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Just as tickets went on sale for KCON 2024 in Los Angeles, the K-pop mega festival and convention announced a special surprise guest to its lineup as well as three noteworthy names as hosts.
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For its first KCON Los Angeles since first hitting its stage in 2017, NCT 127 has been announced as part of a “special lineup” for the fest, joining previously announced stars like ZICO, ENHYPEN, P1Harmony, NMIXX, A.C.E and more. A graphic announcing the group’s involvement featured seven members of the group — Johnny, Yuta, Doyoung, Jaehyun, Jungwoo, Mark and Haechan — as leader Taeyong began fulfilling his mandatory South Korean military service in March, and Taeil was announced to enlist this year as well and may begin his service by the July performance.
KCON also revealed the three hosts that will hold MC duties for the live taping of M Countdown, the weekly live performance program on the K-pop music channel Mnet, which occasionally goes abroad for live tapings.
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Rowoon, the Korean-drama actor Rowoon and former member of boy band SF9, will host Friday, July 26, marking his first appearance at KCON LA since 2019. Solo star Jeon Somi is the M Countdown host for Saturday, July 27, to mark her long-awaited return to L.A. and first time back at KCON since 2016 when she first performed with her former girl group, I.O.I. Finally, top K-drama actor Kim Soo Hyun will host on Sunday, June 28.
Notably, KCON’s central featuring of stars like Kim Soo Hyun and Rowoon marks a move back towards featuring more actors from Korea as it did in past iterations during the ’10s despite the prominence of K-dramas and Korean cinema, arguably growing more prominent in the post-pandemic years.
Tickets for KCON’s general onsale opened this afternoon, June 10, local time. KCON 2024 Los Angeles takes place across Los Angeles’ Crypto.com Arena, LA Convention Center and Gilbert Lindsay Plaza from July 26-28.
Taylor Swift declared Charlie Puth should be a bigger artist on her song “The Tortured Poets Department,” but the “Attention” singer would probably declare himself confused after his latest fan encounter.
In a hilarious new TikTok from serial serenader Harry Daniels, Puth looks totally baffled as the creator approaches him from behind a fence and starts singing Swift’s lyrics on “Tortured Poets” — in which she gives the “See You Again” musician a big shout-out.
“You smoked then ate seven bars of chocolate/ We declared Charlie Puth should be a bigger artist,” Daniels sings in an exaggerated tone.
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“What is this?” Puth says, looking lost. But Daniels had already walked away.
The TikToker is known for surprising musicians with spontaneous performances of their songs. In April, for instance, he made the rounds at Coachella and sang for Katy Perry, Gwen Stefani, Paris Hilton, Tyga, Becky G, Reneé Rapp and Wallows’ Dylan Minnette.
The video comes nearly two months after Swift surprised fans (and Puth) by including him in the lyrics to the title track of her latest album The Tortured Poets Department, which recently nabbed a seventh week at No. 1 on the Billboard 200. It took some time before the “Light Switch” artist properly responded to the shout-out, but in May, he revealed that the recognition inspired him to release a new song of his own titled “Hero.”
“I’ve never put out a song like this before,” he wrote on Instagram last month. “It’s very different for me, but I want to thank @taylorswift for letting me know musically that I just couldn’t keep this on my hard drive any longer.”
“My new song HERO is about when you see someone you love hurting themselves, ruining the things in their life that are good, but you just can’t save them,” he added at the time. “I’m very excited to share my next album with you, especially this song because it’s a great representation of what’s to come.”
Watch Daniels sing for Charlie Puth below.
There aren’t too many singer-songwriters making brainy, avant-leaning dance-pop that appeals equally to the hips, the head and the heart, but Róisín Murphy has always been one of a kind. From her time in the duo Moloko in the ‘90s to her no-misses solo discography that includes electropop classics such as Overpowered (2007) and Róisín Machine (2020), she never fails to deliver, particularly on stage. So when the Irish artist hits the U.S. for a tour, people turn out – and sure enough, a packed audience spanning generations and state lines (some folks drove more than four hours to see her) greeted Murphy when she played New York City’s Brooklyn Paramount on Friday (June 7).
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With a title like Hit Parade Tour, one might wonder if the trek is Murphy’s version of Madonna’s Celebration Tour or Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour, both career-spanning global treks that played to enthusiastic (well, mostly) crowds and critical raves. And while Hit Parade is, more directly, the name of her 2023 album (which she followed this year with the companion piece Hit Parade Remixes), you wouldn’t be too far off.
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Over the course of a lengthy, muscular set, Murphy performed four tunes from her old band, one from her solo debut, three tracks from Overpowered, and four apiece from Róisín Machine and Hit Parade. Hardly career-encompassing (two albums were skipped), but a pretty healthy mix of beloved catalog and more recent material spanning a quarter of a century.
Throughout those years, Murphy’s substantial vocal chops have only seemed to improve with each release. During her show at the gorgeously restored, dramatically lit Brooklyn Paramount, she performed peerless electropop without singing to track (almost unheard of in pop) in front of a live band that provided every rubbery bass line, shimmering synth and razor-sharp beat in real time. (Originally a movie palace that opened at the top of the talking pictures era, Brooklyn Paramount turned into a live venue that housed everyone from Ella Fitzgerald to Buddy Holly in the ’50s before shutting down to the wider public for decades; it only reopened as a concert space this year thanks to Live Nation and Arcadis.)
As a fashion-forward artist frequently inspired by drag and queer culture (more than a few chart-topping pop stars with larger profiles have followed in her footsteps), Murphy brought a mix of camp, eleganza and couture to the show, changing her outfit for nearly every song – sometimes while still singing.
The wild costuming and nonstop dance party clearly resonated with her substantial queer fanbase, who turned out in big numbers at the Brooklyn Paramount despite Murphy’s controversial comments last year. In Aug. 2023, a screenshot from Murphy’s Facebook account called puberty blockers – a go-to boogeyman for people targeting the trans community – “F—KED.” Shortly after, she released a statement apologizing for her “directly hurtful” comments, affirming her commitment to “celebrating diversity” without directly backtracking on the issue; she did, however, promise to “bow out of this conversation within the public domain.” Since then, fans – who had previously expressed widespread disappointment in her comments – have mostly dropped the topic, and it didn’t seem to impact her ticket sales too much, at least based on the NYC turnout. (In 2023, she played Terminal 5, which fits about 300 more people than the Brooklyn Paramount does – not enough of a drop in venue size to extrapolate anything meaningful.)
Notwithstanding her regressive, unnecessary take on trans youth, Murphy continues to craft, record and execute some of the most innovative dance-pop of this century. And on her latest trek, it comes to life in all its beautiful, bizarre splendor.
Upcoming Hit Parade Tour Dates
June 10 – HISTORY – Toronto, Canada
June 11 – Riviera Theatre – Chicago, IL
June 13 – Bonnaroo Music & Arts Festival – Manchester, TN
June 15 – The Fillmore Miami Beach – Miami, FL
November 1 – Roseland Theater – Portland, OR
November 2 – Moore Theatre – Seattle, WA
November 3 – Vogue Theatre – Vancouver, Canada
November 7 – The Shrine Expo Hll – Los Angeles, CA
November 9 – The Warfield – San Francisco, CA
Jason Kelce was a Super Bowl champ, a seven-time Pro Bowl selection and retired last year after 13 seasons as one of the NFL‘s most reliable, indomitable centers to ever play the game. But in a recent appearance on comedian Andrew Santino’s Whiskey Ginger podcast, the second-most-famous Kelce said that his, and his family’s life, have definitely been given a make-over thanks to brother Travis Kelce‘s high-profile relationship with Taylor Swift.
Santino asked how Jason’s wife, Kylie Kelce, has been handling the spotlight since her brother-in-law began dating the biggest pop star in the world last summer and if she finds the added scrutiny to be annoying or kind of fun. “I think it’s both,” Jason said, noting that the Prime Video documentary Kelce following her husband’s 2022-2023 season with the Philadelphia Eagles may have helped prime Kylie for the avalanche of attention; the doc debuted in September, right around the time Swift and Travis Kelce made their romance official.
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“I think she’s a little big uncomfortable with, I guess, how much it’s become and our family’s out there, like people know what our kids look like,” he said of the couple’s three young daughters. “We’ve tried to retract from that a little bit. But I think she enjoys the fact that she gets to go and do charitable outings and she gets to give back to the community.”
That said, they both understand that the scrutiny comes with the territory of fame and even if it gets to be “too much” at times, Jason said the microscope on his younger brother is beyond anything he could imagine. “Travis and Taylor have taken it to another level and that’s a whole other side of it,” said Jason. “Kylie and I think we have it bad, and then we go hang out with one of them for a second. This is a whole other situation here. I don’t even know how to, like… you can’t be a normal person at that point.”
Despite the more intense spotlight, Jason said he hasn’t seen Travis turn into someone else. “I haven’t seen him change one bit,” Jason Kelce said of his three-time Super Bowl-winning brother. “I think it’s a compliment. He stayed true to himself. He’s still humble. He treats everyone with the utmost respect, like they’re equals regardless of who they are.”
Travis echoed that emotion in a Good Morning America interview last week, in which he said that he’s always been a “very grounded guy” and that he’s “so fortunate, so grateful” for all the opportunities that have come his way lately.
Watch Jason Kelce talk about fame and navigating the Traylor attention below.
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Taylor Swift is anything but down bad after three successful Eras Tour shows in Scotland, shortly after which she thanked fans for showing up in record-breaking numbers in a heartfelt post on Instagram Monday (June 10). Sharing a slew of photos from her performances at Murrayfield Stadium, the pop star excitedly wrote, “Edinburgh!!! You truly […]
Celine Dion suspected something was wrong with her for a a long time. But it wasn’t until she publicly shared her diagnosis with the rare neurological condition Stiff Person Syndrome in 2022 that the singer finally felt like she’d come clean about her health struggles. In the latest preview of an upcoming NBC primetime special […]
Jung Kook‘s “Never Let Go” tops this week’s new music poll.
Music fans voted in a poll published Friday (June 7) on Billboard, choosing the BTS star’s solo track as their favorite new music release of the past week, a week full of hot new pop tunes.
Jung Kook’s brand-new song brought in a whopping 79% of the vote, with the BTS ARMY coming in strong to show their support. Voters this week chose “Never Let Go” over new music releases from Sabrina Carpenter, Zach Bryan feat. Noeline Hofmann, Charli XCX, Gracie Abrams, Tems and RAYE.
BTS star Jung Kook gets sentimental on his single “Never Let Go,” the first new solo tune fans have heard since the release of his 2023 debut album, Golden, which launched at No. 2 on the Billboard 200 albums chart last year. The new song is dedicated to BTS’ beloved supporters, affectionately called ARMY, and conveys “a sincere message to never let go of each other,” according to HYBE.
“Oh, every day, I wonder if this all is just a dream,” Jung Kook sings on the sweet track. “Everything falls into place ’cause you’re right here with me/ Without your love, I’m nothing/ You mean more than you know/ And words escape me whenever you’re close/ I tried to put it into words but it don’t measure up/ My pen and paper could never do quite enough/ It’s the truth, it’s the truth/ We got something rеal nothing could break.”
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Jung Kook and fellow BTS members Jin, RM, SUGA, J-Hope, Jimin and V are currently serving in the South Korean military, which mandates an 18-month military enlistment for all able-bodied men by the time they turn 28. While on a break from activities together as BTS amid the group’s service, various solo projects have been released.
Trailing behind “Never Let Go” on this week’s poll is Sabrina Carpenter’s new single “Please Please Please,” with 8% of the vote, Zach Bryan with Noeline Hofmann on “Purple Gas,” with 3% of the vote, and Charli XCX’s Brat album, with 2% of the vote.
See the final results of this week’s new music poll below.
Taylor Swift’s The Tortured Poets Department scores a seventh straight and total week at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 albums chart (dated June 15), as the set earned 148,000 equivalent album units in the U.S. in the week ending June 6 (down 16%), according to Luminate.
Poets is the first album to spend its first seven weeks at No. 1 since Morgan Wallen’s One Thing at a Time led for its first 12 weeks a year ago (March 18-June 3, 2023-dated charts). Among Swift’s collection of 14 No. 1s, Poets surpasses Folklore for the most weeks at No. 1 from its debut, as Folklore spent its first six weeks atop the list (before it slipped to the No. 5 spot in its seventh frame).
Of Swift’s No. 1s on the Billboard 200, Poets matches Red for her fourth-most weeks on top. Ahead of them are 1989 and Fearless (each with 11) and Folklore (eight).
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Meanwhile, Swift adds her 76th career week at No. 1 on the Billboard 200, extending her record among soloists. (Elvis Presley has the second-most among soloists, with 67.) The total encompasses her 14 leaders. (She’s tied with Jay-Z for the most No. 1s among soloists.)
Also in the top 10 of the new Billboard 200, ATEEZ achieves its fifth consecutive, and total, top 10-charting effort as Golden Hour: Part.1 bows at No. 2, while Shaboozey lands his first charting album as his new release Where I’ve Been, Isn’t Where I’m Going launches at No. 5.
The Billboard 200 chart ranks the most popular albums of the week in the U.S. based on multi-metric consumption as measured in equivalent album units, compiled by Luminate. Units comprise album sales, track equivalent albums (TEA) and streaming equivalent albums (SEA). Each unit equals one album sale, or 10 individual tracks sold from an album, or 3,750 ad-supported or 1,250 paid/subscription on-demand official audio and video streams generated by songs from an album. The new June 15, 2024-dated chart will be posted in full on Billboard‘s website on June 11. For all chart news, follow @billboard and @billboardcharts on both X, formerly known as Twitter, and Instagram.
Of The Tortured Poets Department’s 148,000 equivalent album units earned, SEA units comprise 120,000 (down 10% — it’s No. 1 on Top Streaming Albums; its SEA units equal 157.26 million on-demand official streams of the deluxe edition’s 31 songs), album sales comprise 27,000 (down 35%) and TEA units comprise 1,000 (down 22%).
ATEEZ achieves its fifth consecutive, and total, top 10-charting album on the Billboard 200 as Golden Hour: Part.1 debuts at No. 2 with 131,000 equivalent album units earned (the largest week of 2024 for any K-pop album). Of that sum, album sales comprise 127,000 (the year’s biggest sales week for a K-pop album; it’s also the top-selling album of the week; it’s No. 1 on Top Album Sales), SEA units comprise 4,000 (equaling 6.15 million on-demand official streams of the set’s six songs) and TEA units comprise a negligible sum. The album’s first-week sales were supported by its availability across 31 CD variants, all containing branded paper merch and other collectibles.
Billie Eilish’s Hit Me Hard and Soft slips 2-3 with 117,000 equivalent album units earned (down 19%). With the top three titles on the Billboard 200 each exceeding 100,000 units earned for the week, it’s the second week in a row that the top three have all cleared at least 100,000. The last time that happened was on the Oct. 28- and Nov. 4, 2023-dated lists.
Morgan Wallen’s chart-topping One Thing at a Time is a non-mover at No. 4 on the new Billboard 200 with 71,000 equivalent album units earned (down 3%).
Shaboozey’s third album, Where I’ve Been, Isn’t Where I’m Going, debuts at No. 5 on the Billboard 200, marking the first chart entry from the artist. The set was ushered in by the smash single “A Bar Song (Tipsy),” which has reached No. 3 on the all-genre Billboard Hot 100 and No. 1 on Hot Country Songs. The album earned 50,000 equivalent album units in its first week, and of that figure, SEA units comprise 39,000 (equaling 52.66 million on-demand official streams of the set’s 12 songs, largely powered by “A Bar Song”), album sales comprise 8,000 (it was only available to purchase as a standard digital download album) and TEA units comprise 3,000.
Wallen’s former leader Dangerous: The Double Album is a non-mover at No. 6 on the new Billboard 200 with 43,000 equivalent album units earned (down 4%), Noah Kahan’s Stick Season steps 9-7 (42,000; up 5%), Future and Metro Boomin’s chart-topping We Don’t Trust You slips 7-8 (40,000; down 6%), Gunna’s One of Wun falls 8-9 (nearly 40,000; down 6%) and Zach Bryan’s self-titled former No. 1 is stationary at No. 10 (36,000; down 3%).
Luminate, the independent data provider to the Billboard charts, completes a thorough review of all data submissions used in compiling the weekly chart rankings. Luminate reviews and authenticates data. In partnership with Billboard, data deemed suspicious or unverifiable is removed, using established criteria, before final chart calculations are made and published.
“What a charming Saturday” it was for Taylor Swift fans, just like the singer-songwriter narrates on “The Bolter,” one of the tracks she played live for the first time ever last night (June 8).
The Eras Tour sets Swift up to pull deep from her discography when she wants to, during her ever-changing acoustic section of the concert. Nearing her 100th show on the sprawling trek (Saturday night in Edinburgh, Scotland, was No. 98), the star got particularly unpredictable in her choice of surprise songs when she sat at the piano at the Scottish Gas Murrayfield Stadium.
First, on guitar, Swift debuted one of her newer songs live. She played “The Bolter,” one of the last tracks on the Anthology edition of 2024’s The Tortured Poets Department, her new album that’s so far spent six consecutive weeks at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 chart.
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A song in which she tells a story that comes to the realization “hearts are hers for the breakin’” and that there’s “escape in escaping,” “The Bolter” flawlessly pivoted to 2017’s “Getaway Car,” from Reputation.
Swift performing well thought-out mashups during the surprise song part of the Eras show has become customary on the international leg of The Eras Tour, ever since the singer announced her intention to “be as creative as possible with the acoustic set moving forward,” back in February.
Saturday night in Edinburgh, she followed the mashup of “The Bolter” and “Getaway Car” with another song combo, this one more surprising than the first. On piano, she paired “All of the Girls You Loved Before,” a one-off track she released from the vault of 2019’s Lover, with a song Swift wasn’t even sure her crowd would recognize: “Crazier,” found only on the soundtrack for the 2009 film Hannah Montana: The Movie.
But the stadium had no problem recalling the swooping chorus of “Crazier,” and sang with her: “You lift my feet off the ground/ You spin me around/ You make me crazier, crazier/ Feels like I’m fallin’ and I am lost in your eyes/ You make me crazier, crazier, crazier.”
“Oh my god,” Swift said, laughing at how many people knew the words.
Watch both of Swift’s Saturday night Scotland surprises in the fan-captured clips below, and enjoy Billboard‘s complete list of all the songs we’ve heard in the Eras acoustic set (it gets updated with every tour date).
Wistful Folklore single “Cardigan” was the soundtrack to a couple’s engagement in Edinburgh, Scotland, on Friday (June 7), and Taylor Swift watched it happen. Apparently moved by the emotional moment, Swift commented on the marriage proposal she’d just seen from the stage, in front of a packed stadium.
“You put me on and said I was your favorite,” Swift sang with a smile. She looked out to the Scottish Gas Murrayfield Stadium crowd as she finished the song performed atop the The Eras Tour’s Folklore cabin.
“I love performing this entire show in the sunlight ’cause I’m pretty sure I just saw somebody get engaged over here,” she said to cheers confirming she wasn’t imagining things. “Did it happen?” Swift eagerly asked, and then threw her arms up, giggled and yelled, “YES!”
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“You have no idea,” continued Swift. “I never get to see that, right? ‘Cause it’s dark, usually, at night. But it’s not right now, so congratulations! Wow.”
“I just saw that whole thing!” she marveled. “Man, that’s amazing.”
Picking up her guitar, she added to the couple, “Thanks for doing that at my concert. That’s a big moment. Huge!”
Later in the concert, the extra light in Edinburgh helped the singer make sure her fans stayed safe during her always-anticipated acoustic set, when she performs solo and enjoys some audience interaction at the endstage.
Mid-strum during “Would’ve, Could’ve, Should’ve” from the 3am edition of Midnights — which she combined with pieces of 1989‘s “I Know Places,” as one of her surprise performances at the show — the star stopped singing the bridge.
To the tune of the song, she said, “I need help right in front of me, please, right in front of me. Just gonna keep playing until we notice where it is.”
Pointing her guitar in the direction of a person in need of assistance in the general admission floor area of the venue, she said, “Right there,” and then, “I’m just gonna keep playing ’til somebody helps them … We’re not gonna keep singing. We’re just gonna keep talking about the people that we help in front of me … Just let me know when. I could do this all night,” eventually resuming her song when she was sure the person got the attention they needed.
Swift followed the guitar performance with a mashup of Evermore‘s “‘Tis the Damn Season” and Lover‘s “Daylight” on piano.
Below, watch the newly engaged couple’s romantic moment, seemingly documented by fellow Swifties with cell phones, and a closeup clip of Swift’s reaction from the stage.
Plus, see Swift’s interaction with the crowd during “Would’ve, Could’ve, Should’ve.”
📹 | FULL video of Taylor performing the most chaotic surprise songs ever 😅‘Would’ve, Could’ve, Should’ve’ x ‘I Know Places’ 💙🩵 pic.twitter.com/YLbi4um8d4— The Eras Tour Singapore (@TSTheErasTourSG) June 8, 2024