Innholdsfortegnelse for May 11, 2019 i Billboard Magazine

Latin Music Week LAS VEGAS, APRIL 22-25 PHOTOGRAPHED BY GIZELLE HERNANDEZ THE 2019 BILLBOARD LATIN MUSIC CONFERENCE TOOK over The Venetian in Las Vegas April 22-25, bringing icons, rising stars, executives, insiders and influencers together to discuss Latin music’s ongoing mainstream ascent and future endeavors. Ozuna explained why he pushed back his upcoming album, Wisin & Yandel opened up about their five-year hiatus, and the Rivera family revealed an upcoming tour to honor the late Jenni. On the business side, Nielsen Music industry insights and analytics senior vp David Bakula unveiled encouraging stats on Hispanic consumers’ streaming habits, PR pros got candid about damage-control tips, and BMI brought its “How I Wrote That Song” panel. It all culminated in the Billboard Latin Music Awards on April 25 at the…

How do you use streaming in your daily life? I use it a lot when I work out or when I’m in the car. I’m always trying to up my own bar, and that only happens when you’re a sponge to the giant world of music. But I still believe in purchasing music. I buy albums on iTunes and don’t just stream them. That’s the healthiest way to tell an artist that you’re a fan. GIRL set the record for the largest debut-week streaming sum for a country album by a woman, with 23.96 million on-demand U.S. streams, according to Nielsen Music. How did you work with platforms on the rollout? It’s not just about a sponsored post or tweet. It’s about working with these teams and thinking, “How…

LIKE MOST MUSIC LOVERS UNDER 40, Tierra Whack can count the CDs she owns on one hand: The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill, 50 Cent’s Get Rich or Die Tryin’ and Missy Elliott’s Under Construction and Supa Dupa Fly. She spends most of her time on a bevy of streaming services or listening to a giant playlist of 5,000 of her favorite old-school hip-hop and R&B songs. Still, she would like to release a CD of her own someday. “I think everyone should,” says the 23-year-old Philadelphia native. “A hard copy? It’s fire. People want vinyl and cassette tapes — it’s just cool to be able to touch it and feel it.” When she first got Apple Music, says Whack, “I was like, ‘All right, I’m going to try to…

This year marked the 15th anniversary of Allen’s company, MAC Presents, which has staked out its place at “the intersection [of] gaming, technology, fashion, food and music,” she says. “We do everything from brand partnerships and strategy work to social media, activations, experiential events, production and more.” Most recently, she and her small team — comprising “90% women” — have achieved hip-hop branding coups like Valee’s partnership with Adidas, Travis Scott’s Postmates sponsorship for his Astroworld — Wish You Were Here Tour and MadeinTYO’s Fresh Faces deal with Sprite. Allen has ongoing projects with brands that include Citi, Swisher Sweets, Uber and Brooklyn’s Kings Theatre. She helped steer Khalid’s mainstream breakthrough via partnerships with Forever 21, AT&T and Uber/Uber Eats, as well as an expansive deal with Hollister that…

Helping brands connect with fans attending over 100 Live Nation festivals worldwide, Ford, 54, and her team drove festival sponsorship for the world’s leading live-entertainment company by 13% in 2018. She’s a leader at the Live Nation division that, under global president of media and sponsorship Russell Wallach (see page 52), gives marketers the means to reach some 93 million fans (up 8% from 2017) at Live Nation concerts and festivals. Ford achieved that growth through new deals with Nissan, Subway, American Eagle, Pantene, Sterling Wine and Sony, among others, by using a powerful new tool to strike those partnerships: Live Nation’s global consumer study, “The Power of Live.” The project, which surveyed 22,500 fans in 11 countries across five continents, produced a number of key insights, among them…

Thrones, Avengers, Dolls Arrive A trio of albums from the worlds of TV and film arrives on the Billboard 200, led by For the Throne: Music Inspired by the HBO Series Game of Thrones at No. 37. The strictly inspired-by set (no songs on the album are in the TV show) starts with 15,000 equivalent album units earned in the week ending May 2, according to Nielsen Music. Of that sum, 4,000 were album sales, while track-equivalent album units comprised 2,000 and streaming-equivalent album units totaled 9,000. The compilation features new material from Mumford & Sons and The Lumineers, plus the all-star collaboration “Power Is Power” by SZA, The Weeknd and Travis Scott. At No. 88 on the Billboard 200, the score soundtrack to blockbuster Marvel action film Avengers:…

Rice Chases First No. 1 Chase Rice (above) earns his first Country Airplay chart-topper as “Eyes on You” increases by 6% to 38.5 million audience impressions, according to Nielsen Music. He notched two prior top 10s — “Ready Set Roll” (No. 5 in 2014) and “Gonna Wanna Tonight” (No. 2, 2015) — after co-writing Florida Georgia Line’s debut smash, “Cruise,” which reigned for three weeks in 2012 and led Hot Country Songs (which combines airplay/streaming/sales data) for 24 frames. Dylan Scott’s EP Nothing To Do Town arrives at No. 3 on Top Country Albums with 13,000 equivalent album units, marking his highest rank and top consumption week. With 10,000 in traditional album sales, the set opens atop Country Album Sales as Scott scores his first No. 1 on the…

Farruko’s Fifth Top 10 Gangalee by Farruko (above) pops in at No. 2 on Top Latin Albums and Latin Rhythm Albums with 10,000 equivalent album units earned in the week ending May 2, according to Nielsen Music. His seventh studio effort marks his fifth consecutive top 10 on the former chart and his seventh straight one on the latter. Gangalee scores the third-biggest debut week for a Latin set released in 2019. It follows Romeo Santos’ Utopía (24,000 units; April 20) and Luis Fonsi’s Vida (22,000; Feb. 16). A little under 1,000 of Gangalee’s opening-unit sum were album sales. The bulk of its units were attributed to streaming activity: It registered 9,000 in streaming-equivalent album units (translating to 12 million on-demand audio streams for the set’s songs). Two Gangalee…

LIL DICKY HAS ALWAYS RELEASED music at a glacial place — one increasingly at odds with today’s flood-the-market model. “I’m not an infinite-good-ideas guy,” says the comedic rapper born Dave Burd, who in the past four years has released only a pair of songs. “I have, like, 10 good ideas every two years. So I want to make them count.” But with “Earth,” the shaggy-haired MC took his exacting methods to a new extreme. The star-studded single took more than three years to complete and made headlines for its absurdist animated video that finds nearly every major pop star on the planet voicing a different animal (Justin Bieber as a baboon, Ariana Grande as a zebra, Halsey as a lion cub, Ed Sheeran as a koala). “I’ve never worked…

KATY PERRY BROUGHT SNACKS — A clear plastic bag of chips and Pedialyte, to be precise. It’s the second day of Coachella’s first weekend, and Perry is huddled among a rarefied group of festivalgoers at the Outdoor Theatre. There’s Perry’s fiancé, actor Orlando Bloom; Late Late Show host James Corden; omnipresent DJ-producer Diplo; Apple CEO Tim Cook; and Apple Music global creative director/Beats 1 host Zane Lowe, plus much of Interscope Records’ staff. The only person missing is the star they’ve all come to see: Billie Eilish. Two weeks earlier, Eilish — the 17-year-old singer-songwriter who has been pronounced everything from a prodigy to the future of pop — dropped her debut album, When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go? It immediately shot to No. 1 on…

LAST DECEMBER, UNIVERSAL MUSIC GROUP announced that Queen’s 1975 single “Bohemian Rhapsody” had become the 20th century’s most streamed song, with over 1.6 billion global streams at the time. Since frontman Freddie Mercury’s death in 1991, surviving members Brian May and Roger Taylor, along with longtime manager Jim Beach, have kept the band’s brand strong through tours with American Idol alum Adam Lambert and robust merchandising and licensing efforts. But it was last fall’s Mercury biopic Bohemian Rhapsody — which has surpassed $900 million in worldwide grosses (according to Box Office Mojo) and won four Oscars — that pushed Queen into a streaming stratosphere typically reserved for contemporary pop and hip-hop. While classic rock acts often struggle to adapt to modern music consumption, Queen has evolved into a streaming…

RHIANNON GIDDENS “Country music, this music of the working class, is the music of people who don’t have a lot of power. We like to talk about the Founding Fathers a lot, but the people who built this country, that’s the people where country and blues come from. And you don’t have America without them.” DOLLY PARTON “It’s just simple ways of telling stories, experiencing and expressing feelings. You can dance to it, you can cry to it, you can make love to it, you can play it at a funeral… It just really has something in it for everybody. And people relate to it.” KETCH SECOR “It’s what American folk music has come to be called when it followed the path of the fiddle and the banjo.…

Since her promotion in April 2017 to global consumer chief marketing officer at Citi, Breithaupt and her international team have reaffirmed Citi’s commitment to music, collaborating with some 1,500 artists on over 12,000 events and experiences worldwide through the Citi Entertainment program (previously known as Citi Private Pass). For any global brand, reaching customers worldwide can be difficult. “But music is the one thing — that universal language — that is incredibly powerful for brands to connect on a deeper level with consumers,” says Breithaupt. Among her most effective initiatives is Citi Sound Vault, now in its third year. During Grammy Week in February, the program (booked through Live Nation) offered cardholders exclusive access to small-venue shows in Los Angeles by P!nk, Muse and Chris Stapleton. Breithaupt calls it…

Kevin Abstract Emerges Kevin Abstract (above) debuts at No. 4 on Emerging Artists as his sophomore LP, Arizona Baby, opens at No. 29 on Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums with 12,000 equivalent album units earned, according to Nielsen Music. The Brockhampton member first charted solo with debut LP American Boyfriend: A Suburban Love Story, which hit No. 17 on Heatseekers Albums in 2016. Plus, Catfish & The Bottlemen bow at No. 10 on Emerging Artists as their third LP, The Balance, arrives at No. 31 on Top Rock Albums (7,000 units). The set’s lead single, “Longshot,” concurrently reaches a new No. 4 high on the Alternative airplay chart, where it is the band’s first top five hit. —Xander Zellner CHART BEAT SUTHERLAND’S ‘RECKLESS’ RETURN Actor-singer-songwriter Kiefer Sutherland debuts at No. 16…

Mendes Gains; Farruko Debuts Shawn Mendes (below) rockets 33-17 on the Social 50 after promoting the release of his single “If Can’t Have You” throughout the April 26-May 2 tracking week, prior to its May 3 debut. Mendes snagged gains in nearly all social media metrics, led by 275,000 Twitter mentions (up 75%) and 165,000 Twitter reactions (a boost of 261%), according to Next Big Sound. The pop singer promoted the song in multiple tweets, such as retweeting Niall Horan’s enthusiastic response to the track. Mendes followed the promo with a May 4 appearance on NBC’s Saturday Night Live. Farruko appears on the chart at No. 50, marking the Puerto Rican reggaetón artist’s Social 50 debut. He bows thanks in large part to a 455% jump in YouTube subscribers…

AJR Arrives AJR (above) rules Top Rock Albums for the first time as Neotheater bows with 32,000 equivalent album units earned (22,000 in traditional album sales), according to Nielsen Music. The set, which is also new at No. 2 on Alternative Albums, is the sibling trio’s first top 10 on the all-genre Billboard 200, debuting at No. 8 and surpassing the No. 61 peak of its 2017 LP, The Click. Six tracks from Neotheater dot Hot Rock Songs, paced by lead radio single “100 Bad Days” at No. 11. The Black Keys earn their first leader on the Mainstream Rock airplay chart with “Lo/Hi.” The duo previously reached a No. 5 high with “Lonely Boy” in 2012. “Lo/Hi” becomes the first song to have topped Mainstream Rock, Triple A…

‘People’ Pleasers Sydney-based worship music collective Hillsong United nets its eighth No. 1 (all of which have debuted at the summit) on Top Christian Albums as People arrives with 107,000 equivalent album units earned, according to Nielsen Music. With 101,000 copies sold, the set starts as the act’s first No. 1 on Top Album Sales as the week’s top seller across all genres. The group achieves its biggest sales week, eclipsing the 47,000 that Empires sold in its first frame in 2012. On the Billboard 200, People begins at No. 2, marking the ensemble’s highest rank and third top 10 on the all-genre multimetric list. Meanwhile, Lauren Daigle’s “You Say” leads the streaming-, airplay- and sales-based Hot Christian Songs chart for a 41st week, a reign second only to…

LEGEND Bullets indicate titles with greatest weekly gains. Album Charts Recording Industry Assn. of America (RIAA) certification for physical shipments & digital downloads of 500,000 albums (Gold). RIAA certification for physical shipments & digital downloads of 1 million units (Platinum). Numeral noted with Platinum symbol indicates album’s multiplatinum level. RIAA certification for physical shipments & digital downloads of 10 million units (Diamond). Numeral noted with Diamond symbol indicates album’s multiplatinum level. Latin albums certification for physical shipments & digital downloads of 30,000 units (Oro). Latin albums certification for physical shipments & digital downloads of 60,000 units (Platino). Numeral noted with Platino symbol indicates album’s multiplatinum level. Digital Songs Charts RIAA certification for 500,000 paid downloads and on-demand streams where 100 streams equal 1 download (Gold). RIAA certification for 1…

In the first quarter of 2019, Sony/ATV widened its lead as the top publisher among the 100 most played radio songs, growing its market share to 22.52% from 21.2% in the fourth quarter of 2018. It also posted an increase in the number of radio songs with 58, up from 56 last quarter, led by the No. 1 track for the period, Panic! at the Disco’s “High Hopes.” This quarter, Billboard also looked at publisher market share for the Hot 100, which factors in streaming and sales as well as airplay; Sony/ATV was also the leader there, with a 21.35% market share. In fact, the top six publishers held the same spots on each list. For the second quarter in a row, Universal Music Publishing Group ranked second, with…

CONFIDENCE IS KEY “Years ago, when I first met him, he was already one of the most confident people I ever met. He told me he was going to be one of the greatest ever in music and was going to make one of the greatest TV shows of all time. So the confidence has always been there. But he’s also neurotic in how he thinks about every detail.” CHAMPIONING A CAUSE “Everything we do at SB Projects has to have a philanthropic element, and I’ve never had an artist say they have an issue with that. I have young children, so I personally find climate change to be an incredibly important issue. The fact that Dicky stepped forward [regarding] this issue was so impressive to me.” NO ONE-TRICK…

Attendees of the 2019 Met Gala, held May 6 in New York, explored the theme of Camp: Notes on Fashion — and no one embraced the concept more than Lady Gaga, one of the event’s five co-chairs alongside Gucci creative director Alessandro Michele, Harry Styles, Serena Williams and Vogue editor-in-chief Anna Wintour. Gaga walked the carpet in not one but four separate looks, all designed by her friend Brandon Maxwell. First, he unzipped her intensely pouffed-out fuchsia dress to reveal a black strapless gown, which she completed by holding an open umbrella above her head; that gown slipped off to unveil a fitted fuchsia dress that Gaga accessorized with a clunky, old-fashioned cellphone and oversize sunglasses while a member of her posse misted her with hair spray; finally, Maxwell…

IN AN INDUSTRY DOMINATED by experimental release strategies and last-minute, digital-first albums, Billie Eilish has shown the power of sticking to a carefully plotted global marketing plan — vindicating believers in old-school artist development and major-label scale. “Our approach was always to treat her as a global artist, using all the platforms as partners to give her as many inroads for fans” as possible, says Interscope Geffen A&M (IGA) vice chairman Steve Berman. Here’s how she and her team accomplished that. CORE FOCUS When Spotify first featured “Ocean Eyes” on its New Music Friday playlist, the song didn’t resonate like hip-hop did at the time. But the metrics, says Spotify head of global genre groups Mike Biggane, called to mind Post Malone, whose core fans drove his engagement on…

Everyone has gotten into the music business: beverage companies, financial firms, clothing retailers, hoteliers, cellphone providers, car manufacturers and more have recognized that nothing creates an emotional connection with consumers like music and artists. Artists, in turn, realize that the right brand partnerships can amplify their creativity, their profile and opportunities to connect with their fans. Some $2.6 billion in revenue annually reaches the music industry from the branding business, Billboard estimates, with sponsorship spending on music tours, venues and festivals making up more than 60% of that amount. The consultancy IEG estimates that brand spending in the live sector totaled $1.61 billion in 2018, a 4.8% increase over the previous year. The balance of revenue comes from fees paid for the use of music in ads, films, games…

When it comes to relationships between brands and artists, Curtis says the essential challenge is, “How do we create value together? It’s not always easy, but it’s really satisfying when you do that collaboration the right way.” She took on that task afresh with the launch in April 2018 of a new global marketing campaign for American Express called Powerful Backing: Don’t Do Business/Don’t Live Life Without It. (The tagline evokes the company’s classic 1975 ads that told cardholders, “Don’t leave home without it.”) Curtis says that value is created in three ways in relation to music: “How we back our customers, our partners and the music community.” Under Curtis, American Express has become known for giving customers priority access to high-demand concerts and exclusive events. The past year…

P!nk Earns Third No. 1 P!nk claims her third total and consecutive chart-topper on the Billboard 200 as Hurts 2B Human arrives at the summit with 115,000 equivalent album units earned during the week ending May 2, according to Nielsen Music. Of that sum, 95,000 were in album sales. Hurts 2B Human follows P!nk’s previous leaders Beautiful Trauma (2017) and The Truth About Love (2012). Hurts 2B Human was ushered in by the radio single “Walk Me Home,” which recently became P!nk’s 16th top 10 on the Adult Top 40 chart. On Mainstream Top 40, it rises 40-38 in its second week. It’s her 29th charting hit. The new album follows Beautiful Trauma, which charged in at No. 1 in November 2017 with 408,000 units earned in its first…

AIRPLAY DATA COMPILED BY RADIO SONGS: The week’s most popular songs, ranked by radio airplay audience impressions as measured by Nielsen Music. Stations are electronically monitored 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. DIGITAL SONG SALES: The week’s top-downloaded songs, ranked by sales data as compiled by Nielsen Music. POP/RHYTHMIC/ADULT: The week’s most popular current songs at mainstream top 40, rhythmic, adult contemporary and adult top 40 formats, respectively, ranked by radio airplay detections, as measured by Nielsen Music. Songs are defined as current if they are relatively recently-released titles, or songs receiving widespread airplay and/or sales activity for the first time. Stations are electronically monitored 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. See Charts Legend on billboard.com/biz for complete rules and explanations. All charts © 2019,…

CrasH Lands At The Top ScHoolboy Q (above) claims his third straight No. 1 on Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums as CrasH Talk starts with 81,000 equivalent album units earned in the week ending May 2, according to Nielsen Music. The rapper, born Quincy Hanley, previously ruled the ranking with 2014’s Oxymoron and 2016’s Blank Face LP, both of which claimed one week on top. As Talk arrives, three of its tracks debut on Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs: “Floating,” featuring 21 Savage (No. 25); “CHopstix,” with Travis Scott (No. 32); and “CrasH” (No. 46). Meanwhile, Talk release “Numb Numb Juice” re-enters the list at No. 38, having reached a No. 25 high in March. “CHopstix” also finds renewed life at radio as it returns to R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay at No. 49 after debuting…

Reason To Be Even ‘Happier’ “Happier” by Marshmello and Bastille (above, from left) ties the record for the most weeks at No. 1 on Hot Dance/Electronic Songs (dating to the chart’s inception in January 2013). The track reigns for a 33rd week and matches the No. 1 run of Zedd, Maren Morris and Grey’s “The Middle” in 2018. Marshmello also rises to No. 2 with “Here With Me” (featuring CHVRCHES), marking the first double-up in the top two spots since the masked DJ-producer ranked at No. 1 with “Wolves,” with Selena Gomez, and No. 2 with “Silence” (featuring Khalid) in January 2018. Also on Hot Dance/Electronic Songs, Martin Garrix scores his sixth top 10 with “Summer Days” (No. 7), the first each for featured artists Macklemore and Patrick Stump.…