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“Still fabulous!” That was one of the compliments overheard as fans filed out of the Hollywood Bowl following Patti LaBelle’s 8065 Tour kickoff on Sunday evening (July 7).
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The numbers refer to LaBelle’s double celebration this year: her 80th birthday in May and 65-year career in entertainment. Those 65 years represent a pioneering, Grammy-winning music career that began in the early ‘60s as frontwoman for Patti Labelle & the Bluebelles, which evolved into the innovative trio LaBelle in the ‘70s with Nona Hendryx and the late Sarah Dash before LaBelle embarked on a solo career.
After opening her set with the emotion-packed “You Saved My Life,” LaBelle was definitely in her element as she kicked off her shoes not once but twice, cracked jokes (“Don’t get it twisted, I want my shoe back,” she told an audience member who’d caught one of them), busted a couple of dance moves with her singers and even did some of her trademark wing flexing. She also dedicated her own moving take on “If You Asked Me To” to Celine Dion (who covered the song after LaBelle in 1992).
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LaBelle’s soaring vocals especially took center stage on the ballad “If Only You Knew” (a surprise as it wasn’t on the set list provided by the Bowl) — eliciting a standing ovation — and on show closer “Lady Marmalade.” For the latter, she chose several males from the audience to join her onstage and try their hand at singing the hit themselves, which met with audience cheers and laughter. Her nearly 90-minute performance also included classics such as “Love, Need and Want You,” “On My Own” (her duet with Michael McDonald) and “You Are My Friend.”
Upcoming stops on LaBelle’s 8065 junket include Sacramento (7/20), Phoenix (8/11) and Memphis (9/12). In between, she’s still busy with her successful food company, Patti’s Good Life, which recently added a new pancake and waffle mix to its menu. And coming soon: Patti LaBelle Wines. In an interview with Billboard prior to her Hollywood Bowl show, LaBelle reflected on her career, the new wave of R&B female artists and the R word: retirement.
What else can fans expect when they catch you on this 2024 tour circuit?
I’m very eclectic and very spontaneous. I will do a whole lot of different kinds of music. You never know what I might do, but it’s going to be nice. They [the shows] will be about who I am: a Bluebelles girl, a member of Labelle and then Patti LaBelle. It will be a reminder of what I’ve done all my life, you know? I just want to give a public thank you for all the years that people have been on my page with me. I can’t take that for granted because people can spend their money in other places, on other entertainers. But when they decide to see a Patti LaBelle show or to buy a Patti LaBelle record, I feel blessed.
Are you working on any new music?
I have been working on something for the last two years. But you know, sometimes when you record, of course, you’re going to start, and then you’re going to stop. Or something might come into play where you say, “Well, God, I have to stop this right now and then go back into recording again when I get good music.” I’m very picky. I want to do age-appropriate music for an 80-year young woman. I can’t do anything that makes me feel as if I’m stretching out on something that I shouldn’t be. So this is going to have to be something that’s well thought out. It’s hard for me to find good material that I want to put out. But I’m not going to stop. I hope that something might be out in the next six months.
Did you ever envision having a 65-year career? A lot of people can’t say that.
Because of my three sisters dying before they turned 50, I would always pray that I could make 50. When I did, it was like a miracle. God has given me grace and I’m still here. And to say that I’m still here at 80, still doing what I did when I was 20, 30 and 40 … it’s another blessing. Because you can’t always take for granted that you’re going to be here at the age of 80, still performing and still in your right mind. So every day I say, “Thank you God for another day.”
Nona Hendryx, Patti LaBelle and Gladys Knight attend Patti LaBelle’s Surprise 80th Birthday Celebration at The Glasshouse on May 23, 2024 in New York City.
Johnny Nunez/Getty Images for Patti’s Good Life
Please describe the feeling that you get as you’re preparing to step on stage.
It’s a rush that I’ve gotten all my life. I’ve never, ever not been nervous before a show; I’m always petrified. Especially when you go out and see the crowd standing or saying your name and making you feel just wonderful. That doesn’t happen all the time for a lot of people, but it’s still happening with me. My band and I have our prayer before we go on. They continue to push me and keep me feeling good onstage for 75-90 minutes. I’m always saying to myself, “God, I wonder if they’re going to care for me tonight like they did years ago.” That’s always on my mind because I don’t want to become an afterthought, like “Why is she still singing?” I just don’t want to be that person. So every time I go out there, I’m praying that they [the audience] will accept me.
Where do you get your energy?
That’s God, girl. Like I said, I’ve outlived most of my family members but I still have a show to do tomorrow, the next night and the next night. So that’s energetic for me. Sometimes my body might be sore, but I’m going to go out there and do my thing. I don’t feel any pain when I’m performing, you know? And I thank God for that after a show. And that makes me feel great that I can still do it. I don’t know what 80 should feel like, so I don’t know if I feel 80. Maybe I feel about 40 inside [laughs]. For exercise, I have a pool that I get in. I can’t swim but I can kick. And I walk my dog. I move my body to do things that I know will help me.
What one life lesson have you embraced during your 80 years? And what one music career lesson do you still carry with you after 65 years?
For the first: to not hold grudges. In 80 years, you can have a lot of things that could set you off or put you in a place where you say, “I hate this. I hate that.” But I don’t have hate in my life. I’ve learned to forgive those who have put me in such awful positions that you can’t think a person will forgive someone for doing that. But I’ve always taken the high road. So the older I get, the more I’ve become a forgiver. Because I always say there must be a real reason why a person is hurting, why they’re so ugly inside. So those people you pray for, and I sometimes bring them closer to me. It’s not going to hurt you to be nice to someone who’s not nice to you.
And for the second: that not everyone is going to accept me. There have been times in my 65 years of being in show business when there’s been a lot of rejection for Patti LaBelle: for my music, for my shows, for my acting, for whatever I’ve done in life. I know that everybody’s not going to accept it; that I’m going to get no’s and sometimes I’ll get some yeses. All of that stuff has happened in my life and will continue to happen because everybody’s not going to love Patti LaBelle.
Is there one song that you still love to perform after all these years?
I enjoy “If Only You Knew.” It’s a hard song to sing, but I can still sing it. Those notes at the end: I’m amazed every time they come out. So that’s one of my favorites for that reason. And I haven’t changed the keys to [my] songs; they’re in the original keys.
What do you think about the new wave of female singer-songwriters in R&B right now?
There are a lot of great singers in young women such as Coco Jones and Victoria Monét. I continue to bless them on, honey. Don’t stop; don’t stop. And of course Beyoncé, my girl. I’m just happy for her period for everything she’s doing and will continue to do. I’m seeing a lot of goodness in these young ladies performing and selling the way they’re selling. When Beyoncé did her country album, I said, “You go, girl” because music is music. And she is from Texas and she’s holding them. I just want her to continue to do any type of music that she wants to do. Music doesn’t have a color; it doesn’t have a race. Music is music period.
When I was coming up, it [the industry climate] was nowhere near what it’s like now. It’s a much better place being a Black female performer; much more so than when we — Sarah, Nona, Cindy [Birdsong, a member of the Bluebelles] and I — were doing it at the time. So I’m very happy about the climate where Black women are singing anything they want. I wish it had been like that when we were coming up. But then again, if it was like that I might not appreciate what I have now as much as I do. We paid our dues.
Is the R word — retirement — in your vocabulary?
How do you spell it? [laughs]. That’s not in my book. No way. I’m going to keep on going. There’s no reason to stop unless you just can’t do anything anymore, right? And how can you retire from something you love?
As a Detroit native himself, Skilla Baby has his thoughts on the best rappers from the city. The musician joined the This Is Keke Palmer podcast as a guest recently, where he disagreed with the notion that Eminem is the best rapper from Detroit. “I don’t know because if you think number-wise Eminem is the […]
Back in 1993, 2Pac sat down with The Source for an interview and the late rapper made some disparaging remarks about music legend Quincy Jones. “All he does is stick his d—k in white b—es and make f—ed up kids,” Pac said at the time.
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This infuriated a then 17-year-old Rashida Jones, so much so that she wrote an open letter to the magazine in defense of her father. In her letter she tore into Shakur’s interview, starting it off by saying, “Because I am the youngest of Quincy Jones’ six daughters, I cannot view this article or this man without bias [“War Stories” by Kim Green, Aug, ’93]. But I do think that anyone who reads this article would be shocked by his ignorance and lack of respect for his people.”
Adding, “To demean a man like Quincy Jones, a man who came from the ghetto of Chicago and through his talent and perseverance became a living music legend, demeans the whole progress of African Americans.” She then ended her letter by saying, “Where the hell would you be if Black people like him hadn’t paved the way for you to even have the opportunity to express yourself? I don’t see you fighting for you race. In my Opinion, you’re destroying it and shitting all over your people.”
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The actress recalled this incident in a recent profile with The New Yorker and was asked by writer Michael Schulman how their relationship evolved after the letter and once he started dating her older sister Kidada Jones. “Furious! So precocious, so self-righteous. Yeah, I was so mad,” she answered. “It was a new perspective to me. I kind of understand the nuance more now that I’m older. It just felt like a completely unwarranted attack.”
She then added that she was interning at Warner Bros. Records when she wrote the letter. “I printed it off my word processor and put it in an envelope and sent it to The Source,” she recalled. “I was interning at Warner Bros. Records that summer, so I think I wrote it there. Maybe I had the other intern proof it for me.” The actress then said ‘Pac mistook her older sister Kidada for her in New York and apologized, saying, “And then my sister was out somewhere in New York, and Tupac came up to apologize to her, because he thought it was me.”
She continued by saying, “It resolved itself really nicely, because when I met him, he immediately apologized to me, immediately apologized to my dad. We sat down and had a really good conversation about it, and then he was family.”
Rashida took the experience as a lesson, saying, “That was an early lesson for me, because I have been self-righteous in my life, and I really have worked hard to stop looking at things in a binary way. We’re so flawed and so complicated.”
Quincy wasn’t a fan of the late rapper dating his daughter either, telling The New York Times in 2012 that he “wasn’t happy at first.”
But, eventually they mended fences and squashed things. “He’d attacked me for having all these white wives. And my daughter Rashida, who was at Harvard, wrote a letter to The Source taking him apart,” he said. “I remember one night I was dropping Rashida at Jerry’s delicatessen, and Tupac was talking to Kidada because he was falling in love with her then. Like an idiot, I went over to him, put two arms on his shoulders and said, ‘Pac, we gotta sit down and talk, man.’”
Adding, “If he had had a gun, I would’ve been done. But we talked. He apologized. We became very close after that.”
Rashida would go on to forge a friendship with Shakur and even wrote a paper on him during her junior year of college.
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Tyga and Sabrina Claudio have sparked dating rumors as the newest musical power couple. T-Raww and the 27-year-old R&B singer posed for a series of intimate photos on the beach, which sent their fans into a frenzy on Monday afternoon (July 8) coming off the holiday weekend. Explore See latest videos, charts and news See […]
Robert Glasper stays busy. When Billboard recently caught up with the five-time Grammy winner, it was on the eve of his performance — with his band and special guest Yebba — at the annual Hollywood Bowl Jazz Festival on June 16. And between rehearsals for that performance, he was in the midst of recording his next album.
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And this after announcing the arrival of his latest album, Let Go, just a few days prior. The release of the meditative instrumental album, one of several planned projects via an exclusive partnership with Apple Music, also coincided with the music platform’s celebration of jazz during Black Music Month.
Thanks to critically acclaimed, burgeoning jazz artists such as Grammy winner Samara Joy, fellow Grammy winner Laufey and 2023 Mercury Music Prize winner Ezra Collective, jazz has been making some headlines in the last several years. And as a noted jazz artist himself, Glasper is here for this new wave.
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“I think that people are OK with jazz moving into the modern times,” he says. “People are kind of letting go and allowing it to do what it needs to do. We already have jazz history. But new things [in jazz] also need to be done so that the new things can, in turn, make history. People like Samara Joy … she’s a breath of fresh air. She obviously has studied the history of the music, but you can hear her through it as well. And she’s not afraid of genre-hopping either. I love the fact that she’s steeped so deep in gospel music and R&B. People are seeing others like Esperanza [Spalding] and Gregory Porter, who are bringing jazz into a new day.
“They’re saying it’s OK to learn the history,” continues Glasper, “but don’t get held back by it. That lesson is being taught. And a lot of people are embracing this new wave of artists who are telling their stories and aren’t afraid to do so.”
Now back in the studio recording his next album for Apple Music, Glasper describes the forthcoming project as half jazz and half hip-hop. With fellow musicians Walter Smith on tenor saxophone, Keyon Harrold on trumpet, Vicente Archer on bass, Kendrick Scott on drums and Mike Moreno on guitar, Glasper is currently recording the album’s jazz half.
“We’re recording some jazz tunes in a very acoustic, sextet style,” Glasper explains. The other half of the album will be hip-hop versions of those jazz songs. I’m going to have different hip-hop producers sample each of those songs and make a hip-hop beat out of it.”
In the meantime, Glasper is busy ramping up for Blue Note Jazz Festival Presents: The Black Radio Experience. As earlier announced, John Legend, Jill Scott and André 3000 are headlining the Napa Valley, Calif., event during Labor Day weekend (Aug. 30-Sept. 1). The festival, a partnership between Blue Note Entertainment Group and Black Radio Productions, will be hosted by Sway Calloway.
Ticking off a lineup that also features Andra Day, Common with Pete Rock, Musiq Soulchild, Nile Rodgers and Christian McBride (more info here), Glasper — also doubling as artist in residence — says the festival “will be a tad bit more intimate than last year. We’re looking forward to a great weekend.”
Offstage, Glasper has been busy working on various television projects since scoring the music for Peacock’s The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air reboot Bel-Air in 2022 with fellow artist/musician Terrace Martin. Those projects include creating the original score for the current Apple TV+ limited series The Big Cigar. With a cast that includes André Holland and Glynn Turman, the six-part drama chronicles Black Panther founder Huey P. Newton’s escape from the FBI to Cuba.
Glasper, who also counts The Photograph and season two of HBO’s Winning Time: The Rise of the Lakers Dynasty among his film and television credits, most recently did the music for the forthcoming documentary about R&B/pop singer/songwriter legend Luther Vandross. Luther: Never Too Much, directed by Dawn Porter, is slated to premiere next year on CNN, OWN and Max.
“Luther was the soundtrack to my childhood,” Glasper tells Billboard about the chance to work on the documentary. “We didn’t have a family gathering without Luther’s music playing. Doing the music for this doc was close to my heart. It felt like him.”
Serena Williams expects to be dancing to Kendrick Lamar’s “Not Like Us” for the rest of the summer.
Speaking at ESSENCE Festival in New Orleans over the weekend, the tennis legend called “Not Like Us” a “jam” and crowned the Drake diss track as the “hit of the summer.”
“I love that song. It’s like the hit of the summer,” she said. “When they play that jam, I’m jamming. That jam is jamming.”
Per Complex, Serena added that she’s getting her “Crip walk” on to the Mustard-produced Hot 100-topping banger. “You definitely Crip walking in that song. It’s so cool what he did though. Bringing everyone to the stage? That was incredible. I couldn’t believe it,” she continued.
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K. Dot actually name-drops his fellow Compton icon on the track. “From Alondra down to Central, n—a better not speak on Serena,” he raps about Williams while seemingly daring Drake to keep her name in his mouth.
Drake was rumored to be dating Serena Williams throughout the first half of the 2010s. However, in June, Common insinuated that “wars happen over women” after N.O.R.E. brought up how the two were linked to dating Serena at different times. (Common dated Serena from about 2007 to 2010).
“You know, wars happen over women,” Common admitted of his feud with Drake on Drink Champs. “That’s just what it is. But I ain’t going to get at you if you with somebody I was with. But if you start throwing me a couple little, you know, you trying to throw some jabs, you know, and I’m like, ‘Come on man, OK.’”
Williams and Drake were spotted locking lips in 2015 and he pulled up to her U.S. Open tennis match in the same year, which had many thinking the couple was taking their relationship to the next level. However, her rep denied to People in October that year that the two were dating, instead noting that they were merely longtime friends.
Serena tied the knot with Alexis Ohanian in 2017. The tennis icon and entrepreneur share two daughters.
Drake dissed the Reddit co-founder on 2022 Her Loss cut “Middle of the Ocean.” “Sidebar, Serena, your husband a groupie/ He claim we don’t got a problem but/ No, boo, it is like you coming for sushi,” he raps.
Ohanianappeared to reply to Drake via X at the time, writing: “The reason I stay winning is because I’m relentless about being the absolute best at whatever I do—including being the best groupie for my wife & daughter.”
“Not Like Us” reached the Billboard Hot 100’s apex, and is holding firm at No. 3 on this week’s chart. The track could receive a boost next week thanks to the Dave Free and Lamar-directed music video, which arrived on July 4.
Watch Serena talk about “Not Like Us” below:
Eminem has once again demonstrated his enduring influence in the rap game with the release of his highly anticipated music video for “Tobey” on Monday (July 8). The track, featuring fellow Detroit natives Big Sean and BabyTron, has received major attention since its release and received the visual treatment that fans have been waiting for. […]
The talk of a Hot Boys reunion at Essence Fest this past weekend was all the hype in New Orleans. Juvenile told fans that a long-awaited Hot Boys album was in the works, and Birdman recently told Billboard he hoped to get everybody on stage together.
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“It’s been 15-20 years since we’ve been onstage together,” he said. “We’ve got a great production and some special guests. It’s going to be amazing! We are working on a few things that we can’t talk about yet. But I can promise you that it’s going to be a night to remember.”
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However, things didn’t go as planned. Lil Wayne chose not to hit the stage with Birdman, Mannie Fresh, Juvenile and B.G., instead performing a 20-minute set after they finished. He also changed the Cash Money logos onscreen to Young Money logos and said he was “here on behalf of Young Money f–king Records,” according to nola.com.
This is as close as we got to a full Cash Money/Hot Boys reunion at Essence Fest. Mannie was on stage, but not in this shotEveryone thought Wayne was a no show, but he came & did a solo set after everyone left. He never appeared on stage w/ BG & Juvy. Turk wasn’t there at all😢 pic.twitter.com/ov4ZaN0jfH— Andrew Barber (@fakeshoredrive) July 6, 2024
Weezy also said he had no idea about a new Hot Boys album. While making a guest appearance on NFL player Cam Heywood’s podcast Not Just Football in late June, he responded when asked about a Hot Boys comeback, “Sh—t, you just told me.”
Heywood then replied, “Juvie said, ‘We got the album already cookin’.’” Still a bit confused, Wayne then answered, “I ain’t been to the kitchen yet. I would not lie to you, I have not been in that kitchen yet. I have no problem with going to that kitchen, but I ain’t smell it, it ain’t come through the window yet. I ain’t smell the food … They ain’t told me nothing yet.”
Turk was noticeably absent from the Hot Boys reunion on stage as well. Last month on social media, he addressed a possible reunion at the popular festival, saying he was still trying to iron out the business side of things and that he was doing everything in his power to be there.
B.G. went on Instagram Live and gave his take as to why Turk wasn’t there. “It’s only one n—a that ain’t in this b—h, you heard me?” B.G. said. “He brought that on hisself. N—a did a bunch of h— sh—t, he can’t take it back. He got to fault hisself for not being here.”
The Hot Boys released three albums all together, with their last project being 2003’s Let ‘Em Burn.
Kendrick Lamar’s “Not Like Us” has permeated different avenues of pop culture, and now, even libraries are feeling the impact of the Drake diss. The Los Angeles Public Library went viral over the weekend when it posted a video to TikTok and Instagram over the weekend, debating whether its owl puppet needed to say farewell […]
Ice Spice keeps her side of the street clean, especially when Taylor Swift is involved. When fans at the rapper’s Rolling Loud Europe set started booing her “Karma” collaborator’s song Sunday (July 7), the former had the best reaction: blowing kisses to the haters and keeping things moving.
The moment came when Swift’s part of the duo’s “Karma” remix — which reached No. 2 on the Billboard Hot 100 after Ice hopped on the track last year — started playing over the speakers during the 24-year-old Bronx native’s festival set in Austria. “Swifties, make some noise!” Ice cheered, to which a group of fans started booing loudly, waving thumbs-down symbols.
Ice, however, was unbothered. Instead of directly acknowledging the negativity, she simply blew a kiss and gave a stony expression, seemingly in the haters’ direction, before moving right along.
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The “In Ha Mood” artist was one of several musicians to take the stage at this year’s European edition of Rolling Loud, where she also performed tracks such as “Gimmie a Light” and new single “Phat Butt.” Nicki Minaj, Playboi Carti and Travis Scott served as headliners, while Gunna, Sexyy Red, Don Toliver, Offset and more were billed on the 2024 program as well.
And if some festivalgoers were expecting Ice not stand by Swift, they were sorely mistaken. Both artists have been vocal in their support for one another since coming together on “Karma,” with the pop star asserting on more than one occasion that the rapper is the “one to watch.”
Ice has also said that Swift often acts as a guiding light for her when it comes to her career. “When I was in the studio with Taylor, like, I’ll never forget that,” the rapper shared with Billboard in the March 2024 issue. “She told me, ‘No matter what, just keep making music and everything’s going to be fine.’”
The younger musician is currently gearing up to release her debut album, Y2K!, on July 26. After teasing that the project features more than one A-list collaboration, many fans have speculated that Swift may make an appearance for a “Karma” sequel — but Ice isn’t giving anything away just yet.
“I don’t know,” she said at the BET Awards in June when asked about the rumors, giving a coy smile. “Let’s see, let’s see, let’s see.”
See the moment Ice Spice blew kisses at her crowd while “Karma” played at her Rolling Loud Europe set.