNC for both “Better Place” (from Trolls Band Together) and “Paradise” from Justin Timberlake’s Everything I Thought I Was. “We’re all great friends, and we’re always talking,” says Chasez. “The conversation has been a little more open — right now I’m focusing on Playing with Fire, Justin’s on tour, Joey’s about to do & Juliet [on Broadway], but we’re always talking and anything’s possible in the future. It’s always gotta be for the right reasons.”
And speaking of potential reunions, he speaks about celebrating the 25th anniversary of fellow former Mouseketeer Christina Aguilera’s debut album with her — and the potential for them to do a duet someday: “If it was the right thing and organic, I’d be happy to sing with her anytime,” he says with enthusiasm.
Watch the full interview — including the story behind “Better Place,” how *NSYNC’s performance with Timberlake earlier this year in Los Angeles came together, and how Playing With Fire pushed Chasez vocally — above.
A new documentary series chronicling the rise and fall of Ace of Base, one of the biggest Swedish pop band exports of all time, following in the tradition of fellow Billboard Hot 100 chart-toppers ABBA and Roxette, is coming this winter.
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Featuring unseen home movie footage and new interviews with members of the band, their business team, music executives, artists and cultural critics, Ace of Base: All That She Wants debuts in full Dec. 5 on Viaplay, a streaming service that hosts Nordic and European TV series and films.
The Swedish quartet — Ulf Ekberg and the siblings Jonas, Jenny and Malin Berggren — first saw success in America with “All That She Wants,” a No. 2 Hot 100 hit and Pop Airplay No. 1, but follow-up single “The Sign” rocketed them to the top of the Hot 100. It was a ubiquitous, era-defining, reggae-flavored dance-pop smash in the mid ‘90s, and remains the longest-leading No. 1 ever on the Pop Airplay chart (it dominated for 14 weeks in 1994).
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Ace of Base scored seven top 40 Hot 100 hits throughout the decade, including “Don’t Turn Around” (another Pop Airplay topper) from their U.S. debut album, The Sign, a repackaging of their European debut Happy Nation that topped the Billboard 200 when released by Arista. Naturally, Arista founder and industry legend Clive Davis is one of the interviewees in this docu-series, which also features sit-downs with Wyclef Jean, Nigerian-Swedish singer Dr. Alban (“It’s My Life”), the group’s manager, lawyer, A&R, bodyguard and one of their backup dancers to provide the full picture of their “warts-and-all” story. Ace of Base: All That She Wants also includes an interview with Billboard executive digital director Joe Lynch, i.e., the person writing this article.
In addition to their own hits, Ace of Base helped crack open the door for Swedish artists such as Robyn and The Cardigans to make inroads in the States — not to mention pop producers Denniz Pop and Max Martin, who would permanently shift the direction of commercial pop in America via their work with Britney Spears, Backstreet Boys and *NSYNC.
You can check out the trailer below and the full three-part documentary on Dec. 5.
Ariana Grande says she absolutely had to “earn” the right to play Glinda in the upcoming two-part big screen adaptation of Wicked. Speaking to Sentimental Men podcast hosts Quincy Born and Kevin Bianchi this week, Grande said she’s “always been a Wizard of Oz person,” but despite her global pop fame — including nine No. 1 Billboard Hot 100 hits — and deep knowledge and love for the original 1939 Judy Garland movie The Wizard of Oz and the 2003 Tony-winning Broadway production of Wicked, it was not a given that she’d land the gig in director Jon M. Chu’s fantastical re-imagining.
“People sometimes say to me, ‘you had to audition?’ Of course, are you out of your gourd?,” she said about earning the right to step into the beloved role opposite Cynthia Erivo’s Elphaba. “It’s Wicked! And it requires a totally different skill set than people know me for and have ever seen me do anything like,” she explained. “It’s Wicked! That’s the most respectful thing! It has to be earned… period!”
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If anything, Grande said her pop stardom could have worked against her in certain ways. “When you have this characterized persona that’s out there and people know you very well as this one thing, is this person going to be able to erase that and disappear into a character?,” she said, stressing that nothing about her playing Glinda is about herself, but only about inhabiting the beloved character.
During the pod recording where the singer apologized several times for her dog Myron’s incessant barking, Grande told the hosts that she has often turned to the Broadway Wicked original cast album for comfort and a “safe space” if she is nervous or needs to warm up her voice.
Grande also recalled that she first saw Wicked on Broadway when she was just 10, feeling “very, very, very fortunate” to see the original cast at a time when it was the show that “everyone was talking about.” In addition to repeatedly seeing the show on the Great White Way, after bidding way too much in a Broadway Cares Equity Fight AIDS auction for a backstage tour, the budding star was gifted a “little wand” and “magical body wash” by star Kristin Chenoweth.
How obsessed was she? At one point Grande erased every single song on her iPod with the exception of the Wicked soundtrack, further proof that this dream gig might have been in the stars all along. And, when the first murmurings about the film version reached her desk before the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic, the singer said she told her team that she was willing to immediately pull the plug on her 2019 Sweetener world tour so she could go home and start on voice and acting lessons.
“‘I’m gonna turn this s–t out,’” Grande said she told her team more than a year before her August 2021 audition. “‘This is all I want. It’s done.’” Though they appreciated her enthusiasm, Grande said her management politely said no way to cancelling the tour at a time when the singer thought she might be brought in to read for both lead roles.
She knew, however, that Glinda was the part she was destined to inhabit. When Chenoweth gave her the thumbs up, Ariana said she lost it. “We had talked about it for years and years and years, but me finally confessing to her that I wanted to go in for Glinda was like a whole different thing,” Grande said about asking Chenoweth for guidance on how to really nail the part and make it her own without resorting to an impersonation.
“I said, ‘Hey, I think they’re doing this now, and I think that I wanna go for Glinda,’ and she went into the bathroom and closed the door and started crying,” Grande said beginning to tear up herself at the memory. “It was the sweetest thing in the world. Oh my god, it makes me emotional. It was so cute. She was just like, ‘I was hoping this would happen. I love you, and I trust you with it, baby girl.’ She was like, ‘Just do your thing. Just do your thing. You are so funny and you have great instincts and no one knows that.”
The first part of the movie that also co-stars Jeff Goldblum, Michelle Yeoh, Bowen Yang, Jonathan Bailey and Marissa Bode, opens in theaters on Nov. 22.
Watch Grande talk Wicked below.
Tyler, the Creator threatened to bring back the “old” him at his “30 Minutes of Chromakopia” mini-concert in Boston on Halloween (Oct. 31) while talking about his ire at Taylor Swift fans. The rapper lashed out at what he deemed an attempt by Swifties to “cancel” him recently over old lyrics after he momentarily took […]
Billboard’s Friday Music Guide serves as a handy guide to this Friday’s most essential releases — the key music that everyone will be talking about today, and that will be dominating playlists this weekend and beyond.
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This week, Lil Uzi Vert blasts off to a new world, The Weeknd gets edgy with Anitta, and Shawn Mendes hoists up a “Heart of Gold.” Check out all of this week’s picks below:
Lil Uzi Vert, Eternal Atake 2
Eternal Atake arrived in 2020 as a breathless amalgamation of Lil Uzi Vert’s elastic flows and forward-thinking ideas, a rap enigma blooming into a superstar; its sequel, which follows last year’s Pink Tape, harkens back to its predecessor at times — “Chill Bae” belongs alongside his older melodic masterworks — but also forges ahead with more tumbling bars, spaced-out beats and braggadocio.
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The Weeknd feat. Anitta, “São Paulo”
“São Paulo,” the high-wattage new team-up between The Weeknd and Anitta, immediately justifies its Halloween release: within the opening minute, a sinister synth arrangement prod at Abel Tesfaye as he gasps out, “Every time I try to run, you put your curse all over me.” Soon, “São Paulo” widens its stance and shape-shifts, offering throbbing percussion and Latin flourishes while never dropping its eeriest undertones.
Shawn Mendes, “Heart of Gold”
“Heart of Gold” is the moment in which Shawn Mendes’ sonic pivot to rootsy folk-rock catches up to his natural songwriting ability: a grief-stricken reflection on a friend he couldn’t help in time, the single boasts a myriad of moving images as well as the strongest hook of Mendes’ latest era.
The Cure, Songs of a Lost World
With Songs of a Lost World, the Cure’s first studio album in a whopping 16 years, Robert Smith and co. have offered the ideal project for longtime fans: a no-dust-detected presentation of the goth-rock greats’ classic sound, but with interesting new wrinkles, including the sweeping, 10-minute epic “Endsong” to close out the new affair.
Champion, Skrillex, Four Tet & Naisha, “Talk to Me”
Any time that Skrillex and Four Tet’s names appear together on a new track, the dance world is going to pay attention — and sure enough, “Talk to Me,” a new collaboration with British producer Champion and singer-songwriter Naisha, represents a squiggly autumnal banger, with streamlined instrumentation that dismisses the notion of a too-crowded studio.
Future & Travis Scott, “South of France (Remix)”
Future’s victory lap is not done: after triumphing with his pair of Metro Boomin albums, We Don’t Trust You and We Still Don’t Trust You, and then serving up solo revelry on Mixtape Pluto, the latter project’s “South of France” has received a remix featuring Travis Scott, with both A-listers gliding over the burbling beat.
Megan Moroney, Blue Christmas… Duh
A few months after returning with Am I Okay?, Megan Moroney is quickly back to ring in the start of the holiday season with Blue Christmas… Duh, a three-song EP featuring a pair of originals from the country star (the delicious “All I Want for Christmas is a Cowboy” and heartfelt “Christmas Morning”), as well as, duh, a cover of “Blue Christmas.”
Editor’s Pick: Ethel Cain, “Punish”
If Preacher’s Daughter, Ethel Cain’s superb 2022 album, toyed with the ideas of pop structure and classic American iconography, “Punish” suggests that she’s prepared to explode all expectations for her next move: a nearly 7-minute drone song that starts with fragile beauty and builds up to eardrum-rattling noise, “Punish” showcases Cain’s talent while legitimately surprising the listeners — always a good thing.
Jennifer Lopez introduced Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris at a rally in Las Vegas on Thursday night (Oct. 31), imploring the audience to take a hard look at the stark differences between the sitting Vice President and twice impeached former President Donald Trump.
“At Madison Square Garden, he reminded us who he really is and how he really feels,” Lopez said of Trump in reference to his rally at MSG on Sunday in which a comedian told a succession of racist and sexist jokes, including one in which he referred to Puerto Rico as a “floating island of garbage.”
“It wasn’t just Puerto Ricans who were offended that day, OK? It was every Latino in this country, it was humanity and anyone of decent character,” said Lopez, who endorsed Harris this week. The offensive comment from the comedian who also made an off-color joke about the O.J. Simpson murders tied to Kansas City Chiefs star Travis Kelce and Taylor Swift, set up more than a dozen other opening speakers who warmed up the crowd for Trump with equally offensive comments. One referred to Democrats as “degenerates… low-lives [and] Jew-haters,” while fired Fox News host Tucker Carlson purposely misstated Harris’ heritage by calling her the “first Samoan Malaysian low IQ, former California prosecutor to ever be elected President.”
The Puerto Rico slur, in particular, drove endorsements for Harris from Lopez, as well as P.R. natives Bad Bunny, Ricky Martin and Luis Fonsi. Nicky Jam, who was born in Massachusetts to a P.R.-native father, withdrew his previous endorsement of Trump to throw in with the Harris/Walz campaign amid the wave of anger over the slur about the U.S. territory whose 3.2 million residents are U.S. citizens, but who cannot vote in elections. Lopez stressed that she was not on stage supporting Harris at the event in the crucial swing state “to trash anyone or bring them down.”
But with just days before Tuesday’s (Nov. 5) election, the singer explained, “I know what that can feel like and I wouldn’t do it to my worst enemy, or even when facing the biggest adversary I think America has internally ever had,” in reference to convicted felon Trump, who has vowed to use the engines of presidential power to take vengeance on his political enemies if re-elected. “But over Kamala Harris’ entire career, she has proven to us who she is. She has shown up for us every day, for the people. And it’s time for us to show up for her.”
Lopez noted that her parents were born in Puerto Rico and moved to New York before she was born, saying, “We are Americans. I am a mother. I am a sister. I am an actor and an entertainer and I like Hollywood endings. I like when the good guy, or in this case the good girl, wins. And with an understanding of our past and a faith in our future, I will be casting my ballot for Kamala Harris for president of the United States proudly.”
She also added, “You can’t even spell American without ‘Rican.”
Pollsters continue to call the contest between Harris and former reality TV host Trump a toss-up, which might also explain why Harris invited Lopez and Mexican rock band Maná — who performed at Thursday’s rally — to join her in a state where Latinos represent around 30% of the population; across the country an estimated 36.2 million Latinos are eligible to vote this year. Earlier in the day, Los Tigres del Norte performed at a Harris rally in Phoenix.
While Lopez and Harris were encouraging people to vote, Trump staged a stunt in Green Bay, WI in which he dressed up like a garbage collector in an orange vest and drove in circles on an airport tarmac in a Trump-branded garbage truck. His campaign said it was in an effort to call attention to a video of President Biden saying “the only garbage I see floating out there is his supporter,” which the White House later clarified was a reference to the other speakers at Trump’s rally.
“His demonization of Latinos is unconscionable, and it’s un-American. It’s totally contrary to everything we’ve done, everything we’ve been,” Biden added.
Check out video and photos of Lopez at the Harris campaign below.