Month: June 2023

Taylor Swift and Matty Healy are no more, according to multiple reports. And whether fans are absolutely heartbroken or have been waiting eagerly for this day since the romance rumors first swirled in May, they have a lot to say about it online.

Word of the apparent split first came Monday (June 5), with TMZ being first to report that the two stars had parted ways after less than two months of dating — although, their romance wasn’t ever officially confirmed beyond photos of the two looking very couple-y in public. The 1975 frontman, for instance, was spotted at multiple shows of Swift’s Eras tour, and the two were also seen last month holding hands while out to dinner with mutual friend Jack Antonoff.

Later, Healy and the “Anti-Hero” pop star were seen leaving Electric Lady Studios in New York City side by side.

From start to (apparent) finish, many of the artists’ fans were champions of the rumored romance and are now left saddened by the news. One person tweeted, “i’ll miss u forever matty n taylor </3,” while another wrote, “it’s a sad time to be a Taylor and a 1975 fan.”

Others, however, are celebrating the separation loudly and proudly — likely because of Swift’s involvement with Healy despite his various controversies.

“TAYLOR AND MATTY BROKE UP EVERYBODY PARTY,” tweeted one Swiftie.

“speak now tv tracklist vs matty healy taylor breakup announcement fighting over what makes me happiest,” wrote another, referencing Swift’s recent Speak Now (Taylor’s Version) tracklist announcement (which also happened to come on June 5).

Check out what fans are saying about Taylor and Matty’s reported split below:

David Kushner realized he might have a hit on his hands in March, when he performed “Daylight” to a packed London venue while opening for Dean Lewis. He’d been teasing the then-unreleased single on TikTok and Instagram for weeks, and “everybody knew the words,” he tells Billboard. Fan recordings of Kushner performing the song in concert only fed into the hype: “There’s one video [on TikTok] with like 30 million views and 7 million likes.”

Riding a wave of social media-fueled anticipation, “Daylight” arrived through Virgin Music on Apr. 14 and quickly became Kushner’s commercial breakthrough, debuting at No. 48 on the Billboard Hot 100 on the chart dated April 29 as well as cracking the top 10 of the Billboard Global Excl. U.S. chart. Characterized by Kushner’s bellowing vocals and a haunting piano melody, the song’s lyrics deal with the self-destructive potential of fulfilling the less savory end of one’s desires: “There’s darkness in the distance/From the way that I’ve been livin’,” he sings. “But I know I can’t resist it.”

Kushner, 22, grew up in the Chicago suburb of Barrington, the youngest of five musical siblings, with four sisters that played piano and a brother who played in a prominent local band. Though he always enjoyed singing and took guitar lessons in the fourth grade, it wasn’t until he finished high school — and realized that college didn’t interest him — that he decided to pursue music as a career. He began taking vocal lessons and learning the guitar again, but he initially struggled to find his voice.

In September 2020, after co-writing with a high school friend and recording with producers he met through social media, he self-distributed a crop of “way more poppy” tracks sung in a higher vocal range — a far cry from the baritone he’s become known for since. In fact, it was only when a vocal coach encouraged him to experiment with a lower range that he found his artistic footing. “I entered a new creative dimension in a way,” says Kushner, who has since removed those earlier songs from streaming services. “It felt like I stepped from one world into another.”

His new singing style was promptly validated: Kushner partnered with Virgin Music in December 2021 after a meeting with President Jacqueline Saturn and other executives, who suggested that a distributor, rather than a traditional label, was the best route, given his TikTok following. He then released his 2022 EP, Footprints I Found, through the company, with lead single “Miserable Man” performed in that self-described “lower octave.” The austere, acoustic guitar-driven ballad reached No. 23 on Billboard‘s Bubbling Under Hot 100 chart.

Soon after, Kushner met his manager, Altar MGMT’s Brent Shows, through an artist friend he met on TikTok and previously wrote with in Los Angeles, where he moved earlier this year. Kushner originally hired Shows — who also owned a video production company — to create content for his social channels. Before long, Shows was managing Kushner on a part-time basis before making it his full-time gig last fall.

“I was in the room when ‘Daylight’ was written and watched the entire process from the first melody that was sung to the last submission to [Virgin],” says Shows of working with Kushner. “Just seeing that whole process, you realize the talent the kid has.”

Kushner began writing the hit this January while taking a break from a session for another, as-of-yet unreleased track. “I first sang [the melody] in my falsetto voice … it was just a vomit vocal that came out,” he says. After writing the chorus (“Oh, I love it and I hate it at the same time/You and I drink the poison from the same vine”), he went home and played it for his girlfriend, who was instantly “stoked,” he says. He finished writing the song on his landlord’s piano, then recorded a rough demo at home.

Kushner started teasing the “Daylight” chorus online later that month. “It took off a little bit, not anything crazy,” he says. It wasn’t until he began tagging Hozier in his social media posts about the song — encouraged, in part, by comparisons from fans — that it started to go viral. “Fans were blowing up all my videos because they were agreeing with me,” he says. “They were like…’We need this to happen.’”

Though Hozier declined a collaboration, Shows reached out to another key player in the Irish singer-songwriter’s rise: Rob Kirwan, who produced Hozier’s breakthrough 2014 self-titled album. After hearing the “Daylight” demo, Kirwan agreed to produce it, not yet aware of the song’s TikTok virality. “Rob truly just liked the song, and wanted to be a part of the project,” says Shows.

Despite an initial release date slated for May 5, the momentum surrounding the song prompted Kushner to push for an earlier release — and Shows, trusting Kushner’s instincts, moved the release up to Apr. 14. Its music video arrived the same day, and has since garnered more than 26 million YouTube views.

Shows says they’re now focused on breaking the song at radio, with promo tours scheduled for the U.S. and Europe. There have also been talks about putting out an acoustic version, while discussions are progressing with some “pretty large names” for dance remixes of the song, says Shows.

Soon, Kushner will play a few sold-out headlining shows in the U.S. and U.K., followed by an opening slot for Lewis Capaldi, an artist that Kushner says has influenced him in more ways than one. “He’s been such an inspiration [to] my songwriting.” But he looks to the chart-topper on a more personal level too: “I also have tic disorder,” he adds — a diagnosis of Tourette Syndrome, which Capaldi has long addressed, including in a recent Netflix documentary. “A lot of people don’t know [that] about me, but I want to be more open about it.” Kushner says it first started with a vocal tic when he was a child and has since “progressed” — though when he’s focused on music, whether during the recording process or playing a show, his symptoms nearly disappear.

Fans can expect continued openness from Kushner on his debut album — on which he’s collaborating with several producers and songwriters, including Kirwan — that he hopes to release later this year. Both Kushner and Shows are content with remaining independent for the moment: “We just love the team that we have… and [Virgin] operates as a full services label for David,” says Shows.

“This is just the beginning. This is the floor,” he continues. “A ceiling? You can’t even see it.”

A version of this story originally appeared in the June 3, 2023, issue of Billboard.

Astrud Gilberto, “The Girl From Ipanema” singer who helped make bossa nova a sensation in the 1960s, died at 83 on Monday (June 5).

Paul Ricci, a friend and former collaborator of Gilberto’s, confirmed the news of the Brazilian singer’s death on social media at the request of her son Marcelo. “She was an important part of ALL that is Brazilian music in the world and she changed many lives with her energy,” he said in statement via Facebook.

Gilberto’s “The Girl From Ipanema” came about in a serendipitous way. The track was originally recorded by her then-husband, João Gilberto, also known as the the father of bossa nova. In 1963, the couple traveled to New York City to record with Stan Getz and fellow Brazilian bossa nova star Antônio Carlos Jobim, and during one of the sessions, Astrud was asked to join in despite having no recording experience.

“While rehearsing with Stan in the song ‘The Girl From Ipanema,’ João casually asked me to join in and sing a chorus in English after he had just sung the first chorus in Portuguese,” the late singer shared in a 2002 interview with for her official website, according to The New York Times. “Stan was very receptive. I’ll never forget that while we were listening back to the just recorded version, Stan said to me, ‘This song is going to make you famous.’”

Getz was right — a solo version of “The Girl From Impanema” without João’s Portuguese lyrics and featuring only Astrud was released in 1964. In the United States, the track peaked at No. 5 on the all-genre Billboard Hot 100, and later won the Grammy Award for record of the year in 1964.

Though Gilberto would not have another major hit, later in her career she received the Latin Jazz USA Award for Lifetime Achievement in 1992 and was inducted into the International Latin Music Hall of Fame in 2002. Gilberto was also nominated for best new artist of 1964, but lost to The Beatles. She was nominated for best vocal performance — female in both 1964 and 1965, but lost to Barbra Streisand both years.

Revisit “The Girl From Ipanema” below.

The top 10 of the all-genre Billboard 200 albums chart is more than a little bit country this week, as a full half of the region comprises country titles. It’s the first time that there are five country albums in the top 10 in nearly a decade.

The country sets in the top 10 on the chart dated June 10 are: Morgan Wallen’s One Thing at a Time and Dangerous: The Double Album (Nos. 2 and 5, with the former falling from the No. 1 slot after spending its first 12 weeks on top), Luke Combs’ Gettin’ Old (No. 7), Zach Bryan’s American Heartbreak (No. 9) and Bailey Zimmerman’s Religiously. The Album. (No. 10). (Country albums are those that have charted on, or are eligible for, Billboard’s Top Country Albums chart.)

The chart last had at least five country sets in the top 10 on the Oct. 5, 2013-dated list. That week, Justin Moore’s Off the Beaten Path debuted at No. 2, Chris Young’s A.M. launched at No. 3, Luke Bryan’s former leader Crash My Party was at No. 6, Keith Urban’s Fuse fell from the top spot to No. 8, and Billy Currington’s We Are Tonight debuted at No. 10.

The Billboard 200 chart ranks the most popular albums of the week in the U.S. based on multimetric 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 June 10, 2023-dated chart will be posted in full on Billboard‘s website on June 6. For all chart news, follow @billboard and @billboardcharts on both Twitter and Instagram.

Quantavious Grier, brother of rapper Young Thug, was sentenced Monday (June 5) to nine years and six months in prison after investigators said he violated his probation.

According to WSB-TV, in December, Grier (who performs under the name Unfoonk) pleaded guilty to one count of violating the RICO Act and one count of theft by receiving stolen property as part of the wider YSL case involving Young Thug and several other associates. At the time, Grier was sentenced to 12 years in prison, with two years commuted and 10 years probation.

But on May 4, Grier was arrested again in Atlanta for possessing a firearm by a convicted felon, being associated with a criminal street gang to participate in illegal activity and traffic offenses, WSB-TV reports. According to the outlet, at the time of his arrest, Grier was parked at a BP gas station in a black Mercedes G-Wagon with a group of people around the driver’s side door; in an affidavit, plainclothes officers wrote that they deemed the gathering a possible drug deal. When the SUV pulled away, the officers stopped it, citing a window tint violation and adding that the vehicle smelled like marijuana, which remains illegal in the state of Georgia.

WSB-TV reports that the officer who wrote the affidavit noted a handgun in plain view inside the vehicle: “Mr. Grier advised that the gun was clean, which prompted me to believe he had knowledge of the firearm being there.”

During Monday’s sentencing, Judge Ural Glanville stated that Grier hadn’t paid $141.08 in probation fees or started his community service, but that the deciding factor in his sentencing was being caught with a firearm. “Part of the special condition was that you weren’t supposed to possess a gun,” he added. While Grier’s attorney had asked for a probation revocation of two years in prison, Glanville ultimately handed down the longer sentence.

“The issue I find aggravating in this particular circumstance are several. You got arrested with a gun within six months of you being placed on probation,” Glanville said during the sentencing. “All you had to do was complete your probation and do what you were supposed to do.”

An attorney for Grier did not immediately respond to Billboard‘s request for comment.

Grier was indicted alongside Young Thug (real name Jeffery Williams), Gunna (real name Sergio Kitchens) and dozens of others in May on accusations that their group, YSL, was not really a record label called “Young Stoner Life” but instead a violent Atlanta street gang called “Young Slime Life.” The charges include allegations of murder, carjacking, armed robbery, drug dealing and illegal firearm possession over the course of the past decade. Though Gunna pleaded out in December, Young Thug remains in prison ahead of trial.