Rock
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Darius Rucker isn’t exactly feeling like a spring chicken after a recent onstage mishap at a Hootie & the Blowfish concert. As captured on video by a fan, the 58-year-old singer/songwriter took a tumble while performing with his band at Riverfront Revival in Charleston, South Carolina, on Saturday. In the middle of singing the opening […]
Robert’s Smith’s songwriting in The Cure has long focused squarely on melancholy and dark themes. But on the band’s long-awaited upcoming album, Songs of a Lost World (Nov. 1), he takes on a bit of real-life heartache that he said inspired him to pay tribute to his late brother. In a nearly two-hour interview with British journalist Matt Everitt — which can be unlocked by flipping to the album’s release date in Roman numerals here — Smith explains the origins of “I Can Never Say Goodbye.”
“I wrote this song a lot of different ways, until I hit on a very simple narrative of what actually happened on the night he died,” he said of the song dedicated to his late older brother, Richard, while also copping to the Cure’s songs always having an edge of the “fear of morality” in them. “It went all around the houses and I went everywhere with this song to sum up how I felt. In the end, it turned into a reasonably bleak little vignette.”
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The singer said he struggled to balance the “outpouring” of emotion he felt at the time with the need to write a coherent song, admitting that some earlier versions of the tune were “too overwrought” for general consumption. For the record, he loved them, but other people suggested they night be “too much.” In fact, when Smith, 65, performed “Goodbye” live on the Cure’s 2023 tour, he said he had trouble not going over the top and being overcome by emotion in concert.
Smith continued, “I wrote the song about it, and the music itself was what I wanted to breathe. I didn’t want the words to dominate the song, in a way that the music can become a backdrop to what you’re singing. In this, I think the music is more important than what I’m singing in a way. It’s a very difficult song to sing. People say ‘cathartic’ too much, but it was. It allowed me to deal with it, and I think it’s helped me enormously.”
Realizing he hasn’t got “that many more albums” in his future, Smith said he wanted his new songs to “mean something,” as opposed to some older Cure songs he said were not as personal. “On this album they all matter [to me],” he said of songs such as “I Can Never Say Goodbye,” which finds him singing, “Something wicked this way comes/ To steal away my brother’s life/ Something wicked this way comes/ I could never say goodbye.”
“When you’re younger, you romanticize [death], even without knowing it. Then it starts happening to your immediate family and friends and suddenly it’s a different thing. It’s something that I struggled with lyrically: how to put this into the songs? I feel like I am different person than I was when we last made an album. I wanted that to come through.”
Songs of a Lost World is the Cure’s long-awaited follow-up to 2008’s 4:13 Dream; so far the group has previewed the LP with the songs “A Fragile Thing,” as well as “Alone.”
Neil Young has made it clear he’s no fan of Donald Trump. The “Keep on Rockin’ in the Free World” guitar hero has threatened to sue twice impeached convicted felon Trump before for playing his songs at campaign rallies, and over the weekend Young made it clear that he does not want to give the former President a second chance in Washington.
“Kamala Harris — She is an honest forthright truth teller who is experienced in the White House, free from ambiguity or evasiveness, who goes straight to the point,” wrote Young on his Archives site on Friday about the sitting Vice President, who is less than a month away from possibly becoming the nation’s first female President.
“Clear headed, young enough to hold the office for a couple of bright future terms, Kamala Harris is a good person who is unafraid to take on criminals and uphold the law of the USA. She’s my candidate for the future of this country,” he continued.
Toronto-born Young, 78 — who became a naturalized American citizen in 2020 — has been very vocal about his disdain for Trump, who continues to peddle the false narrative that he won the 2020 election over President Joe Biden, while over the weekend hurling his latest insult at his opponent when he referred to former Senator and California Attorney General Harris as “retarded.”
“Kamala Harris will take on the billionaire class and make them pay their fair share of taxes,” Young concluded. “She will not owe them favors. She is a kind, considerate American. Cast your vote for a beautiful future for your family. Kamala Harris for President.”
After years of threatening to sue Trump for using his music at campaign rallies without permission, as well as penning a scathing open letter to the former reality TV star in which he referred to Trump as “a disgrace to my country,” Young’s endorsement is a double-down on his August decision to let Harris’ VP pic, Gov. Tim Walz, officially use his song “Rockin’ in the Free World” during campaign events.
Young joins a growing list of A-list stars who’ve stepped up to support Harris since she unexpectedly jumped into the race in July when President Biden agreed to not seek a second term. Among the artists proudly supporting Harris are: Beyoncé, Charli XCX, Billie Eilish, Barbra Streisand, Taylor Swift, Megan Thee Stallion, P!nk, Bon Iver, Bruce Springsteen, Olivia Rodrigo, Ariana Grande and many more.
In recent years, The Cure’s Robert Smith has been vocal about the shifting touring and ticket market. In 2023, the singer convinced Ticketmaster to give partial refunds to fans who had purchased tickets to their Songs Of A Lost World tour, hitting back at “unduly high” fees. For their U.S. run of dates, the band had kept the prices purposefully low to stay affordable, with some priced at $20, but the fees occasionally outstripped the value of the ticket.
In a new, lengthy interview, first published in the The Times, Smith has commented further on Ticketmaster’s practices and specifically their dynamic pricing model.
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“I was shocked by how much profit is made [by ticketing],” Smith said. “I thought, ‘We don’t need to make all this money.’ My fights with the label have all been about how we can price things lower. The only reason you’d charge more for a gig is if you were worried that it was the last time you would be able to sell a T-shirt.”
He continued: “But if you had the self-belief that you’re still going to be here in a year’s time, you’d want the show to be great so people come back. You don’t want to charge as much as the market will let you. If people save on the tickets, they buy beer or merch. There is goodwill, they will come back next time. It is a self-fulfilling good vibe and I don’t understand why more people don’t do it.”
“It was easy to set ticket prices, but you need to be pig-headed. We didn’t allow dynamic pricing because it’s a scam that would disappear if every artist said, ‘I don’t want that!’ But most artists hide behind management. “Oh, we didn’t know,” they say. They all know. If they say they do not, they’re either f–king stupid or lying. It’s just driven by greed.”
You can watch the full interview with Smith at The Cure’s website.
The Cure are releasing their first album in 16 years, Songs Of A Lost World, on Nov. 1 and the LP will be accompanied by a string of shows in London on release week. The band have shared two songs from the record so far, brooding opener “Alone” and “A Fragile Thing.”
Smith’s comments arrive not long after the controversial ticket sale for Oasis’ reunion tour in 2025. Dynamic pricing was used in the process for the band’s 19 stadium dates in the U.K. and Ireland, causing ticket prices to rise and fans forced to make quick decisions on prices that were higher than initially advertised.
The fallout and anger from fans prompted the U.K.’s Competition and Market Authority to investigate the use of the sale tactic. Oasis, who will be playing a run of shows next summer across the globe, distanced themselves from the dynamic pricing model and opted against using the method for their North American dates, which went on sale earlier this month.
Ticketmaster introduced the dynamic pricing scale in 2022 in a bid to help combat touts and the secondary ticket market. The company insists that bands and promoters set the ticket prices and that dynamic pricing is only used with approval by the artist’s team.
Liam Gallagher isn’t amused by Saturday Night Live‘s take on his tumultuous relationship with brother Noel.
The long-feuding Oasis siblings were portrayed by SNL cast members James Austin Johnson (Noel) and Sarah Sherman (Liam) during the “Weekend Update” segment of the long-running NBC sketch comedy show’s episode on Oct. 12.
In the sketch, “Weekend Update” host Colin Jost interviews the brothers about the North American leg of their 2025 Oasis reunion tour and whether they’ll break up before the launch.
“I’m cool if he’s cool,” Johnson’s Noel responds. “I’m cool, I’m cool, I’m cooler than you are,” Sherman’s Liam hits back. Unconvinced, Jost says, “Great. So, that’s a no.”
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The skit continues with Noel and Liam mostly bickering and answering questions with the lyrics of “Wonderwall,” while only agreeing on topics like cartoon characters, their favorite Sex in the City boyfriend, and the best Will Smith film.
Sherman’s Liam also claims their feud began at London’s Wembley Stadium in 1993 when Noel told the Spice Girls that his brother had a “crooked knob — you said me knob bended like Beckham!”
As expected, the real Liam Gallagher didn’t take too kindly to SNL‘s interpretation of his relationship with Noel. “Are they meant to be comedians,” he commented on X (formerly Twitter) early Sunday under a post linked to the skit.
Oasis announced their long-awaited reunion tour in late August. The global trek is scheduled to launch in September 2025 with multiple dates in the United Kingdom, followed by performances in North America, Europe, and Australia.
Oasis split in 2009 after years of massive chart success and tabloid headlines in the U.K. tied to the Gallagher siblings’ fierce rivalry, with main songwriter older brother Noel quitting the band after a backstage fight with Liam at a show near Paris that year. The brothers haven’t performed live since then, though they often play Oasis songs during their solo gigs and with their side bands and, until the reunion announcement, continued to snipe at each other online and in the press.
Watch SNL‘s “Weekend Update” with Oasis sketch below. For those without cable, the broadcast streams on Peacock, which you can sign up for at the link here. Having a Peacock account also gives fans access to previous SNL episodes.
Coldplay captures its fifth No. 1 album on the Billboard 200 chart, and first in over a decade, as Moon Music debuts atop the list (dated Oct. 19). The set launches with 120,000 equivalent album units earned, of which 106,000 are in traditional album sales. Both figures represent the biggest week, by units and album sales, for the group since 2015.
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Overall, Moon Music marks the 10th top 10-charting effort for the band. The act previously led the list with Ghost Stories (2014), Mylo Xyloto (2011), Viva La Vida or Death and All His Friends (2008) and X&Y (2005).
The Billboard 200 chart ranks the most popular albums of the week in the U.S. based on multi-metric consumption as measured in equivalent album units, compiled by Luminate. Units comprise album sales, track equivalent albums (TEA) and streaming equivalent albums (SEA). Each unit equals one album sale, or 10 individual tracks sold from an album, or 3,750 ad-supported or 1,250 paid/subscription on-demand official audio and video streams generated by songs from an album. The new Oct. 19, 2024-dated chart will be posted in full on Billboard‘s website on Tuesday (Oct. 15). For all chart news, follow @billboard and @billboardcharts on both X, formerly known as Twitter, and Instagram.
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Of Moon Music’s first-week units of 120,000, album sales comprise 106,000 (it’s the top-selling album of the week at No. 1 on Top Album Sales), SEA units comprise 13,000 (equaling 16.71 million on-demand official streams of the set’s songs) and TEA units comprise 1,000. The group last garnered a larger week, in either overall units or album sales, with the debut frame of 2015’s A Head Full of Dreams, which bowed with 210,000 units, of which 195,000 were in traditional album sales.
The new album’s opening-week sales were bolstered by its availability across at least eight vinyl variants (including two signed editions, and a Target edition with three bonus tracks) and in six CD variants (including a signed edition, and a “notebook edition” in collectible packaging with bonus voice notes) — all of which were manufactured with eco-friendly initiatives. The set was also available in at least four digital download variants. Of the digital editions, there were two versions that each included 10 bonus tracks each. Coldplay’s official webstore offered the download editions at a discount during release week.
The album’s vinyl sales total 29,000 for the week — Coldplay’s best sales week on vinyl ever.
The new album was preceded by the single “feelslikeimfallinginlove,” which reached No. 81 on the all-genre Billboard Hot 100 chart in July. It also reached the top 10 on Alternative Airplay and Adult Pop Airplay, the act’s 15th and 12th top 10 on those tallies, respectively.
The new album’s Oct. 4 release was ushered in with a flurry of media looks, including appearances and/or performances by the band or its frontman Chris Martin on CBS’ Sunday Morning (Sept. 29), QVC (Oct. 2), NBC’s The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon (Oct. 3), NBC’s Saturday Night Live (Oct. 5) and NBC’s Today (Oct. 8).
Notably, among British groups, Coldplay ties for the fourth-most No. 1 albums on the Billboard 200. Leading the pack are The Beatles, with 19 leaders. The Rolling Stones are second, with nine, while Led Zeppelin is third, with seven No. 1s. Coldplay, Pink Floyd and Wings (counting albums billed to either Wings, or Paul McCartney and Wings) are tied with five No. 1s each.
Sabrina Carpenter’s Short n’ Sweet falls a spot to No. 2 (with 93,000 equivalent album units; down 8%) after four nonconsecutive weeks atop the list. It’s No. 1 on the Top Streaming Albums chart for a sixth nonconsecutive week. Chappell Roan’s The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess dips 2-3 on the Billboard 200 (56,000; down 12%), Morgan Wallen’s chart-topping One Thing at a Time is a non-mover at No. 4 (50,000; down less than 1%), and Billie Eilish’s Hit Me Hard and Soft is stationary at No. 5 (50,000; up 1%).
Three former leaders are up next, with Taylor Swift’s The Tortured Poets Department rising one spot to No. 6 (45,000 equivalent album units; up 1%), Post Malone’s F-1 Trillion dips 6-7 (43,000; down 8%) and Future’s Mixtape Pluto falls 3-8 (40,000; down 28%).
Rounding out the top 10 are Noah Kahan’s Stick Season, descending 8-9 (37,000 equivalent album units; down 2%), and Wallen’s former No. 1 Dangerous: The Double Album, holding steady at No. 10 (32,000; down 2%).
Luminate, the independent data provider to the Billboard charts, completes a thorough review of all data submissions used in compiling the weekly chart rankings. Luminate reviews and authenticates data. In partnership with Billboard, data deemed suspicious or unverifiable is removed, using established criteria, before final chart calculations are made and published.
Stevie Nicks has made her triumphant return to Saturday Night Live. The iconic Fleetwood Mac frontwoman performed on the long-running NBC sketch comedy show for the first time in 41 years during the Ariana Grande-hosted episode on Oct. 12. Dressed in her usual all-black ensemble, the 76-year-old singer-songwriter opened with a powerful performance of her […]
A founding member of the experimental rock band Mr. Bungle was found guilty Friday (Oct. 11) of first-degree murder in the killing of his girlfriend after prosecutors in California found an audio file the victim recorded on her phone as she fought for her life.
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A jury in Santa Cruz deliberated for a day before finding Theobald “Theo” Lengyel guilty of first-degree murder in the killing of his girlfriend Alice “Alyx” Kamakaokalani Herrmann on the night of Dec. 4, 2023, inside her Capitola home, KSBW-TV reported. Lengyel faces life in prison and is set to be sentenced in November.
Lengyel, 55, was arrested in January after investigators found Herrmann’s remains in a wooded area of Tilden Regional Park in Berkeley. Herrmann was reported missing the previous month after she didn’t show up to a family gathering in Hawaii.
On Oct. 1, prosecutors played an audio recorded on Herrmann’s phone begging for her life as her boyfriend strangled her to death, KRON-TV reported.
It is unclear if Herrmann, 61, intentionally recorded the audio or if the app inadvertently recorded it.
District Attorney’s Office Inspector Steven Ryan testified that investigators did not discover the chilling audio file until Sept. 22, 2024, a month after Lengyel’s murder trial began.
The recording starts with Lengyel playing piano before growing angry at Herrmann because she doesn’t want to go out to play pool. Herrmann repeatedly says she does not want to go because she has to work in Berkeley the next day.
A few minutes into their argument, Lengyel can be heard threatening his girlfriend stating, “I could mash your f(asterisk)(asterisk)(asterisk)ing brain.”
According to prosecutors, the verbal argument escalated into a physical altercation. Herrmann could then be heard pleading for her life, gasping for air.
Lengyel left Mr. Bungle in 1996 after playing saxophone, clarinet and keyboards on several recordings, including the band’s self-titled 1991 debut album and Disco Volante in 1995. He did not participate in any of the band’s recent reunion tours, which began in 2020.
Mr. Bungle was formed in Northern California’s Humboldt County in 1985 by high school friends including guitarist Trey Spruance, bassist Trevor Dunn and vocalist Mike Patton, who went on to perform with Faith No More. Mr. Bungle experimented with funk, heavy metal, electronic, jazz and other musical styles, gaining popularity during the alternative rock boom of the 1990s.
In a 2005 Q&A, Dunn said Lengyel left the band on bad terms, SF Gate reported.
For the fourth straight week, the TikTok Billboard Top 50 chart has a new No. 1 — this time Yeah Yeah Yeahs’ “Maps,” which reigns on the Oct. 12-dated survey.
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The TikTok Billboard Top 50 is a weekly ranking of the most popular songs on TikTok in the United States based on creations, video views and user engagement. The latest chart reflects activity from Sept. 30-Oct. 6. Activity on TikTok is not included in Billboard charts except for the TikTok Billboard Top 50.
“Maps” rules the chart in its second week on the list, following a No. 20 debut on the Oct. 5 tally. Its rise is attributed to a recent trend using the song wherein creators use a filter to remove their facial features and then have them cascade back down onto their face, often with uncanny results.
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A previous, continuing trend that began in September also sets a sped-up version of “Maps” to a dance trend.
“Maps” peaked at No. 87 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 2004, and it appeared on the Yeah Yeah Yeahs’ debut album Fever to Tell in 2003. In the week ending Oct. 3, the song earned 1.5 million official U.S. streams, up 40%, according to Luminate.
“Maps” follows the reigns of Alphaville’s “Forever Young” (Oct. 5), BabyChiefDoit’s “Rollin’” (Sept. 28) and Surf Curse’s “Disco” (Sept. 21), which each ruled the TikTok Billboard Top 50 for one week.
NLE Choppa and 41’s “Or What” lifts one spot to rank at No. 2 on the Oct. 12 survey, followed by Alphaville’s “Forever Young,” which drops 1-3. “Or What” is mostly driven by lip-synching uploads to the 2024 song (it was released a month ago on Sept. 6), with the tune concurrently leaping 79% in official U.S. streams to 5.7 million in the week ending Oct. 3, begetting its No. 91 debut on the latest Hot 100.
The latest TikTok Billboard Top 50 is the first chart of the year to incorporate October data, and that can only mean one thing: the return of Girl in Red’s “We Fell in Love in October.” The song re-enters at No. 4, a new peak, after rising as high as No. 5 last October. The song trends on TikTok, as well as other platforms, every year around this time, sans any sort of dominating trend other than the changing of the month.
The top debut of the week belongs to J. Cole, whose “She Knows,” featuring Amber Coffman and The Cults, bows at No. 7. The 11-year-old song (it was released as part of the rapper’s album Born Sinner in 2013) is largely being used in content about the arrest of Sean “Diddy” Combs and allegations that he was involved in the deaths of multiple musicians (honing in on the lyric “Only bad thing ‘bout a star is they burn up/ Rest in peace to Aaliyah/ Rest in peace to Left Eye/ Michael Jackson, I’ll see ya/ Just as soon as I die” (other videos also bring Beyoncé into the fold, alleging she was aware of Diddy’s alleged crimes).
“She Knows,” which peaked at No. 90 on the Hot 100 in 2014, sports a 133% jump in streams to 2.8 million in the week ending Oct. 3.
A pair of Milli Vanilli songs also debut on the TikTok Billboard Top 50: “Blame It on the Rain” and “Girl I’m Gonna Miss You,” which start at Nos. 34 and 37, respectively. The songs’ rise on the chart runs concurrent with the duo’s catalog gaining in streams after multiple tunes’ synchs in Netflix’s Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story series, which was released on Sept. 19.
See the full TikTok Billboard Top 50 here. You can also tune in each Friday to SiriusXM’s TikTok Radio (channel 4) to hear the premiere of the chart’s top 10 countdown at 3 p.m. ET, with reruns heard throughout the week.
After 25 years, Disturbed still can’t shake The Sickness. The hard rockers announced on Thursday (Oct. 10) that they will embark on a 34-date North American tour celebrating the 25th anniversary of their 2000 debut album, on which they’ll perform the entire LP and a second set of greatest hits each night.
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The Live Nation-produced The Sickness 25th Anniversary Tour is slated to kick off in Nampa, ID on Feb. 25 and hit arenas in Denver, St. Louis, Minneapolis, Chicago, Detroit, Boston, Cincinnati, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Toronto, San Antonio, Seattle, San Francisco and Phoenix before winding down on May 17 at the MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas.
Three Days Grace and Sevendust will open the first half of the tour, with Daughtry and Nothing More doing the honors for the second half.
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The Sickness, which topped out at No. 29 on the Billboard 200 album chart and was certified five-times platinum, featured such fan favorites as “Down With the Sickness,” “Stupify” and “Voices.”
Ticket sales will kick off with an artist presale beginning Oct. 15 at 10 a.m. local time; fans can pre-register here. Additional pre-sales will take place throughout the next week before a general onsale begins at 10 a.m. local time on Oct. 18. Additional European/UK dates will be announced soon.
Earlier this year, the David Draiman-led band’s churning cover of Simon & Garfunkel’s “The Sound of Silence” passed the one billion mark on YouTube, marking their first entry into the Billion Views Club.
Check out the dates for Disturbed’s The Sickness 25th Anniversary Tour below:
Feb. 25 — Nampa, ID @ Ford Idaho Center Arena*Feb. 27 — Denver, CO @ Ball Arena*March 2 — St. Louis, MO @ Enterprise Center*March 4 — Milwaukee, WI @ Fiserv Forum*March 6 — Minneapolis, MN @ Target Center*March 8 — Chicago, IL @ United Center*March 10 — Detroit, MI @ Little Caesars Arena*March 12 — Louisville, KY @ KFC Yum! Center*March 14 — Boston, MA @ TD Garden*March 17 — Washington, DC @ Capital One Arena*March 19 — Montreal, QC @ Centre Bell*March 21 — New York, NY @ Madison Square Garden*March 29 — Cincinnati, OH @ Heritage Bank Center^March 31 — Cleveland, OH @ Rocket Mortgage FieldHouse^April 2 — Philadelphia, PA @ Wells Fargo Center^April 4 — Buffalo, NY @ KeyBank Center^April 5 — Pittsburgh, PA @ PPG Paints Arena^April 7 — Toronto, ON @ Scotiabank Arena^April 9 — Indianapolis, IN @ Gainbridge Fieldhouse^April 12 — Charlotte, NC @ Spectrum Center^April 14 — Raleigh, NC @ Lenovo Center^April 16 — Birmingham, AL @ Legacy Arena at The BJCC^April 18 — Sunrise, FL @ Amerant Bank Arena^April 23 — Duluth, GA @ Gas South Arena^April 25 — San Antonio, TX @ Front Bank Center^April 26 — Fort Worth, TX @ Dickies Arena^April 28 — Oklahoma City, OK @ Paycom Center^May 5 — Seattle, WA @ Climate Pledge Arena^May 7 — Portland, OR @ Moda Center^May 9 — Sacramento, CA @ Golden 1 Center^May 10 — San Francisco, CA @ Chase Center^May 13 — Inglewood, CA @ Kia Forum^May 15 — Phoenix, AZ @ Footprint Center^May 17 — Las Vegas, NV @ MGM Grand Garden Arena^
*with special guests Three Days Grace and opener Sevendust^with special guests Daughtry and opener Nothing More