Dance
First Spin: The Week’s Best New Dance Tracks From Caribou, LP Giobbi & HANA & More
Caribou, “You Can Do It” Dan Snaith’s 2020 LP Home was all texture and melancholic mood, an album made for the long, contemplative solitude of quarantine. The Canadian producer’s latest single is…not that. “You Can Do It” is pure joy, manifest in the bright, gently ascending chord progressions, the lyrics (“You can do it! You can do it! You can do it!…”) and the corresponding video, which simply features dogs — glorious dogs! — jumping and running through fields and catching frisbees in slow motion. Watch it. Try not to smile. Altogether, it’s a tightly produced, deliciously un-self-serious one-off from one of the best in the game. Caribou goes on tour in North America this fall, with dates extending into early 2...
Executive of the Week: Carbon Fiber Music President Franklin Martínez
The song was released June 24 on Sony Music Latin with little fanfare — there wasn’t even a video ready — and debuted at No. 28 on the Hot Latin Songs chart dated July 17. It jumped to the top 10 four weeks later, reaching No. 6 on the chart dated Aug. 7, and finally No. 1 this week, thanks to a 20% boost in streams (reaching the top 20 of Streaming Songs and No. 1 on Latin streaming songs) and airplay support. The real driver of the song on the Latin charts was its performance on the dance charts. There, it debuted at No. 9 on the chart dated July 17 and has remained on the top 10 since, peaking at No. 1 last week. That’s because at heart, “Pepas” is an EDM track, propelled by dozens of remixes by DJs big and small that also aided its rise on the global charts — climbing...
Tomorrowland Forms Dance Label With Universal Music Germany
Through the partnership, Tomorrowland will enjoy direct access to a collective pool of UMG’s international label divisions, including Virgin Records and Astralwerks in the U.S. Leading the partnership will be Berlin-based Virgin Records executives Alexander Neipp, Daniel Schmidt and Magnus Textor, and Tina Adams at Virgin Music Label & Artist Services. Over the past 15 years Tomorrowland has built a reputation as one of the world’s leading festivals and electronic music brands by consistently expanding and evolving their relationship with music fans,” Frank Briegmann, chairman and CEO, Universal Music Central Europe and Deutsche Grammophon, said in a press release. He added that the partners had created a “uniquely flexible model” that will “help drive success and create global hits fo...
Elton John Returns to Billboard Hot 100 After 21 Years With Dua Lipa Collab ‘Cold Heart’
John makes his first Hot 100 appearance since the chart dated July 29, 2000, when “Someday Out of the Blue” ranked at No. 99 after reaching No. 49. “Cold Heart” is his 68th career entry, a run that began on the Aug. 15, 1970, tally, when “Border Song” bowed at No. 93. John boasts nine Hot 100 No. 1s, from “Crocodile Rock” in 1973 to “Candle in the Wind 1997″/”Something About the Way You Look Tonight,” his longest-leading hit (14 weeks), in 1997-98. He has notched 27 top 10s (tied for the ninth-best total in the chart’s 63-year archives), among 57 top 40 hits (the sixth-best sum; plus, he ranked in the top 40 in a record 30 consecutive years, from 1970 through 1999). Meanwhile, Lipa, who earns her 17th Hot 100 hit...
Skrillex, Justin Bieber & Don Toliver Team Up for ‘Don’t Go’: Stream It Now
“Don’t Go” is the most recent Skrillex/Bieber collab since Skrillex co-wrote “2 Much” on Bieber’s March LP, Justice. That song followed “Sorry,” which Skrillex produced for Bieber’s 2015 album, Purpose. “To be honest,” Skrillex told Zane Lowe of first linking with Bieber, “before I even worked with Justin Bieber, in that era, I didn’t really pay attention to pop music that much and I wasn’t really paying attention to what was current and relevant, and I knew his music and I knew who he was…So for me, it’s similar to when Korn called me up earlier in my career and I was just honored to work with people who were great. “The thing about Justin,” Skrillex continued, &...
Can Holly+ Solve the Problem of Deepfake Vocals?
Though there is evidence to suggest “publicity” or “personality” rights may provide some pathway to legal recourse for the commercial use of a public figure’s voice (like Tom Waits v. Frito Lay, a 1992 lawsuit in which the singer sued Frito Lay for the unauthorized impersonation his voice for a commercial and won), these rights vary from state-to-state and still have yet to address a case specific to the new frontier of AI-rendered vocals. But for experimental electronic musician Holly Herndon, who has been working at the intersection of music and artificial intelligence for years, including a doctoral stint at Stanford University, she sees this space as a brave new world for musicians. Instead of fighting to destroy the inevitable behemoth of AI, Herndon is showing others how to control i...
Fans Choose Elton John & Dua Lipa’s ‘Cold Heart (Pnau Remix)’ as This Week’s Favorite New Music
“Cold Heart” melds the legendary singer’s “Kiss the Bride,” “Rocket Man,” “Where’s the Shoorah?” and “Sacrifice” into a dance bop featuring vocals by Lipa. The two previously joined forces in March during John’s annual Oscar viewing party, where Lipa and John took turns duetting with each other’s songs, including his Billboard Hot 100 No. 1 “Bennie and the Jets” and her Future Nostalgia deep cut “Love Again.” Placing second on the past week’s tally with 25% of the vote was a remix of WizKid’s “Essence” featuring Bieber and Tems. “Essence” debuted on the Billboard Hot 100 in July at No. 82 after the Tems-assisted song was released in October 2020 fr...
First Spin: The Week’s Best New Dance Tracks From Love Regenerator, Justin Martin & More
Now that Calvin Harris has given us his annual summer dance-pop jam (“By Your Side”), he’s heading back to the club. The Scottish super-producer launched his new, rave-ready Love Regenerator alias in January 2020, releasing 10 original tracks in six months, including the adrenaline-rushing Moving EP with UK up-and-comer Eli Brown. After a yearlong hiatus, Love Regenerator is back and reunited with Brown on new single “We Can Come Together.” A club and festival anthem in waiting as ravers slowly return to once-empty dance floors, “We Can Come Together” swells with pure piano house euphoria that could breach tear ducts with its vocal call for unity: “I feel the time has come for us to come together/ I realize that only we can make it better.” — KRYSTAL RODRIGUEZ Justin Martin R...
Elton John and Dua Lipa Blast Off With New Collab ‘Cold Heart,’ Remixed by Pnau: Listen
On paper, it reads as though it couldn’t work. On audio, it’s something else. Elton and Lipa have much in common. They teamed up in March for his annual Oscar viewing party, where Lipa and John took turns duetting with each other’s songs, including his Billboard Hot 100 No. 1 “Bennie and the Jets” and her Future Nostalgia deep cut “Love Again.” John was also one of the VIP guest stars on Lipa’s Studio 2054 livestream last year. “Dua, I adore you,” John teased on Instagram ahead of the “Cold Heart” release, “and it has been an incredible experience making this together. I can’t wait for you all to hear it!” Elton and Pnau have history, too. Back in 2012, Pnau remixed a collection of Elton’s classic songs for the album Good Morning to the Night...
First Spin: The Week’s Best New Dance Tracks From Flight Facilities, Feed Me, Point Point & More
Flight Facilities feat. Drama, “Move” Change is in the air for Flight Facilities. The Australian purveyors of chill poolside vibes have lately been bumping up energy on recent songs like “The Ghost” and Channel Tres collaboration “Lights Up.” In a statement, they share: “Subconsciously, a decade after releasing early 80’s inspired disco, our internal musical clocks have us creating early ‘90s inspired dance.” New single “Move,” featuring Chicago duo Drama, isn’t just inspired by the ‘90s — it’s a whole time machine back to when house music ruled the Billboard dance/club charts, buoyed by the voices of divas like CeCe Peniston, Crystal Waters and Martha Wash. Drama’s Via Rosa is less roaring and more vocally reserved here, but the thumping bassline, sweaty drums and swelling piano mel...
Example Signs to Call & Response, Joining Global Management Team: Exclusive
The company also represents the likes of Carmouflage Rose, James Angus, Toby Hobart and Brooke Toia. Micky McNeice of Circle Eight (Todd Edwards, Andy Sheldrake) and Joshua Taylor-Anderson of Call & Response will jointly guide Example’s career into album eight and beyond. “We are at the beginning of taking him to new heights. With a global team in place and his most exciting, true to form and contemporary music to date,” Taylor-Anderson, Call & Response founder and CEO, tells Billboard. McNeice adds, “Example is the hardest working artist I know, the past two years as management have been a blessing. With Elliot now being based in Brisbane the link up with Josh at Call & Response was the perfect addition to our global team”. Example is an established artist in the U.K., w...
Paul Johnson, House Music Icon, Dies at 50 After COVID-19 Battle
Born in Chicago in 1971, Johnson began DJing in the mid-’80s while still a teenager. Expanding into production in 1990, he went on to release hundreds of records over the next three decades for labels such as Peacefrog, Moody Recordings, Dance Mania and Cajual. His 1999 single “Get Get Down,” from his album The Groove I Have, spent 18 weeks on Billboard’s Dance Club Songs chart, where it ultimately hit No. 1. The song was an international hit as well, topping RPM’s Top 30 Dance chart in Canada and going top 10 in Greece, Belgium, France, the Netherlands and the UK. Johnson also started the Dust Traxx label with Radek Hawryszczuk in 1997, which has released music from producers including K-Alexi, Stacy Kidd, Glenn Underground and Robert Armani. Johnson’s legacy as a house music great is per...
