Category: Pop Daypop

Kim Petras has dropped the new single “If Jesus Was a Rockstar,” the follow-up to her hit single, “Unholy” with Sam Smith.

In a recent interview, Petras shared with The Daily Beast: “I think the point of this song [“If Jesus Was a Rockstar”] is taking away the bells and whistles and the extreme, over-exaggerated characters that I’ve created in the past, especially on Slut Pop and Turn Off the Light. It’s the first time that it’s not an escapist song, and it’s about how I feel as a human in the world right now. It’s the first time that I just felt like the song was meaningful enough to stand by itself.”

Listen to “If Jesus Was a Rockstar” – here.

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Miley Cyrus revealed that she’s teaming up with her superstar godmother, Dolly Parton, to host the second iteration of Miley’s New Year’s Eve Party, airing live from Miami, Florida on NBC, and streaming on Peacock.

Cyrus shared a clip on social media with Parton: “Miley’s New Year’s Eve Party is about getting glamorous and dressing your best,” Cyrus says, with Parton replying, “Well, we do that every day, don’t we, Miley?” Cyrus agrees, saying that Parton “taught me well.” Parton promises that the show is “gonna be legendary.”

Miley’s New Year’s Eve Party is set to kick off on Saturday, December 31 at 10:30 p.m. and run until 12:30 a.m. ET. Saturday Night Live creator and EP Lorne Michaels will serve as executive producer, and the lineup will be announced at a later time, according to a press release.  Jen Neal, Executive Vice President, Entertainment Live Events, Specials and E! News, NBCUniversal Television and Streaming, said: “The inaugural ‘Miley’s New Year’s Eve Party’ was an unqualified success and we know this year’s show will be just as spectacular, with plenty of surprises and lots of fun. We can’t wait to get the party started.”

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Adele will celebrated New Year’s Eve with two shows added to her Las Vegas residency.  The singer wrote on social media: “New Years Eve has always been a let down for me. I seem to always end up spending it in a car on my way to or from somewhere! But not this year!! I’ll be ringing 2023 in on stage!! I dress up to the nines on NYE and I would love it if those of you that come would too! Let’s go all out black tie vibes.”

The ‘Weekends with Adele’ residency at Las Vegas’ Colosseum at Caesars Palace kicked off last Friday, Nov. 18, and runs through March 25, 2023.  Adele will celebrate the New Year with her fans with two shows on December 30 and December 31st. Tickets will be available for pre-sale on Wednesday (Nov. 23) at 10 a.m. local time. For tickets, head here.

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Elton John and Britney Spears have released the acoustic version of their hit duet, “Hold Me Closer,” along with a video for the new version of their song.

The music video for ‘Hold Me Closer (Acoustic)’ features Olympic Gold Medalist Nathan Chen ice skating to a routine he choreographed himself.  In 2019, Chen first incorporated John’s songs into his free skate program after his choreographer saw the motion-picture “Rocketman.” Chen, a lifelong fan of Elton John, decided to use his Elton John-inspired program for the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics, where he won the Gold Medal for his performance. Following his Olympic victory, Chen and fellow ice-skating colleagues attended one of John’s Farewell Yellow Brick Road Tour performances in Charlotte, North Carolina where Elton surprised him with a surprise congratulatory shout-out from the stage.

Said Chen: “Elton John’s music means something to anybody who’s ever listened to it. ‘Rocket Man’ has always intrigued me — it’s otherworldly, but it’s just as much about our lives on Earth, love and loneliness, dreams and disappointments. In a way, ‘Rocket Man’ captures what my own journey has felt like — and getting to skate to it at the Olympics was one of the most special moments of my life. I couldn’t believe it when I heard Elton thought of me for this video. Elton and Britney created something really beautiful with this version of ‘Hold Me Closer’ — and I’m so honored to be a part of it.”

Take a look at the video for the acoustic version of “Hold Me Closer” – here.

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P!NK has announced her highly-anticipated ninth studio album, Trustfall, will be released on February 17th via RCA Records. Target will offer an exclusive hot pink vinyl edition. A Zine-Pak CD and bundles are available via Pink’s online store. To pre-order, head here.

Trustful will be P!NK’s first studio album since 2019’s Hurts 2B Human. The singer shared the first single off the album earlier this month with the release of “Never Gonna Not Dance Again,” produced by Grammy-winning hitmakers Max Martin and Shellback, who also co-wrote the song with P!NK. The music video for the track was co-directed by P!NK, with Nick Florez & RJ Durell.

The announcement of Trustfall comes shortly after the news of P!NK’s return to touring with the Summer Carnival 2023 Tour. The North American leg kicks-off in Toronto on July 24th and will see P!NK performing at stadiums across North America, joined by Brandi Carlile and Pat Benatar & Neil Giraldo on select dates, with Grouplove and KidCutUp supporting on all dates.

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The 50th American Music Awards took place on Sunday night at the Microsoft Theater in Los Angeles, hosted by Wayne Brady and airing on ABC.

Taylor Swift ruled the evening, sweeping all six categories for which she was nominated, including artist of the year, the night’s top honor. Swift is now the most decorated artist in AMAs history, with 40 career wins. BTS also broke records, winning in favorite pop duo or group for the fourth time, making them the most awarded group in the history of the category. Elton John took home his first AMA win since 1988 for best collaboration with Dua Lipa, becoming the longest-recognized artist in the awards show’s history. (John was first nominated for an AMA in 1974.)

Bad Bunny won for Best Male Latin Artist and his Un Verano Sin Ti was named Best Latin Album, while Anitta won for Best Female Latin Artist. Beyonce was awarded Best R&B Artist with her album Renaissance winning for Best R&B Album; and the Best Male R&B Artist statuette went to Chris Brown. Kendrick Lamar scored the Best Male Hip-Hop Artist award, with his Mr. Morale & The Big Steppers LP named Best Hip-Hop Album; Nicki Minaj won Best Female Hip-Hop Artist. Morgan Wallen earned the Best Male Country Artist award, and his single “Wasted on You” winning for Best Country Song.

Lionel Richie, a 17-time AMA winner, was honored with the Icon Award for his career contributions to the music industry, with Charlie Puth, Stevie Wonder and Ari Lennox performing a tribute to Richie.

For the full list of winners, head here.

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Ticketmaster is apologizing to Taylor Swift and her fans for the disasterous presale for her The Eras Tour, and for canceling the public on-sale. The company released an updated public statement about what went wrong during Tuesday’s Verified Fan presale that left millions of fans without tickets.

Ticketmaster’s tweet read: “We strive to make ticket buying as easy as possible for fans, but that hasn’t been the case for many people trying to buy tickets for Taylor Swift | The Eras Tour. First, we want to apologize to Taylor and all of her fans – especially those who had a terrible experience trying to purchase tickets. Next, we feel we owe it to everyone to share some information to help explain what happened … Historically, we’ve been able to manage huge volume coming into the site to shop for tickets, so those with Verified Fan codes have a smooth shopping process. However, this time the staggering number of bot attacks as well as fans who didn’t have codes drove unprecedented traffic on our site, resulting in 3.5 billion total system requests – 4x our previous peak … We handle onsales for countless top tours, some of the biggest sporting events, and more. Never before has a Verified Fan onsale sparked so much attention – or traffic. This disrupted the predictability and reliability that is the hallmark of our Verified Fan platform.”

Ticketmaster added that it will work to improve its system in hopes this doesn’t happen again: “The biggest venues and artists turn to us because we have the leading ticketing technology in the world – that doesn’t mean it’s perfect, and clearly for Taylor Swift | The Eras Tour onsale it wasn’t. But we’re always working to improve the ticket buying experience. Especially for high demand onsales, which continue to test new limits. We’re working to shore up our tech for the new bar that has been set by demand for the Taylor Swift | The Eras Tour. Once we get through that, if there are any next steps, updates will be shared accordingly.  While it’s impossible for everyone to get tickets to these shows, we know we can do more to improve the experience and that’s what we’re focused on.”

Demand for Swift concert tickets was huge before the Verified Fan presale. Swift initially announced 27 dates and then added eight and then 17 new dates within two weeks. Swift will play multiple nights in all cities, tallying to 52 shows in US stadiums in 2023. And despite the ticket sale problems, Ticketmaster did note that “over 2 million tickets were sold on Ticketmaster for Taylor Swift | The Eras Tour on Nov. 15 – the most tickets ever sold for an artist in a single day.”

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Lizzo has added a second North American leg to her successful 2022 Special tour. The second legdubbed The Special 2our — kicks off Friday, April 21st in Knoxville, TN at Thompson-Boling Arena.  The 17-date second leg of the tour continues through St. Louis, Montreal, Chicago and more before wrapping up on Friday, June 2, 2023, at Acrisure Arena in Palm Desert, CA.

Lizzo’s LP Special dropped in July 2022 and went on to debut at No. 2 with 69,000 equivalent album units sold in its first week, giving Lizzo her highest-charting album to date and the highest-charting album by a female artist in 2022 at the time.

Public on sale for the second leg The Special 2our will begin Friday, November 18th at 10 am local time via Ticketmaster.

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Ticketmaster announced that the public ticket sale for Taylor Swift’s “The Eras Tour” on Fri, November 18th has been canceled. Ticketmaster tweeted on Thursday: “Due to extraordinarily high demands on ticketing systems and insufficient remaining ticket inventory to meet that demand, tomorrow’s public on-sale for Taylor Swift | The Eras Tour has been cancelled.” 

Ticket pre-sales began on Nov. 15, with the high demand causing Ticketmaster’s website to crash. The company previously had fans pre-register as Verified Fans before the sale, and over 3.5 million fans pre-registered for Swift’s program — the largest registration in Ticketmaster’s history.   After Ticketmaster’s announcement, Swift fans expressed their disappointment, and even created a website to attempt to take action against Ticketmaster “through collective action.”

Ticketmaster previously issued an explanation in response to the chaos surrounding buying tickets for Swift’s tour: “The Eras on sale made one thing clear: Taylor Swift is an unstoppable force and continues to set records. We strive to make ticket buying as easy as possible for fans, but that hasn’t been the case for many people trying to buy tickets for the Eras Tour. We want to share some information to help explain what happened …Even when a high demand on sale goes flawlessly from a tech perspective, many fans are left empty-handed. For example: based on the volume of traffic to our site, Taylor would need to perform over 900 stadium shows (almost 20x the number of shows she is doing)… that’s a stadium show every single night for the next 2.5 years.”

As of press time, there was no word on whether the general sale will be postponed, or how many tickets still remain after the pre-sale.

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Sam Smith shared the full tracklist for their highly-anticipated new album Gloria. Smith revealed the titles of the 13 tracks that will be included on their upcoming fourth studio album, and in addition to his collab with Kim Petras on their smash hit “Unholy,” Smith also teams up with Ed Sheeran, Jessie Reyez, and Koffee.

Smith shared his thoughts on Gloria:  “I’m feeling overwhelmed and emotional as I start to let go of Gloria and hand this work over to you. It has been magical in every way to make this piece of music and by giving this record to you I am giving you part of my heart and soul.”

Gloria drops on January 27th, 2023. Check out the full tracklist – here.

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