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Harry Styles took to social media on Thursday (Dec. 15) to reflect on everything he’s accomplished in the last calendar year.
“2022 changed my life,” the pop star wrote alongside a black-and-white snap of himself lounging on an empty stadium stage during his global Love on Tour trek. “I can’t begin to thank all of you who supported me through it, I’ll never forget it. I hope your end of year is filled with happiness and calm. Love you all. See you next year. H.”
Indeed, the former One Direction-er has had quite the year, from his aforementioned tour across North America, Europe and South America — including a historic 15-date takeover of New York City’s Madison Square Garden to the release of his third solo album Harry’s House.
“As It Was,” that studio set’s lead single also snowballed into one of the biggest pop behemoths of the year, spending 15 non-consecutive weeks at No. 1 on the Hot 100 and setting a new record for most weeks at the top by a song with only one credited artist. Additionally, the soft rock bop surpassed The Kid LAROI and Justin Bieber’s “Stay” as the titleholder for most weeks at both No. 2 (25 weeks) and No. 3 (23 weeks) in the history of the chart.
Styles also made the pivot to movie stardom this year, playing the leading man in not one, but two major motion pictures: (now-ex-)girlfriend Olivia Wilde’s Don’t Worry Darling opposite Florence Pugh and LGBTQ+ historical drama My Policeman. And all of that on top of headlining Coachella, scoring six more Grammy nominations, helping register tens of thousands of new voters for November’s midterm elections and more.
Check out Styles’ sign-off to 2022 below.
For this year’s update of our ongoing Greatest Pop Star by Year project, Billboard is counting down our staff picks for the top 10 pop stars of 2022 all this week. At No. 3, we remember the year in Taylor Swift — who got started a little late in the calendar, but certainly didn’t need long to make up for lost time.
After back-to-back years of releasing two full-length projects, Taylor Swift began 2022 on a relatively low-key note – well, as low-key as things can ever be for a global superstar still at the peak of her powers, at least.
There was the out-of-nowhere feud with the frontman of Blur and Gorillaz (yes, Damon, she really writes her own music), the first of two college courses announced in her honor (one at NYU, the next at Texas), a nostalgic reunion with one of her musical besties (Ed Sheeran’s “The Joker & The Queen” remix) – and let’s not forget the Virginia Tech scientists who cemented their Swiftie status in April by naming a new species of millipede “Nannaria Swiftae.” In May, the singer/songwriter emerged to make her biggest public appearance of the year so far to give the NYU commencement address, urging the Class of 2022 to hold on to their enthusiasm, coolness be damned. “Never be ashamed of trying,” she said in the 20-minute pep talk. “Effortlessness is a myth.”
Billboard’s Greatest Pop Stars of 2022:Introduction & Honorable Mentions | Rookie of the Year: Steve Lacy | Comeback of the Year: Sam Smith | No. 10: Nicki Minaj | No. 9: Future | No. 8: Jack Harlow | No. 7: Doja Cat | No. 6: Lizzo | No. 5: Drake | No. 4: Beyoncé
Things started to pick up in the Swift cycle in the late spring/early summer, when the pop auteur continued to make strides in the film and TV worlds, including three new soundtrack moments: “This Love (Taylor’s Version)” was re-recorded for Netflix’s teen drama series The Summer I Turned Pretty, the woodsy “Carolina” was written specifically for the book-to-big-screen adaptation of Where the Crawdads Sing, and “Bad Blood (Taylor’s Version)” was brought out of the kennel for DC League of Super-Pets. She also kicked off a still-ongoing film-festival circuit, promoting her self-directed All Too Well: The Short Film at June’s Tribeca Film Festival.
So now that we’ve reviewed the first eight months of our reigning 2021 Greatest Pop Star, forget everything you just learned about Taylor’s 2022 — because the Swift Calendar Year didn’t truly begin until Aug. 28. That’s when she hit the MTV Video Music Awards – a stage where she’s made more than a few headlines over her 16-year career – to not only collect the evening’s highest honor, but also to announce that she had a brand-new album called Midnights coming in October. All year, fans had been speculating about which of her Big Machine releases she’d re-record next (all signs pointed to either 2010’s Speak Now or 2014’s 1989 as the likely contenders), never stopping to think that they might get a whole new album instead.
Thus began Swift’s master class in modern-day album promotion, during which she set out to hit every corner of the music-buying public. There were the TikTok song-title reveals that kicked off on Sept. 21; then Midnights lyrics popped up on billboards from New York to London to Sao Paolo, Brazil, starting Oct. 17; and on Oct. 18, she began unveiling five things “that kept me up at night and helped inspire the Midnights album” via Spotify, also in daily doses. But if you’re not on TikTok or Spotify and missed the global billboards, do you watch football? Because Swift’s final pre-release push was an album teaser that premiered during Thursday Night Football, hours ahead of the album’s arrival.
With all of these teasers and previews, there was one thing that wasn’t revealed ahead of midnight on Oct 21: any music. Despite almost two months of lead time, no lead singles or music videos were released — which only bolstered the intrigue surrounding the album. Would it be stripped-down and understated like her most recent original albums, 2020’s folklore and evermore? Would it channel the adrenaline-rush pop of the trio of projects before that, 2019’s Lover, 2017’s reputation and 2014’s 1989? Or would Swift be newly inspired by revisiting the young country songwriter behind 2008’s Fearless and 2012’s Red for her pair of 2021 re-recordings?
The answer was really all of the above. You could recognize bits and pieces from all of Swift’s eras throughout the project, with songs that are alternately dreamy (“Snow on the Beach” with Lana del Rey, “Sweet Nothing” written with boyfriend Joe Alwyn), dancey (the shiny “Anti-Hero” and “Bejeweled”), and razor-sharp (“Vigilante Shit”). A lot of the familiarity could be attributed to the omnipresence of Jack Antonoff, who’d worked with Swift since 1989 and was the lone co-producer credited on the 13 songs. In the headline for its review, The New York Times said Swift was “caught between yesterday and tomorrow” on the album, but it feels more apt to look at Midnights like a massive snowball that has all of Taylor’s previous albums rolled up inside it, while still glistening and new on the outside.
And to keep that snowball rolling, only three hours after the standard album’s release, Swift surprised fans with the expanded 20-song 3am Edition, this time teaming up with her other go-to producer, Aaron Dessner, for six of the seven songs. Fans who had already had time to listen to the 44-minute original at least four times since midnight were thrilled to have even more lyrics to decode and soundscapes to live in – including the buzziest bonus track “Would’ve, Could’ve, Should’ve,” which fans speculated was about her brief relationship with John Mayer and their 13-year age gap. Five hours after that, Swifties had yet another new release to devour: The “Anti-Hero” video – the first of many Midnights Music Movies promised in the Thursday Night Football teaser – dropped at 8 a.m. ET on Oct. 21 and features the pop star attending her own funeral, with Mike Birbiglia, John Early and Mary Elizabeth Ellis playing her adult children. That wasn’t the only release-week music video either: On Oct. 24, the appropriately blingy clip for “Bejeweled” arrived, co-starring Laura Dern and Haim as the wicked stepmother and stepsisters in Swift’s very own Cinderella story.
While all of this is a lot, even by Swift’s overachieving standards, the full-court press paid off in spades when Midnights scored the largest week for any album since Adele’s 25 in 2015, moving 1.578 million equivalent album units in its debut frame, and the biggest sales week since Taylor’s own reputation in 2017, with 1.14 million in traditional album sales. The blockbuster easily conquered the Billboard 200, and over on the Billboard Hot 100, Swift became the first artist in history to hold all top 10 slots, led by the chart-topping “Anti-Hero”; in addition, all 20 songs from the project hit the tally.
In the month-plus since Midnights’ release, Swift has continued to fend off some pretty fierce competition on the chart, with the catchphrase-spawning “Anti-Hero” besting new music from both Rihanna and Drake to hold strong at No. 1 on the Hot 100 for six weeks – only falling to Mariah Carey’s perennial Christmas chart-topper this week. In the early frames, she got a sales boost from a series of “Anti-Hero” remixes, including one featuring Antonoff’s band Bleachers. (Drake seemingly took notice of his Republic labelmate’s aggressive strategy, covering up Swift’s No. 1 slot with emojis when he re-posted the Hot 100 top 10 the week that Her Loss, his joint album with 21 Savage, hit the chart.)
While this year has been another monumental one for Swift, 2023 is shaping up to be even more massive, with the Nov. 1 announcement of the Eras Tour, her first proper trek in nearly five years, which is setting out to encapsulate all the material she’s released in the past decade and a half. The overwhelming demand to be at one of Taylor’s 52 shows just about broke Ticketmaster (in both the immediate and long-term senses), which is currently being sued by disgruntled Swifties locked out of the ticket-buying process and was even taken to task by Swift herself. “It’s truly amazing that 2.4 million people got tickets, but it really pisses me off that a lot of them feel like they went through several bear attacks to get them,” she said in an Instagram statement on Nov. 18. Following her crusades to get better pay for artists from Apple Music and grant ownership of master recordings to musicians, perhaps reforming Ticketmaster can be Swift’s next pet project.
In addition to her tour and whatever Taylor’s Versions that may await her, Swift has several major awards shows to attend next year too. After being the top winner at the 2022 American Music Awards, MTV EMAs and People’s Choice Awards – and being named songwriter-artist of the decade at the Nashville Songwriter Awards – Swift has a shot at winning her first Golden Globe in January (original song for “Carolina”) and could nab four more Grammys in February to add to her 11, including one Big Four possibility: song of the year for “All Too Well (10 Minute Version) (The Short Film).” Then there’s her new side hustle as a filmmaker: After getting a taste of directing with her music videos and All Too Well (The Short Film), Swift is set to make her directorial debut with an unnamed Searchlight Pictures production for which she wrote the original script.
Given Swift’s staggering accomplishments in 2022, it might be hard to believe that she doesn’t repeat as Billboard’s Greatest Pop Star this year — but the wildest part is just how much of her year was piled into these past few months. Looking at what’s on the horizon, it looks like she’s ready to snatch the crown right back in 2023. Remember what she told those college kids: “Never be ashamed of trying.”
Vernon is the next member of SEVENTEEN who’s gearing up to go solo. On Thursday (Dec. 15), the rapper announced that he will be releasing a debut solo mixtape titled Black Eye, making him the third of the 13-member group to drop a solo project.
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The news was shared to SEVENTEEN’s social media accounts along with the official cover art, which is a faux poster that features the title of the project written in bold red graffiti lettering and a photo of Vernon standing atop a smoking monster truck. Flames and stark lighting also decorate the poster, as well an order to “turn up the radio!” for the project’s release date — Dec. 23.
Vernon’s solo mixtape comes after the release of Hoshi’s Spider mixtape, which arrived in April 2021, and Woozi’s Ruby mixtape, released in January.
Vernon’s most recent release was his February collaboration with Charli XCX for the remix of the pop star’s single “Beg for You” featuring Rina Sawayama.
The remixed version of the song, which included production from producer A.G. Cook, features the K-pop idol thinking hard about a future with his lover. “All the endless conversations about us been going on in our head/ In the night, we dream a future together and I feel bad in your bed/ I beg for you, please stay, I can’t go a day without/ No, I can’t go a day without you,” Vernon sang on his verse.
See the announcement and art for Vernon’s mixtape below.
Nick Jonas called into The Late Late Show with James Corden on Wednesday night (Dec. 14) to surprise Haley Lu Richardson during her interview.
The White Lotus star admitted in her chat with James Corden that she grew up as a Jonas Brothers superfan, and naturally, the host even whipped out a photo of Richardson posing with the boy band as a giddy, brace-faced teen. “Honestly, in therapy I will bring up this picture of myself…Like this is the picture I talk to of my inner child,” she said. “But yeah, she was in love with the Jonas Brothers, she waited for probably three or four hours in line at a meet and greet line with her mother to meet Nick and Joe and Kevin.
Richardson also shared that Nick was her favorite of the three brothers, and she even tried to give him a handmade tie during the photo-op, but said that all gifts were taken away by security. “I think he’s got the tie, I’m almost certain he wore it on his wedding day,” Corden joked.
After a commercial break, the host pulled off the big surprise, pulling his phone out of his desk to reveal the youngest JoBro member on the line via FaceTime. Letting loose a stream of expletives, Richardson could hardly look at the camera at first, falling over herself and even asking, “Is this a pre-recorded video?”
“No, I promise you…I just finished White Lotus last night, you were fantastic,” Nick responded, leading Richardson to practically burst into tears. Finally, Corden brought up the missing tie, which the actress insisted was from “like fifteen years ago,” but Nick happily went along with the story, confirming, “Yes, I still have the tie. Of course! I may or may not have the time. But it’s great to meet you again.”
Richardson then let her inner child fully out, telling the pop star, “You’re a huge part of my childhood and, therefore, life forever. All of my Converse, as I said earlier, in grade school and middle school have your name on them. And I’m so proud of you, and going to your guys’ concerts now, like, recently as adults, I feel so proud of the three of you. And I’m so happy for your lives and your creative endeavors and your families. And I love you.”
“That means the world. This is such a lovely surprise,” Jonas replied. “And next time you want to come to a show, bring another tie and I will make sure it gets to me.”
Watch Jonas’ sweet surprise for Richardson below.
‘Tis the season to spread a little joy and love and nobody knows that better than Christmas queen Mariah Carey. A few days after making a South American fan’s dreams come true by bumping her up to the front row of her Madison Square Garden “Merry Christmas to All” show, MC did it again on Wednesday (Dec. 14) when she heaped praise on a young singer’s enthusiastic performance of “All I Want For Christmas Is You.”
It all started when proud mom Jen White-Johnson posted a video on Tuesday of her fourth grade son Knox singing Mariah’s perennial December No. 1 hit with his school choir at a school holiday concert with the inspiring message: “Timeline cleanse if you need one! Knox tonight at his 4th grade school winter concert singing @MariahCarey ‘All I Want For Christmas Is You’ #AutisticJoy on full display! My kid is everything! I hope Mariah sees this!!”
In the clip, Knox, wearing a seasonal-appropriate red sweater, can be seen happily singing along with his peers before taking a killer solo that drew howls of delight from the audience. Mariah saw it and responded with a joyful message of her own.
“Your kid IS everything!!!!!! Knox, you made my day,” she tweeted. “Your JOY gives me and everyone watching JOY. THANK YOU for reminding me why I wake up in the morning and do what I do. I love you.” White-Johnson, whose Twitter bio describes her as an “Neurodivergent Mama” and “ADHD artist + educator for disability culture + justice,” was, of course, overjoyed by the note from Carey.
“So this just happened. @MariahCarey just said Knox’s name,” she responded after Carey’s post. “We thank you Mariah for giving us the best Christmas ever. We appreciate you showing us your amazing love and light this holiday season and for amplifying Knox’s #AutisticJoy#BlackBoyJoy This made our world!”
Billboard caught up with White-Johnson on Thursday morning (Dec. 15) and she revealed that Carey did more than just let Knox know he was seen and loved. “Mariah sent me a DM saying she knows it might be a bit too late for a fourth grader, but she would be happy if we would join her on Friday (Dec. 17) for front row seats [at her second MSG holiday concert],” White-Johnson says, adding that the singer also acknowledged that it might be a bit loud for Knox, but that the invite was open if they could make it.
“The fact that she was so caring in paying attention to the fact that he’s autistic and that he would need accommodations? It’s last minute for us and we probably can’t make it, but I love the fact that she invited us,” White-Johnson says. “She’s really taking her role as the queen of Christmas very seriously and that’s what this is about. I feel like because she’s a mother she understand the joy kids are innately going to give the world with all this negativity around us.”
White-Johnson,42, says it was a “full-circle” moment for her, since she grew up listening to Carey’s music and sang her songs in talent shows in high school. As for how Knox reacted to the shout-out from the pop superstar, she says he was super excited and definitely zeroed in on the part of the tweet where Mariah said she loved him. “He was looking at the screen and out of everything that she said, that stuck out,” she says.
“‘She loves me? She loves me? And she doesn’t even know me!’,” she says Knox responded, adding that she told her son that his joy is infectious and that “she loves everyone. I believe she’s waiting and hoping for these little moments and gems to drop and her Christmas spell is working. Her fairy dust is happening. The spirit she’s illumination is working in the world.”
Check out the heart-warming exchange below.
Your kid IS everything!!!!!! Knox, you made my day. Your JOY gives me and everyone watching JOY. THANK YOU for reminding me why I wake up in the morning and do what I do. I love you ❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️ https://t.co/iW19QQxBOP— Mariah Carey (@MariahCarey) December 14, 2022
Taylor Swift has been dating Joe Alwyn since 2016, and while they’ve been together for six years, the couple has remained private about everything surrounding their relationship.
While the couple’s relationship is strictly off-limits when it comes to the press, Swift and Alwyn have briefly mentioned each other in interviews throughout the years, showing the respect and love they still have for each other after all this time.
They’ve even written songs together. Alwyn contributed to both 2020’s Folklore and its sister album Evermore under his literary-leaning pen name — co-writing the Bon Iver duet “Exile” and producing six other songs on the former, as well as penning “Champagne Problems,” The National-assisted “Coney Island” and second Justin Vernon collab “Evermore” on the latter.
In fact, thanks to his songwriting credit on Folklore, the actor even took home his own Grammy after Swift’s surprise pandemic studio set won album of the year at the 2021 Grammy Awards. These days, Alwyn is focused on his primary occupation onscreen while Swift remains in the process of re-recording her back catalog of albums.
In honor of Taylor Swift and Joe Alwyn’s super-private, but super-loving relationship, we’ve compiled all the times the longtime couple has talked about each other in the press, documentaries and beyond — from Swift admitting to fans that “Gorgeous” is about her boyfriend and confirming that he is, in fact, Folklore co-writer William Bowery to Alwyn sharing how he feels about love songs dedicated to him.
See our full list, in chronological order, below.
Talk about a merry Little (Mix) Christmas! On Tuesday (Dec. 13), the three members of Little Mix got together to celebrate the holidays and showed their fans the reunion on social media.
“Reunited for a Christmas catch up and it feels so good,” the trio captioned the snap of themselves smiling and sandwiched together with their arms around one another. In the photo, Leigh-Anne Pinnock wears a cozy all-brown ensemble while Perrie Edwards opts for an oversized blazer in army green. Jade Thirlwall, meanwhile, gives a peek at the Egyptian tattoo on her ribcage in a crocheted white crop top and camo pants.
After announcing they’d be going on a hiatus last December, the British girl group spent the first part of 2022 on The Confetti Tour across the U.K. and Ireland in support of their sixth album of the same name. Since then, Thirlwall has inked a deal with RCA Records to launch her solo career and hopped into the studio with TWICE’s Nayeon to write album cut “Candyfloss” off the K-pop idol’s debut solo mini-album IM NAYEON.
Edwards got engaged to fiancé Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain in June, just months before the pair’s Cheshire County home was burglarized while they were home with their 1-year-old son Axel. (The intruders reportedly made off with designer bags and jewelry while the family was downstairs.)
Meanwhile, former member Jesy Nelson has yet to release a follow-up to her 2021 solo single “Boyz” featuring Nicki Minaj after exiting the girl group back in December 2020.
Get a look at Little Mix’s cozy Christmas catch-up below.
Just a few days after Georgia Holt died at 96 on Dec. 10, Cher is giving more information on her mother’s death.
After noting that she “can’t sleep very well,” on Twitter on Tuesday (Dec. 13), the “Believe” singer explained that Holt has “been Sick & rallying, she then got bad, She was in so much pain.”
Cher continued, “Finally she coded on way to [the hospital]. By time we Got to Hosp….The Woman who Who Was MY KICK A– MOM was No [longer] Here.” The 76-year-old singer did not reveal any additional details surrounding Holt’s illness.
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The truth…. She’s beenSick,&rallying,she then got bad,She was in so much pain. Finally she coded on way to Hosp. By time we Got to Hosp….The Woman who Who Was MY KICK ASS MOM was No long Here— Cher (@cher) December 13, 2022
Cher also encouraged fans to listen to Holt’s song, “I’m Just Your Yesterday,” which features the late star’s iconic daughter. “You’ll see where I stole my voice,” Cher wrote.
Look for Cher & mom sing “I’m just your yesterday. You’ll see where I stole my voice.— Cher (@cher) December 13, 2022
Throughout her life, appeared in such films as A Life of Her Own (1950), Grounds for Marriage (1951), Father’s Little Dividend (1951) and Artists and Models (1955) and on TV shows like The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet and, as a “Jacques Marcel” model, on I Love Lucy (in the hilarious 1956 episode “Lucy Gets a Paris Gown”).
In the music world, she was offered a contract by Columbia Records, and in 1980 recorded an album, Honky Tonk Woman, which features “I’m Just Your Yesterday.” The album wasn’t officially released until 2013, after the master tapes were rediscovered in Holt’s garage.
“I know that a record company might want to sign me just because I’m Cher’s mother,” she told People magazine in 1978. “I’d like to have a career, but I’m not going to be a novelty or a flash in the pan. A lot of people say I can do it.”
For this year’s update of our ongoing Greatest Pop Star by Year project, Billboard is counting down our staff picks for the top 10 pop stars of 2022 all this week. At No. 5, we remember the year in Drake — who dominated headlines and made even more chart history with two very different new albums.
A warm embrace between Kanye West (now Ye) and Drake – two hip-hop titans who had been swapping diss verses and petty social media exchanges for months up until music executive J. Prince mediated a truce – cut through the brisk December night during last year’s sold-out “Free Larry Hoover” benefit concert at the Los Angeles Coliseum. While Ye ran through his greatest hits catalog, Drake completed his victory lap with Certified Lover Boy, his 10th Billboard 200-topping album (though one met with middling reviews), with its first-ever live performance. The concert, and reconciliation, wasn’t just monumental for either rapper or even the millions of fans who witnessed it in person or via livestream; it was monumental for hip-hop.
Billboard’s Greatest Pop Stars of 2022:Introduction & Honorable Mentions | Rookie of the Year: Steve Lacy | Comeback of the Year: Sam Smith | No. 10: Nicki Minaj | No. 9: Future | No. 8: Jack Harlow | No. 7: Doja Cat | No. 6: Lizzo
Going into 2022, the 6 God still couldn’t be knocked from his pedestal, and he couldn’t be blamed for mostly just cruising at his high altitude through the year’s first few months. Guest spots on Gunna’s “P power” in January, which arrived a week later than its parent album DS4Ever, and Jack Harlow’s “Churchill Downs” in May helped elevate both Southern rap princes, which comes with the territory of a Drizzy co-sign. But it was the Louisville-bred charmer who was matching Drake’s “flows and the hoes and the packed out shows,” and seemingly coming for his title of rap’s heartthrob. Yet even without the heart etched into his hairline, Drake was still the same old lovelorn Lothario – and it showed on his verse from Future’s “Wait For U,” also featuring Tems, which became Future’s biggest-ever hit as a lead artist and Drake’s 10th No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 in May.
By the year’s midway point, Drake eased off on the team efforts so he could focus on his own craft. On a random afternoon in the middle of June, Drake posted a shadowy graphic on Instagram with chrome, technicolor lettering that read “Honestly, Nevermind” – the title of his out-of-nowhere seventh studio album he was delivering the next day. Another surprise awaited its listeners once midnight rolled around: Drake had made a full-on dance album, alongside veteran house music producers like Black Coffee, Gordo (formerly known as DJ Carnage), Ry X and GOVI.
The set spurred mixed reactions from critics who weren’t convinced he pulled off house music, Drake purists who didn’t care for anything he did outside of rap, and those in between who found his stylistic departure refreshing. Regardless, Honestly, Nevermind became his 11th No. 1 album (though with an underwhelming-for-Drake 204,000 equivalent album units in its first week), and “Jimmy Cooks” with 21 Savage –- the only conventional rap song from the project -– became his 11th No. 1 Hot 100 hit (and record-extending seventh No. 1 debut), making him the first solo male artist to debut at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 and Billboard Hot 100 simultaneously twice, following his dual feat with CLB and “Way 2 Sexy” just the year before.
Statistically, Drake still proved he couldn’t miss – and that even if artistically his efforts weren’t to everyone’s taste, he still had his fingers on the pulse of what’s hot, given who followed suit just one month later. In July, Beyoncé ushered a proper dance Renaissance with her own studio effort, one that was more celebrated by critics for its due diligence to the genre – and one that surprisingly featured a writing credit from one Aubrey Drake Graham on the track “Heated.” The Queen’s triumphant return outperformed Drake’s Honestly, Nevermind as Renaissance launched atop the Billboard 200 with 332,000 units – but with Drizzy’s imprint on her album, and his own dance album’s release a month prior, he clearly knew to get ahead of the curve.
Yet considering Honestly, Nevermind’s relative commercial disappointment, it didn’t come as a surprise when Drake went back to what he knew best and reconnected with two of his favorite collaborators. DJ Khaled tapped him and Lil Baby for “Staying Alive,” the lead single from his then-forthcoming album God Did with a questionable, semi-catchy interpolation of the Bee Gees’ 1977 smash by the same name. With “Staying Alive” debuting at No. 5 on the Hot 100, Drake racked up yet another Billboard chart record: He now held the most top 5 hits (30) on the chart, beating The Beatles’ mark previously held for 55 years. And only he could make such an impressive feat sound totally ordinary by writing “Ok I broke my records for the month now” over a screenshot of his latest accomplishment on Instagram.
While Drake was effortlessly rewriting Billboard’s record books, he wasn’t having that same kind of historic run with his live performances. In July, he announced October World Weekend – a precursor to his OVO Fest that he promised to bring “around the world in 2023 to mark its 10th anniversary” – which featured a Young Money reunion with Nicki Minaj and Lil Wayne on the lineup. But the announcement of his COVID-19 diagnosis just hours before the YM trinity was set to take the stage postponed the concert by a week. And once the show did actually happen, it didn’t sustain the recovery he might’ve expected. He resumed the hype by announcing a solo SiriusXM concert at Harlem’s Apollo Theater in November, but Takeoff’s untimely shooting death on the first of the month dampened the mood and led to Drizzy pushing back the shows to the top of 2023.
But he came in strong during the fourth quarter of 2022 – taking a cue from the fact that “Jimmy Cooks” was the only real breakout hit from his Honestly, Nevermind set, and recording an entire album with his collaborator on that chart-topper, 21 Savage. The treacherous twosome embarked on the ultimate faux press run ahead of their collab project, Her Loss: a counterfeit Vogue cover that sparked a real-life lawsuit from Condé Nast; a Tiny Desk teaser NPR invited them to perform “forreal;” a deepfake interview on The Howard Stern Show; a Saturday Night Live performance of “On BS” that was, in fact, B.S.; and a COLORS performance that was too good to be true (because it wasn’t). Even though another COVID diagnosis (this time from his right-hand producer Noah “40” Shebib) hit Drizzy with another delay, he offset it with an explosive impact.
The release of Her Loss in early November was met with mixed reviews from critics and crowds, considering his controversial bars about Megan Thee Stallion and ex-girlfriend Serena Williams’ husband Alexis Ohanian – but regardless, Drake’s diehards were relieved to hear him rapping again following his dance album detour. Her Loss ended up becoming Drake’s gain, earning him his 12th No. 1 album (and 21 Savage’s 3rd) with the year’s biggest week for an R&B/hip-hop set and the fourth-largest streaming week ever for any album, with 513.56 million total on-demand official streams in its debut week. Despite Taylor Swift maintaining her Hot 100 reign with “Anti-Hero” – much to Drake’s emoji-filled dismay – he still controlled eight spots out of the top 10, making him the only artist to have logged at least eight songs in the Hot 100’s top 10 twice, following his nine-spot takeover in September 2021 during CLB’s debut chart week.
Drake ended 2022 by consistently putting numbers up on the board and persisting as the most statistically untouchable rapper, proving that even his not-so-massive year is still bigger than nearly anyone else’s. He extended his reign on Billboard’s year-end Top R&B/Hip-Hop Artist chart for a seventh year (in large part due to CLB’s staying power), and even earned a new title when he also topped Billboard’s year-end Top Dance/Electronic Artist chart, thanks to the surprising-yet-not-surprising success of Honestly, Nevermind.
And even if he remained adamant in maintaining his grudge against the Recording Academy by not submitting any of his own music, his high-profile assists ensured he was still accounted for — as his verses on “Wait For U” and “Churchill Downs” earned him two Grammy nominations for best rap song, with the former also receiving a nod for best melodic rap performance, and his writing on Bey’s Renaissance secured him an album of the year nod. Even when you think he misses, The Boy still scores.
The days are shorter, the nights are colder and the trees are bare. Inside, fireplaces are crackling to shield loved ones from the chilly air. When winter makes its way back around, sunny days can sometimes feel like distant, made-up memories.
While the gloom can lead to long hours inside as you avoid muddy snow and frostbitten fingers, those languid evenings can transform into quite the cozy affair, given the right soundtrack. That’s why Billboard has put together a list of 26 essential tracks for your wintertime listening pleasure.
We know December marks the beginning of celebrations for “the most wonderful time of the year.” But a good winter playlist goes beyond Christmas trees and jingling bells. The mix should be one you’d listen to all season long — weeks and months after unwrapping your final gift. So no, you won’t find Mariah Carey’s “All I Want For Christmas Is You” nor any of your holiday favorites below (for that, you can check out Billboard’s Greatest of All Time Holiday 100 list based on our charts).
Keep reading to discover tunes consistent with the mood shift that — for many of us — rolls in with the cold front. The increased time spent with our own thoughts brings on a brooding self-reflection that can feel as comforting as it can feel overwhelming. Artists from Taylor Swift to Bob Dylan to The Weeknd have captured that feeling, crafting riveting wintery melodies ideal for introspection, whether you’re curled up with your favorite blanket or venturing out into the snow.
