State Champ Radio Pop
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After praising Taylor Swift earlier this week, Azealia Banks is now sharing which other superstar the “Fortnight” singer reminds her of: Cher. On X Thursday (Jan. 30), the “212” rapper retweeted a post about Swift welcoming Mary J. Blige on the 1989 World Tour and remarked, “Taylor reminds me a lot of Cher.” Blige recently […]
Charli XCX is riding the Brat wave all the way to this year’s Grammys, where she’s nominated for seven awards — and she’s fully aware that she owes it all to the album that made her a household name. In a W Magazine cover story published Thursday (Jan. 30), the pop star reflected on picking […]
On February 8, 2015, nearly everyone in attendance at the Staples Center in Los Angeles expected the top prize at the 57th Annual Grammy Awards to go to Beyoncé. The pop and R&B superstar had changed the game 14 months earlier with the surprise drop of her self-titled album, topping the Billboard 200, drawing unanimous raves and dominating the culture for the entire year to follow. But when it came time for Prince to announce the winner for album of the year that night, a different solo “B” name was called – confusing many in the crowd and watching at home, infuriating one easily excited fellow superstar, and setting into motion many of the narratives that continue to define the Grammys a decade later.
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This week, on the Greatest Pop Stars podcast, we debut our Great Moments in Pop History series, looking at some of the pivotal moments throughout the decades that have come to define our perception of pop music, pop culture and pop stardom. On the precipice of the upcoming Grammys – airing this Sunday (Feb. 2), with one of the most loaded nominee classes in recent memory – we flash back to 10 years earlier, when one of 2025’s preeminent nominees (and the biggest overall winner in Grammy history) lost an album of the year race she was the heavy favorite to win, with Beck’s acclaimed-but-less-impactful Morning Phase instead taking home top honors. It’s a snub the Recording Academy still has not yet made good on, with Beyoncé being nominated and losing in the category twice in the years since.
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Host Andrew Unterberger is joined by Billboard executive digital director (and Pop Shop Podcast co-host) Katie Atkinson – who was in the building that memorable night – to recall everything there is to recall about the 2015 Grammys. We start with everything else of note that happened during those Grammys – like Sam Smith’s early-career-peak night of dominance, the cavalcade of pop megastars performing (but somehow playing zero of their signature hits) and an A-plus-list trio of legends united for one time only. We also run through some of our favorite less-starry performances of the night, including Hozier with a towering Annie Lennox, and Sia with both a wig and Kristen Wiig.
And then, we dig into the nitty gritty of Beck beating Beyoncé – and Kanye nearly crashing the stage in protest – and the impact it all ended up having on the Grammys’ next decade. We remember the double-shock of Beck’s longshot victory combined with Kanye’s oh-no-not-again fakeout, and give context for how bizarre it was (and remains) that Beck, of all people, became the face of Grammy-approved establishment rock. Then, of course, we set our sights on the 2025 awards – where Beyoncé is once again an album of the year nominee, for 2024’s Cowboy Carter – and ask: Is it finally time for the Queen to take home the crown? (And if she finally does this year, will it actually be… kinda weird?)
Check it out above — along with a YouTube playlist of some of the most memorable moments from the 2015 awards — and subscribe to the Greatest Pop Stars podcast on Apple Music or Spotify (or wherever you get your podcasts) for weekly discussions every Thursday about all things related to pop stardom!
Former One Direction band mates Louis Tomlinson and Zayn Malik had an unexpected reunion, sort of, during Zayn’s Stairway to the Sky show at Los Angeles’ Shrine Expo Hall on Wednesday night (Jan. 29). In video of the sweet moment caught posted by Pop Crave, Malik told the crowd, “tonight is kind of special. An […]
Katy Perry can’t wait to hit the road this year with the whole family for her Lifetimes tour. On Wednesday night (Jan. 29) she told Jimmy Kimmel that she and fiancé Orlando Bloom will be taking their four-year-old daughter Daisy with them on her 75-date world tour, which kicks off in Mexico City on April 23.
“Now I have a four-year-old little girl and we’re going around the world and it’s going to be very different,” Perry said of her first global outing since 2017. One of the biggest changes is that instead of taking the stage around 9 or 9:30 p.m., Perry plans to take all her fellow mothers and fathers into consideration by kicking things off closer to 8:30 because she now understands that bedtime takes more than 90 minutes.
And while Daisy saw her mom perform during Perry’s Las Vegas residency, when Kimmel asked if the toddler will be singing and dancing along to Katy’s songs — or if she has a favorite — the singer admitted that her daughter’s top pick is not the one she’d prefer. “She knows a song that I don’t want her to know,” Perry said. “[It’s] called ‘Peacock.’ Again, this is my karma. I have obviously tortured people with this,” she added of the spicy track from her 2010 Teenage Dream album on which she subtly requests, “I wanna see your peacock, cock, cock/ Your peacock, cock/ Your peacock, cock, cock.”
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“I got her a peacock dress-up dress at the zoo and she just dances around and sings that song I’m just like, ‘NO!!’,” Perry said, covering her face.
The singer, dressed in a studded leather two-piece outfit, kicked the chat off with a bang after Kimmel said she seemed hyped up and “ready to go,” prompting Perry to confirm she was “ret ta go!” before busting into a the hand-jive portion of Chappell Roan’s “Hot To Go.”
“H-O-T-T,” she began, before the studio audience picked up the “G-O!” part to Perry’s delight. Kimmel then noted that the last time Perry was on his show she’d announced she was quitting American Idol after seven years to mount the Lifetimes tour. “I miss them so much though,” she said of her former desk mates, Lionel Richie and Luke Bryan. “Hi Luke, hi Lionel!,” she added, noting that both men still reach out to her by text and that they still talk.
“They probably started a new text chain with Carrie Underwood,” Kimmel teased about the Trump inauguration performer country star who will join the team when the 23rd season of the show kicks off on March 9 on ABC. “They probably have a new text chain, but I think it’s perfect,” Perry said.
Perry also talked about her first-ever concert, a Radiohead show at the Santa Barbara bowl when she was 13 — but looked 18. “They invited me backstage and my dad said, ‘hell no!’,” she recalled. Kimmel then cued up a clip of a show from way back where Perry did a daring stage dive, a bit she said she used to do all the time during her first road outing on the Warped Tour in 2008. “I really went for that one! I’ve never seen that clip!” she said.
The singer also plugged tonight’s (Jan. 30) Fire Aid concert to raise funds for the victims of the recent L.A. wildfires, where she’ll perform at the Intuit alongside Billie Eilish, Gracie Abrams, Lady Gaga, Olivia Rodrigo, Peso Pluma and many more.
Watch Perry on Jimmy Kimmel Live! below.
Kelly Clarkson and Billie Eilish are musical “Birds of a Feather.” On her latest Kellyoke installment, Clarkson performed Eilish’s standout Hit Me Hard and Soft track, “Birds of a Feather.” Dressed in a berry-toned jumpsuit, the American Idol winner started off slow in the verses before she effortlessly belted the chorus. “Birds of a feather, […]
Taylor Swift is Travis Kelce’s biggest fan. After Kelce and the Kansas City Chiefs claimed their victory over the Buffalo Bills to head to next month’s Super Bowl LIX on Feb. 9 in New Orleans, the tight end celebrated on the field after winning the AFC Championship alongside Swift and his mother, Donna Kelce. In […]
A star has been born at Madame Tussauds London, where a new Lady Gaga wax figure will be available for fans to see starting next month. The figure’s look is inspired by Gaga’s outfit at the 2022 Grammy Awards, paying homage to this year’s ceremony, where her Hot 100 chart-topping Bruno Mars collaboration, “Die With […]
Lady Gaga has some hard-earned wisdom to pass down to the younger pop stars who are following in her footsteps. In a new cover story interview with Elle published Tusday (Jan. 28), the 13-time Grammy winner gave her two cents on artists such as Chappell Roan, Sabrina Carpenter and Charli XCX rapidly reaching superstar status […]
Post Malone is headed to New Orleans. As announced Wednesday (Jan. 29), the superstar is set to perform at the official Super Bowl Tailgate hosted this year by YouTube, taking the stage in Louisiana just before the Kansas City Chiefs take on the Philadelphia Eagles Feb. 9. Set to take place at 4 p.m. ET […]
