Pop
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She knows she didn’t invent the idea of “gay pop,” but pop singer and Internet personality JoJo Siwa would like to see the subset become an “official genre” of music.
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During an interview on SiriusXM’s Hits 1 Miami With Mack & Jen, Siwa clarified the comments she made in a viral video interview with Billboard, saying she simply wants to see more queer art get recognized. “So, here’s the thing — ‘gay pop’ is a thing that people have done, but it is not an official genre of music,” she explained. “It is a style, but it is how there’s rap, there’s rock, there’s R&B, there’s pop — if you look on the iTunes charts … this should be a literal genre of music.”
The former Dance Moms star continued, saying that she doesn’t feel the current categorizations for LGBTQ+ artists are sufficient. “There’s so many gay pop artists … but I think that those gay pop artists do deserve a bigger home than what they have right now,” she said.
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Siwa originally spoke about the concept of “gay pop” during an interview with Billboard‘s Tetris Kelly about her new song “Karma,” when she claimed that she told her label (Columbia Records) that she “wanted to start a new genre … called ‘gay pop.’” Commenters quickly called out the singer for claiming to have created a “genre” that has existed for years — even LGBTQ+ pioneers Tegan and Sara shared a video on TikTok where they silently stared into a camera following the 20-year-old’s comments.
In a later interview with TMZ, Siwa clarified that she didn’t intend to say that she “invented” the concept of “gay pop” music. “I am not the inventor of gay pop, for sure not. But I do want to be a piece of making it bigger than it already is,” she said. “I’m not the president [of gay pop], but I might be the CEO, or the CMO. I can be the CMO, the chief marketing officer, and use my marketing tactics whether people like it or not.”
Elsewhere in her interview on SiriusXM, Siwa bemoaned the ongoing backlash to her comments. “I could say I want world peace, and everyone would be like, ‘How dare you want peace for the world!’” she said. “People ask me all the time, they’re like, ‘Do you feel like you have to be very careful about what you say?’ And I’m like, ‘No, because no matter what I say, it’s going down anyways.’”
Watch a clip from Siwa’s interview below:
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Devils roll the dice, angels roll their eyes, and sneaky EDM remixes catch Taylor Swift by surprise.
In a video from the Neon Carnival party during the first weekend of Coachella, the pop star can be seen having a hilarious reaction to hearing her Billboard Hot 100-topping single “Cruel Summer” come on over the speakers between sets, quickly realizing that it’s slightly different from the one she’s used to.
In the blurry clip, Swift sits down in what appears to be a VIP area, singing and dancing along to her own lyrics as the Lover hit blares over the noisy crowd. Halfway through the chorus, though, the 14-time Grammy winner’s original mix shifts into a club-ready dance track, with the second syllable of the word “cool” repeating over and over in the lead-up to a bass drop — “It’s a cruel summer, it’s cool -ool -ool -ool -ool…” For a second, Swift continues singing the words as usual, but when she realizes that she’s the only one, she freezes in place before looking around with a confused expression on her face.
The man behind the remix is Vanderpump Rules star James Kennedy, who was DJing at Neon Carnival on Saturday night in Thermal, Calif., about a 15-minute drive from Coachella. When reached by Billboard for his reaction to the viral video, Kennedy was still processing the fact that he had DJ’d for the likes of Swift and her Kansas City Chiefs star boyfriend Travis Kelce.
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“Not only a dream come true DJing Neon Carnival, but the fact that Taylor and Travis were there feeling the vibes and enjoying themselves was unreal!” Kennedy said in an exclusive statement, mentioning that his Swiftie girlfriend Ally Lewber, who also stars on Vanderpump Rules, couldn’t believe it either. “Ally and I were just at the Eras Tour in L.A! (Ally still can’t get over it haha!)“
Given that Swift sings “Cruel Summer” every night on her global Eras Tour, it makes sense that her brain might have been on autopilot for a second or two of the remix. The track first dropped in 2019 as part of the singer’s seventh studio album Lover but wasn’t made a radio single until 2023, after which it steadily ascended to No. 1 on the Hot 100 in October, a full four years after its release.
Swift also spent day 2 of the festival’s first weekend watching Bleachers and Ice Spice’s Coachella sets alongside Kelce, with the pair adorably dancing together in the crowd. In just a few days, she’ll release her highly anticipated 11th studio album, The Tortured Poets Department, complete with collaborations from Post Malone and Florence + the Machine.
See Swift’s startled reaction to hearing Kennedy’s remix below.
Ariana Grande loves her Nonna! The pop superstar took to Instagram on Tuesday (April 16) to celebrate her grandmother Marjorie Grande’s history-making chart achievement. Explore Explore See latest videos, charts and news See latest videos, charts and news “Celebrating the one and only, most beautiful Nonna who has now made history for being the senior […]
Another piece of Taylor Swift‘s The Tortured Poets Department has fallen into place. With just three days left until the new album arrives, the 34-year-old pop star unveiled another lyric from the 16-track set in partnership with Spotify on Tuesday (April 16) — and it’s a loaded one.
The streaming service premiered the snippet of an unknown track at its Swiftie library installation in Los Angeles Tuesday, the first of three days the pop-up is set to take place. A display case resting on pressed flowers and a lacy white veil at the event finds an open book of “Tortured Poets Department” stationary reading the new lyric in all-caps: “Even statues crumble if they’re made to wait.”
Around the same time, a video appeared on the Spotify page for Tortured Poets showing Swift herself sitting at a typewriter, hammering out the same phrase.
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The revelation isn’t the first time the metaphor-loving Grammy winner has given fans a taste of the new album, which follows her 2022 Billboard 200-topping LP Midnights. On April 8, the day of the 2024 total solar eclipse, she shared the topical lyric on social media: “Crowd goes wild at her fingertips. Half moonshine, full eclipse.”
Then, on Sunday (April 14), Swift celebrated the news that Target would be carrying special vinyl variants of Tortured Poets by posting another fragment: “I wish I could un-recall how we almost had it all.”
It’s also possible that the taglines assigned to each deluxe edition of the record double as lyrics. For instance, the backside of “The Manuscript” version of the project features the phrase “I love you, it’s ruining my life,” while “The Bolter” carries the message, “You don’t get to tell me about sad.”
The very first piece of the album Swift gifted to fans, however, came on the day she announced Tortured Poets at the 2024 Grammys. Shortly after breaking the news during her best pop vocal acceptance speech, the superstar posted on Instagram: “And so I enter into evidence my tarnished coat of arms/ My muses, acquired like bruises, my talismans and charms/ The tick, tick, tick of love bombs/ My veins of pitch black ink/ All’s fair in love and poetry …”
See how Spotify unveiled the new Tortured Poets Department lyric below.
Michael J. Fox has been added to the list of celebrity Swifties. The Back to the Future star sat down with People recently, where he named Taylor Swift as someone who will have an even greater impact in the next 50 years. “I think she’s going to be a really important person. I think she […]
JoJo Siwa‘s edgy new era might be all about charting a new path forward, but her “Karma” is bringing along some key players from her past. In a conversation with Billboard News, renowned choreographer Richy Jackson details how his approach to choreography has evolved since he first worked with the pop star more than a decade ago.
“I met JoJo on a show I was judging called Abby’s Ultimate Dance Competition,” he recounts. “I think she was nine years old. Later on in her career, she was with Nickelodeon, she began doing Dance Moms with Abby Lee [Miller] and she started doing music on YouTube. I hadn’t seen her since that competition show, and I happened to run into her and her mom at Studio City, and her mom was like, ‘Would you ever wanna choreograph for JoJo?’ And I’m like, ‘Yes!’”
Siwa placed fifth on season two of Abby’s Ultimate Dance Competition, and appeared on seasons five and six of Dance Moms from 2015 to 2016. In 2017, the multi-hyphenate signed with Nickelodeon, under whom she acted in various programs, released several children’s songs and starred in her own feature film, The J Team, which earned her a pair of Children’s and Family Emmy nods. On the Kid Albums chart, Siwa has logged three entries, reaching as high as No. 12 with 2019’s Celebrate.
“She was 13 then. Chroeographing for her then … she was very young, the songs were for kids, it was with Nickelodeon,” explains Jackson. “There [were] certain dance moves I could do and not do, certain hip moves couldn’t make it into the choreography because it was for kids. But now, that she’s in her ‘adult pop star’ era that we’re about to get into — now, it’s like the game is open. We’ve been laughing, ’cause I’m like, ‘Ah, now we can do this move and do that move!” It’s more risque, so I’m excited. She’s just one of those artist that I feel is the next generation’s big pop star, and she just goes for it, and I love that about her.”
Jackson, of course, is no stranger to helping pop stars express their risque side through dance. His credits include the bulk of Lady Gaga‘s acclaimed videography — including 2009’s VMAs-sweeping “Bad Romance” and 2017’s headlining sets at Coachella and the Super Bowl Halftime Show — as well as Katy Perry‘s “California Gurls” and, now, Siwa’s “Karma.”
Siwa launched “Karma” with a flashy, choreogrpahy-packed music video on April 5, with the intent to achieve a rebrand similar to that of Miley Cyrus during her controversial Bangerz era back in 2013. “The last song JoJo played for me was ‘D.R.E.A.M.,’” says Jackson. “It was very young, very kiddie. Once I heard [“Karma”] I was like, ‘Yes!’ It was so unexpected … to hear this vibe on her, I loved it.”
In his chat with Billboard News, Jackson also reflects on his experience bringing Gaga’s iconic dance moves to the gaming landscape via an A.I.-utilizing Fortnite collaboration, recalls learning that he would be choreographing the Super Bowl Halftime Show and discusses the impact of TikTok on the contemporary dance scene.
Watch Richy Jackson’s full Billboard News interview above.
A cryptic mural teasing Taylor Swift‘s fast-approaching new album The Tortured Poets Department has appeared in Chicago, complete with an enormous QR code that leads fans to an error message on the pop star’s YouTube channel. A group of painters was still working on the mural as of Monday (April 15), brushing the black-and-white piece […]
Three years after he blew Fab Four fans’ minds with his The Beatles: Get Back series, director Peter Jackson is dipping back into his Beatle bag on May 8 with the re-release of Michael Lindsay-Hogg’s legendary 1970 documentary Let It Be.
The film chronicling the final days of John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr will be available for the first time in more than 50 years when it airs exclusively on Disney+ on May 8.
According to a release, the film recorded during the midst of the group’s breakup “now takes its rightful place in the band’s history. Once viewed through a darker lens, the film is now brought to light through its restoration and in the context of revelations brought forth” in Jackson’s Emmy-winning 2021 docuseries.
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“Let It Be was ready to go in October/November 1969, but it didn’t come out until April 1970. One month before its release, The Beatles officially broke up. And so the people went to see Let It Be with sadness in their hearts, thinking, ‘I’ll never see The Beatles together again. I will never have that joy again,’” director Lindsay-Hogg said in a statement. “And it very much darkened the perception of the film. But, in fact, how often do you get to see artists of this stature working together to make what they hear in their heads into songs. And then you get to the roof and you see their excitement, camaraderie and sheer joy in playing together again as a group and know, as we do now, that it was the final time, and we view it with full understanding of who they were and still are and a little poignancy. I was knocked out by what Peter was able to do with Get Back, using all the footage I’d shot 50 years previously.”
In fact, the restored Let It Be features footage that appeared Get Back, taking viewers into the studio and onto the Apple Corps London rooftop in Jan. 1969 for what would be the quartet’s final live performance. It also features the band in the studio writing and recording their Let It Be album. In the wake of the rapturous appreciation for Jackson’s series, and with Lindsay-Hogg’s support, Apple Corps asked Jackson’s Park Road Post Production team to restore Let It Be from the original 16mm negative, a process that also included the remastering of the film’s sound using the same MAL de-mix technology that was employed on Get Back.
“I’m absolutely thrilled that Michael’s movie, Let It Be, has been restored and is finally being re-released after being unavailable for decades,” said Jackson in a statement. “I was so lucky to have access to Michael’s outtakes for Get Back, and I’ve always thought that Let It Be is needed to complete the Get Back story. Over three parts, we showed Michael and The Beatles filming a groundbreaking new documentary, and Let It Be is that documentary – the movie they released in 1970. I now think of it all as one epic story, finally completed after five decades. The two projects support and enhance each other: Let It Be is the climax of Get Back, while Get Back provides a vital missing context for Let It Be. Michael Lindsay-Hogg was unfailingly helpful and gracious while I made Get Back, and it’s only right that his original movie has the last word…looking and sounding far better than it did in 1970.”
On Monday, prior to the announcement — and six months after the Fabs dropped what was billed as their final song, the melancholy “Now and Then” — the Beatles site teased “There will be an answer,” a lyric from 1970’s “Let It Be.” The post was accompanied by four blank frames positioned to resemble the Let It Be album artwork, as well as what seemed like a cryptic clue, “At last…” and the Disney+ and Apple Corps logos.
Though Let It Be premiered in movie theaters in 1970 and was released on home video formats in the early 1980s, it has never been officially issued on DVD, blu-ray or streaming.
Seven years after releasing her first string of songs on streaming services, Chappell Roan is now officially a Billboard Hot 100-charting artist.
The pop singer-songwriter earns her first entry on the April 20-dated Hot 100 with “Good Luck, Babe!” The song, released April 5 via KRA International/Amusement/Island/Republic, opens at No. 77 with 6.6 million official streams, 67,000 in radio airplay audience and 1,000 downloads sold in the U.S. through April 11, according to Luminate. Chappell co-wrote the song with Justin Tranter and Dan Nigro, who also produced it. She performed it live for the first time Friday (April 12) during her Coachella set.
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Chappell Roan (real name Kayleigh Amstutz; her artist name is a tribute to her late grandfather, Dennis Chappell, and the song “The Strawberry Roan”), from Willard, Mo., first reached Billboard’s charts in October 2023 with her debut full-length album, The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess. The set debuted at No. 3 on Heatseekers Albums. It debuted at No. 127 on the Billboard 200 dated April 6 and jumps to a new No. 66 high on the latest list.
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Chappell Roan initially signed to Atlantic Records in 2015 and released a five-track EP, School Nights, before she left the label in 2020. She subsequently teamed up with songwriter-producer Nigro – the chart-topping hitmaker who has collaborated with Olivia Rodrigo, Conan Gray and Caroline Polachek – for her breakout songs “Pink Pony Club” and “Naked in Manhattan.”
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“My music [at that time] reflected the feelings of my first time in a gay club, my first time falling in love with a woman, my first time feeling homesick,” she told Billboard last year. “I had to go through all those experiences, that pain and suffering, to rebirth myself into where I am now.”
Chappell Roan maintained a cult following ahead of her Hot 100 arrival. Her music draws from ‘80s disco and early-2000s pop hits. On tour, she invites local drag queens to open for her and donates a portion of ticket sales to For the Gworls, an organization that raises money to aid Black transgender people.
“Especially as a queer person who has the privilege of making money off the queer community to support myself, it’s important to redistribute funds,” she told Billboard.
Chappell Roan is currently on her Midwest Princess Tour. Later this month, she’ll join Rodrigo on the European leg of the latter’s Guts World Tour. Along with the second weekend of Coachella, she is also slated to perform at Boston Calling, Governors Ball and Bonnaroo.
It’s been almost four years since Katy Perry put on her clown nose on the cover of her sixth studio album, Smile. The follow-up to the somewhat dour 2017 album Witness featured collaborations with producers including Charlie Puth, Stargate and Zedd and an upbeat vibe fueled by the singles “Daisies” and “Smile.” On Monday night […]