Rock
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Beyoncé‘s country era is only just beginning, but some fans are already convinced they know which musical direction the superstar will take next: rock. Less than two weeks after Bey became the first Black woman to top the Hot Country Songs chart with her new single “Texas Hold ‘Em,” a fan theory that the singer […]
Pearl Jam’s “Dark Matter” becomes the band’s first leader on Billboard’s Hot Hard Rock Songs chart, rising to No. 1 from No. 3 on the survey dated March 2. In the Feb. 16-22 tracking week, the first full tracking frame for “Dark Matter,” which was released Feb. 13, the song accumulated 5.6 million radio audience […]
Twenty One Pilots officially announced the Clancy era on Thursday (Feb. 29). The quadrennial quirk of the calendar was the perfect time to reveal that the final chapter in the Blurryface saga will unfold when the Columbus, Ohio duo’s seventh album drops on May 17.
Before releasing the video for first single “Overcompensate,” singer/guitarist Tyler Joseph and drummer Josh Dun shared the album’s fiery artwork earlier in the day, in which the pair stand amid a field of licking flames, with the title situated vertically over Joseph’s balaclava-obscured face.
The “Overcompensate” visual opens with a hovering shot of an ocean before a glitchy woman’s voice and insistent keyboard thrum bubble up over a map of the fictional land of Trench. The drone-like shot then flies above a barren-looking island before dropping into Dema as an ominous voice croaks, “welcome back to Trench.”
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The scene switches to an empty arena bathed in blood-red light, with Dun in the middle of the floor playing the song’s thundering beat as a masked Joseph materializes to sing to a room full of grim-faced young people in grey sweatsuits. With the beat slowing down, Joseph breaks into his familiar rap cadence, “Earned my stripes/ Three hundreds tracks in my Adidas jacket/ Bless your ear holes while you react/ Acting gobsmacked don’t hesitate to maybe overcompensate/ I feel like I was just here/ Same twitching in my eyes,” before singing the melodic chorus, “I fly by the dangerous bend symbol/ Don’t hesitate to maybe overcompensate/ And then by the time I catch in my peripheral/ Don’t hesitate to maybe overcompensate.”
Climbing to a high point in a pulpit-like spot — not unlike the platform Joseph often scrambles onto during the band’s arena shows — the singer then reveals “I am Clancy,” pulling open his jacket to reveal suspenders with rune-like letters running down them horizontally. Near the end of the clip, the audience shuffles out and Dun and Tyler move to the front of a classroom while a series of mysterious symbols, maps and legends are projected onto their faces. It ends, of course, with yet another unexplained image: a glowing-eyed Clancy dressed all in black holding up a pair of animal horns before slyly smiling at the camera.
Because 21P’s knotty world building is jammed with more Easter eggs than a Taylor Swift concert, eagle-eyed fans noted that the Clancy release date is exactly nine years to the day after the 2015 drop of the first album in the sprawling Blurryface saga. Last week the band began the roll-out of the new album’s story via the four-minute video “I Am Clancy” recap video, which served as a catch-up on the story of the allegorical walled city of Dema, the rebel Banditos outlaw group and the story’s villain, the red-robed Nice, aka Blurryface.
The upcoming album is posited as the final entry in the long-running story that began on the group’s 2015 breakthrough Blurryface album, and then continued on 2018’s Trench and 2021’s Scaled and Icy. The news was accompanied by what appears to be the color theme of the Clancy album, red tape, which was spotted over the digital covers of the band’s albums on streaming services. The Blurryface story kicked off with a red and black color scheme before pivoting to yellow for Trench.
Check out the Clancy album cover and “Overcompensate” video below.
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A week after scoring a splashy debut at No. 11 on the TikTok Billboard Top 50 chart, Djo’s “End of Beginning” vaults to No. 1 on the March 2-dated survey.
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 Feb. 19-25. Activity on TikTok is not included in Billboard charts except for the TikTok Billboard Top 50. Titles that are part of Universal Music Group’s catalog are currently unavailable on TikTok.
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“End of Beginning,” as previously reported, encompasses a TikTok trend that largely centers on Chicago, which is mentioned prominently in the 2022 song’s lyrics. The line “And when I’m back in Chicago, I feel it/ Another version of me, I was in it” soundtracks footage of the city, people discussing their time there or even users pining for similar experiences in other cities.
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A more recent trend featuring “End of Beginning” is a photo montage with the prompt “If I won the lottery I wouldn’t tell anyone, but there’d be signs,” showing off how their life would change after winning the cash. While the Chicago-specific trend kicked off the song’s TikTok rise, the latest theme helped drive the track to an explosion on the platform – and subsequently on audio and video streaming services – that begets its jump to No. 1.
Concurrently, “End of Beginning” becomes Djo’s (real name Joe Keery, known also as an actor on Stranger Things, Fargo and more) first appearance on the Billboard Hot 100, bowing at No. 51. It accumulated 8.4 million official U.S. streams Feb. 16-22, a 194% jump, according to Luminate. Those streams also drive it to No. 2 on Alternative Streaming Songs.
“End of Beginning” takes over No. 1 on the TikTok Billboard Top 50 from Bobby Caldwell’s “What You Won’t Do for Love,” which falls to No. 2 after one week atop the tally. The trend for the 1978 song, which peaked at No. 9 on the Hot 100 in its time, continues, though; as noted toward the Feb. 24 ranking, creators are most often using the song to supplement footage of different food items and dishes, including chocolate-covered strawberries, while others zoom in on pets or significant others. The song jumped another 15% in official U.S. streams Feb. 16-22 to 1.8 million.
The week’s top debut is one spot below at No. 3: Glee cast’s version of “Rose’s Turn,” a song originally written for the musical Gypsy. The tune’s opening line “All that work and what did it get me? Why did I do it?” is used as creators lament trying hard to accomplish something, only for it to be all for naught.
Beyonce’s “Texas Hold ‘Em,” concurrently the week’s No. 1 song on the Hot 100, continues its ascent on the TikTok Billboard Top 50, leaping from No. 13 to No. 4, while one of its closest competitors on the Hot 100, Ye (formerly Kanye West) and Ty Dolla $ign’s “Carnival,” starts at No. 5.
While uploads for “Texas Hold ‘Em” remain largely rooted in a dance trend to the country tune, “Carnival” is being used in a variety of ways, from usages in general viral clips to creators reacting to the track, considered to be the runaway hit from Ye and Ty Dolla $ign’s No. 1 album Vultures 1.
Both “Texas Hold ‘Em” and “Carnival” rise in official U.S. streams Feb. 16-22, the former up 51% to 29 million streams and the latter jumping 5% to 24.6 million.
Cat Janice‘s “Dance You Outta My Head” ranks at No. 6; the chart’s latest tracking week came prior to the 31-year-old singer’s Feb. 28 death from sarcoma; she debuted the song while in hospice as her final release.
One other song debuts in the TikTok Billboard Top 50’s top 10: Armando Trovajoli’s “L’amore Dice Ciao,” the “slow take” version of which bows at No. 8. The instrumental track from the Italian pianist and composer is mostly utilized in a trend soundtracking animation to the prompt “Do you think you would be my [fill in the blank] in every universe?” – often friend, mother, sibling, etc. – with the response “I hope we are,” showing the users in multiple forms.
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.
The final day of February arrives with an abundance of blessings from St. Vincent. In addition to sharing a new song and music video titled “Broken Man” Thursday (Feb. 29), the singer-songwriter born Annie Clark also announced that her next album, All Born Screaming, is set to arrive this spring. Set over sharp-edged electric guitar […]
Stevie Nicks is joining the already power-packed lineup for this summer’s BST Hyde Park concert series in London. The Fleetwood Mac singer and solo star was announced as the headliner for the July 12 concert in Hyde Park, joining a roster of shows that already includes BST gigs by Kings of Leon, Kylie Minogue, the […]
Fans will finally get to see Paul Simon dive into his songwriting legacy and the high points of his nearly seven-decade career in music when the biopic In Restless Dreams: The Music of Paul Simon hits streaming next month.
“People used to say, ‘Oh, you have your finger on the pulse,’” Simon says in voiceover in the 90-second trailer for the “definitive” musical doc chronicling the 82-year-old singer’s legendary career; the film premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival last year and will bow as a two-part series on MGM+ on March 17 and 24. “No, I don’t have my finger on the pulse… I just have my finger out there and the pulse is running under,” Simon says.
In addition to taking viewers behind the scenes of the making of Simon’s 2023 album Seven Psalms, the Alex Gibney-directed doc promises to includes never-before-seen footage from throughout Simon’s storied career, from his days in Simon & Garfunkel to the global success of his landmark 1986 world music album Graceland.
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The opening montage says it all, bouncing from footage of a fresh-faced Simon at the beginning of his career in the mid-1950s, to his historical free 1981 Concert in Central Park benefit show with former partner Art Garfunkel for 500,000 and the sessions for the meditative Psalms song cycle.
“I’ve never wanted to be anything other than a singer and songwriter,” says Simon, author of such indelible hits as “Homeward Bound,” “The Sound of Silence,” “Mrs. Robinson,” “Me and Julio Down by the Schoolyard,” “Loves Me Like a Rock” and the South Africa-inspired Graceland, which won the 1987 Grammy for album of the year.
His collaboration with Garfunkel — which began when they were teenagers performing as Tom & Jerry — spawned dozens of hits and classic albums during the 1960s until their acrimonious split in 1970. The pair reunited several times over the next three decades for one-off shows and a 1993 world tour, though they would never again record a full album together.
“Artie, that was a good friendship,” he says lovingly about Garfunkel in the trailer. “We thought we should express what our generation felt.”
Watch the trailer for In Restless Dreams below.
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It was never a phase, mom! Especially for Jimmy Butler. The NBA star appears in the new music video for Fall Out Boy’s “So Much (For) Stardust” released on Wednesday (Feb. 28), bringing back his viral “emo” hairstyle, featuring straightened locks in long bangs across his face, which he originally debuted last October for the […]
It was just a typical night in Islington, U.K. on Tuesday (Feb. 27), with the lead singer of stadium-filling Rock and Roll Hall of Famers Green Day, Billie Joe Armstrong, taking the stage at the 600-capacity venue The Garage with his side-project covers band, The Coverups.
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And while that was thrilling enough for the lucky fans who scored tickets, in addition to ripping through such classics as “A Million Miles Away” (Plimsouls), “I Wanna Be Sedated” (Ramones), “Ready Steady Go” (Generation X), “I Think We’re Alone Now” (Tommy James & the Shondells) and other favorites by Bryan Adams, the Pretenders, the Crickets, Buzzcocks and the Clash, Armstrong had one more trick up his sleeve.
“Ladies and gentlemen, Courtney Love,” Armstrong said halfway through the show according to fan video of the moment the Hole singer unexpectedly took the stage. “Thank you, Billie Joe. My name is Courtney Love – you may not remember me. I’ve been living in a cave in Birmingham for about nine years. We’ll give this a f–king try, right?”
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Love then crashed through revved-up takes on Cheap Trick’s 1977 power pop classic “He’s a Whore” and the 1979 Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers tune “Even the Losers” and, according to NME, came back for an encore of Cheap Trick’s iconic “Surrender.”
The show also included Armstrong and company’s takes on David Bowie’s “Ziggy Stardust,” Nirvana’s “Drain You” and the Strokes’ “Last Nite,” as well as a run through the Green Day singer’s side project The Longshot’s 2018 song “Love is For Losers.”
Love has kept a low musical profile since the 2010 release of the Hole album Nobody’s Daughter, which was followed by a series of one-off singles including “You Know My Name” and “Mother.” In Oct. 2023, Love teased tracks from what she said was the imminent follow-up to her first official solo album, 2004’s America’s Sweetheart; at press time she had not provided an update on a release date for that project.
Check out some footage of Love’s surprise appearance and other tracks from Coverups’ show below.
Perry Farrell is of two minds regarding the second Rock & Roll Hall of Fame nomination for Jane’s Addiction.
“I would like the world to view Jane’s in the same light as the greats, but that’s as far as it goes,” he tells Billboard in the midst of the Horns, Thorns en Halos Farewell Tour by Porno For Pyros, his other band with Jane’s drummer Stephen Perkins. “I don’t really get off on trophies. I’ve always kind of felt like I’m on my own island. It’s nice of them to consider me, (but) I’m not so sure I belong there.”
A vanguard of the alternative rock scene, Jane’s Addiction was previously nominated for the Rock Hall in 2017. The on-and-off group’s fourth and most recent studio album, The Great Escape Artist, was released during 2011, and it’s released two live albums since, in 2013 and 2017. A non-album single, “Another Soulmate,” came out in 2013. The group toured during 2022 and 2023 with original bassist Eric Avery back in the lineup but not guitarist Dave Navarro, who was struggling with effects from long COVID. The group has reportedly been in the studio working on new material as well.
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Asked if he wants people to vote for him, Farrell, a co-creator of Lollapalooza, responded, “That’s up to you. If you’re gonna do it, check off Cher’s box, too.” He also voiced support for an eventual induction for the MC5, which has been nominated six times. Jane’s currently ranks 12th in the fan voting for the Rock Hall. Public votes can be cast via vote.rockhall.com.
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Rock Hall concerns are currently taking a back seat while Farrell and Perkins criss-cross the country with Porno For Pyros — including original guitarist Peter DiStefano but with Mike Watt subbing for Martyn LeNoble.
“We are just playing elegant, gnarly, unpredictable punk-jazz,” Farrell says of the shows, which are mixing songs from the band’s two studio albums with the recently released “Agua” and “Little ME” and occasional covers. “We’re getting the job done by spreading a good message. I think we’re getting to spread a message that I think the world sorely needs right now — not tomorrow. When we go out and play Porno, I feel like we’re able to relate and inspire people through music. It’s the nicest experience that can happen to you.”
Farrell adds that despite the tour’s name this may not be the last we see of Porno For Pyros. “It really depends on what goes down,” he says. “If we all enjoy each other’s, not just company but each other’s musicianship, how we are playing on stage…. That’s the most important thing. I see Porno as a project. I have projects that I do in my life. Porno’s a very important one. I would never say never.”