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Sinead O’Connor’s estate and longtime label Chrysalis Records are speaking out and expressing their disgust after Donald Trump used her 1990 Billboard Hot 100 No. 1 hit “Nothing Compares 2 U” during recent campaign rallies in North Carolina and Maryland. “Throughout her life, it is well known that Sinéad O’Connor lived by a fierce moral […]
Taylor Swift has some family ties to Singapore, the pop star said at her concert at the Singapore National Stadium on Saturday (March 2).
“My mom actually spent a lot of her childhood with her mom and dad and her sister growing up in Singapore,” Swift, seated at her Evermore piano, shared with the crowd of Andrea Swift’s upbringing.
Swift had just finishing singing “Marjorie,” the emotional song she wrote about her grandmother, Marjorie Finlay, and was taking a moment to speak to her fans at the first of six Eras Tour shows at the stadium.
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“A lot of the time when we would come here on tour, my mom would take me and drive me past her old house, and where she used to go to school,” she said from the stage. “I’ve been hearing about Singapore my whole life.”
Swift added, “To get to come here and play a show this big with so many beautiful, generous people who were just essentially honoring my family with what you just did with that song [“Marjorie”], it means the world.”
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The musician mentioned her mother’s history with Singapore several years ago, in a 2016 interview for Singaporean newspaper The Straits Times. Swift told a reporter that her grandfather, who worked for an engineering company, had to move there for work, so her mom “grew up in Singapore. Her parents were traveling around for my grandfather’s job.”
On Sunday, Swift made an announcement about her upcoming album, The Tortured Poets Department, unveiling a fourth and final variant of the project that features a bonus track titled “The Black Dog.” Each of the other three Tortured Poets versions include a different bonus song: “The Manuscript,” “The Bolter” and “The Albatross.” The album arrives on April 19.
Check out Swift’s speech about her mom growing up in Singapore below. Her remaining concert dates at the venue are March 4, 7, 8 and 9.
Justin Bieber‘s mom dug out the family photo album for the pop star’s 30th birthday. “30 YEARS! Just like that. Happy birthday Justin,” Pattie Mallette, Bieber’s mother, wrote on Friday (March 1) in a caption on Instagram, where she posted several personal pictures from Bieber’s childhood. The photos cover a wide timeline, beginning with her […]
Miley Cyrus and Pharrell Williams‘ “Doctor (Work It Out)” has topped this week’s new music poll.
Music fans voted in a poll published Friday (March 1) on Billboard, choosing the team-up between the pop star and producer as their favorite new music release of the past week.
“Doctor (Work It Out)” brought in nearly 59% of the vote, beating out new music by Cardi B (“Like What (Freestyle)”); Charli XCX (“Von Dutch”); Galantis, David Guetta and 5 Seconds of Summer (“Lighter”); ScHoolboy Q (Blue Lips); and others.
Cyrus’ long-awaited collaboration with Pharrell marks the singer’s first release since her 2023 single “Used to Be Young.” The collaboration has been in the works for over a decade, with “Doctor (Work It Out)” originally intended to appear on but apparently scrapped from Cyrus’ 2013 album, Bangerz. In January, Pharrell teased the single at the Louis Vuitton Men’s Fall-Winter 2024 Collection presentation in Paris.
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“We just believe so much in timing and in everything happening when it’s supposed to,” Cyrus said in a recent interview with Apple Music 1’s Zane Lowe. “Around the Grammys, Pharrell and I were talking about putting the song out, and it just felt like it was so serendipitous, and there were so many alignments and so many moments that made me know that now was the perfect time.”
“And then sometimes things in our past make more sense in our present than they ever did then,” she continued. “And so this song, I think the nature, the celebration, the feeling, especially with the video, the joy, the dancing, the letting go, it’s what this song really always needed. I don’t think I could have delivered that at that time [in 2013] … It completely embodies my spirit and my essence at this exact moment.”
“Doctor (Work It Out)” follows the same thread of unrepentant desire as the duo’s past hit “Come Get It Bae,” with a little more disco swagger and medical double entendres in the mix; the song could evaporate tomorrow or become a durable hit, but either way, Cyrus sounds like she’s having a great time with it.
Trailing behind “Doctor (Work It Out)” on the poll is Cardi B’s “Like What (Freestyle),” which brought in 13% of the vote.
See the final results of this week’s new music release poll below.
TWICE achieves its first No. 1 album on the Billboard 200 chart as With YOU-th debuts atop the tally (dated March 9) with 95,000 equivalent album units earned in the U.S. in the week ending Feb. 29, according to Luminate, largely from traditional album sales. It’s the fifth top 10 for the Korean pop ensemble in total, all earned consecutively.
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With YOU-th is the first No. 1 on the Billboard 200 by an all-female group since BLACKPINK’s Born Pink opened at No. 1 in 2022, and only the third since 2008, when Danity Kane’s Welcome to the Dollhouse debuted atop the list.
Also in the top 10 of the new Billboard 200, fellow all-female Korean pop group LE SSERAFIM debuts at No. 8 with Easy, marking the act’s second top 10-charting effort.
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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 March 9-dated chart will be posted in full on Billboard‘s website on March 5. For all chart news, follow @billboard and @billboardcharts on both X, formerly known as Twitter, and Instagram.
Of With YOU-th’s 95,000 units earned in the tracking week ending Feb. 29, album sales comprise 90,000 (it’s the top-selling album of the week, as it debuts at No. 1 on Top Album Sales; it’s also the largest sales week for an album in 2024), SEA units comprise 4,500 (equaling 6.33 million official on-demand streams of the set’s six songs) and TEA units comprise 500. Sales of With YOU-th were bolstered by its availability across 14 CD variants (including exclusives for Barnes & Noble, Target, Walmart and the act’s webstore, all with branded paper merchandise inside the packages as well as some randomized elements) and three vinyl variants (all picture discs, including one Target-exclusive version).
As With YOU-th is mostly in the Korean language, it is the 24th mostly non-English language album to hit No. 1, and the first of 2024.
Morgan Wallen’s chart-topping One Thing at a Time climbs 3-2 with 67,000 equivalent album units earned (up 5%), while Ye (formerly known as Kanye West) and Ty Dolla $ign’s Vultures 1 falls 1-3 in its third week with 64,000 (down 14%). Noah Kahan’s Stick Season is a non-mover at No. 4 with 57,000 units (down 4%), SZA’s former leader SOS is also stationary, at No. 5, with 47,000 (up 1%), Drake’s chart-topping For All the Dogs rises 8-6 with 43,000 (up 1%), and Taylor Swift’s former No. 1 1989 (Taylor’s Version) dips 6-7 with 41,000 (down 7%).
LE SSERAFIM’s Easy starts at No. 8 with 41,000 equivalent album units earned, marking the second top 10-charting effort for the pop group. The act previously hit the top 10 with last year’s Unforgiven, debuting and peaking at No. 6. Of Easy’s 41,000 first-week units, album sales comprise 34,000, SEA units comprise 7,000 (equaling 9.86 million official on-demand streams of the set’s five songs) and TEA units equal a negligible sum. Sales of Easy were aided by its availability across 14 CD variants (including exclusives for Barnes & Noble, Target and Walmart, all with branded paper merch inside their packages, including some randomized).
Rounding out the top 10 of the new Billboard 200 are a pair of chart-topping sets: Taylor Swift’s Lover falls 7-9 with 40,000 equivalent album units (down 8%) and 21 Savage‘s American Dream is steady at No. 10 with 38,000 units (up 1%).
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.
Taylor Swift announced the fourth and final variant of her upcoming album, The Tortured Poets Department, during her second Eras Tour concert in Singapore on Sunday (March 3). Explore Explore See latest videos, charts and news See latest videos, charts and news The reveal arrived during the surprise songs portion of the pop superstar’s set, […]
Rihanna made her return to the stage at a pre-wedding gig for Anant Ambani and Radhika Merchant in Jamnagar, India, on Friday (March 1).
The singer and Fenty mogul performed at a lavish party that was part of a multi-day celebration for the soon-to-be newlyweds, who will officially tie the knot July 12 in Mumbai. The nearly 1,200-person guest list included Rihanna as well as Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg, Sunder Picha, Ivanka Trump and Bollywood celebrity Shah Rukh Khan, the AP reports.
Ambani is the son of multi-billionaire Mukesh Ambani, the chairman and managing director of Reliance Industries, and Nita Ambani, founder of the Reliance Foundation. Merchant is the daughter of Viren Merchant, CEO of Encore Healthcare Pvt. Ltd., and entrepreneur Shaila Merchant.
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“The show was the best,” Rihanna was seen saying on camera post-concert, while being approached by paparazzi. “I haven’t done a real show in eight years.”
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Although Rihanna performed for the Super Bowl halftime show and at the Oscars last year, she hasn’t put on a full concert since her Anti World Tour in 2016. There were reportedly 19 songs on Friday night’s set list.
The Ambani dynasty is well-known for extravagant wedding festivities. When Mukesh’s daughter Isha got married in 2018, Beyoncé performed at the ceremony, and when the business titan’s oldest son Akash tied the knot in 2019, Coldplay’s Chris Martin and the Chainsmokers were hired.
See clips of Rihanna in India below, including videos of her performing “Bitch Better Have My Money,” “Work,” “Umbrella,” “Stay,” “All of the Lights,” “We Found Love,” “Diamonds” and more.
“A message from the department” was livestreamed by Taylor Swift from Singapore. With no explanation, a mashup of “I Don’t Wanna Live Forever” and “Dress” — both originally released during the pop star’s Reputation era — could be viewed directly from Swift’s official Instagram account by fans around the world on Saturday (March 2).
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The stream went live during the surprise song set, or as Swift called it, the “crazy acoustic section,” of the first of six Eras Tour dates in Singapore — the portion of the concert where he plays a couple surprise songs (or, lately, mashups). She will go on to perform at the Singapore National Stadium on March 3, 4, 7, 8 and 9.
As the stream happened, Swifties noticed that the official Taylor Swift webstore was blacked out. Visitors could not access the store, which was closed for a period of time, without a site admin’s password, leaving fans wondering whether something new was about about to launch for sale. At press time, her webstore is up and running, with no new products.
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The “a message from the department” message that popped up along with the livestream is a reference to Swift’s upcoming album, The Tortured Poets Department, coming on April 19. The message was ended with a black heart.
Swift has already announced three variants of the album, each featuring a different bonus track: “The Manuscript,” “The Bolter” and “The Albatross.” She revealed “The Bolter” and “The Albatross” editions at previous tour dates in Melbourne and Sydney, Australia. Fans guessed another announcement might have been made at the first Singapore concert of the tour — maybe a fourth bonus song — but no announcement was made.
And given her choice of songs to perform and livestream (and the fact that only this mashup was streamed, not her full acoustic set), Swifties theorized that the Easter egg-loving musician might have been giving some Reputation-related signs from Singapore.
“I Don’t Wanna Live Forever” is Swift’s duet with Zayn Malik that was first released in December 2016 and included on the Fifty Shades Darker soundtrack when it dropped in February 2017.
“Dress” is track No. 12 on Swift’s sixth studio album, Reputation, released in November 2017.
So far Swift has released the “Taylor’s Version” of all of the albums she’s expected to re-record except for Reputation and her debut, self-titled album. No release date has been announced for either re-recording yet.
Just before the “I Don’t Wanna Live Forever”/”Dress” mashup in Singapore, Swift performed a mashup of Speak Now opener “Mine” and Red track “Starlight” on guitar that was not livestreamed on her official account, but captured by others at the stadium. Watch both mashups in the clips below.
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Patrick Regan is opening up about the friendship he’s developed with Taylor Swift in the process of making sure Travis Kelce’s hair never goes out of style. In a recent appearance on The Tease podcast, the hairstylist — who’s been buzzing the Kansas City Chiefs tight end’s hair for six years — gushed that “Taylor […]
Whether it’s albums or baked goods, everyone loves Taylor’s Version. Days after Andy Reid revealed that Taylor Swift baked homemade Pop-Tarts for Travis Kelce and the rest of the Kansas City Chiefs offensive line, the official toaster-treat brand has called on the singer to share her recipe — and it’s going to great lengths to […]