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Camila Cabello took part in Capital FM’s “Finish the Lyric “game recently, where she was tasked to test her musical knowledge by completing the lyrics to songs presented to her. Amid songs by Taylor Swift, Tyla, Tate McRae and more, Cabello sang along to the viral second verse of Sabrina Carpenter’s “Espresso.”
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While she got some of the lines confused, fans began buzzing at the timing of Capital FM’s release of the clip. Sabrina Carpenter dropped her sixth studio album, Short n’ Sweet, last week, which led to a slew of unconfirmed theories that some of the songs are about a potential love triangle between herself, Cabello and Shawn Mendes.
Carpenter and Mendes were spotted spending time together in February 2023, a year after the “In My Blood” singer split from Cabello in November 2021. Just two months later, Cabello and Mendes were spotted rekindling their romance at Coachella.
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Songs on Carpenter’s album, including “Coincidence,” “Sharpest Tool” and “Taste” all seem to follow a storyline about a love interest rekindling his romance with his ex-girlfriend. The corresponding “Taste” visual stars Jenna Ortega, who fans think was casted to represent Cabello in the clip.
Cabello also seemingly added fuel to the flame, by recently sharing a TikTok singing along to her own track, “June Gloom,” which features the lyrics: “She’s cool, I heard/ Won’t act surprised, I saw the pictures/ […] If she’s so amazing, why are you on this side of town? / If you like her so much, what are you here trying to find out?”
Again, the theories are just rumors, but check out Cabello’s “Finish the Lyric” round below.
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With the first quarter of the 21st century coming to a close, Billboard is spending the next few months counting down our staff picks for the 25 greatest pop stars of the last 25 years. We’ve already named our Honorable Mentions and our No. 25, No. 24 and No. 23 stars, and now we remember the century in One Direction — who helped to redefine pop music, pop stardom and pop fandom in their brief-but-dominant 2010s run, while also minting five future solo hitmakers (including one absolute superstar).
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Piles of headshots were accumulating on a table in front of The X Factor judges Simon Cowell, Nicole Scherzinger and Louis Walsh. Tasked with deciding which contestants would make it to the next round of the competition, the panel analyzed each photo – and as they sorted through the contestants, an idea started to form. “You can’t get rid of little stars, you know?” Scherzinger said. “So you put them all together.” And in a twist of fate, five journeys that were in peril merged paths to become One Direction.
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As the boys spent more time together, their roles became clearer: Liam Payne, with his standout audition, would be the leader; Louis Tomlinson’s charm would make him the lovable prankster; Niall Horan, the humble boy from Ireland would be the down-to-earth sweetheart; Zayn Malik, reserved with undeniably striking looks, would be the mysterious one; and Harry Styles, with his curly locks, dimples and wide smile, would be the heartthrob. Together, they were 1D, and they would take over the world.
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One Direction’s ascent to global stardom proved that the boy band archetype could still thrive in the 21st century, albeit in a new and distinctly modern way. In just five years, 1D released five albums that brought up-tempo British pop-rock to the States and laid the foundation for today’s international pop groups. A new online community, “stan Twitter,” rallied around the group, and their superfans, called “Directioners,” helped their idols achieve astronomical mainstream success, changing fan-to-fan communication and fan-to-artist relationships forever.
Back in 2011, One Direction won the hearts of The X Factor’s U.K. audience with a mix of pop covers ranging from Coldplay’s “Viva la Vida” to Snow Patrol’s “Chasing Cars” – and even though they didn’t win the competition, they won something bigger: an already-devout fan following, and a contract with Simon Cowell’s Syco Records. Cowell moved swiftly to capitalize on One Direction’s momentum, pairing the group with established hitmakers to churn out their debut single “What Makes You Beautiful.” Savan Kotecha, whose writing credits already included songs for Britney Spears, Katy Perry and Usher, penned the track, and perfected it with the help of fellow writer Carl Falk, who would go on to write for Ariana Grande, Jason Derulo and Madonna.
“What Makes You Beautiful” was a work of bubblegum pop perfection that popped the top 40 bubble. When the track was released in the U.K. and Ireland in September of 2011, pop was dominated by EDM, turbo-pop and Young Money-style hip-hop – but managed to break through the noise and rise to the top of the charts. The single was so commercially successful that it drummed up interest overseas – by the time One Direction’s debut album Up All Night was released in the U.K. and Ireland in November of 2011, #Bring1DtoUS was trending regularly on Twitter, with fans organizing their own marketing efforts to catch the group’s attention, including flash mobs and DIY music videos combining clips from fans from all over the country.
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As soon as One Direction touched down on American soil, the quintet was breaking records and taking names. “What Makes You Beautiful” was digitally released on Valentine’s Day of 2012, debuting at No. 28 on the Billboard Hot 100 and marking the biggest debut for a British act in over a decade. It peaked at No. 4 less than two months later, when Up All Night was released in the U.S. to a No. 1 bow on the Billboard 200, cementing 1D as the first U.K. group to score that achievement with a debut album. When One Direction made their first stateside TV appearance on the Today Show to promote the release of Up All Night, 15,000 fans showed up, comparable to audiences pulled by Justin Bieber and Lady Gaga.
Straddling the line of being child-friendly, brand-safe public figures and being young men in their late teens and early twenties was critical to One Direction’s success, as the lads were ubiquitous in what seemed like every way possible. The group was booked to open for Big Time Rush, a Nickelodeon-bred boy band that was taking off in the states, on their already sold-out tour – but their presence was so overwhelming that they overshadowed their headliner, and the Up All Night Tour sold out in venues across the U.S. soon after.
One Direction had a je ne sais quois that set them apart from other boy bands. Unlike most of their predecessors, the five members didn’t follow choreography or dress alike, but they still possessed the same level of charisma – just in different packages. Their distinct personalities shined in interviews, video diaries and Twitter Q&As, and even more so when they interacted with one another. Watching five young men come together like brothers to live out their dreams was inspiring, and their camaraderie warmed the hearts of millions. The fans treasured the group’s relationships so deeply that they declared allegiance to every possible combination of inter-band dynamics, including “Narry,” “LiLo,” and “Ziam.”
One Direction
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Directioners wanted more – and they got what they wished for. A Pepsi Super Bowl Halftime commercial with NFL star Drew Brees aired, guest appearances on iCarly and SNL premiered on the same day in April, and the quintet took the stage at the closing ceremony of the 2012 Olympics. You couldn’t walk into a drugstore without encountering a One Direction toothbrush or turn on the radio without hearing “What Makes You Beautiful” – it was Beatlemania for the 2010s, powered by fans who were online 24/7, 365 days a year and watching their every move – literally, sometimes going as far as hacking security cameras in elevators and airports just to catch a glimpse of their favorite band.
The release of One Direction’s sophomore album Take Me Home ushered in a new era: The set also debuted atop the Billboard 200, making One Direction the first group to best the Billboard 200 with their first two albums since American girl group Danity Kane, and the group became the first boy band in U.S. chart history to land two No. 1 albums in a calendar year. But the accolades were not as significant to the group as how the release helped them evolve their image. Each member had writing credits on this album, showing that they were involved artists who had control of the development of their music; and bolder, more blatantly suggestive lyrics on songs like “Live While We’re Young” and fan favorite “Rock Me” reminded their audience that despite their Radio Disney-friendly appeal, the members were all adults by then, ranging from 18 to 20 years old. While critics were not convinced that One Direction could shake its bubblegum pop sound, fans loved it, and the Take Me Home Tour was the band’s biggest yet, wrapped with an accompanying concert film.
With so much commercial success, nonstop touring and more, fans and critics alike began to wonder: how long can this all be sustained? Repeating the cycle of Take Me Home, One Direction released their third album Midnight Memories in November of 2013, earning their third consecutive No. 1 on the Billboard 200, and highest debut on the Hot 100 (No. 2) with accompanying lead single “Best Song Ever.” The group was making what critics would finally admit was “great rock music” – but fans and outsiders alike could sense that they were tired; this was, after all, their third No. 1 album in just over a year and a half since their U.S. debut. Still, One Direction pushed forward with the Where We Are tour, playing stadiums two years into their careers – and packing them with 3.4 million fans, while also flipping said tour into a concert film. Everything 1D touched turned to gold.
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At the tail end of the tour, One Direction announced their fourth LP, Four. Their aptly named fourth studio album rollout began with “Steal My Girl,” drawing praise and comparisons to Journey. This old-school rock and alt-folk inspiration was present throughout the record, and it made 1D’s music feel more elevated than prior releases. It felt like the group had collectively matured and improved, and the set notched the group’s fourth consecutive debut at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 in November of 2014, making them the first group in history to bow atop the chart with each of its first four albums. Its most critically acclaimed album was celebrated by fans – but what those fans didn’t know was that the LP would also mark the beginning of the end.
Commercial success kept 1D booked and busy, but it couldn’t make up for the toll it had taken on the group’s wellbeing. Shortly after the start of the On The Road Again tour, Malik left for home in hopes of dealing with the stress; less than a week later, on March 25, his departure from the group was announced via Facebook. “I am leaving,” Malik shared, “because I want to be a normal 22-year-old who is able to relax and have some private time out of the spotlight.” At that moment, millions of girls around the world had their hearts broken: not only did Malik’s imminent departure become permanent, but the future of the band officially came into question. The official One Direction account followed Malik’s statement, assuring fans that the remaining four members would continue on and release their fifth studio album, but the plans felt more daunting than reassuring.
The seismic shift caused by Malik’s departure crumbled the foundation that One Direction stood upon, and their final album, Made in the A.M., would ultimately be their swan song. Its lead single “Drag Me Down” was released in July, with an uncharacteristic lack of pre-promotion – and in August, a hiatus was announced for 2016. Made in the A.M. was released in November, and while it was not as commercially successful as their past work, it didn’t matter: It was what the fans needed so that they could say a proper goodbye. “Love You Goodbye,” “History” and the album’s final track “A.M.” memorialized five years of international superstardom and closed the door on a One Direction era for the last time.
Zayn Malik, Harry Styles and Niall Horan
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Freed from the obligations of being in a band, the members of One Direction explored solo ventures. They each released successful top 40 singles: Malik debuted first with “Pillowtalk,” soaring to the top of the Hot 100 in January of 2016 — higher even than 1D ever got as a quintet. Horan followed suit, releasing “This Town” in September with a No. 20 debut, and Tomlinson closed out the year by dropping “Just Hold On,” a collaboration with Steve Aoki, in December, which landed at No. 52. The remaining two members, Styles and Payne, made their solo debuts the year after: Styles’ first single “Sign of the Times” peaked at No. 4 in April of 2017, and Payne’s “Strip That Down” featuring Quavo dropped in May. Payne’s No. 10 debut with “Strip” hammered the final nail into the 1D coffin – and now that each member had their solo debut, the public would decide who would be the most successful outside of the group.
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By December 2019, four of the five former bandmates had released their debut album – all except Tomlinson, who would release his debut Walls in January 2020 – and Malik, Styles and Horan each notched No. 1 Billboard 200 debuts, showing similar promise across the group post-break up. But as Styles’ sophomore album Fine Line began to roll out, with singles like “Adore You” and “Watermelon Sugar” achieving increasingly higher levels of pop success, it was clear that his sustained stardom would be difficult for the other members to match. By the time Harry’s House was released in 2022, Styles was respected by Directioners, new fans and critics alike – so much, in fact, that Harry’s House won Album of the Year at the Grammys the following year. Still, despite Styles’ well-earned superstardom, he always pays tribute to his past, continuing to perform the song that started it all: “What Makes You Beautiful.”
One Direction’s legacy survives in both obvious and unexpected ways. The British pop invasion that the group led in the early 2010s amplified related acts like Ed Sheeran, The Wanted and Little Mix for all the world to hear, and helped bring rock-based pop music back to the mainstream – starting with 5 Seconds of Summer, the Australian band whose hitmaking career skyrocketed after opening for 1D on the Where We Are Tour. The quintet’s greatest contribution, though, was how it changed the blueprint for pop superstardom. While there is no exact formula for fame and success, the Directioners created and normalized a more intense version of “stan” culture than ever before: one that shows devotion through chronic online-ness and community building all day, every day, which has shaped entire industries like K-pop. And even though One Direction only lasted for five years as a group, the impact of its discography — ranging from enduring smashes to beloved deep cuts — continues to shape a generation of pop connoisseurs, and hold a particularly special place in the hearts of Millennials and Gen Z’ers everywhere.
Read more about the Greatest Pop Stars of the 21st Century here and check back on Tuesday when our No. 21 artist is revealed!
Ariana Grande is one femininomenon Chappell Roan loves. While answering questions on a recent livestream, the 26-year-old star had nothing but kind things to say about the 31-year-old vocalist, from praising Eternal Sunshine to hyping up the upcoming Wicked films.
The topic of Grande first came up when one fan left a comment about Wicked, the first installment of which arrives in November starring the R.E.M. Beauty founder as Glinda opposite Cynthia Erivo’s Elphaba. “Oh my god, I’m so excited,” Roan raved of the film adaptation of the Broadway musical of the same name, which was based off of Gregory Maguire’s novel.
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“I’m a really big Ari — I’m an Arianator,” the “Good Luck Babe!” artist added. “I love her album.”
Roan’s comments come nearly two months after Grande sent love to the Missouri native on Instagram Stories, sharing a Wicked-related meme featuring Roan’s 2024 Gov Ball look, which involved painting her entire body green to channel the Statue of Liberty. “I really ♡ @chappellroan,” the Victorious alum wrote at the time.
On Aug. 19, Grande’s friend and Wicked costar Bowen Yang conversed with Roan for Interview magazine, revealing that he was the one to introduce the “Yes, And?” singer to the “Hot to Go!” artist’s work. “I remember drinking a glass of wine with Ariana Grande after we wrapped and being like, ‘You should get on Chappell Roan,” the Saturday Night Live star recalled. “‘She’s f–king awesome. Her live shows are incredible.’”
“I appreciate that,” Roan replied at the time. “I’ve been like, ‘Oh, my god. People are legitimately excited about this album.’”
Roan is currently climbing her way up the Billboard charts, with her album The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess recently reaching a new peak at No. 2 on the Billboard 200 a full 11 months after it was released in September 2023. She has seven entries on the Billboard Hot 100 dated Aug. 31, including “Pink Pony Club,” “Red Wine Supernova,” “Casual,” “Femininomenon” and “My Kink Is Karma.”
As her star has rapidly risen, however, Roan recently needed to set boundaries with fans regarding what she called “predatory behavior” in a lengthy statement on Instagram. “Please stop touching me. Please stop being weird to my family and friends. Please top assuming things about me,” she wrote in the post, which followed a TikTok video in which she also expressed her concerns on the same subject. “There is always more to the story. I am scared and tired. And please—don’t call me Kayleigh.”
On the Billboard Hot 100 dated May 11, 1959, Edward Byrnes and Connie Stevens’ “Kookie, Kookie (Lend Me Your Comb)” soared from No. 19 to No. 4, where it peaked for two weeks.
The song became a novelty hit, tying into the character that Byrnes played on the TV show 77 Sunset Strip. For all its lightheartedness, it made history: It became the first Hot 100 top 10 by two artists who didn’t regularly record together, dating to the chart’s Aug. 4, 1958, start.
A select few such team-ups hit the Hot 100’s top 10 in the 1960s, before the practice made more inroads in the ‘70s, when high-profile artists sharing No. 1s included Elton John and Kiki Dee (“Don’t Go Breaking My Heart”); John Travolta and Olivia Newton-John (“You’re the One That I Want”); and Barbra Streisand with both Neil Diamond (“You Don’t Bring Me Flowers”) and Donna Summer (“No More Tears [Enough Is Enough]”).
By the mid-‘80s, the Hot 100’s timeline had extended far enough that “That’s What Friends Are For” made its own history: As it marked Stevie Wonder’s 27th top 10 and John’s 20th (as well as Dionne Warwick’s 12th and Gladys Knight’s eighth, all under the billing Dionne & Friends), the all-star charity single became the first top 10 by two acts each adding a 20th hit in the tier.
On the Hot 100 dated Aug. 31, Lady Gaga and Bruno Mars bound in at No. 3 with “Die With a Smile” – Mars’ 19th top 10 and Gaga’s 18th. Even with collaborations now long embedded in hit music, the ballad is an impressive outlier, as it becomes the latest rare song in which at least two acts each up their counts to 15 or more top 10s.
Below, browse (or, in honor of Byrnes and Stevens, comb through) a recap of the select songs with such star power, and acts’ Hot 100 top 10 totals at the time of each entry. Notably, Michael Jackson leads with three dominant duets, while Drake, Gaga, Ariana Grande, Paul McCartney, Rihanna and Wonder boast two each.
“Die With a Smile”
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Close enough — welcome back, One Direction. In a rare and exciting twist of events for fans of the boy band, both Niall Horan and Harry Styles were under the same roof singing one of their old hits, with the “As It Was” musician attending the Irish singer-songwriter’s Manchester concert Tuesday night (Aug. 27). In […]
When he was working on his just-released debut solo LP, J, NCT member Jaehyun was striving for a “classic” vibe with the hope that “as time passes by, you could still listen to the [whole] album,” the 27-year-old singer told The Hollywood Reporter. The eight-track collection available now on all streaming platforms includes the slinky […]
The CIA says that the suspects in the alleged plot to attack Taylor Swift‘s Eras Tour shows in Vienna, Austria were aiming to create a massive casualty event involving a “huge” number of victims. The information came during a briefing on Wednesday (August 28) from CIA deputy director David Cohen, who, according to the Associated Press, said that his agency discovered intelligence that helped to disrupt the planning and led to the arrests of the three young suspects.
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Cohen discussed the foiled plot during the annual Intelligence and National Security Summit in Maryland, noting that the CIA informed Austrian authorities of the plan that resulted in Swift cancelling three planned shows in Vienna earlier this month after officials allegedly found links between the suspects and the Islamic State group.
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“They were plotting to kill a huge number — tens of thousands of people at this concert, including I am sure many Americans — and were quite advanced in this,” Cohen said. “The Austrians were able to make those arrests because the agency and our partners in the intelligence community provided them information about what this ISIS-connected group was planning to do.”
The New York Times reported that Cohen did not say how the CIA learned about the planned attack and that counterterrorism warnings don’t always get a lot of attention, but the quick work to foil the Vienna attack — which potentially saved hundreds, if not thousands, of lives — was different. “I can tell you within my agency and others, there were people who thought that was a really good day for Langley,” he said, in reference to the location of the agency’s headquarters. “And not just for the Swifties in the workforce.”
Austrian concert promoter Barracuda Music announced on August 7 that the three sold-out Eras Tour gigs planned for Ernst Happel Stadium on August 8, 9 and 10 were cancelled due to an alleged terror plot aimed at disrupting the shows. According to Austrian authorities, the main suspect is an unnamed 19-year-old Austrian man who had reportedly been inspired by the Islamic State terror group. They said he planned to attack the estimated 30,000 Swifties expected to gather outside the stadium with knives or homemade explosives; the venue itself holds 65,0000 and more than 200,000 fans were anticipated for the shows.
During a raid of the main suspect’s home, police reportedly found chemical substances and other technical devices that were to be used in the attack. The main suspect’s lawyer has said that the allegations were “overacting at its best,” suggesting Austrian authorities were exaggerating the details in order to expand their surveillance powers. The AP noted that Austria’s interior minister, Gerhard Karner, previously said that other intelligence agencies helped Austrian investigators, who cannot legally monitor text messages.
Swift’s Vienna shows were scheduled to be part of the penultimate run on the Eras Tour‘s European leg, and were followed by a five-night stint at London’s Wembley Stadium (August 15-20), which went off without incident. The singer opened up about the scary terror threat in a statement last week, writing, “The reason for the cancellations filled me with a new sense of fear, and a tremendous amount of guilt because so many people had planned on coming to those shows. But I was also so grateful to the authorities because thanks to them, we were grieving concerts and not lives. I was heartened by the love and unity I saw in the fans who banded together. I decided that all of my energy had to go toward helping to protect the nearly half a million people I had coming to see the shows in London. My team and I worked hand in hand with stadium staff and British authorities every day in pursuit of that goal, and I want to thank them for everything they did for us.”
The cancellation of the shows left tens of thousands of Swifties — many of whom traveled from afar to attend the gigs — disappointed and upset, though in classic Swiftie fashion they rallied in the days after by combating fear with joy. After the shows were called off, the singer’s fans flooded the streets of Vienna for impromptu sing-alongs and spontaneous celebrations of their devotion to the pop star.
Authorities had previously said the main suspect confessed to a plan aimed at killing “as many people as possible” and that he had reportedly quit his regular job recently and “conspicuously changed his appearance and adapted to I.S. [Islamic State] propaganda.” Investigators also reportedly found I.S. and al-Qaida materials at the home of a 17-year-old suspect, who was said to have been hired in the week before the planned shows by a company that was to provide services to the stadium and was arrested by police special forces near the stadium. A third 18-year-old suspect has also been arrested, though none of the men have been charged yet and their names have not been made public per Austrian privacy rules.
Swift is currently on a brief hiatus before she is scheduled to pick up the final run of U.S. Eras dates on Oct. 18 at Hard Rock Stadium in Miami.
Ariana Grande is continuing her 10-year celebration of her sophomore project, My Everything.
The superstar took to Instagram to announce that she released a limited 7″ vinyl bundle featuring “Problem,” “Break Free,” “Love Me Harder” and “One Last Time,” in addition to a digital bundle with a capella and instrumental versions of those same singles as well as “Bang Bang” on Tuesday.
“i love you all so, very much and i am deeply, eternally grateful,” she wrote in her Instagram post, which features photos from the 2014 era of the project.
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As always, her longtime collaborator The Weeknd, who teamed up with Grande on “Love Me Harder,” shared love for his pal on his Instagram Stories. “10 years,” he wrote alongside a white heart, while re-sharing Grande’s Instagram post.
Last week, Grande announced new vinyl and digital deluxe editions of the Billboard 200 chart-topping project, which also dominated the Billboard Hot 100 top 10 with hits such as “Break Free,” “Love Me Harder” with The Weeknd and “Problem” featuring Iggy Azalea. The pink-tinted vinyl, which is available on Grande’s website, features the original set’s track list plus songs that were previously never made available in the format: “Bang Bang,” “Only 1,” “You Don’t Know Me,” “Cadillac Song” and “Too Close.”
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Eleven years ago, Grande’s debut project, Yours Truly, also debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 albums chart, but she told Billboard in 2014 that she allowed herself to celebrate for only about an hour before immediately getting back to work on the project that would become My Everything. “I’m a workaholic, and a perfectionist,” she said at the time. “I never thought I’d be able to say this, but I love this [album] five times as much as I love Yours Truly. They’re different, but I love this one so much more.”
Flavor Flav was known for giving nicknames to his Flavor of Love contestants, and now he has a new moniker of his own. The Public Enemy star sat down as a guest on the most recent episode of Politickin’, hosted by Gavin Newsom, Marshawn Lynch, and Doug Hendrickson. When asked if he has a collab […]
After weeks of climbing the charts and drawing groundbreaking crowds to her performances, Chappell Roan had to get something off of her chest.
Addressing her audience of over 3 million followers in a frank pair of TikTok videos, the “Pink Pony Club” singer stared directly into her camera, eschewed the typical dynamics of artist-to-fan communication, and laid everything bare. “I don’t care that abuse and harassment, stalking, whatever, is a normal thing to do to people who are famous or a little famous,” she said, her voice breaking. “I don’t give a f–k if you think it’s selfish of me to say no for a photo, or for your time, or for a hug. That’s not normal, that’s weird. It’s weird how people think that you know a person just because you see them online.”
While Roan disabled comments on her videos, that didn’t stop the oncoming discourse from consuming online spaces. A majority of the messages across X, TikTok and Instagram were affirmations, supporting the singer for taking a strong position; a vocal minority of others offered comments that bore a striking similarity to the ones Roan called out in her videos. Some users said Roan wasn’t “cut out” for pop stardom. Others proclaimed that being a pop star required a “sacrifice” of personal privacy. More still suggested that Roan should “be a little more open” to photos with fans in public.
The debates about what is expected of pop stars when it comes to interacting with fans forces the question — at what point does genuine appreciation for an artist’s work cross the line into inappropriate behavior?
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Nick Bobetsky, Roan’s manager, puts it simply on a call with Billboard: “It’s about artists setting boundaries. The majority of fans don’t cross that line, but there are some who just don’t respect those boundaries. And it’s not even really all about fans — it’s about human boundaries.”
When she first read Roan’s statement, artist manager Kristina Russo says she felt something within her “relax.” Russo has worked with pop singer-songwriter GAYLE since the “abcdefu” singer was 14 years old, and says that preparing her client for inappropriate fan behavior has always been one of the hardest parts of her job.
“I had like a whole other purpose, aside from wanting to make her dreams a reality,” Russo says. “It was like an experiment — ‘Can you raise a young person up in this industry who can also maintain their humanity and their personal autonomy?’ Seeing [Chappell] talk about this made me feel like we were on the right path.”
Why do some fans feel a need to be so close with an artist who doesn’t know them? “A fan I interviewed once said, ‘I have stage four cancer, and when I go to my chemotherapy, I take my iPod with my Josh Groban music because it makes me feel better,’” explains Dr. Gayle Stever, an associate professor of psychology at Empire State University and the author of The Psychology of Celebrity who has spent her career studying fan behavior, embedding with fandoms across the cultural gamut. “[The fan was] seeking to be near this person through their work … and her proximity to this person and their work in turn gives her comfort.”
What Stever is talking about is a phenomenon in which a person develops a close relationship with someone — often a media figure or celebrity — who does not know them in return. That one-sided relationship can develop over time, as a fan begins to derive feelings of comfort and security from a figure and their work, which then forms what she refers to a “parasocial attachment.”
The concept of the parasocial relationship has become a major talking point online. The phrase is often deployed by those criticizing what they deem to be irregular behavior, in order to paint certain fans as weird and off-putting. But Dr. Stever makes it clear that parasocial relationships are a feature, not a bug, when it comes to human behavior — and no one is immune to forming a one-sided bond.
“As humans, we are biologically hard-wired to create connections with people from infancy,” she says. “So whether we want to admit it or not, we all form connections with familiar people in media all the time.”
It’s also not a new concept in the music industry. Back in the mid-60’s, news broadcasts around the world touted the onset of “Beatlemania” as the Fab Four rose to public prominence. In the decades following, stars like Michael Jackson, Bruce Springsteen, Madonna, Prince and dozens more found themselves garnering massive, mobilized fan bases. Soon after, fans began to give themselves their own branding — the Beliebers, Little Monsters and others became veritable fan armies all marching under the same flag.
Robert Thompson, the director of Syracuse University’s Bleier Center for Television and Popular Culture, points out that these types of fan-celebrity relationships go back even further in history. “We can look at the Roman Empire and the fandom that went on for gladiators — there’s old graffiti of the top gladiators at the time, and the fans were carving stuff into buildings and furniture,” he says. “I suspect that as long as we’ve had people performing in any way, we have had relationships with those performers.”
So why, in 2024, does it feel like we’ve reached a fever pitch in terms of boundary-crossing fan interactions?
One factor is how the advent of the internet has fundamentally changed the way that fans and artists interact with one another. Ryan Star, a recording artist and the CEO and co-founder of social-audio platform Stationhead, says that with the internet came a complete upending of the way the industry thought about fan engagement.
“Social [media] became everything, where music was almost secondary to it,” Star says. “If you were a rock star [pre-internet], there was a disconnect where [fans] couldn’t relate to you. Now, you suddenly have a hyper-connection between fans and artists thanks to social media.”
Bobetsky agrees, adding that artists don’t have much of a choice when it comes to using networking platforms like X and TikTok. “Whether an artist leans into it or not, they’re generally on social media,” he says. “That heightens the personal connection that fans feel. That’s an amazing part of modern culture, that people can have that, but I think that in particular feels new, where you’ve got this more personal connection with fans broadcast at the broadest potential level.”
Colette Patnaude Nelson, a manager for artists like Conan Gray and J. Maya, knows firsthand how fundamentally social media has changed the course of fan-artist interactions. “I started my career representing YouTubers — I’ve watched the social interaction between audiences and influencers or artists just intensify,” she says.
But Stever posits that fan dynamics, be they online or in-person, have remained largely unchanged throughout the history of modern pop culture. “Every single one of these things we’re talking about, I saw pre-internet,” she says. “What you had was the same kind of fans doing the same kind of things.”
What the internet has done for fans, Stever says, is remove most barriers for entry. Where pre-internet fandoms would have to meet in-person — at conventions, concerts or elsewhere — today’s fans have direct access at all hours to others with similar points of view. Some fandoms of the past required payment in order to be a member of a fan club; now, fans can organize independently without money changing hands.
Social media has also inexorably concentrated the power of fan bases, to the point where they now inherently compete with one another. Swifties, Barbs, Stylers, Team Drizzy, ARMY and others can now not only show support for their favorite artists, but defend them against other fan groups. “Nowadays, there is almost a sense that one of the ways one expresses fandom online is to protect the border, to take the wagons and defend your territory,” Thompson says. “The blessing about everything opening up is that it is opened up to all kinds of other voices who were either silenced or stigmatized before. The curse is that it opens it up to everybody, and we’ve seen the manifestation of that with the spread of hate speech and false information online and among fandoms.”
That’s part of why Star wanted to create an online platform that prioritized community building over tribalism among fans. At Stationhead, fans are able to join channels corresponding to the artists they adore, and essentially stream music with fellow fans. Occasionally, the artists themselves will host listening parties for fans on the platform, solidifying their own base while silently promoting a healthier, less-fraught online dynamic.
Star points out that other social platforms, despite benefitting from artists’ presence on them, were not “purpose-built” to support artist-fan relationships. Stationhead, by contrast, was built with that relationship in mind. “When fans all come together to listen and the artist is there too [on a Stationhead channel], it is like kind of a live event,” he explains. “Joining that without being a fan would be like going to a concert for someone you didn’t like — why would you be there?”
Creating a sense of community and safety among fans is important — but as Roan pointed out in a follow-up Instagram post to her original videos, artists’ safety and well-being also has to be considered. “Women do not owe you a reason why they don’t want to be touched or talked to,” she wrote. “I am specifically talking about predatory behavior (disguised as ‘superfan’ behavior) that has been normalized because of the way women who are well-known have been treated in the past.”
As unwelcome behavior toward artists persists, many in the music industry believe that it is within an artist’s best interests to stay silent about unwanted interactions. One artist manager, who spoke to Billboard on the condition of anonymity, described Roan’s comments as “a thought best kept in her head.
“The relationship with fans is incredibly precious. Fans are hard-earned — especially from artists who are relatively new to the pop space — and pop fans especially are ruthless,” they added. “[Saying what Roan said] definitely comes across as a ‘biting the hand that feeds you’ situation.”
Russo fundamentally disagrees with that notion, saying the only way to help mitigate the surrounding circumstances of toxic behavior is to have hard conversations with fans. “Unfortunately, that is the training we receive in this industry — put up with the things that you’re not comfortable with in order to do well. Which is why what Chappell said fuels me as a manager,” she says. “The only way to change things like this is to talk about them. If somebody is telling you how to treat them, listen.”
So what can realistically be done to help artists dealing with inappropriate fan behavior? For starters, Stever says there is a danger of painting all fans as boundary-crossers — what she refers to as “homogeneity of the out group” (“I know, it’s very jargon-y,” she quips). “The psychological tendency is to treat a group of people as if they’re all the same,” she adds. “The reality is that the vast majority of fans are just as appalled at this [behavior] as [Chappell] is.”
The same concept applies to artists: Bobetsky claims that any industry-spanning “solution” to toxic behavior is virtually impossible, because different artists prioritize different aspects of their jobs. “Some seek the fame, some seek the celebrity — others, like Chappell, are all about music and message, and about being an artist,” he explains.
With that understanding, Patnaude Nelson says a good industry-wide starting point would be to normalize letting artists say “no” to certain opportunities. “Not everyone has to do a meet-and-greet at a show — that’s not something that we should press upon every single artist,” she offers. “We can’t control fans, but what we can do is be supportive of our artists and listen to them.”
For Russo, eliminating boundaries for artists to access mental health professionals is a must. “My dream is to have a psychologist on the road,” she says. “I would love if, structurally, we can make that a thing worked into artists’ deals.”
But Bobetsky is quick to point out that real change has to start at fans’ level. “I understand why we put artists on a pedestal, because we all find a sense of self through our favorite artist,” he says. “But I think you have to remind yourself that, as superhuman as you may consider your favorite artist, they are a person, and that person deserves boundaries.
“Take the advice I give my four-year-old, fans,” he adds. “Behave in a way that you’d want someone to behave around you.”