Rock
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The stories about Casablanca Records are legendarily insane. Some center around the tall tales of the wildly successful independent label founded by producer Neil Bogart in 1973 that briefly shot to global dominance during the disco era thanks releasing landmark albums by everyone from Kiss to Donna Summer, the Village People, George Clinton’s Parliament and Cher. They also, invariably, lead to equally bonkers accounts of shady accounting, mountains of debt (and cocaine) and wild accounts of the lengths Bogart would go to promote his acts.
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Sounds like a movie, right? Well, on March 31 that biopic, Spinning Gold, will hit theaters with an all-star cast of characters re-telling the improbable tale of Bogart’s rocket ride to the heights, and depths, of the music business. The film’s official trailer dropped on Thursday (Dec. 15) and it gives just a little taste of the whirlwind ride Bogart took the industry on while providing sneak peeks at Wiz Khalifa as Clinton, Jeremy Jordan as the label boss, Ledisi as Gladys Knight, Jason DeRulo as Ronald Isley, Pink Sweat$ as Bill Withers and Tayla Parx as Summer.
The trailer for the film directed and written by Bogart’s’ son, Timothy Scott Bogart, opens with Casablanca’s jaw-dropping sales figures (200 million records), while showing a frizzy-haired Jordan strutting through the label’s chaotic offices while ticking off a list of the famous roster, including Summer (born LaDonna Adrian Gaines), who blanches at her new bosses’ decision to change her name because “everything is hotter in the summer.”
With Kiss’ 1975 hit “Rock and Roll All Nite” blasting in the background, the fairy tale story quickly begins to unravel, though, as Bogart is seen facing more than $7 million of red ink, which, of course, inspires him to punch out the bearer of bad news, as one’s boss does. There are briefcases full of cash, threats of a hit put out by rival Motown Records, phone calls to the mafia to ask for a little help with that whole situation and Bogart placing a giant bet on a couple of kids from Queens (Kiss’ Paul Stanley and Gene Simmons) who had dreams of being the biggest rock stars in the world.
“Their mix of creative insanity, a total belief in each other and the music they were creating, shaped our culture and ultimately defined a generation,” reads a description of the film. “In a story so unbelievable that it can only be true, comes the motion picture event of the musical journey of Neil Bogart and how his Casablanca Records created the greatest soundtrack of our lives.”
Watch the Spinning Gold trailer below.
Hayley Williams is well-acquainted with the rigors of stardom in your teens. Which might explain why the Paramore singer — who was signed to her first production deal at 14 — can relate to the mind-bending journey Billie Eilish has been on over the past five years.
“We’ve spoken throughout the years since she kind of came onto the scene,” Williams, 33, told Sirius XM’s Alt Nation in a chat about her interactions with Eilish, 20. “The first thing I experienced or I witnessed of her was [2018’s] ‘When the Party’s Over,’ that video. And then I watched an interview with her and I felt like there was something inside of me that was watching me — slash us — as teenagers doing interviews and navigating this world.”
Williams was just 17 when Paramore’s All We Know Is Falling came out in 2005, while Eilish was 14 when she uploaded “Ocean Eyes,” the song that would catapult her to fame. Hayley said that’s one of the reasons watching Billie’s rise has felt very familiar to her.
“She does it on a level we’ve never experienced, but I just feel such a love towards her and her family and I think they’re so special,” said Williams, who recalled going to Billie’s house for Thanksgiving last year for a delicious meal of vegan cinnamon rolls made by Eilish’s mom. “We had already connected, I had connected with her mom too, just about their organization that they have. But ever since that Thanksgiving cinnamon roll treat, just, I mean… The rest is history. I feel like I would do anything for them,” she added, shouting out Eilish’s older brother and producer, Finneas, as well.
And as someone who has been doing it for more than half her life, Williams predicted, “I think they’re going to be around for a really long time.”
The mutual admiration society isn’t just virtual, either. Williams and Eilish teamed up earlier this year when they performed Paramore’s “Misery Business” and Billie’s “Happier Than Ever” together at Coachella.
Watch Williams’ interview below.
There has been so much to love about Netflix’s latest hit show Wednesday, from the coming-of-age storyline and deadpan demeanor of the titular Addams Family character (played by Jenna Ortega) to the goth style choices and supernatural mysteries surrounding the show’s Nevermore Academy setting. But what has captivated audiences just as much is the thrilling soundtrack. Within the show’s first season, there’s a tapestry of classic Latin ballads, string concertos and multiple generations of rock. The combination of the song choices themselves and the scenes they’re set to has stirred up conversation all over the internet.
While Netflix is no stranger to such virality (see how the streaming service revived Kate Bush’s “Running Up That Hill”), it was thrilling to see Wednesday give a similar bump to The Cramps’ 1981 post-punk classic “Goo Goo Muck,” thanks to a dazzling dance scene in episode four where Ortega shows off some of her kookiest moves. Of course, it wasn’t long until TikTok users put their own spin on the quirky scene by dressing up as Ortega’s character and dancing to Lady Gaga’s 2011 track “Bloody Mary.” The trend has caught on so much so that Gaga’s song has re-entered the Billboard Global 200’s top 40, while even the pop star herself dressed up like Wednesday and danced to her Born This Way number.
Following the success of the series, Billboard spoke to music supervisors Jen Malone and Nicole Weisberg about setting the tone for the series, the Gaga TikTok craze and what Cramps song they almost used instead of “Goo Goo Muck.”
How did doing music supervision for shows like Yellowjackets and Euphoria help inform the process of putting together the soundtrack for Wednesday?
Jen: Each show is very different in terms of the overall vision, sound and tone. It’s really just a collaboration with the showrunners, as it is with each other show and each other team that we work with. On any show, music can be used in different ways. So it’s really just following their lead, and a lot of listening to how they see the character and how they see music as a character in the show. We’re really lucky in that in a lot of shows that we work on, music is a character, and I think that’s definitely the same for Wednesday.
How did you concept the sound for Wednesday?
Nicole: It was a very collaborative process, and the intention the whole time is to pay homage to Wednesday’s story. [Looking at it through] her lens to make all of these choices was such a fun way to approach an Addams Family project. So it was sort of a combination of just looking for that perfect vintage song that sounds [like] classic Addams Family, but is serious vintage cool that has a wink to it and feels like we’re still having fun.
What did you envision Wednesday listening to as a teen?
Nicole: We really leaned into a lot more vintage. Wednesday doesn’t have a phone, she doesn’t have social media. So we really leaned into a lot of the Latinx vintage and female vocals, but then also combined [that] with some of the later placements, like The Cramps [and] this goth, post-punk sound. Obviously, the chorus with the cello was a huge, huge part of our show.
What did the moodboard for the show’s soundtrack look like?
Jen: We really drew from the Addams Family in general, knowing that this is Wednesday’s story. We started with a big playlist of songs from anywhere and everywhere, that we thought could somehow somewhere fit into this series. It really ranged from several different genres and several different time periods. We also were also true to telling Wednesday’s story, and the Addams Family franchise is our cornerstone for the music story.
Wednesday’s solo dance scene to “Goo Goo Muck” by The Cramps has become a viral moment from the show. Was that song always meant to be used for that scene?
Jen: It was not scripted in. When we got to shooting that episode, we really collaborated with [creators] Al [Gough], Miles [Millar] and Tim [Burton] and got them a bunch of options that they would obviously also discuss with Jenna, who was going to be doing the choreography for the dance. We actually were talking about “Human Fly” from The Cramps, and those guys ended up coming back and they’re like, “Let’s do ‘Goo Goo Muck.’”
Nicole: These things unfold where we have the script, and then we’re figuring it out before it’s going to shoot, and we haven’t even worked on all the other episodes. It was a big moment to really ground the show. The Cramps were on our playlist from the beginning, and it just happened organically where we would go back and forth with the producers and Tim. Like Jen said, Jenna was a big part of taking the temperature on most of these big moments, because she just embodied Wednesday so much. It was like, if she feels like this would be natural for her to do, then we kind of got the green light. She was the pinnacle of every moment.
Jen: Even the cello pieces, Jenna was involved in those discussions. She actually had made her own cello playlist, which was really really cool.
It’s been a big year for Netflix’s viral music moments, especially following the resurgence of Kate Bush love after Stranger Things used “Running Up That Hill.” How do you balance those kinds of standout moments so that they feel organic?
Jen: Our job as music supervisors is to serve the director and the showrunner’s vision and serve the story. That’s the only thing that we focus on: collaborating and providing ideas to Al, Miles and Tim. Having moments go viral, that’s just the icing on the cake. That’s super exciting, but not something that we set out to do.
Wednesday‘s dance scene popularized Lady Gaga’s “Bloody Mary” again, thanks to TikTok. How has that impacted the hype around the show?
Jen: It’s just so exciting to see how fans are reacting to the show and creating their own videos. I just like seeing the dances and the costumes they put together. It’s super fun to watch these kids create their own moments. It’s funny, you’re not seeing people watch TV. Now, you’re getting to watch your fans react in real-time to something. It’s definitely a surreal experience because we worked on the stuff a year ago, and you don’t think about this happening this way.
Lady Gaga has shown her support for Wednesday on social media and even made her own “Bloody Mary” dance video inspired by the show. Have you considered featuring a Gaga song next season?
Jen: We don’t know the long-term plan for the show, but I hope we will be able to create more notable music moments.
Obviously, Wednesday and her roommate Enid have such distinct personalities. How did that affect their music taste on-screen?
Nicole: That was always going to be polar opposites, just because of the nature of their characters. Enid is bright and fun-loving, so it was natural to fill her playlist with pop music and feel-good, uptempo [songs] — and then Wednesday is like, ‘I’m serious and I want vintage quality,’ and doesn’t care about Enid’s music taste very much. It was fun to play a contrast in those moments when they’re hanging out in their bedroom, and you can’t have both girls’ music playing at once.
What made you guys decide to use “Don’t Stop” by Fleetwood Mac during the Crackstone Memorial sequence?
Jen: I think that one actually came from Al, Miles and Tim.
Nicole: When the statue was on fire, [it was] building up to that moment. We loved the Metallica cover with the cello and everything was building up to that moment. Fleetwood Mac was intended to play contrast to all the darkness that’s about to come right after it. What I thought was carved out really nicely was when we had the Beach House song, right into Fleetwood, right into Vivaldi, right into Metallica. It just felt like a perfect storm of just setting up the rest of the season for the chaos that’s about to ensue.
Back catalogs are big business in this music industry. It seems as though every couple of months you read about another artist selling their music to an outside source, like Neil Young going to U.K. investment firm Hipgnosis Songs Fund (run by music industry veteran Merck Mercuriadis) with 50% of his song catalog or Bob Dylan selling the masters of his works to longtime label Sony Music.
But when you consider how busy the catalog divisions of such revered companies as Sony, Universal and BMG are, it’s gauging out to be a symbiotic relationship where the fan wins out in the end. Especially when it comes to emptying out the vaults.
This year, in particular, seemed to teem with catalog-based titles from some of the biggest names in the industry. And not just rote ‘Greatest Hits’ collections, but immersive experiences that allow fans to explore inside the creation of favorite LP with audio rarities and visual ephemera. Sometimes it doesn’t even have to be a fave, but rather an album so deep in an artist’s discography you forgot how much you dug it in the first place.
It wasn’t easy choosing just 10 box sets to include in this roundup. There was so much that came out this year from which to pick, given the grand carousel of Complete Recordings, Super Deluxe Editions and Bootleg Series-styled lost treasures on display. This carefully curated selection, however, will hopefully give you a good idea of the wealth of product available in 2022.
After only two weeks on the chart, Metallica’s “Lux Æterna” is No. 1 on Billboard’s Mainstream Rock Airplay list dated Dec. 17.
The song climbs to the top after debuting at No. 2 on the Dec. 10 survey, the best start for any song in 16 years.
With its two-week trip to No. 1, “Lux” completes the quickest coronation in eight years. Foo Fighters’ “Something From Nothing” also took two frames in November 2014.
“Lux” and “Something” are the only two songs to need two or fewer weeks to reign in the entirety of the 2000s. Prior to “Something,” the last act to pull off the feat was Metallica with its cover of Bob Seger‘s “Turn the Page,” which hit No. 1 in its second week in November 1998.
Metallica snags its 11th Mainstream Rock Airplay leader and first since “All Within My Hands,” which crowned the ranking for four weeks in September 2020. In between “Hands” and “Lux,” the band reached No. 18 this August with the reserviced 1986 track “Master of Puppets,” following its synch in the fourth season of Netflix’s Stranger Things.
Metallica’s 11 No. 1s, which kicked off with “Until It Sleeps” in 1996, place the band in a three-way tie for sixth all time on Mainstream Rock Airplay, which began in 1981, alongside Disturbed and Foo Fighters. Shinedown leads all acts with 18 rulers.
Most No. 1s, Mainstream Rock Airplay
18, Shinedown
17, Three Days Grace
13, Five Finger Death Punch
13, Van Halen
12, Godsmack
11, Disturbed
11, Foo Fighters
11, Metallica
10, Tom Petty (solo and with the Heartbreakers)
10, Volbeat
Concurrently, “Lux” ranks at No. 2 for a second week on the all-rock-format, audience-based Rock & Alternative Airplay chart with 4.5 million audience impressions, according to Luminate. It also lifts 35-34 on Alternative Airplay.
“Lux” leads the multi-metric Hot Hard Rock Songs list for a second week. In addition to its radio airplay, the song scored 2.5 million official U.S. streams and sold 2,000 downloads in the Dec. 2-8 tracking week.
Metallica’s 11th studio album, 72 Seasons, is due April 14, 2023.
Welcome to Rockville announced the lineup for its 2023 festival on Wednesday (Dec. 14), including Slipknot, Tool, Avenged Sevenfold and Pantera.
Next year’s iteration of the hard rock festival will take place May 18 to May 21 at the Daytona International Speedway in Daytona Beach, Fla. Slipknot will headline the first day of the event with Rob Zombie, Queens of the Stone Age, Puscifer, Trivium, Bullet For My Valentine, Black Veil Brides and more are also on the roster.
Joining Avenged Sevenfold on day two will be Evanescence, Hardy, I Prevail, Motionless In White, Asking Alexandria and Sleeping with Sirens while Godsmack, Alice Cooper, Chevelle, Alter Bridge, Jason Bonham’s Led Zeppelin Evening, Knocked Loose and others will hit the stage on day three ahead of Pantera’s headlining set.
Finally, Tool will round out the headliners on day four with Deftones, Incubus, The Mars Volta and Coheed & Cambria also on the slate.
“We are so excited to be bringing this fantastic lineup to Welcome to Rockville,” said festival producer Danny Wimmer in a statement. “Our fans have been wanting Pantera and along with one of Avenged Sevenfold’s first live shows in five years, crowd favorite Slipknot, AND one of the greatest rock bands of all time, Tool, we are delivering a jam-packed weekend to the ‘The World Center of Rock.’ Can’t wait to see everyone in May!”
Both weekend passes and single-day tickets to Welcome to Rockville are now on sale to the general public via the festival’s official website. Layaway options are also available for attendees through the end of the year.
Check out Welcome to Rockville’s 2023 lineup announcement below.
Veteran Scottish punk band The Exploited have canceled their remaining 2022 tour dates following an onstage health incident that affected singer Wattie Buchan during a show in Bogota, Colombia on Saturday. “Yesterday, December 10th, 2022 during the end of the set Wattie collapsed on stage in Bogota, COL and was rushed into hospital by ambulance,” the band wrote in a Facebook post on Sunday.
“Thankfully Wattie is feeling better now and is resting in a hotel in Bogota… Due to doctor’s orders all remaining shows for 2022 have been cancelled, including tonight’s performance in Cali, COL,” the band continued, noting that they were preparing to return home to the UK while also offering an apology to fans and promoters for the sudden cancellation; the group’s planned show on Friday (Dec. 16) in London has also been scotched.
“We are sorry about this but Wattie is exhausted and told to cancel all upcoming gigs for this year,” they added alongside a video from the Bogota show in which Buchan, 65 — rocking his signature towering liberty spike hairstyle — is seen doubling over with his hands on his knees before collapsing to the stage and being attended to by stagehands. An Instagram post featured pictures of Buchan in the back of an ambulance with an oxygen tube in his nose.
Back in Feb. 2014, Buchan collapsed on stage during a show in Lisbon, Portugal after suffering a heart attack and was hospitalized in Belgium in 2017 after suffering a heart issue while on tour. A band spokesperson reportedly told Scottish broadcaster STV that, “Wattie had another suspected heart attack. He tried playing on but had to actually stop a couple of songs until he eventually collapsed. He got taken away to hospital in an ambulance but over 900 people refused to leave the venue until he heard he was alright. The Exploited are held as idols over here, and Wattie is seen as the king of punk. He has kept the punk movement alive when everyone in the press said it was dead. He is actually a living legend.”
Back in March 2020, the hard-touring band steadfastly refused to cancel their planned 40th anniversary tour in the midst of the then-exploding COVID-19 pandemic. “F–k coronavirus! I have had five heart attacks, a quad heart bypass and a heart pacemaker fitted,” Buchan told tour promoter DRW Entertainment, who shared the rocker’s thoughts in a Facebook post at the time. “Cancel gigs for a virus? We ain’t f–king Green Day — we are the real deal. No danger will we be canceling our upcoming gigs. Punk’s not dead!”
The beloved punks formed in Edinburgh in 1979 and released their full-length debut, Punks Not Dead, in 1981; Buchan is the sole remaining original member.
See the band’s post below.
Matty Healy showed off his affection for Phoebe Bridgers in a new social media post on Monday (Dec. 12).
In the Instagram photo, the frontman of The 1975 puckers up for a closed-eyed smooch on the lips with Bridgers as Bo Burnham stands behind the pair with his hands on each of their shoulders. “Gay Poets Society,” Healy captioned the post, referencing the 1989 classic Dead Poets Society starring Robin Williams, Ethan Hawke, Josh Charles and more.
Naturally, fans of both artists went crazy over the pic, with one commenting, “What was more culturally significant? The Renaissance… or this photo.” Another wrote, “Bold of you to assume dead poets society isn’t gay.”
“Why is this my 2021 Spotify wrapped,” a third added.
Several others made reference to Normal People‘s Paul Mescal, who’s been in a relationship with Bridgers since 2020. “PAUL MESCAL DO SOMETHING,” one follower hilariously wrote in all caps, while another commented, “The only thing that could make this better is if paul mescal was involved.”
This is hardly the first time Healy’s publicly locked lips with a fellow musician, either. At the end of November, he engaged in a brief but passionate onstage kiss his long time bandmate Ross MacDonald during The 1975’s concert at the Bill Graham Civic Auditorium in San Francisco. (“The luckiest girl in the world,” the bassist joked at the time, sharing the photo on his own Instagram feed.)
Meanwhile, Bridgers recently teamed up with SZA for their new collab “Ghost In the Machine” off the R&B star’s long-awaited sophomore album SOS.
Check out Healy and Bridgers’ Burnham-approved kiss on Instagram.
The pop-punk princess hit the road this year with Machine Gun Kelly, followed by a headlining trek and festival gigs. Below, she reflects on the experience and the current state of the genre.
There is so much that has happened this past year in the pop-punk scene, and I’m stoked to be making music. Being able to get back onstage has also been a lot of fun because I’ve been able to travel all over the world just this year through Canada, the United States, South America and Japan. The energy of a pop-punk show is really special, and it’s something that I found was missing in the last few years, and thankfully, it’s back.
I think a lot of the resurgence of pop-punk in general started when Machine Gun Kelly and Travis Barker teamed up for [MGK’s 2020 album] Tickets to My Downfall, and that album was so successful. It introduced and reintroduced emo and pop-punk music to the world again. Now we’re seeing the return of pop-punk everywhere in terms of sound and fashion, and it’s all the things it was but just in a different generation now, and I love it. Most importantly, there has been a return of live guitars and drums that pushed pop-punk into the forefront of mainstream music.
It was awesome being a part of the When We Were Young festival in Las Vegas and being able to connect with some of my friends that I’ve known my whole life, like All Time Low and Travis Clark from We the Kings. It was also incredible to see the pop-punk genre reconnected with its original audience and also reaching a newer, younger demographic. Afterward, Hayley Williams from Paramore wrote me a really kind letter, saying some really nice things and thanking me for paving the way for young women like her. That was so cool to read. And for anyone looking to join the pop-punk world in the future, I’d say to you, “Welcome to the scene. It’s a wild ride.”
This story originally appeared in the Dec. 10, 2022, issue of Billboard.
Pop-rock superstar Adam Lambert knows his way around a good cover. And on Tuesday (Dec. 13), the singer continued the trend with his latest ode to some ’80s rock icons.
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Lambert unveiled his cover of Duran Duran‘s 1993 hit single “Ordinary World,” in which the American Idol alum slows the track down to create am almost eerie version of the grief-stricken original track. Backed up by a smooth piano and some orchestral strings, Lambert carefully croons out the aching lyrics of the track, never going as far as emulating Simon Le Bon’s signature vocal, but paying homage all the same. Lambert is set to debut his live rendition of the song on Wednesday’s season 22 finale of The Voice.
The singer also announced that the new track was just a taste of what fans could expect off of his forthcoming sixth studio album, High Drama. Due out on Feb. 24 via BMG, the album is set to show off Lambert’s skillset as a cover artist, as he delivers his own versions of songs such as Bonnie Tyler’s “Holding Out for a Hero,” Sia’s “Chandelier,” Billie Eilish’s “Getting Older” and many more.
This is not the first song off of the upcoming project that Lambert has shared. Back in October, he released his rendition of the Noël Coward classic “Mad About the Boy” in tandem with a new documentary about the famed playwright and director, Mad About the Boy — The Noël Coward Story. Lambert’s version will appear as the final track on his new album.
Check out the video for Lambert’s “Ordinary World” cover above, and pre-order his new album High Drama here.