On Thursday (Aug. 4) morning, country music trio Lady A announced they would be postponing the remainder of their “Request Line Tour” in support of guitarist Charles Kelley’s “journey to sobriety.” “We have decided to postpone our Request Line Tour until next year,” the group — which also includes Hillary Scott, and Dave Haywood —
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Live Nation posted solid results in its second quarter earnings report, with a 40% increase in revenue over the same period in 2019 to $4.4 billion, an 86% increase in operating income to $319 million, and a 50% increase in adjusted operating income $480 million. Perhaps most significantly, “We have sold over 100 million tickets
Lex Borrero, the co-founder of Interscope’s Neon16 label, has made his own seat at the table — and brought a full plate. As a teen, Borrero understood the importance of networking. After hundreds of unanswered cold calls, he eventually caught the attention of Universal Music and signed his first artist under his shingle Lex Prods.
Today (Aug. 4), the Black Music Action Coalition (BMAC) revealed honorees for its second annual Music in Action Awards Gala on Sept. 22 at the Beverly Hilton Hotel. Jon “Big Jon” Platt, chairman and CEO of Sony Music Publishing (pictured at left), will be receiving the Clarence Avant Trailblazer award. Kevin Liles, CEO of 300
Johnny Depp and Jeff Beck have been accused of lifting lyrics for their song “Sad Motherfuckin’ Parade” from an obscure “toast” sung by an incarcerated man and documented and released by a folklorist in 1974, according to a report in Rolling Stone. A large number of lyrics of the Depp/Beck song “18” are strikingly similar
The red-hot music rights space has a major new entrant in Litmus Music, which is being launched by veteran music executives Hank Forsyth (pictured at left) and Dan McCarroll (right) with $500 million of funding in partnership with Carlyle Global Credit, Variety can reveal. Litmus will acquire and manage music rights in both recorded music
Samson lead singer and heavy metal pioneer Nicky Moore has died (pictured above, far left). He was believed to be in his 70s. Moore’s death was confirmed on his official Facebook page, which said he died on Wednesday morning. According to rock website Louder, he had been living with Parkinson’s Disease. “It is with immense
Peter Shapiro is a concert promoter, venue owner, magazine publisher and has just added author to his resume, with the Aug. 2 release of his book “The Music Never Stops: What Putting on 10,000 Shows Has Taught Me About Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Magic” (written with Dean Budnick). Based on 50 pivotal shows
Beyoncé’s “Renaissance” is expected to debut at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 albums chart (knocking out Bad Bunny’s seven-week stint with “Un Verano Sin Ti”), marking one of the biggest opening weeks of the year. Should it enter atop the chart, “Renaissance” will be the first album recorded by a woman in 2022 to
Taron Egerton knows about fame — especially after the attention he received for his award-winning work as Elton John in 2019’s “Rocketman.” But Egerton never felt as popular as he did on July 23 when Britney Spears posted videos on her Instagram of them together in London. “I felt very, very, very famous for a
Decades ago, during the early part of my 29-year tenure at Warner Bros. Records (when it still had the “Bros” in the name), I thought about what would happen if we ever lost Mo Ostin. I admit it was a dark thought but even then I knew that the company was something special in the
Beyoncé’s “Renaissance” has undergone a few post-release cosmetic changes. On Wednesday morning, Variety editors confirmed that Kelis’ “Milkshake” sample can no longer be heard on the track on Spotify — although the sample still remains on Apple Music. Given that many fans on social media expressed confusion as to what the sample actually was, popular
Columbia Records has signed Eurovision star Rosa Linn (pictured), who represented Armenia in the 2022 global song competition. Linn joins a roster that includes global acts like BTS, Harry Styles, Lil Nas X and Adele, among many others. A sped-up version of her breakout single “Snap” recently enjoyed a viral moment on TikTok and led
Demi Lovato has provided some context as to why she’s decided to update her pronouns to now include she/her in addition to they/them. In an interview that premiered Aug. 1 on the “Spout Podcast,” Lovato said, “I’ve actually adopted the pronouns of she/her again” and went on to explain that the decision behind the change
King Princess’s sophomore album “Hold On, Baby” closes with the ’90s rock-inspired “Let Us Die” — a four-minute track that features some of the last bits of drumming from Taylor Hawkins, who died unexpectedly while on tour with the Foo Fighters in March. In an interview with Glamour, the 23-year-old singer-songwriter says the collaboration, “was
The War On Drugs has signed with John Silva’s Silva Artist Management, Variety has learned. Until this spring, the Philadelphia-reared rock act had been represented for more than a decade by Fort William Artist Management co-founder Ami Spishock. After two EPs and three studio albums on Secretly Canadian, including the 2014 breakthrough “Lost in the
Rapper Blueface and his girlfriend, Chrisean Rock, were captured on video getting into a physical fight on the streets of Hollywood early Tuesday morning. A source within the Los Angeles Police Department confirms the station has started a preliminary investigation into the altercation but have yet to verify the identities of the couple, as they
One of the wonders of music streaming is its borderlessness. Back in the day, a person might never hear, let alone purchase, music outside their country or comfort zone if they didn’t happen to wander into that area of a record store or radio dial. But streaming has midwifed seemingly unlikely genre collisions like hip-hop
Oscar-nominated songwriting legend Diane Warren made an enemy out of Beyoncé’s legions of fans after questioning why one of the singer’s new songs off her “Renaissance” album has over 20 credited writers. Warren did not mention Beyoncé in her initial tweets but wrote: “How can there be 24 writers on a song?…This isn’t meant as
Bad Bunny’s “Un Verano Sin Ti” has extended its No. 1 run on the Billboard 200 album chart, notching a seventh nonconsecutive week in the top spot. Since its debut in May, the set has not fallen below No. 2 — although, it’s possible Beyoncé’s July 29 debut of “Renaissance” may disrupt the reign, seeing
Dave Grohl will be making an appearance as the fourth member of James Gang — with Joe Walsh on vocals and guitar, drummer Jim Fox and bassist Dale Peters — marking the first time the band has played together in over 15 years. The performance, dubbed “One Last Ride,” was announced early Monday morning as
On his second album, “Wasteland” — which debuted at No. 2 on the Billboard 200, on the strength of 107 million on-demand streams, or 81,000 units in stream equivalent albums — Brent Faiyaz leans into his own dichotomy. He plays the charming romantic, as well as the toxic villain, embracing two of the labels that
That pose that Amanda Shires strikes on the cover of “Take It Like a Man” — is it the look of allure, or alarm? Even after some time spent with the record therein, it still seems like it could be either. The singer-songwriter-violinist kicks off her seventh solo release with “Hawk for the Dove,” about
Mo Ostin, who presided as a top executive at Warner Bros.-Reprise Records for more than three decades, during which the artist-friendly company enjoyed a glittering, hit-making run, has died of natural causes. He was 95. In 1960, Ostin was hired away from Norman Granz’s imprint Verve Records by Frank Sinatra, who, while he failed to
Travis Scott will return to the stage as a headliner next month. Today (Aug. 1), the rapper announced plans for a Las Vegas nightclub residency — a string of seven shows total — under the banner “Road to Utopia” that will take place at the Zouk Nightclub at Resorts World starting on Sept. 17. “From
Drake has postponed tonight’s Young Money Reunion show, the last installment of his three-day event dubbed “October World Weekend,” which was to be held t Toronto’s History. On Monday (Aug. 1) — the day of the scheduled event — the rapper posted an explanation on his Instagram stories sharing that he has tested positive for
Six years after the release of Beyoncé’s magnum opus “Lemonade,” the pop icon has come through again: giving us all something to talk about. The long-anticipated “Renaissance” (volume one of three) is sticky, sweaty, hedonistic art — flanked by a pastiche of genres that never lingers on long enough for the listener to get too
Cyndi Lauper has signed on for a recurring guest role in the upcoming Amazon series “The Horror of Dolores Roach,” Variety has learned exclusively. Lauper will appear in the show opposite previously announced lead Justina Machado as well as cast members Alejandro Hernandez, Kita Updike, K. Todd Freeman, Marc Maron, Jean Yoon, Judy Reyes, and Jeffery
Beyoncé’s seventh studio album “Renaissance” debuted July 29 to universal acclaim, but one lyric in the song “Heated” left many listeners outraged on social media. The song includes the word “spaz” during a verse in which Beyonce sings: “Spazzin’ on that ass, spazz on that ass.” In the medical field, “spastic” refers to a disability
Jay Chou likes to think big. His latest music release, “Greatest Works of Art,” is not just the Mando-pop king’s first full-length album after a six-year hiatus. The album’s elaborate, international production of its eponymous first single and the accompanying music video, features the “cameos” of some of the biggest names in art history. It