When Floating Points was recording with Pharoah Sanders in the summer of 2019, he was moving quickly. Possibly too fast.

“I didn’t have very much time to work with Pharoah,” says the British producer born Sam Shepherd, “and so I felt this pressure to just constantly be delivering music.”

But Sanders — the legendary tenor saxophonist who rose to prominence in the ’60s playing with John Coltrane, Alice Coltrane and other greats while also distinguishing himself as a luminary of the spiritual jazz movement — put his foot on the metaphorical brakes during those 10 days making music at Sargent Recorders, a studio in Los Angeles’ Historic Filipinotown neighborhood.

“He was just calming, slowing everything down,” Shepherd recalls. “He was like, ‘Let’s just listen to this,’ and we’d sit there and listen to the whole thing. And then we’d listen to it again, then again. Three hours would pass and we’d just be listening and listening.”

It wasn’t the speed at which Shepherd — an electronic musician accustomed to the pace of the internet — was used to working. Working with Sanders, more than 40 years Shepherd’s senior, felt like a throwback to the era when there was only so much recording tape available.

“We’d sit and listen,” Shepherd continues, “Then Pharoah would be like, ‘I’m just gonna go into the booth and play this phrase over this thing.’ He’d go in there having had listened to it for a few hours and just play something so succinct and meaningful. He knows it so well that he’s embodied it. It’s not like he’s searching while he’s playing, he’s done all that. He doesn’t need to search on his instrument, he’s done the searching within himself.”

This contemplative, unhurried workflow resulted in Promises, the 2021 collaborative album from Floating Points and Sanders, along with the London Symphony Orchestra. Clocking in at 46 minutes and composed of nine movements, Promises is leisurely, deep and often fairly mystic, with the Philharmonic adding moments of climactic grandeur and Sanders’ playing serving as the sonic and spiritual center, his signature tone offering moments of elegance and cacophony.

Released on Luaka Bop, the label founded by David Byrne in 1988, Promises earned wide and high-brow acclaim, getting glowing reviews from The New York Times, The New Yorker — who called it “a remarkably intimate experience — and earning a 9.0 rating from Pitchfork. The album spent three weeks on Top Albums Sales, where it reached No. 32 in April of 2021.

“It took me by surprise,” Shepherd says of this success. “We originally pressed very few vinyl copies, because we thought this was a relatively niche, jazz/classical crossover record. It connected more than we’d imagined. I’d say, ‘Pharoah, you know, people really like this record.’ He’s like, ‘Oh, yeah?’ And I’d be like, ‘No, people really like this record, Pharoah.'”

As the pandemic waned, the two artists — Shepherd in the U.K. and Sanders in Los Angeles — along with their respective teams, discussed doing a one-time only live performance of Promises. The Hollywood Bowl was selected as the venue, and Shepherd booked a flight to Los Angeles to meet with Sanders and make plans. Then, the week Shepherd was supposed to get on the plane, Sanders died, passing away on Sept. 24, 2022 at the age of 81. A cause of death was not given.

“So it was very much a long period of of quiet,” Shepherd says of what happened next. “Then conversations about doing it started to get bounced around again… It took me awhile to warm up to the idea.”

But Shepherd did, eventually, warm. So tomorrow (Sept. 20), almost a year to the day after Sanders’ passing, Shepherd will perform the first and likely only live performance of Promises at the Hollywood Bowl.

Speaking to Billboard on the phone from the Burbank studio hosting rehearsals for the show, Shepherd — enthusiastic, thoughtful and completely affable in conversation — allows that doing it without Sanders being around to give it his blessing “feels a little heavy for me. I haven’t vocalized it, I don’t even think I fully understand it. It’s not a normal thing for a musician to collaborate on a project with someone, and that person is no longer around.”

Without the mythic figure at the center of the project, Shepherd has instead assembled a sort of musical league of legends formed from friends, family and frequent collaborators.

Clearly the most crucial element in designing the performance was figuring out who would play Sanders’ part. Luckily, this answer was also obviou:. British saxophonist Shabaka Hutchings is a mutual friend of Sanders and Shepherd’s, who played in Shepherd’s first band and is a person who, Shepherd says, “Pharoah was a great admirer of.” While there’s demand to tour Promises, Shepherd says it simply isn’t possible, given that Hutchings is planning to put down his sax to focus on the flute shortly after the show.

Also in the band: electronic artist Kara-Lis Coverdale, “who every time I hear her play is just the most innovative, interesting electronic music I’ve heard in in my life.” Hinako Omori — “another amazing composer I’ve known for years in London” — will play the celesta. John Escreet, “one of the greatest pianists I’ve ever heard” will keyboard and synthesizer. Jeffrey Makinson, the organist at the U.K.’s towering Lincoln Cathedral and also Shepherds’ brother-in-law, will play an electric organ. Lara Serafin, who transcribed the previously unwritten down Promises into sheet music and “knows the piece better than anyone on a forensic level” will play electronics. Four Tet and Caribou — frequent Floating Points collaborators and also Shepherds’ “bezzie mates,” will play piano and electronics, respectively.

“They get the record because they were there when I was mixing it,” Shepherd says of these two producers and pals. “They were really part of the whole process of it all coming together — and they know me and I know them, and I know how they play.”

The show will be conducted by Los Angeles favorite Miguel Atwood Ferguson, who will guide the band, members of the L.A. Studio Symphony String Orchestra and special guests the Sun Ra Arkestra, with whom Sanders played with throughout his career.

Surveying the gear laid out in the rehearsal space, Shepherd says Promises is, in a way, quite simple, rooted in four looping chords. “On a technical level, everyone can play their parts.”

As such, rehearsals are more about maintaining morale while also getting to the essence of what makes the piece “kind of magical, I guess,” says Shepherd. “That’s something I’ve got to find again from the beginning.” When asked if he knows how he’s going to do that, he answers, “No, I don’t,” with a laugh.

But then Shepherd, who also has a PhD in neuroscience and epigenetics and first connected with Sanders after Sanders heard his smart, spacial 2015 electronic album Elaenia, weighs the question for a minute. He returns to the recording sessions with Sanders, when Sanders would request that they just sit back and listen to the music.

“That sort of calmness and listening more intently is something I need to try and impart on [this] big group by sort of saying, ‘We need to slow it all down, we need to not feel like this is tedious or not getting anywhere, because it is getting somewhere, it’s just that we’ve got to give our patience to this project as well,'” he relates. “That’s something Pharoah taught me, definitely, patience in listening.”

(He adds that, in his own fast-paced fervor, he recorded enough music with Sanders to make another two albums — but says there is no plans to complete or release these projects. Sanders’ 1977 album Pharoah was re-released this week via Luaka Bop.)

Given the mysterious, ineffable nature of Promises‘ magic, I ask Shepherd how he’ll know if the show was a success. He thinks about it, then refers to the album’s “Movement 8,” which closes with a minute of silence before the orchestra comes back in for the climax.

“That’s going to be a pinnacle moment for me — if that silence is really silent in the Bowl, and all you hear is the noise of some of the stage gear and buzzing through the speakers,” he shares. “If I’ve gotten a little corner of this noisey-ass American city just to be quiet, and ten or twelve or fifteen thousand people are sitting there together quietly because the previous 40 minutes of music has just brought them to this place… I would feel that’s a big moment.”

One can argue that having people sitting in slowed-down stillness would be what Sanders would have wanted to happen, too.

Although British rock band The Last Dinner Party scored a top 10 alternative hit with their debut single, for the five women that comprise the group, they’d been preparing for this moment for years. Just before beginning university in 2020, lead singer Abigail Morris, bassist Georgia Davies and vocalist/guitarist Lizzie Mayland crossed paths and became fast friends, bonding over musical interests. (Morris and Davies attended King’s College London; Mayland at Goldsmiths.) “We would go to gigs all the time, researching and thinking about starting a band,” Morris explains. “We were very intellectual about it for a long time.”

They soon recruited lead guitarist Emily Roberts and vocalist/keyboardist Aurora Nischevi, both of whom were involved in the local music circuit. The five began writing music together at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, though their first release wouldn’t come for nearly three years — but the wait paid off. “Nothing Matters,” the cinematic alt-rock debut single that arrived in April has become a force at radio, reaching a new high of No. 8 on Billboard’s Adult Alternative Airplay chart dated Sept. 23.

While fleshing out its sound, the group built a fan base by testing its material in pubs and small venues around London. “In the age of TikTok, people thought unless you have a song go viral, there’s no way of generating a following,” Morris says. “Ours just felt like a more natural thing. We had much more of a jumping off point from playing shows to seven people who don’t give a f–k to [then] playing much larger shows.”

As the band’s stature in the local scene grew, it wasn’t long before it gained traction in the industry, too: after Q Prime’s Tara Richardson heard about The Last Dinner Party through an audio engineer that worked with the act in the studio, she received four “very impressive” demos, she says. Subsequently, she saw the band perform live in early 2022, and almost immediately, she signed the act to the management firm. By May, the group had scored a record deal with Island. “It’s just so refreshing to see young, strong women,” Richardson says. “They’re not arrogant; they’re not out to prove themselves. They’re just doing what they do, and if you don’t like it, they’re completely fine with it.”

By the start of 2023, with a team in place, the group prepared to officially launch its recording career with “Nothing Matters.” “We built a reputation around the London live circuit and had a bit of buzz around our first release,” says Davies. “This wasn’t a dress rehearsal.” Adds Morris: “You only get one debut.”

With a swelling bridge and a cheeky hook, “Nothing Matters” originally began as a “slow, sad ballad” that Morris wrote about a then-current romantic relationship. “I very rarely write love songs — I only write about heartbreak,” she says with a laugh. “It’s just easier and more dramatic. [But] I was with my boyfriend at the time and I was very happy.” Davies remembers the bandmates then “throwing everything at” the simple piano ballad in the studio, playing around with guitar solos, horn sections and vocal tones. “It was really a song that became itself once it was in the hands of the band,” Davies says. “It was one completely different thing when it first started and it needed to be played live and have everyone’s input.”

The song officially arrived on April 19, and was paired with a Pride & Prejudice-coded music video that delivered dark academia with an edgy girl-band twist. “It captures the spirit of what we’re doing now,” Morris says. “ ‘Nothing Matters’ has that maximalist, tortuous freedom that we have and want for the rest of the record.” By the summer, “Nothing Matters” had become a radio hit: in early July, it debuted on Adult Alternative Airplay; the following month, it did so on Rock & Alternative Airplay.

Since the breakthrough hit arrived, The Last Dinner Party has grown its touring platform well beyond the pubs from their early days, supporting Florence + the Machine and Hozier on separate runs and performing at major festivals including Glastonbury and Reading & Leeds. The band will soon embark on a 10-stop U.K. headlining tour, followed by five dates in the U.S. It’ll have two other singles in tow for the trek: The bouncy pop-rock “Sinner” dropped in late June, and its next release, which the band calls a “left turn,” is due to arrive by the end of September.

With a debut album expected sometime in 2024, The Last Dinner Party’s members seem completely in sync: Morris and Davies finishing each other’s sentences multiple times during our interview, including when discussing what keeps the band’s emotional bond so strong. “I think what’s missing in a lot of artists [is] a commitment to themselves because they want to seem cool or ironic,” says Davies. “I want people to see our sincerity and be themselves too.”

“We advise them, but at the end of the day, they know what they’re doing,” says Richardson. “They have mood boards — everything has already been discussed. Excuse the French, but they’re not f–king around.”

A version of this story will appear in the Sept. 23, 2023 issue of Billboard.

”Bongos,” Megan Thee Stallion’s latest collaboration with Cardi B, serves as Meg’s first musical release of the year — a slight change of pace for the artist who famously pumped out two studio albums, a compilation tape and an EP in a little over two years.

Her most recent album, August 2022’s Traumazine, followed years of intense emotional and personal turmoil, online vitriol and legal sagas for the three-time Grammy-winning rapper. On Aug. 8, Tory Lanez was sentenced to 10 years in prison for shooting Megan in July 2020, a long-awaited conclusion to three years of court drama.

“I feel like I’m finally closing all the old chapters and now I’m starting with a blank slate,” Megan tells Billboard in a new interview. “Very fresh, very new. I think the Hotties are gonna be so excited.”

“Bongos” — a raucous Brazilian-funk-nodding sequel to 2020’s historic “WAP” that debuts at No. 14 on this week’s Billboard Hot 100— is the first section of that new chapter. Alongside the song’s release, Megan and Cardi also treated fans to an eye-popping music video — with choreography courtesy of Sean Bankhead — as well as a showstopping performance at the 2023 MTV Music Video Awards.

With more new music on the horizon and a new collaboration with Flamin’ Hot called Flamin’ Hot University (FU), Megan Thee Stallion is carefully setting the stage to take the entire world by storm — again.

Megan Thee Stallion will serve as Thee Official Hot Girl Dean of Admission for Flamin’ Hot University, which features a one-of-a-kind online curriculum centered on food, fashion and lifestyle. FU will also give students the entire catalog of Flamin’ Hot snacks in a special limited-edition package — complete with exclusive merch designed by Melody Ehsani — approved by Megan herself. Proceeds from the merch line will go toward a scholarship for deserving students at Texas Southern University, the “Thot Sh–” rapper’s alma mater, thus helping them sidestep student debt.

In a hilarious conversation with Billboard, Megan breaks down some of her Flamin’ Hot University courses, provides an update on her forthcoming new album, reflects on her friendship with Cardi B, and gives her true reaction to Justin Timberlake yelling out her trademark “real hot girl sh–” ad lib after the VMAs.

How did you come up with the curriculum for Flamin’ Hot University? What are your responsibilities as the Hot Girl Dean of Admissions?

I’m basically just the overseer of all things Hot Girl at this camp. I just wanted to have a lot of things that have something to do with things that are personal to me, how to be a Hot Girl, you know? How to make your favorite snacks at 2 a.m. I feel like every college student knows the struggle. I feel like Hot Cheetos are definitely on the menu at every campus, this is what we eat! So I just want to do things that feel real to me. 

Recently, the state of public education in the country has become increasingly muddled by some troubling political agendas. What does it mean to you to be able to give back to your HBCU during a time like this? 

I know what it’s like to be a struggling college student. I know what it feels like to be discouraged: “I give up, my classes are hard, I can’t even pay for this, etc.” But I really got through it, and I wanted to be able to give back to other students that I know feel the same way I felt. So once I was able to give it, I was like, “Yeah, lemme put my people on.”

That’s real. What’s your favorite Flamin’ Hot snack?

Everybody knows I love me a good fried pickle, so I definitely love making Hot Cheeto fried pickles. That’s my sh–! With ranch!

When you sit back and reflect on how you’ve grown “Real Hot Girl Sh—” from a catchphrase to one of the most recognizable brands in contemporary pop culture, how do you feel?

I feel surprised half the time. Like, wow, I really just be talking, and I just be living, and people are like, “Yes, I wanna do that too!” [Laughs.] I feel like it’s amazing to just authentically be myself and it, you know, translates into a brand. And it makes me feel like, “OK, you know what? I can’t be doing too bad, right?!”

When it comes to the specific Flamin’ Hot University curriculum, what can people expect to see in some of your lessons?

They can definitely expect all of my Hot Girl recipes from the things that I personally would make out of Hot Cheetos and some stuff that I didn’t even know about. Some things that I took from other people. It’s a chef, his name is Chef Scotty and he also went to TSU, and he put me on a few snacks. So I feel like he definitely gonna figure out some things to eat at 2 in the morning.

We gon’ be eating real good! 

We gon’ be eating real good! [Laughs] 

One of my favorite parts of your TikTok is how hard you go in the gym. What role has physical fitness played in your life over the past couple of years?

Physical fitness helps me with my mental. If I feel like I’m a little stressed or I’m a little whatever I’m feeling that day, I know I can go let it out in the gym and it helps me clear my mind. I love boxing. I love anything HIIT [high-intensity interval training]-wise. I love pushing myself. When I’m in the gym, I’m like, “Girl, if you can’t do two more squats, I don’t know if you’re gonna be able to handle two more comments!” 

So, I definitely go in the gym and I push myself and I motivate myself and I’m pushing my body. But, to push your body, I feel like it’s to push yourself mentally. The gym is definitely a mental thing. To get yourself out the bed in the morning or whatever part of the day, even if you don’t have time to work out in the morning, if you push yourself to finish your day and go to the gym, I feel like it’s all mental. And I feel like you feel like, “Oh my gosh, I did it,” and now you can reward yourself. Working out just feels super rewarding. I feel very accomplished after I work out. 

Congratulations on the “Bongos” release and VMAs performance! The music video is very elaborate. What was it like shooting that? 

It was so much fun! Every time me and Cardi link up, it ain’t nothing but laughs and a whole party. Both our teams absolutely love each other. Everybody hangs out on their own time anyway, so it kind of felt like we was going out every morning. Oop, Cardi had me waking up so early for these damn — lemme not even curse — Cardi had me waking up so early for these shoots!

How early y’all was up? 

Baby, I will start my glam at 3 in the morning to do my first shot at like 8 or 9, and sometimes it didn’t even happen at 8 or 9. If I’m up at 3 in the morning, I’m probably shooting at 3 p.m.! Like goddang! But it was a great time though.

Y’all built different, because 3 a.m. is crazy.  

3 a.m. is crazy! But you know you can’t pay the sun to stay out long, so you gotta get all your shots during the day.

While recording “Bongos,” did you and Cardi feel any pressure to re-create or live up to the heights of “WAP”? 

I know for myself, I don’t make music with any expectations. I don’t really care about charts and stuff like that. Obviously, everybody wanna be No. 1, everybody wants to win, everybody wants to give their fans these bragging rights. But I just make music because I love to make music, so I’m not making it like, “Oh, I gotta top this” or “Oh, we have to be better than the last time.” I’m like, “No, we’re gonna make a song because we like to make music, and it’s gonna be fun!” It doesn’t have to be the same vibe. That was already its great, own moment. It served its purpose at that time. That was two, three years ago. We two different women now! So this is different. 

I wasn’t expecting it to be anything like “WAP” because we’re not even in the same headspace. I think it was COVID. Baby, we was in the house recording! [Laughs.] Now we outside! It’s time for everybody to be in a good mood. It’s time for everybody to feel a different way. I was so excited when [Cardi] sent me this song because I had never recorded over a beat like that before. I never rapped to anything like that, and I felt like it was a challenge. I was like, “Oh, this is something new. OK, girl, you want me to go to work today, I got you!”

What is it about Cardi specifically that makes her such a good collaborator and friend? 

Speaking to the collaborator part like, she literally just let me do me. This is the second time she’s sent me a song, and I’ll be like, “Friend, can I do whatever I want to do on the beat? I’m finna put two verses on here, all right?” She always let me do whatever I want to do creatively. I just appreciate that so much because sometimes people try to give you a direction and they want you to do what they want you to do, but she’s like “Megan, what you think?” She’ll ask me what I think about this song like, “OK, how you think we could make it better? What should we do next? Just do whatever you wanna do and then we’ll piece it together.” 

I love the creative freedom that she gives me. She’s always open to whatever I’m saying or any suggestion, so I love that about her. She not scared to try nothing, and her ego ain’t big. She’s not a woman that’s scared to say “you’re right.” So, I really love that about her work-wise. 

Friendship-wise, she’s just so real. When I first met her, she was so shy! Anybody’ll probably see her online and they think her personality gonna be one way, no, it’s so opposite. But like as we got more [close as] friends — you know people start off shy and then they get like “Oh, yeah, this the real you”? — I feel like I definitely get to see the real her. She’s just so nice, and she’s really a kind person. That’s what I really like about her. And she just raw. First thing that come to that lady brain, she gon’ say it! And I like that. I respect people like that. She’s definitely a “take it how you wanna take it” type of person.

@theestallion

I just talk with my hands lol 💁🏽‍♀️see ya next time @Justin Timberlake

♬ Fukai Mori – Do As Infinity

When can we expect new music from you, girl? We’re starving! 

It’s definitely coming very soon. I’m really excited about this chapter of my life because I feel like I’m finally closing all the old chapters, and now I’m starting with a blank slate. Very fresh, very new. I think Thee Hotties are gonna be so excited. I’m trying different things. I got a lot of things that I produced with Ju and with some new producers.

Oh, you got behind the boards! 

Baby, I was behind the piano! Yeah! [Laughs] It’s very exciting. I can’t wait for Thee Hotties to really get in my head with this new person I feel like I’m becoming.

What sounds are you thinking of? Is there anything you know for sure you want to address? Is there a tour on the way? What other tea can you give us! 

The tea is… everything about the music is tea! [Laughs] Just expect the unexpected. Expect a lot of rawness, a lot of realness, a lot of sh— talking. Just know I’m coming and I hope everybody ready. 

Oh, we ready! One quick question before you go: Were you expecting Justin Timberlake to say “real hot girl sh—” in that TikTok? 

Dawg! That’s why my mouth was open big! I was so excited! It’s a good feeling when you know the icons know about you. It made me feel good. I was like, “C’mon, real hot girl sh—!”

 

Per Sundin had seen the future.

Then the President of Universal Music Nordic, Sundin was invited to Ibiza to see Swedish House Mafia play their 2010 residency at Pacha.

“It was like, ‘When are they going on stage? Half past two? In the morning? Oh my god,'” recalls Sundin, who at this time was not yet fully steeped in dance music’s late-night culture. At Pacha he ventured onto the dancefloor amidst a massive crowd “fist-pumping towards the DJ booth.” It was then he knew: “This is the future of pop.”

Back in Stockholm, Sundin looked around for his own dance act to sign, eventually connecting with a young Swedish producer then going by Tim Berg, along with the artist’s manager, Ash Pournouri. Sundin signed the artist’s 2010 debut single, “Seek Bromance.” The label and the producer, who was by then going by Avicii, followed that with 2012’s “Fade Into Darkness” — and then, of course, the era-defining global phenomenon that was “Levels.”

But the biggest success was yet to come.

Avicii’s debut album, True, came out on September 13, 2013. By its release date, it was already soaring on the wings of its lead single “Wake Me Up,” the first-ever country/EDM hybrid to cross over to top 40, which as of today has 1.18 billion official on-demand U.S. streams, according to Luminate. The song reached No. 4 on the Billboard Hot 100 in October of 2013, marking what would be the highest-charting song of Avicii’s career, and his only top 10 hit. It also spent 26 weeks at No. 1 on the Hot Dance/Electronic Songs chart, and this past June, became the RIAA’s highest certified dance song.

Dance music purists may have hated the track — when “Wake Me Up” was mentioned at a business lunch in 2013, one dance music publicist put her finger in her mouth and pretended to vomit — but anyone with ears had to admit it was catchy. True was also a phenomenon: With it, Avicii bucked the trend of EDM artists only releasing singles, instead presenting a cohesive body of work that bore surprising country/bluegrass influences, which were at first misunderstood, but ultimately distinguished him as an innovator and world class creative.

The album currently has two billion total on-demand official U.S. streams, according to Luminate. It reached No. 5 on the Billboard 200 in October of 2013 and spent eight weeks at No. 1 on Top Dance/Electronic Albums. Today (Sept. 13) marks the ten-year anniversary of True, which will be celebrated with never-before-released footage of the album’s production, released on the Avicii social media accounts over the next month.

Sundin — now the CEO of Pophouse, which purchased 75% of Avicii’s recording and publishing catalog in 2022 — here recalls the album’s origins to Billboard, along with the excitement for it within Universal, and how an unlicensed Soundcloud mix helped shift hatred for the LP into global acclaim.

Tell me about the earliest phases of the album.

[“Levels”] really moved my career internationally and inside Universal. At that time when I came into [the dance world], everyone did instrumentals beats, and then they tested that on the audience. If the audience liked it, they called in a topliner or vocalist to write the lyrics, and tried different verses and different topliners.

But Tim was like, ‘I want to be an artist. I don’t want to do one song instrumentals and this [testing] process. I want to do an album.” I said “You know, this is dance music. You don’t do albums.”

But he told me that they were already working on it — so I went to Tim’s studio, which was just a five minutes walk from Universal’s Stockholm office — and they played me me “Wake Me Up.” This was in February of 2013.

What did you think when you heard it?

I tried to hold back, because if I say, “It’s fantastic,” then Ash would increase the price for the advance, so I had to hold back everything. I was like, “Yeah, this could work.”

That was the only song they played me. I went back to the office and I called my superiors — because this was above my pay grade, because he asked for a lot of millions for this album — and talked about it. We did so well with “Levels,” and that really was a breakthrough for us, for me and for Universal Music Sweden, because that really ignited interest around the world for EDM music. So when this album was in place, we went all in on it and just did everything we could [for it].

So you first hear “Wake Me Up” in February, and then a month later the album is being debuted at Ultra Music Festival in Miami. Famously, that show bombed. What was it was like being there?

I invited people from all over the world to Ultra Music Festival. There, Avicii decided together with his management to premiere the album — with the original songwriters and topliners he worked with on the album.

So he first played an approximately 45-minutes set of a traditional Avicii concert. Then, for the audience it was like a changeover, like a new act coming on. The DJ booth was moved to the right of the stage, and then came a guy who started singing “Wake Me Up.” For me, it was obvious, because I love the track. But for the audience, it was a disaster. They hated it.

Then Dan Tyminski did “Hey Brother,” and no one understood. They wanted traditional Avicii songs with big drops, and to just able to dance in their party mode, if I say so. So online it was terrible, like, “Rest in peace Avicii’s career.” It was really, really tough for him. He was devastated. He was like, “Am I wrong? Have I done something bad?” He just really didn’t understand the reactions.

What was that moment like for you?

I remember Andrew Kronfeld, who still is the Executive Vice President of Universal Music, was standing there with me and said, “Don’t worry, this is a fantastic album. It was fantastic yesterday, it will be fantastic tomorrow.”

Did the marketing plan for True change at all, after what happened at Ultra?

Yes. What happened was that… we knew the music was great, but we couldn’t release it, because “Wake Me Up” was supposed to be out in mid-June. We couldn’t play anything until that. Then Ash said, “Maybe we can do a remix of it and put it out on SoundCloud.” And I said, “You can’t do that, because that’s not legal.”

Ash said, “But maybe if I do it…” And I was like, “I’m not involved in this, but yes, do it. Just put the mix together.” Avicii remixed all 10 songs from the album and put a mix on SoundCloud. You can still find it there. It’s a fantastic. The reactions in the comments — everyone was like, “This is really good.” “Why did people say this was bad? This is fantastic.” I have goosebumps talking about it again, because it was like, “Oh my god, this is really happening.”

That must’ve been exciting.

It created a hype on SoundCloud. Ash could do it, but we [at Universal] couldn’t, because it was licensed to us. [At that time] they didn’t have a deal for for releasing music on SoundCloud that was under contract. So that’s why I was reluctant to do it. If it went wrong … we couldn’t really handle it. But again, I said, “OK, do it.” And they did.

That’s how it took off. That’s how the other conversation changed from being brutally tough and hateful to love for this True album.

Was it always obvious that “Wake Me Up” would be the lead single?

Yes, it was obvious. It wasn’t even a discussion. “Hey Brother” is a little bit too country, so that wasn’t it. “Addicted To You” was one that was discussed. In hindsight, you can always say, “This is what we believed in the whole time.” And, you know, sometimes you lie about it to sound smart. But in this case, it was, “This is the single,” and it was from the beginning.

I was going to ask if this album felt like a business risk within Universal, given the country influences, but it sounds like there was a lot of goodwill around it.

Yeah. Everyone that heard it said, “This is going to be sensational,” because there were so many singles on it. We could work for a long, long time on it… We believed then at Universal Music that EDM was the new big wave. And it was, with Swedish House Mafia and Tiësto and David Guetta and Calvin Harris. It was just, bang.

Was there anything you’d have wanted to change about the album?

One sad thing is that my favorite song on the album was “Heart on My Sleeve” with Imagine Dragons. The interesting thing is that Ash, and I think this is quite clever, didn’t want to have any features on the album. Every other EDM artist had “featuring whoever” on the on the songs. Everyone did at this time.

But Ash decided no one could be featured — because if someone like Imagine Dragons gets featured, then it’s going to be “Imagine Dragons featuring Avicii.” If you take all that away, then it’s just an Avicii song, and Avicii is the artist. So when radio station played the song, it’s Avicii.

So for a number of reasons, including the fact that it wasn’t yet a finished song, “Heart Upon My Sleeve” appeared as an instrumental on True.  Years later, Dan Reynolds added a verse to the track, and the final song and completed vocals are on the posthumously released album TIM.    

Was there a feeling of anticipation within Universal around the album of like, “Wait until they hear this”?

Yes. That’s why it was such a crazy feeling when we were at Ultra. I had drink tables paid for. I was spending a lot of money to have everyone from Universal there: marketing directors, managing directors. I played the music the day before the festival, and they loved it.

So it was a shock, because we believed this was going to be so good, and everyone that heard it said it was fantastic … Maybe it was badly presented from stage, so people didn’t understand. It was not communicated that this is what they were going to do … It was a combination of people wanting to party to hit songs they’d heard before and not good presenting from stage. There could have been a voiceover with someone saying, “And now ladies and gentlemen, you’re going to hear the new album from Avicii.” And that wasn’t done. Was I shocked about it? Yes, I was.

So you’re in the VIP section at Ultra with bottle service and all the business people — what’s the mood?

You question yourself. “Am I totally getting this wrong?” “Am I reading in the wrong way?”

I’d always considered that moment for Tim and everybody on stage, but I hadn’t considered your perspective.

No one cares about the record execs. [Laughs.] But it was worse for Tim, of course. He was devastated. He went to his parents, I think it was in Los Angeles, and [his father] Klas told me that he was just shocked.

But it all turns itself around rather quickly, and obviously the album becomes a massive hit. At what point do you start celebrating?

Everywhere in the world, you heard “Wake Me Up” on the radio, but you never celebrate. That’s the crazy thing about being in the music business — you can celebrate when you give an artist a plaque or whatever it is, but then you’re already onto “OK, what’s next?”

Do you think Tim felt that pressure of “what’s next?”

I never talked to him about exactly that. But he was just — he was a very, very good igniter when it came to creating music. When he unfortunately died too early, if you look at sketches, demos and songs on his hard drive, he was close to 100 [projects]. He loved to study, loved to work with other people.

When he when he landed in Oman [editors note: Avicii died by suicide in Muscat, Oman on April 20, 2018], we had a conference call and talked about the music. He was so in a positive mode. “This is what we’re going to do, and please book a studio in [Kenya]; I want to work with people there, and then I want to go to New Hampshire, then l want to go to London.” He just wanted just to have studio time, he loved to be in the studio and do his thing. So yeah, so he was looking forward.

10 years on, what do you think True‘s legacy is?

It’s hard for me to say. Billboard did a thing about the 100 biggest moments of EDM, and the number one was Tim’s career. I just…I get emotional because it’s… [a pause while he tears up, then collects himself], because what we accomplished during this short period of time, it’s just unbelievable.

It’s fitting that on the same day that Hilary — Southern California’s first tropical storm in 84 years — rains her way out of Los Angeles, Sean “Diddy” Combs breezes into Billboard’s studio for a sit-down interview. He’s a fascinating whirlwind of activity from the moment he arrives in his ever-present shades: stopping first to huddle with the photographer about the lighting for the shoot, orchestrating the background setup for his video chat; then changing outfits to match his vibe just before the cameras roll. “It’s just not my vibration,” he declares at one point as the backdrop is being rearranged. “I’m in a high frequency right now.”

“High frequency” and “low frequency” are phrases that often crop up during this interview and a follow-up conversation a week later as Combs talks about returning to music with his first album in 13 years, The Love Album: Off the Grid, and explains his take on what fans have been missing from him.

“You’ve always got to bring something new and fresh,” he says. “I wouldn’t have come back after 13 years if I didn’t have something to say.”

And right now, Combs has got a lot to say. This year marks the 30th anniversary of Bad Boy Entertainment and the 10th anniversary of his REVOLT TV network, with its reimagined REVOLT World summit (featuring keynotes, panels and performances by Don Toliver, Mr. Eazi and more) slated for Sept. 22-24 in Atlanta. And with his sixth studio album that his own Love Records will deliver on Sept. 15 (“Diddy Day,” he calls it), he’s officially launching a creative renaissance, too.

The R&B album features Diddy rapping alongside a guest roster of 29 established and emerging stars, ranging from Mary J. Blige, H.E.R., Summer Walker, Jazmine Sullivan and Coco Jones to The-Dream, Justin Bieber, Ty Dolla $ign, Burna Boy, Kalan.FrFr and Love Records artist Jozzy. Comprising 22 tracks and two interludes, The Love Album: Off the Grid is dedicated to late producer Chucky Thompson, who was an original member of Bad Boy’s in-house production collective called the Hitmen. The Weeknd makes his final guest stint on the album’s next single, “Another One of Me,” with French Montana and 21 Savage. Another track, “Kim Porter,” with Diddy and Babyface featuring John Legend, pays tribute to Combs’ late former girlfriend and mother of three of his children.

“This isn’t just an R&B album; it’s an R&B movie [about love],” says Combs, who executive-produced and curated the project. “It’s probably one of the biggest collections of talent ever, all unified on one album. And I happen to be blessed to have The Weeknd’s last feature. The song talks about being unique, in a sense — telling your ex-girl that another one of me won’t come around.”

As an artist, Combs’ bona fides speak for themselves. Since his ’90s heyday, the triple Grammy winner has sold 8.1 million albums in the United States, according to Luminate, with five titles charting in the top 10 on the Billboard 200: No Way Out (No. 1, 1997), Forever (No. 2, 1999), The Saga Continues … (No. 2, 2001), Press Play (No. 1, 2006) and Last Train to Paris (No. 7, 2011). He has landed 38 career entries on the Billboard Hot 100, including 15 top 10s and five No. 1s: “Can’t Nobody Hold Me Down,” featuring Ma$e; “I’ll Be Missing You,” with Faith Evans and featuring 112; The Notorious B.I.G.’s “Mo Money Mo Problems,” featuring Puff Daddy & Ma$e; “Bump Bump Bump,” with B2K; and “Shake Ya Tailfeather,” with Nelly and Murphy Lee. Still, when his new album’s first single, “Gotta Move On,” with Bryson Tiller, peaked at No. 3 in 2022, it was his first top 10 on the R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay chart since “Last Night” featuring Keyshia Cole in 2007, which went to No. 7. (“Gotta” also topped Adult R&B Airplay for two weeks last November.)

Then in September, Combs rocked the industry with the surprise announcement that he was returning his publishing rights to the artists and songwriters who had helped build his Bad Boy Entertainment into a success — a move that came after detractors, most notably Ma$e, alleged that Combs had treated his artists unfairly over the years. Ma$e, Evans, The LOX, 112 and the estate of The Notorious B.I.G. are among the creatives who have already signed agreements to regain those rights.

During his interview with Billboard, Combs speaks about his push to close the wealth gap for Black people and promote diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives. On behalf of the latter cause, his Sean Combs Foundation recently donated $1 million to Jackson State University, a historically Black university. He also announced a $1 million investment fund in partnership with Earn Your Leisure founders Rashad Bilal and Troy Millings to provide a practical model for economic empowerment in Black communities. He notes as well that profits from the fund would support his three Capital Preparatory charter schools in New York and Connecticut.

Referencing Tulsa, Okla.’s iconic Black Wall Street — which was destroyed in a racially motivated massacre just over 100 years ago — Combs says, “I’m about empowering Black minds, Black ideas, Black businesses. That’s my focus. I used to be looking for the next Biggie. Now I’m looking for the next entrepreneur that I can help support through resources and knowledge. My purpose has leveled up.”

Dina Sahim, who has been co-managing Combs at SALXCO alongside company chief Wassim “Sal” Slaiby since 2021, says there’s a reason why her client has helped foster the careers of so many other stars: “He doesn’t take days off. Every minute of every single day is spent doing something that contributes to his growth as a person, as a businessman and to the people around him. He didn’t get to where he is by mistake. And he lives to perpetuate wealth and inspiration. He wants everybody to eat like he’s eating; wants to teach everyone to take what they have, build on it and create an empire.”

But make no mistake: Combs is still all about having fun as he jubilantly navigates his return to music’s center stage. “I’m a 26-year-old in a 53-year-old body,” the MTV Video Music Awards’ (VMAs) newly minted Global Icon Award honoree says with a laugh. “There are still a lot of things I want to do on my Diddy list. So yeah, I’m back. Just in my bag and having fun. Whenever it feels like work, I’ll leave.”

First things first: What prompted you to return the publishing rights to the Bad Boy artists and writers?

I decided to reassign publishing rights to the whole catalog in May or June 2021. The news is just now coming out because it took time to finalize everything. But this was during the time that I was holding the Grammys to task. I was also getting major offers for the catalog during the [acquisition] frenzy back then. When I was looking at the catalog and everything, I was put in a position where I felt like I had to look in the mirror. I had to make sure that what I was standing for was my total truth. We live in a time where things are constantly evolving. And it was about reform for me. It was me looking at ways I could reform things as a person that’s been asking for change. It was just the right and obvious thing to do; something I’m proud I did. As a businessman, there comes a time when you have to pick purpose over profit. I’m glad that I’ve seen both sides. As a businessman, I’ve evolved and was blessed to be in a position to give the publishing back.

Ma$e was very vocal about reclaiming his publishing rights. Have the two of you reconciled?

Everything’s cool and good now. You know, we’re brothers and brothers fight. I love him and that’s it.

The other big recent news is the release of your long-promised ode to R&B, The Love Album: Off the Grid. Why a return to recording at this point in your career?

It’s been 13 years since Last Train to Paris. When it came out, it kind of broke my heart because people didn’t understand it right away. It was a bit before its time, and I know I was in my ego.

What didn’t they understand?

I had to compromise the uncut Blackness and soul of what I was trying to do, like on the song “Coming Home.” I have the talent as a producer, you know, to make a No. 1 record. But that’s very dangerous because sometimes that record may not be authentic or your intentions aren’t in the right place. My intentions were to get another No. 1 record instead of keeping the album uncut and soulful.

As time went on, people were able to connect with the album, and it’s become a cult classic. But for a couple of years after that, I didn’t know what to do. I wasn’t hearing the sounds. Then I started just dealing with life and had to go through a healing journey. When I came out of that, I was like, “What do I want to do that makes me happy?” And it was, “I need to get back to music.” So I immediately said, “I’m going to start a new label called Love Records, and I’m going to focus on R&B and bring back what it’s missing: that soul, that love, that unapologetic Blackness, that expression of vulnerability and on a different, higher frequency.”

The album sounds very autobiographical. Was that also one of your intentions this time around?

Yes. This time I decided, “I’m going to just bare my soul and give people my truth.” So this is my love story through all of my different relationships. It’s about going away for 48 hours with a young lady, turning the phones off, locking in and connecting. We should all go off the grid with our significant other, whoever it is you love, and get to know each other better. And I had the musical vision for my story. I was like, “First, I’m going to make some R&B music for dancing to make her feel comfortable, then some slow love- and baby-making music for the strokers, then some baby-don’t-leave-me music.” And I have some of the best — and my favorite — voices in R&B telling my love story. What I’m bringing back to the game is that Puffy sound, not following any trends or algorithms. I’m not knocking anything that’s out there, but a lot of things are just so toxic.

Why has R&B become such an important crusade for you?

My first love is R&B. The first record that I produced was the remix of “Come and Talk to Me” by Jodeci. And from there going on to Mary J. Blige and, you know, to being the king of hip-hop soul.

When I was younger, R&B saved my life. I thought I was going to be a football player. Then I got hurt on my last day of camp as a senior. My heart was broken; I didn’t have a B plan. And that music really saved my life. Dancing in the clubs in New York, getting the chance to be picked up as a background dancer and seeing the industry that I fell in love with saved me. Then as life goes on, you get hit with so many things: losing the mother of my children, losing my girlfriend; just being hurt, down and lost. R&B helped me find myself and get back on my feet again. So I can’t wait for people to hear how I’ve come full circle.

In fact, I’ve come full circle on so many things. It’s rare, having a career of 30 years and still having the ability to make relevant music without selling out or trying to be on somebody else’s wave. I’m here to unify us, the whole R&B community. I returned to my roots of production; those sensibilities like when I was just starting out at 23. As a student of the game, I’m working with all the new, younger producers. We have a nice new crew of Hitmen that has been assembled to take this to the next level. I’m learning from them and their fresh energy, and they’re learning from me. That’s one of the things that I’m always going to be: a platform. I went from being on the stage to becoming the stage. So launching some new artists on the album was also a definite priority.

Why did you say last year that R&B is dead?

When I said, “R&B is dead,” I wanted to wake up the R&B universe and shed some light on it. My intention was to do exactly what’s happened. We’re now in this R&B renaissance. After leaving the game for so long and coming back, I realized there was a lack of resources, a lack of support from radio, a lack of belief. When I said [that], it wasn’t being said in a negative way. It was also part of unifying us in getting back to our Blackness, getting off that computer and getting back into feeling. If you ain’t got no feeling, you dead. So I’m here to bring back that feeling.

There are a lot of artists out there, of course, pushing the envelope with different styles of R&B. And I’m seeing people step their game up. This renaissance has such incredible artists from Summer Walker and SZA to The Weeknd and Brent Faiyaz … so much richness. But I believe we have to make some noise to be heard more and get the same resources to be able to compete. This genre deserves to be put in a position to win. R&B and hip-hop are not the same.

I’m glad to hear you say that because many people in the industry keep putting R&B under the hip-hop banner.

I’ve had conversations with some of the people in power, and almost all the people in power are not from the R&B community or the culture. That’s when you get the lack of understanding and resources. To them, it just sounds like the same thing. So I’m in a season of total independence. I had an experience with Motown where it was like, “I’ve come too far to ask somebody that isn’t where I’m from about cultural and artistic things. If I’m going to bet on anybody, I’m going to bet on the people I believe in.” So I decided to go independent with Love Records and Bad Boy. I decided to come back into the game with bolder ideas of ownership, distribution and future manufacturing because those are the things that we as a people are cut out of.

Since #TheShowMustBePaused, has the music industry overall made any substantial progress in terms of diversity, equity and inclusion?

We have some representation … Shout out and all due respect to everybody that’s in power. But [for most people], there’s still somebody over them, a white man that they have to get permission from to do something. And it’s always been the same, no matter what the industry. When you’re independent, you don’t have to ask that permission. You can do what you want to do. It’s time for change. And the only way you get change is you’ve got to make the change — and not just change progress. It’s all a bunch of bulls–t. Diversity isn’t about inclusion; diversity is about sharing power. And nothing has changed. It’s gotten worse.

What about the changes the Recording Academy has made since you put the organization on notice in 2020 for the Grammys never respecting Black music “to the point that it should be”?

They went right to work immediately. There’s a lot of work to be done, but radical steps have been made. And that’s really what I’m on: radical change. Not making tiny steps. Me making those statements made them look at themselves, made me look at myself and made the whole industry have to look at itself and our [collective] responsibility toward evolving through diversity, through economics and through this human race where everybody just wants to be better. But it wasn’t just me; there were a bunch of us [Black executives] that stepped up behind the scenes as a collective in pushing for change. And the Academy really responded in a responsible way. So now it’s also up to artists to understand how to get in there and really utilize the academy for their benefit.

Speaking of change, you signed with SALXCO for management. What was behind that decision?

Finding the right manager is hard. Someone that’s going to be kind of obsessed about every move you have going on as much as you would be. That’s what you hope for: to find someone with that kind of talent, who can actually tell you something worthwhile and understands a bigger picture. For example, one of the big decisions we’ve made is that my first concert will be in Europe, not in America, as we make this a global release. There were a lot of things that affected the whole energy behind how this project is being rolled out and positioned. So I respect Sal’s opinion and vision. And he and Dina make it enjoyable.

In addition to celebrating your 30th anniversary in music, REVOLT is marking its 10th birthday. What’s your vision for the network moving forward?

To make it not just the biggest Black-owned network but the biggest media company that I can. I’m not pigeonholing myself. Again, nobody’s going to give us power, and they’re not going to share it with us. That’s why 10 years ago, I named my network REVOLT, because we have to take our quality of life back. There’s so much value and information. And when the Black media doesn’t have an outlet that’s controlled by somebody of color, then it’s not truly a Black free press. REVOLT is the only foundation right now that’s going in that direction. But it takes time. I own 65% of REVOLT, so we could change the narrative. I’m investing in the Black future with REVOLT. It’s not a hustle, not a money play. Everything I do is to make sure that I do my best to break down the barriers. Media is one of the most important and powerful parts of freedom.

As far as our business strategy, we’re in acquisition mode to really build a Black-owned media conglomerate. That’s why we were looking at BET and at a couple of other businesses. BET is definitely the mecca, the originator of Black media, and still is. So just the thought of unifying … We’re not going to be able to reach our highest level of success in the media world, like a Rupert Murdoch, if we don’t unify. Like me, Tyler Perry and Byron Allen. We have a responsibility because it’s like 15 of us getting money, but 10 billion people in the world. We need to pool our resources, everybody from LeBron James and Issa Rae to Tracee Ellis Ross to Jada Pinkett [Smith] and Queen Latifah. That’s what I’m pushing for: unity in a disruptive way that’s never been done before. Having such a media platform is one of the most powerful tools in changing our trajectory.

Given your busy September with the VMAs, the album rollout and the REVOLT World summit, is the long-awaited Verzuz battle between you and Jermaine Dupri still on the table for this month?

The only Verzuz I want to have right now is Puff Daddy versus Diddy. The only person I’m in competition with is myself. (Smiles.) But the battle with Jermaine isn’t off the table. We’re still trying to work it out, and I definitely look forward to that.

You entered Forbes’ billionaire rappers circle last year. Who’s on their way from hip-hop’s next generation?

Nipsey Hussle, to me, was that young Puff version. But one person that I can say right now is Travis Scott. I can relate to how he’s diversifying his portfolio and really understanding how to take it to the next level. I also think Yung Miami [aka Caresha Brownlee] from the City Girls. She reminds me of Oprah with the endless possibilities that she has as far as her clothing line, television shows, performances, live podcasts. I really respect both of their hustles and see them being able to break through.

Despite this being the 50th-anniversary year of hip-hop, music pundits have written stories about hip-hop’s lack of top-charting singles and albums in 2023. What’s your take on the genre’s evolution into 2024?

Right now, people are looking for something fresh. Everything’s been so monotonous and low frequency with everybody sounding so much like each other. However, I think you’re going to see a balance. You’re still going to have your ratchet stuff, you’re still going to have the turn-up. But people are going to come up with new styles. It’s time. The beauty of it is that you can make your own type of music and cultivate your own community. When you have 8 billion people in the world, you can do all right if you have 2 million in your fan base. I just see hip-hop constantly evolving and constantly melding with different types of music. There’s Afro beats melding with trap melding with what’s going on in London melding with what’s going on in dance music. Everything’s just coming together.

The smile on your face as you say all this … it’s like maybe seeing the younger Sean during the Uptown days.

Definitely. I’ve gotten a chance to look at everything with new, fresh eyes. I learned that from my baby … You know, I just had a baby. And the baby looks around at everything. So I started to look around, hearing things and being more open-minded. The future of hip-hop, I think, is really looking up, especially with AI coming in. I think it’s going to have an impact; that it will be another category of music. But also looking at older hip-hop and R&B artists selling out arenas … it’s a wealthy season right now for music in general.

As you reflect on your career thus far, how do you view your legacy as an elder statesman of hip-hop alongside Dr. Dre and Jay-Z?

We’re all different people at different stages in our lives, you know what I’m saying? But there’s only one Diddy. There’s only one Jay-Z. There’s only one Dr. Dre. We’re all good where we’re at, and we’re in our purpose. I’m living my purpose as far as coming in and making people feel something. Breaking down barriers and showing people how to hustle, make money, make a career and living — and be successful.

The scene will be immediately familiar to anyone who has attended a music festival: a DJ riling up a crowd, playing a hit but ratcheting up the anticipation by toying with the melody before the drums charge to the rescue. Only this time, the hit hadn’t come out yet — the South Korean producer Peggy Gou was teasing an unreleased single titled “(It Goes Like) Nanana.” 

Attendees at the Lost Nomads festival outside of Marrakesh hardly seemed to mind; a TikTok video capturing Gou’s set shows listeners throwing their hands in the air with abandon. One onlooker, standing behind the DJ’s right shoulder, removes the cigarette hanging unlit from his lips to unleash a hoot just as the percussion hits. 

That sunset TikTok clip helped kickstart a viral chain of events that has turned “(It Goes Like) Nanana” into Gou’s mainstream breakthrough. The single is her first to scale the Billboard charts, climbing inside the top 40 on the Global 200, and it’s earned 27 million on-demand streams in the U.S. since its release, according to Luminate. For a time it was the lead track on Spotify’s flagship playlist Today’s Top Hits, a spot usually taken up by major-label superstars, not dance producers on the independent label XL. 

No one is more surprised than Gou. She didn’t have TikTok when “(It Goes Like) Nanana” started to go like viral; she found out about that success from her friends. She also doesn’t watch the charts. “I really did not expect this reaction,” Gou says. “My song was never on a chart before. In the beginning I wasn’t sure what [charting] meant exactly.”

@capturewithbadr

Sunrise vibe with PEGGY GOU 🪄 #peggygou #techno #dj #morocco #agafay #marrakech #festival

♬ original sound – Badr

But the excursion into new commercial territory is welcome — a relief, in fact. After her rubbery 2019 single “Starry Night” became popular on dancefloors, Gou felt pressured to top it. “Sometimes pressure is a good thing,” she says. “It always kind of pushes me.”

“(It Goes Like) Nanana” was born during the pandemic, while Gou was binging dance music and hip-hop from the 1990s. The simplicity of the house music she absorbed from that decade stood out: “A lot of the hooks are repetitive, but it’s still catchy, you don’t get bored.” She cites SNAP!’s chugging hit “Rhythm Is a Dancer” and the German producer ATB as touchstones. 

Musical train-spotters on TikTok have thrown out a handful of other references in video comments: Kylie Minogue! (Presumably because she knows her way around a “la-la-la,” which isn’t too far from a “na-na-na.”) “I Like To Move It”! (Maybe in the progression of the bass line?) A Touch of Class’s “Around the World;” Gala’s “Freed From Desire” — take a fistful of Ultimate Dance Party CDs from the second half of the ’90s, throw them in a blender, and you might get something along the lines of “(It Goes Like) Nanana.”

Gou’s biggest tracks to date — “Starry Night” and “It Makes You Forget (Itgehane)” — are sung predominantly in Korean. But when she tried that approach on “(It Goes Like) Nanana,” “it didn’t really work,” so she ended up singing it all in English instead. Gou also subbed in an entirely new bass line at the last minute before she started playing it out at festivals like Lost Nomads. 

Badr Bounailat, who shot the popular video of Gou near Marrakesh on June 3rd and posted it June 5th, has two theories about why it amassed over 7 million views. First, he says, “I’m a photographer, and that’s a good frame.” (The top comment on his post: “Can we talk about that zoom quality ouffff.”) Second: “People were in it, they were responding well to the song.” 

The scenic locale may have helped as well. Harmony Soleil, music director for KNHC, a dance radio station in Seattle, was excited to find the video of Gou in her feed. “I’m a tiny bit obsessed with her, in a not weird way,” Soleil jokes. “She’s always in amazing places. What do you mean, you’re in Morocco and you’re in Spain and you’re in Japan?” (Soleil has been playing Gou on KNHC, jumping at the chance “to support an artist who hasn’t had a lot of U.S. radio airplay otherwise.”)

Thanks to all the online attention, by the time “(It Goes Like) Nanana” was officially released on June 15th, Gou felt like the track “was already out.” She was quickly inundated with requests from DJs — from “EDM to jungle to soul to hardcore techno” — asking for stems to make their own remixes. 

The biggest re-work has come from Ian Asher, a DJ and producer with a large following who has a knack for making mash-ups that drive TikTokers wild. Asher, who calls “Starry Night” “a classic,” decided to fuse Gou’s single with CamelPhat’s “Cola,” a skipping but hard-nosed dance track that became an international hit in 2017. “What I love about it is that you have two party songs,”  Asher explains, “but one is very bright and summery, and the other is like you’re going into a nightclub.”

@ianasher

Im performing at Slate NYC this Friday July 21st… should I play this? #housemusic #cola #itgoeslikenanana

♬ NANANA COLA IAN ASHER EDIT Out Now On SoundCloud – Ian Asher

His mash-up from July went bananas on both TikTok and Instagram, appearing in more than 780,000 user created videos. The “Cola x Nanana” meld is not officially available, which in practice means there are bootleg versions on Spotify, YouTube, and SoundCloud as of this week. “It keeps getting taken down, but people keep re-finding it and uploading it on every platform,” Asher notes. “It’s a whole mini-drama.” (It gets taken down because the remix is technically unauthorized; Gou only gave stems to the German DJ-producer Boys Noize.)

The social media fervor around “(It Goes Like) Nanana” in its various forms propelled the track out of the world of independent-label dance music. “I first became aware of Peggy about three years ago on more of an underground level,” says Jonathan Geronimo, vp of electronic/dance programming for SiriusXM. He found out about “(It Goes Like) Nanana” from his colleagues overseeing TikTok Radio, saw that it was “exploding globally,” and put it into rotation a few days after its official release. SiriusXM has played the track more than 700 times since, and Geronimo believes it has “a shot” to make the jump over to pop radio, “especially with the format really keeping a close eye on what’s happening on TikTok.”

Gou’s single hit the Global 200 in July and has since climbed to No. 33, giving her a strong tailwind as she finalizes her full-length debut, due out early in 2024 on XL. The album also draws on her recent dive into ’90s sounds. Once again, though, she is feeling the need to top herself. “I don’t think there’s any track on my album that’s as catchy as ‘Nanana,’” Gou says. “The second single that’s coming out is very different — close to pop.”

That said, predicting audience reactions is notoriously difficult — she didn’t know that millions of listeners would find “(It Goes Like) Nanana” so bewitching. Still, the pressure remains. “My mindset is always: I can do better,” Gou adds. “I can do better.” 

Nigerian dance artist Kah-Lo released her debut album, Pain/Pleasure, on Sept. 8 via Epic Records. Here, she writes about the long journey that brought her to this achievement.

I always knew I would become a musician, before I even knew how to spell the word. I always wrote poetry and other bits, but didn’t start making music until I met a bunch of like-minded friends in secondary school in the mid-noughties. 

Prior to meeting these friends – most of them rappers and boys – a lot of my dreams of becoming a musician seemed so wildly far-fetched that at 13, my teachers and classmates once sat me down and, out of genuine concern, tried to talk me out of chasing these dreams.

Growing up in Nigeria at the time, telling most people you wanted to make music for a living was like telling them you wanted to toss your life in the trash. Telling them you wanted to make globally accepted music was even worse. To be a successful musician – one who made a lucrative living, was so beyond anyone’s imagination, you started to sound crazier the older you got.

It was a dream that was never validated until I met those friends. We wanted to make music Nigerians had never even thought to make, and we wanted it to be so good it would be heard, respected, and measured on the same plane as the musicians we idolized. 

We started to see what could be possible when a label called Storm Records launched with a slew of rappers, musicians and producers fusing Nigerian instruments and slang with Western patterns and flow in a way we had never heard before. They had Naeto C and Ikechukwu, who came onto the rap scene fresh from New York. They also had Sasha P – a standout female MC who started out with one of the first rap collectives known as the Trybesmen. She came back on the scene with a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it lyrical maturity I’m still decoding to this day. 

It started to dawn on me that our dreams were, indeed, valid. These rappers weren’t making Afropop or Afro- anything. They were making rap. But this was 2007, and Afropop itself was barely even scratching the surface, let alone Nigerian artists making Western-adjacent music in Nigerian accents. However, I left Lagos for New York in 2009 — knowing at the very least, it was possible.

I eventually started cultivating a sound and posting my original music to SoundCloud. I started getting messages from DJs asking to use the monotone deadpan talk-rap sections of my reverb heavy alt-R&B over dance music. In that era, dance music was dubstep and Baauer’s “Harlem Shake,” so these requests confused me. How would it even work?

I eventually connected with electronic producer Riton via Twitter, and used what was then my last $20 to head to the studio in Brooklyn to record with him. We made two tracks. One of them was a carefully written alt-R&B number, and the other was “Rinse and Repeat.” 

At his insistence, I used the talk-rap style over a minimalist dance beat he had made. I had never made dance music before – at least not intentionally. I couldn’t fathom how a genre I mostly associated with looped vocals and sample-heavy hits from the early-2000s by the likes of Daft Punk, Fatboy Slim and Groove Armada could possibly command significant attention. The climate of dance music I knew at the time didn’t accommodate such stylings. I cried on the way home and decided to move back home to Lagos since it was clear music wouldn’t work out for me. Who would listen to that?

I was wrong. The song became a global hit.

Over the next few years, I would perform in places I had yet to even dream of. All over Europe, North America opening for Sofi Tukker, touring in Australia and a brief gig in Russia. Albeit incredible, it was also a bit uncomfortable. The bulk of the shows would be lineups full of white male DJs where I’d end up being the only Black person/woman on the stage. Sometimes, it would be entire towns where I seemed to be the only Black person there at all. 

Once in a while, we’d do gigs where there would be other insanely talented Black artists in the green rooms – Raye, MNEK and Kelli-Leigh were frequent fixtures. However, I quickly started to notice, we weren’t on the lineups for our own merit. In most cases, we were there because we had collaborated on hit records with the white, male DJs who were booked for these gigs.

I dyed my wigs all sorts of bright colors to make sure I looked extra captivating on camera, because the recap videos and livestreams I asked my friends and family to watch almost always seemed to miss me. I figured perhaps I wasn’t dynamic enough on stage. 

I didn’t start attracting my own attention until I debuted an electric green wig in Ibiza in the summer of 2018. I visually became hard to ignore with such a bright color against my dark skin, and that bled into the music and my persona as well. Things started to change, and I started to get booked on my own accord – much to the chagrin of my collaborators.

We – the Black artists who made up the bulk of the vocal prowess that was in dance music – weren’t supposed to be in the limelight. We were supposed to live in the shrouded mystery of samples, topline vocalists or even session musicians. In dance music, the DJ was king. To draw attention to yourself in that way was to overstep, and to even be credited as a primary artist on a record was something you had to fight for, and viewed as a “favor” you were to be grateful for. 

Meanwhile, Nigerian pop music was just starting to be recognized by mainstream media outlets as its own thing. My first few tracks had been referred to as having “Afrobeat elements” – I imagine due to my blended Nigerian accent. I had to constantly reiterate I was making house music, and not Afrohouse.

Regardless, it seemed like the very space I was taking up as an artist was defying odds, and it was wonderful, because it’s all I really ever wanted to prove. Being nominated for the Grammy for best dance recording in 2017, for “Rinse & Repeat,” was one of the best milestones of my career. One of the most respected musical bodies had recognized my art as it was, and not based it off of my cultural background.

I started getting collaboration requests on a larger scale from some of the biggest DJs in the world. Chances to release my own records were few and far between – and when I eventually did, I hardly got much support on the scale my features would. 

It wasn’t until my dear friend and DJ/producer, Michael Brun, taught me how to DJ that I fully understood the power of my vocals. The delivery and global citizen feel of it made it a perfect fit for beat-matching, and it was malleable enough to go over any beat style. It started to make sense why – since my days on SoundCloud and even to this day – my a cappellas were always in high demand. It gave me a new perspective, and I began understanding the power of “no,” for instance, when the track wasn’t one I felt was a good fit for me and my brand.

Understanding that power, and going from a scarcity mindset to one of abundance, opened me up to new opportunities. No longer would I be minimized to support DJs when I bring just as much to the track as they do. Some collaborators were not happy about this, and it led to a lot of friction, naturally so.

I moved back to New York and signed to Epic Records in 2020 at the peak of the global pandemic, and I released my debut EP in the summer of 2021, aptly called The Arrival.

For the first time in my career, I released a body of work that I had creative control over and truly represented me in every facet. It spawned a solo single on the Dance/Mix Show Airplay chart – a feat that was deemed unrealistic for a Nigerian and a Black woman making dance music.

“Drag Me Out,” a one-off single, followed the year after to the same acclaim. It wasn’t a fluke, and I could stand on my own. Black female “vocalists” – who are usually talented singer/songwriters in their own right – can stand on their own. I’m insanely proud of proving people wrong.

My debut album, Pain/Pleasure came out this past Friday, September 8th. The first half of it was written while I was going through a lot of these trials and tribulations, so I explore themes of anger on “fund$,” pain on the title track, and hurt on “Karma.”

The last half of it is a lot more triumphant, because through all of that and against all odds, I did it. I overcame, and there’s a lot to celebrate for it. 

There were an unlimited number of ways the new Chemical Brothers album might have turned out.

Gathered in the studio, the duo — Ed Simons and Tom Rowlands — presided over a glut of music made during the pandemic. Unsure of what to do with it all, they considered assembling a triple LP, or a quadruple LP, or maybe something more loose and kitchen sink-ish that would highlight the nuances of their creative process.

“I was thinking, ‘Maybe that’ll be cool, to do something really different to how we’ve made our albums before,'” Rowlands tells Billboard over Zoom, “And then in listening to it, it was like, ‘Hm, that’s not so good.'”

So ultimately the pair, friends since their days at the University of Manchester and icons since the release of their groundbreaking 1995 debut Exit Planet Dust — did what they’ve done for the last 30 years and pared it all down to the 11-track collection For That Beautiful Feeling, their 10th studio LP, out Friday (Sept. 8) via Republic Records. With many options for how to Tetris the project together, the guys just let their moods dictate.

“We always want our music to not be a technical exercise, but to reflect how the two of us are feeling,” Simons says. “And I guess, you know, it has been a very strange four years.”

He’s not wrong. Much has gone down on a global scale since the Brothers released their last album, 2019’s No Geography. The world went into lockdown a few weeks after the LP won dance/electronic album of the year at the 2020 Grammys. Amid the pandemic, Rowlands tucked himself away in his Sussex studio and started banging out music, which Simons picked up when it was safe to do so. “It was the longest period we’ve spent apart for a while,” Simons says of that time.

As COVID eventually waned, the war in Ukraine began, living costs spiraled in the U.K. and elsewhere and the climate crisis became increasingly tangible and exponentially scarier. It was, is, a lot of psychic weight for them, and for everyone else. But there were, of course, moments of daily joy. That, altogether, was their mood, and thus that is the album.

For That Beautiful Feeling catapults from ecstasy to dread (“we have no reason to live!” declares track two, “No Reason”), to sadness, to a sort of hectic waking dream state, to hope, to the transcendent title track that closes the LP. In total, the project reflects the anxieties and exhilarations of life on earth in 2023 through the same sort of tightly wound, acid-soaked, elegant, raucous, rock-ish, blissful and often subversive style that’s defined their discography.

This oeuvre contains many moments of grace and soaring beauty (“Swoon,” “The Sunshine Underground,” etc.), and it’s this same spirit of connection, love and hope that ultimately centers and steers the new project. Just listen to Beck assuring “When you feel like nothing really matters/ When you feel alone/ When you feel like all your life is shattered/ And you can’t go home/ I’ll come skipping like a stone” on the momentous “Skipping Like a Stone” and try not to feel at least a little uplifted.

“It can’t but affect what sort of music you want to put out,” Simons says of the global crises in play while the album was made. “But we didn’t necessarily want to dwell in that place. We feel like what we create is perhaps a way of having moments of release and escape. ‘Rousing’ became kind of a touchstone. Obviously there’s reflective music within the album, and there’s kind of quite sad bits, but generally we wanted the tone to be one of, not necessarily celebration, but — how can we get to the the part of people that wants to come alive and wants to not stay in this disenchanted, stagnant place?”

“I mean, but it all starts with the desire of uplifting myself,” adds Rowlands. “That’s also what the title of our album is about… For that moment when you hear something, and it affects you and you just kind of get overwhelmed and overtaken. That moment is always the thing being in the studio or playing live is chasing.”

Anyone who’s seen The Chemical Brothers live knows their efficacy in achieving such a feeling in the live setting, with shows bringing audiences to heavy, cathartic, deliriously joyful and yes, ultimately beautiful places.

For U.S. audiences, though, the opportunity to partake has been fewer and farther between than many of us would prefer, with the Brothers playing only roughly a few U.S. shows over the last several years. This includes a primetime slot at Coachella’s Outdoor Stage this past April, a headlining gig at Portola in San Francisco last fall (“It felt really like a real post-EDM festival,” Rowlands says of the event. “We didn’t naturally feel at home in that EDM world”), along with dates in Santa Barbara, New York, Seattle and the Denver area. While they’re touring heavily in the U.K. this fall, they don’t currently have any U.S. shows on the schedule.

“The costs have gone up so much,” Simons says of touring in the States post-pandemic. “It’s just not really viable at the moment… I’m apologetic to the people who do want to see us that it is increasingly difficult for us to get to America, because we have had the times of our lives playing there.”

While the guys and their team have discussed paring down their show to make touring the U.S. more affordable — “a debate that has raged over Zoom,” says Simons — they don’t necessarily want to risk disappointing people who’ve seen social media clips of their current production, which involves a wall of equipment, a strange and captivating visual show and a pair of giant marching robots.

“[The production] originally came from the fact that we didn’t want to inflict [audiences with] just the two of us awkwardly standing with the synthesizers,” says Simons, “so we wanted a big back job, but it’s just grown and grown, and now we’ve got these 40-foot clowns voicing the words.”

But if U.S. audiences can’t catch the guys live in the near future, access is available through Paused in Cosmic Reflection, a Chemical Brothers biography coming Oct. 26. Written with author and old friend Robin Turner, the book includes interviews with Simons and Rowlands, along with pals including Beck, Wayne Coyne and Noel Gallagher. The book tracks the Brothers since their earliest days, when they carried their own gear to sets and woke up the morning after to finish essays on Chaucer.

“I guess there’s no end date,” Simons says of this retrospective, “but we are nearer to the end of The Chemical Brothers than we are the beginning… It has been good to reflect and remember some history. I guess you’ve got to do it before you start forgetting everything, and I’ve got a really good memory.”

“He remembers, like, every small gig above a barber shop we ever did,” says Rowlands. “Then someone would produce a photograph of it and I’d be like, ‘Oh, gotcha. Maybe we did do that.’ … But one of the things about our band is, we don’t like stopping and reflecting. I always want to move on to the next thing. This book really felt like stopping and reflecting.”

They agree their biggest takeaway from all this contemplation is that, Rowlands says, “Our friendship is at the heart of it. That’s the thing that has enabled us.”

“Without being too trite, there’s a chemistry between us,” adds Simons. “We’ve just grown up together. We know what makes each other tick, what makes each other upset… We like each other, it’s as simple as that.”

In terms of legacy, neither sees an expiration date for what they do. Rowlands, who assures that he’ll always be in the studio making music, is pragmatic: “When no one shows up to your concert or your DJ gig, no one listens to your record, then it’s time.”

Simons says the legacy is simply the body of work they’ve created and continue adding to. Then he thinks about it a bit more and tells me a story about an all-ages gig they recently played in the English countryside.

“After, lots of our friends bought their teenage kids backstage, and they were all wearing Chemical Brothers T-shirts. And then there were little kids, and they had little Chemical Brothers baseball caps.

“Usually,” he continues, “when people come back it’s like ‘Do you want a beer?’ And this time it was like ‘Do you want some chocolate?’ Just seeing 10 or 15 kids who are all children of our friends, and they loved the gig. They lasted till the end. It was cool. That’s the legacy.”

He agrees that it was even, in fact, a beautiful feeling.

Simma down: The King of the Dancehall has returned.  

Seven years after his last studio album — 2016’s Unstoppable — Beenie Man is back with Simma, his latest star-studded, genre-bending opus. Featuring collaborations with a plethora of artists ranging from Shenseea and Shaggy to Giggs and Stonebwoy, Simma effortlessly traverses the intersections of dancehall, roots reggae, drill, hip-hop, and Afrobeats. 

The album arrives amid something of a revival for the Grammy winner. This year, his classic 1997 hit single “Who Am I,” became the soundtrack for one of social media’s most popular music trends — in essence, people sing the first two words of the chorus (“sim simma”) and wait in anticipation for their chosen subject to finish the rest of the lyrics. La La Anthony recently used the challenge, aptly named #SimSimmaChallenge, to quiz famous friends like Kelly Rowland, Ciara and Kim Kardashian on their Beenie Man lyric knowledge. 

The trend is a natural extension of the timelessness of Beenie Man’s music. Dating back to 1983’s The Invincible Beany Man — which arrived when he was just 10 years old — Beenie Man has been reigning over the dancehall. Although the title of his latest album doesn’t have anything to do with “Who Am I” or the #SimSimmaChallenge, the record still houses a few career throughlines, including reunions with Mýa (“Docta”) and Sean Paul (“Supa Star”), who he previously worked with in the early ‘00s and ‘10s. 

Simma, originally completed in 2021, suffered a lengthy delay after Beenie’s mother passed in 2020 following complications from a stroke earlier that year. “At that time when the album fit for release, I was in bare depression, mourning, all of these things,” he reflects. The album also serves as his first LP since his instantly iconic 2020 Verzuz battle with Bounty Killer. In this way, Simma is an unbridled celebration of life, longevity and resilience. 

Beenie Man has earned six entries on the Billboard Hot 100, reaching as high as No. 26 with “Dude” (with Ms. Thing), the lead single from 2004’s Back to Basics. On the Billboard 200, the dancehall legend has racked up five entries to date, peaking at No. 18 with 2002’s Tropical Storm. On Reggae Albums, Beenie Man has notched six No. 1 titles from 13 overall top 10 projects. 

In a conversation with Billboard, Beenie Man goes behind the scenes of the creation of Simma, recounts that improptu mid-flight performance, reflects on his storied career and gives advice to the rising generation of dancehall artists.

Simma has been in the works for some years now. Did anything about the album change between its original release date and Sep. 1, 2023? 

There’s a lot of things that change about the album, because we mek an album before and then my moms drop out by the time when the album fi release. So at that time when the album fit for release, I was in bare depression, mourning, all of these things. I was in it for two years until my brudda Blue decide to say, “Alright, we need to get into this thing now. Get out di depression, get out all di things you going through.” 

So, my natural instinct is to go into the studio and beat up some riddim. So we got some from Fanatix from England – them send first – and then we got some from Busy Signal, and then we start from there suh. Then we went to England and get some more riddims and different type of beats. I never know seh di album turn out di weh it turn out, but when it finish, the job was great. No disrespect. We make over 60 song for di album. 

There’s a host of genres on Simma — from roots reggae to drill — what was your vision in terms of exploring different styles on the record? 

We’re just making music. We do Afrobeats, we do everything. Just make some music. Because people love good music and good music lasts forever. Regardless. Good music outlives you. Trust me.  

You mentioned that there’s some Afrobeats on this album. Recently, there have been conversations around Afrobeats “replacing” dancehall on the global stage, and here you are merging the two styles on Simma. What do you think about the two genres’ ability to coexist? 

There’s no music that can replace dancehall. Dancehall will never go nowhere. Dancehall will always be here. Because if there was no dancehall, there would be no Afrobeats. That don’t make no sense. People haffi stop, because they don’t understand the lifespan of music. You have enough music that come and last 5, 6, 7 years, but dancehall have been here from before hip-hop! If hip-hop a 50-years-old, dancehall almost 100-years-old! [Laughs.]

We have been through Shabba Ranks, we have been through Ninjaman, we have been through the greatest – Super Cat, all of them. So, dancehall is not going nowhere. Not at all. 

There are many collaborations on Simma. Was there any thought of making this a straight collaborative album? Why did you decide to keep the solo tracks on there? 

Every album I’ve been listening to is a million collaborations. You listen to Jay-Z last album, collaboration. You listen to Drake album, collaboration. So, why should not I? So you have a Busy Signal, Jamaican. You have a Shaggy, Jamaican. You have Sean Paul, Jamaican. These are superstars. So why don’t you use your own Jamaican superstars? In Africa, you have a pack of superstars. You have Stonebwoy, superstar. You have Giggs from England. We have all the superstars we can use. It’s my time. So, why not? [The King] has all his subjects. 

We mek this album this way because the first part of the album was all me. Then I said, “Nah, get some people.” I’m still gonna be there. It’s not like somebody guh sing a song pon mi album which I’m not on. I am going to be inside that music. People sometimes dem like listen to other style or other version or other pattern, so mix up di ting. 

Talk to me about the song with Tina (Hoodcelebrityy), “Let Go.” There’s this really dope conversational, back-and-forth vibe going on there. How did that song come about? 

She even surprised me, because she never DJ my lyrics — she just get into the studio just like how mi know she a guh do. But mi nuh wan leave nothing to chance. So when she jump pon di record now and start do her ting, I say, “Oh, wow, murda.” She kill it. And the song wicked. 

You and Teddy Riley have been friends for years. What was it like finally working together in a musical capacity on this album? 

Teddy is a musician, and I’m a musician. Regardless of how long mi know him, it’s a matter of him a have time, because him always busy. The man spend six months a make a riddim for me. Six months. Every time I make di riddim, I finish the song, him send back fi di song and play a next riddim around it, and play a next riddim around it, and put on some other ting and mix the song different and send back di song inna different format and then mi haffi tell him “Stop!” [Laughs.]  

And him say, “Hear this last mix, please listen to this last mix.” So, di man play di last mix fi me and mi seh, “Jesus Christ! Di brudda has a great mind. Just please gimme di last mix, don’t mek mi a beg.” And he gimme di mix. Cause mi nuh wan him fi touch di song again! But every time him touch it, the song get better.

You’ve spoken before about modern dancehall shifting away from the tradition of riddims, who do you think shoulders the responsibility of maintaining that tradition? 

It’s on us [as the older generation]. We are the artists that have been here before. We responsible, because it’s all music. Alright, say you’re having a dancehall stage show anywhere in the world, and you bring one million dancehall artists. You have dancehall artists from Africa, you have dancehall artists from Mexico, you have dancehall artists from America, you have dancehall artists from everywhere in the world! 

But an artist like Ninjaman — none of these artists a bad like Ninjaman. They could never, because Ninjaman walk pon di stage — him don’t have to have a hit song today, him just need to present. Him just walk pon di stage, di people dem get crazy. Shabba Ranks. Him don’t have to have a new song today, all him haffi do is be present. So, imagine me now. I come after them, present, and get a response. Imagine a Buju Banton or a Sean Paul. Imagine a Shaggy, you get where I’m coming from? We will always be here. We nah going nowhere.  

Music is not until death do us part. We dead and music still alive. So, this is what we are here for: longevity, to last, to be that person that people can always depend on. And this is why the album is called Simma, because the King is still here. 

When it comes to the younger, rising generation of dancehall artists, who do you think are the emerging leaders? 

Wow. Alright. I listen to Skeng. I listen to Skillibeng — sometimes I listen to him and laugh because I find him really hilarious. Valiant. Popcaan and dem are still my young artists dem still. They’re who I really listen to. You see, artists with substance and artists that make sense and take my brain somewhere. I don’t really listen to much new dancehall. I don’t — like, seriously. I’ll put in a Lauryn Hill CD and listen to that. 

When did you first see the #SimSimmaChallenge online? 

Well, somebody showed me, yuh know, because mi nuh pon di phone. [Laughs.] And then mi see a next person do it, and mi see another person doing it, and mi see dem still doing it. Then the challenge getting bigger and bigger. So, that’s the reason why I talk about songs with substance. The song outlasts you. 

Alright, suppose I never have the courage fi still doing music, I would never have a new album. But the songs that I did from before gimme di courage fi know I can still do what I’m doing. You have to make songs with substance. Songs [where] we can hear inspiration, songs that can inspire you. You inspire your own self!

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And I think that was really reflected at the West Indian Day Parade in Brooklyn over Labor Day Weekend. I heard different songs of yours all the time while I was out there. 

Exactly. Alright, Bob Marley sing reggae. Mi sing dancehall. Bob Marley the King of Reggae, I’m the King of Dancehall. 

I want to know the story behind that plane performance! They weren’t lit enough for you! 

It’s not a story behind it! Mi leave out mi seat, mi wan look fuh mi band members. So, I went down there and everybody was sleeping. So mi wake up alla di band members dem and everything. But by waking them up, mi a wake up everybody. By the time we reach through di place fi go through the door for first class, everybody a seh, “You have to give something!” So, mi a seh, “What??” Because myself, I was sleeping. So, I said, “Give me something.” So, I’m just standing around and start [singing the opening of “Who Am I”] and the plane start sing.  

It never plan. It’s just something that happened.

Were you able to attend to Caribbean Music Awards the other week (Aug. 31)? 

No, mi never able to see it. But I can remember the first time I win one of those. 1995. It’s been going on for a long time. I went up against Capleton, [starts singing Capleton’s “Tour”]. It was live on TV in America in New York, a matter of fact. 

For those awards shows, I really feel appreciative of them — because they’re giving us the opportunity so we can work harder to become the people that we are today. People appreciate your work, so all yuh haffi do is just give thanks and appreciate what they’re doing. So, I do respect the Caribbean Music Awards and all the years it’s been going. Sorry I don’t have a visa to be there! 

In light of the Bob Marley biopic hitting theaters soon, what are your thoughts on who gets to tell the stories of our Caribbean icons and legends, and how those stories get told? 

Bob Marley have over five sons that coulda play Bob Marley, cause alla dem look like him. But dem decide fi use somebody else. Really don’t make no sense. Well, it’s a Bob Marley movie. Mi wait till mi can get it inna my circle. But, I think dem shoulda use Skip Marley, who is the last Marley. Or use Stephen Marley or Ziggy Marley or Julian Marley. But Bob Marley a Bob Marley. If you make a movie about Bob Marley, everybody wan see it. 

Since you have reached the highest heights that dancehall, and music in general, has to offer, do you have any advice for younger dancehall artists who are looking to follow in your footsteps? 

Two: Work hard in the studio and work harder onstage. Because onstage, people remember you the person, and in the studio, people remember the songs. But if you don’t work harder onstage people will not remember you as an individual, but people will always remember your songs. 

Michael Jackson mek an album every two years, but people still remember him for his performance. I nuh care how many hits Michael Jackson sing, it’s never greater than that Moonwalk. Never greater than that backslide. Yuh see Michael Jackson with spandex? Nobody remember dat. They remember di performance! [Laughs.]  

Elvis Presley was the greatest entertainer before Michael Jackson. Dem still remember Elvis as in performance, not in song. When yuh go in Las Vegas, yuh find 10 Elvis Presley shows, because of his performance. That is my only advice to any artist. 

As the United States prepares to enter another particularly brutal presidential election cycle, the country’s cultural divide is continuing to play out across entertainment. In film, there are the dual box office phenomenons of Barbie and the QAnon-tinged Sound of Freedom — a dynamic that is mirrored in music with Jason Aldean’s “Try That In A Small Town,” and the undertones of racial violence in the song and its video, topping the Billboard Hot 100 as Beyoncé’s Renaissance World Tour, a loving tribute to Black queer culture, breaks records around the world.

Beyoncé’s seismic tour (in support of her Billboard 200-topping 2022 album of the same name) explicitly highlights, uplifts, and centers the lives and cultural contributions of the ballroom scene, a community anchored by Black and brown queer folk — the very people songs like “Small Town” seem to be railing against. It expands Renaissance’s explorations of the expanse of dance music and ballroom culture into a nearly three-hour multi-act spectacle. With the inimitable Kevin Jz Prodigy serving as the tour’s guiding voice, the Renaissance Tour stands in complete defiance of the recent tide of anti-LGBTQIA+ attitudes and legislation that has swept the country, immersing both creator and observer in the unadulterated freedom of ballroom.

Having kicked off on May 10 in Stockholm, Sweden, the Renaissance World Tour touched down in Las Vegas, Nevada for two shows at Allegiant Stadium on August 26 and 27. On Sunday night (Aug. 27), the Human Rights Campaign Foundation, the educational arm of the nation’s largest LGBTQIA+ civil rights organization, hosted the first-ever Equality Ball in association with Beeline Productions and the Shady Gang, with support from Beyoncé’s BeyGOOD Foundation.

“This is a beautiful manifestation,” gushes Human Rights Campaign president, Kelley Robinson. “The fact that it came together this year means so much, because not only has this been a vision that [we] wanted to manifest, but also we’re sitting in a state of emergency right now.”

On Sunday night, The Equality Ball — which Robinson says was the result of the HRC’s partnership with Lena Giroux Zakalik, executive producer for Beeline Productions, and Carlos Basquiat, a dancer and choreographer on the Renaissance World Tour — tackled the pain of death and grief as much as it celebrated the grandeur of ballroom culture. In fact, the Equality Ball served as a hopeful bookend to a month that began in the shadow of the tragic murder of O’Shae Sibley, a Black queer dancer who was attacked with a barrage of homophobic slurs before being killed by a 17-year-old for vogueing to a track from Beyoncé’s Renaissance album.

“Jonty, Yvette [Noel-Schure’s] basically adopted son, was killed,” Robinson says. “One in five of every hate crime is motivated by anti-LGTBQ+ bias, and, at the same time, we’ve got hundreds and hundreds of anti-LGTBQ+ bills that are moving forward in states every day. This was a moment where we needed to not only celebrate the Black queer experience, but [also] put it on center stage.”

Given that Las Vegas lacks the ballroom roots of New York City and the house music roots of Chicago, the city may initially seem like a curious choice to host the Equality Ball. Nonetheless, “we have to be here,” stresses Robinson. “We’re here today in the state that’s gonna be consequential in the 2024 election. We have to understand that for us to be able to celebrate inside that building, to be able to live our fullest and most, most authentic lives, we have to make sure we got laws and policy that protect us on the outside [too].”

@shopaif

It’s 6:31am and I’m about a hour from LAX! I attended the Human Rights Campaign Equality Ball in Las Vegas Sponsored by Bey Good and Bee Line Productions! – Stay tuned for the crazy story of how I went 24 with no sleep to pull this off! 😩💕❤️🏆 – #humanrightscampaign #beygood #beelineproduction #beyonce #ballroom #lgbttiktok #lgbtqia #renaissanceworldtour #lasvegas #ballgown

♬ I’M THAT GIRL – Beyoncé

Like with nearly every other corner of the Black experience, streaks of death mark the ballroom community at every turn — a fact that performers at Sunday night’s Equality Ball did not shy away from. The troupe Madame Arthur, one of the pre-ball performers, delivered a deeply moving cover of ABBA’s “Dancing Queen” that decreased the tempo of the original and featured lyrics rewritten to reflect and uplift the hundreds of thousands of lives that have been senselessly lost to anti-LGBTQIA+ violence.

The history of Madame Arthur – the drag cabaret venue the performance group is named after, which opened in 1946, currently features a troupe of queer artists — added an extra layer of nuance to their performance, a reminder that the fight for total LGBTQIA+ liberation has been roaring for decades on end. “[Ballroom] comes from a really harsh culture. It was birthed out of negativity, to keep it honest. People were getting kicked out of their houses and shunned by their parents,” says Stephanie “Packrat” Whitfield, one of the executive producers of the Equality Ball. “So to make a community, it’s like a phoenix rising from the ashes, right? Everything was against us, and we made this beautiful thing out of nowhere.”

For a culture that loses so many influential movers and shakers before they have a chance to bask in the glory of their own accomplishments, the Equality Ball allowed elders in the ballroom scene to enjoy a night of genuine revelry. Shannon Balenciaga, Overall Mother of the House of Balenciaga, and Stasha Garçon, Iconic Overall godmother of the House of Garçon, shared a good-hearted battle as they both walked the runway during a series of appearances from ballroom icons before the ball formally commenced. Kevin Jz Prodigy and Kevin Aviance, whose voices have provided a key backbone to both the Renaissance album and tour, performed throughout the night, with Prodigy emceeing a healthy chunk of the ball.

In addition, the judges panel for the ball’s five main categories included impactful ballroom figures such as Jack Mizrahi, Dashaun Wesley, Twiggy Pucci Garçon, Ricky Holman and Jennifer Barnes-Balenciaga. The night’s focus on pillars of the ballroom community instead of on the celebrity of Beyoncé emphasized the overarching goal of the Equality Ball — to capture the minds and attention of those who many have only been exposed to ballroom culture through entertainment media, and invite them into an authentic representation of the culture and the fight to keep it safe, preserved, and alive.

“With this Equality Ball, we’ve been trying to educate,” says Whitfield. “We have educational moments throughout the entire event where people can learn about ballroom, because it’s very secretive. We don’t let everybody in, because we are safe.”

While Beyoncé tapped a wide range of Black queer collaborators for Renaissance and its accompanying tour, such as Honey Dijon and DJ Mike Q, one of the biggest challenges with celebrity allyship is toeing the fine line between selflessly uplifting a marginalized community and unintentionally dominating that spotlight. Star power the size of Beyoncé’s rarely dims enough to completely disappear. But the “Break My Soul” singer was far from the focal part on Sunday night. Sure, her tour film crew and dancers — Honey Balenciaga and Les Twins, among them — were in attendance, but the Equality Ball did not buckle under the weight of her celebrity. In fact, most of Beyoncé’s involvement happened behind the scenes through her BeyGOOD charity foundation. Robinson recalls a phone call with BeyGOOD executive director Ivy McGregor, Carlos Basquiat, Zakalik and Whitfield “a week after Jonty was murdered, maybe two weeks after O’Shae was murdered.”

“It was about us sharing our individual experiences,” she reflects. “But it was also about this broader context of what it means for Black and queer folks who are fundamentally defining the culture right now to also have our lives stolen by doing what is necessary to be ourselves.”

Even though the journey towards the Equality Ball began several years before anyone heard a single note of Renaissance, Whitfield reveals that it was only at the “last minute” that everything came together. “It always fell through because people are still getting to know ballroom, and what it really means and how to represent that to the world,” she says. “Woo, I’m getting teary-eyed just talking about it.”

Sunday night was a special one for Whitfield. She and Carlos Basquiat not only got to take in the brilliant ball they co-executive produced, but they also got to debut their new kiki house, the Kiki House of FuBu. “It took us a really long time to find the right people to build the community to raise funding,” notes Whitfield. “That’s one thing in the ballroom community is that we are people from low-income housing, low-income communities. So to bring Black and brown people from all gender expressions and sexualities, it’s always a journey. It was a long road of seven years.”

In addition to the highly entertaining ball, The Human Rights Campaign also offered countless educational resources at the Equality Ball, including HIV testing, voter registration, and direct access to information about local LGBTQ+ programs and initiatives. Events like the Equality Ball are tangible manifestations of celebrity allyship, a mode of support that can often feel surface-level and exploitative. For an album with influences as specific as Renaissance, notions of support simply could not stop with the music. “We love y’all watching Pose and Legendary, but we also want y’all to come outside and support!” proclaimed Whitfield at the start of the night.

@doubletimetwins_

#beyonceafterparty #equalityball #equalityball2023 #voguechallenge

♬ original sound – DoubleTime Twins👯‍♀️

Renaissance — along with Pose, the Emmy-winning FX drama series, and Legendary, a ballroom-themed Max reality competition series — is one of the most prominent works of art in a late-2010s wave of Black queer-inspired pieces of entertainment. “Honestly, it was like ‘Finally!” That’s how I felt [when Renaissance dropped],” says Whitfield. “Some of us have been in ballroom for years and we see everyone use what we do and never give us recognition. There’s a lot of appropriation. So, while they’re elevating, we’re still on the ground floor and underneath the floor, and it’s very unfair.” With Renaissance, however, Beyoncé tapped ballroom icons, Black queer dance music producers and writers and hired tour dancers who “not only have put in the work in the ballroom community, but also have that skill to be onstage and empower a whole generation of new beings,” says Whitfield.

Converting consumers to steadfast supporters of the ballroom scene and Black queer liberation is a testy task, especially when so much of the struggle takes place within the joint vacuum of celebrity allyship and capitalism. Nevertheless, the Equality Ball shines as a beacon of hope. “We love everybody loving the album, but are you really coming to help us?” poses Whitfield. “It’s one thing to help the three or four of us that are onstage, it’s another thing to come into our community and learn about our culture.”

As BeyGOOD’s involvement in the Ball demonstrates, finding the humility to humble yourself and research and learn about a culture that is not yours is imperative to establishing a foundation for genuine, unwavering support. “We still have so many people that are homeless and are fighting for survival on a daily basis,” she stresses. “So, to have people really come in and support our community without just taking up space, but really taking up an active space of learning is what’s important.”

“A lot of people wanna be on the floor now,” she continues. “But you can be on the floor, if you learn the history and respect the pioneers that have laid down their lives for us to be here tonight.”