Charli xcx is on a “runway that goes straight to hell” for her new “SS26” song and music video, which arrived Thursday night (May 21).

For the music video — directed by Torso from a concept by Charli — the singer/songwriter walks the Paris runways in a series of high-fashion looks as she sings lyrics about both style and substance. “Spring Summer ’26/ When the world is gonna end, no hope for any of it/ Yeah, we’re walking on a runway that goes straight to hell/ Nothing’s gonna save us, not music, fashion, or film.”

In the second verse, Charli has some fun with the cancel-culture news cycle, singing, “I was hacked, it got taken out of context, obviously/ But I didn’t do it, even if I did, wrote a really good notes app apology.”

Watch the music video below:

“SS26” arrives two weeks after the release of “Rock Music,” the first taste of Charli’s seventh studio album, which doesn’t yet have a title or release date. Following her buzzy comeback with 2024’s Brat album, Charli announced her intent to pivot away from the dance genre on “Rock Music,” singing: “I think the dance floor is dead/ So now we’re making rock music.” This seemed to catch the attention of Madonna, whose own dance album Confessions II arrives on July 3. The Queen of Pop declared in an Instagram post this week: “If your Dance floor feels dead, maybe you’re playing the wrong music.”

“Rock Music” and “SS26” will both be included on Charli’s yet-untitled next album.

The Iceman is a man of the people. Drake flew to upstate New York and pulled up on NYFlavaaa, who has gained a following singing along with his kids in the car to plenty of Drizzy anthems, and surprised the family with a brand new Escalade SUV.

Drake was in the backseat rapping along to “Janice STFU,” and the crew picked up NYFlavaaa’s daughter from school, who was stuck in shock briefly, but went right into going bar-for-bar with Drake on the Iceman standout.

“Straight from the 6 to the 716, this man needs no introduction,” NYFlavaaa shouted from the driver’s seat. His daughter impressively nailed all of Drake’s verse on “Janice STFU” in less than a week.

Drake posted a photo with the family to his Instagram Story on Thursday (May 21). “Finally made it to see the family @nyflavaaa Picked our goat up from school And a new Escalade for the gang members cause why not,” he wrote.

NYFlavaaa was very emotional while tearing up in an IG Story. “This motherf–ker gave me an Escalade,” he said. “Thank you Jesus, thank you Drake, Chubbs — it’s love. It’s gonna be a lot of tears today.”

“Janice STFU” landed as track No. 4 on Drake’s Iceman album, which arrived on May 15 alongside Habibti and Maid of Honour. The Roget Chahayed-produced cut contains an interpolation of Lykke Li’s “I Follow Rivers,” which caught the Swedish singer off guard.

“Strangely enough, I’ve been really craving Drake and have actually been listening to ‘Marvins Room’ lately,’” she revealed to Rolling Stone. “The old Drake was such an era. When you’d walk into a room and they’d play ‘Hotline Bling.’ … So yeah, I was missing him.”

Watch the heartwarming video below.

It’s Ecca Vandal’s turn, time to pay attention.

Born in South Africa of Sri Lankan heritage, the genre-bending independent artist is now very much at home in Melbourne, Australia. American audiences got a closer look when Vandal made her debut at Coachella. Here’s a talent who effortlessly fuses rock with hip-hop, punk, jazz, electronic and pretty much anything she wants, a performer with more raw energy than an arena on grand final day.

On Wednesday night, May 20, another debut as Vandal made her first appearance on U.S. TV with a powerful performance on Jimmy Kimmel Live.

Sporting blue-toned hair and leading a tight backing tandem of electric guitar and drums, Vandal ripped through “Cruising to Self Soothe,” lifted from her forthcoming studio album LOOKING FOR PEOPLE TO UNFOLLOW, due out Friday, May 22 via Loma Vista Recordings.

The collection was recorded and produced by Richie Buxton and Vandal in Buxton’s childhood bedroom in bayside Melbourne. “We cut out everything that didn’t serve us, the timelines, the metrics, the pressure to ‘stay visible’ online. We tuned out of the feed and turned inwards,” she has said of the project.

In Richie’s room, they built a tiny home studio. “Four walls that became a universe,” she recounts. “The Internet was painfully slow, so we were truly disconnected from the online game.”

Far away from their inner-city friends, and distractions, that little room “became our whole world for nearly two years. It held all our chaos and all our clarity, a little ‘playpen’ where we could live, play and experiment like teenagers again. We started making things with our hands again, tangible, imperfect, and real,” Vandal enthuses. “We wanted to celebrate long-form, the idea of an album as a whole body of work, while the world was chasing 15-second snippets and algorithm friendly noise.”

The Ecca Vandal experience has been lived on stage, with spots at Camp Flog Gnaw and support slots with the likes of Limp Bizkit, Queens of the Stone Age, IDLES, The Prodigy, and, most recently, Deftones. The 2026 U.K. and Continental Europe summer festival circuit beckons.

Check out dates below and watch Ecca Vandal’s performance on Kimmel.

Ecca Vandal’s 2026 U.K. and Europe tour dates
June 3 — Impact Festival at Tauron Arena, Krakow, PL
June 5 — Rock im Park Festival, Nürnberg, DE
June 6 — Rock am Ring Festival, Nurburgring, DE
June 10 — Rock For People, Hradec Kralove, CZ
June 15 — Release Festival, Athens, GR
June 19 — Pinkpop Festival, Landgraaf, NE
June 20 — Southside Festival, Neuhausen ob Eck, DE
June 21 — Hurricane Festival, Scheeßel, DE
June 23 — Sparkassen Park, Mönchengladbach, DE^
June 28 — Outbreak Festival, Manchester, UK
July 2 — Roskilde Festival, Roskilde, DK
July 4 — Rock Werchter Festival, Werchter BE
July 5 — Les Eurockeennes, Belforte, FR
Aug. 18 — Parkbuhne Wuhlheide, Berlin, DE
Aug. 20 — Open Air Gampel, Gampel, CH
Aug. 23 — All Points East x Outbreak Fest, London, UK
Aug. 25 — IMMA, Dublin, IE
Aug. 27 — Edinburgh Summer Sessions, Edinburgh, UK

There were two bosses on The Late Show, as Bruce Springsteen stopped by on Wednesday night (May 20) and paid tribute to outgoing host Stephen Colbert.

Springsteen always seems to show up at the precisely the right time. And so it was, again, as the legendary rocker gave a rousing pro-democracy speech and performed “Streets of Minneapolis” on what was Colbert’s second-to-last show.

“I am here tonight to support Stephen, because you’re the first guy in America who lost his show because we’ve got a president who can’t take a joke,” he remarked, while at the mic. “And because Larry and David Ellison feel the need to kiss his ass to get what they want.”

That second jab was aimed at the Ellison family, led by billionaire Larry Ellison and his son David, who now own and controls Paramount Global following their $8 billion merger with Skydance Media. That arrangement gave them ownership of CBS, the broadcaster for Colbert’s left-leaning program, which regularly punishes Trump’s administration and his MAGA movement with razor-sharp comedy footwork that would make Muhammad Ali proud.

“Stephen, these are small-minded people,” Springsteen added. “They’ve got no idea what the freedoms of this beautiful country are supposed to be about.”

And with that Springsteen dedicated “Streets of Minneapolis” to Colbert. The Boss’s choice of song was a poignant one. He wrote and recorded the anti-ICE (United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement) song following the deaths of Renée Good and Alex Pretti in Minneapolis in January amid Operation Metro Surge, during which undocumented immigrants were targeted and apprehended by ICE.

Then, he premiered the song live in Minneapolis during the Tom Morello-helmed Defend Minnesota benefit concert on Jan. 30. “Streets of Minneapolis” went on to be the highest-selling song in the United States, debuting at No. 1 on Billboard’s Digital Song Sales chart dated Feb. 7, even though it was available for just two days of the tracking period. Springsteen has vowed to donate all proceeds from the recording to the Good and Pretti families, in perpetuity.

Colbert’s final episode of The Late Show will air on Thursday, May 21, drawing curtains on an 11-year run. CBS announced the cancelation in July 2025, citing financial losses. Many observers, however, aren’t buying it, with figures like Senator Elizabeth Warren claiming the axing was political censorship, coming just days after Colbert publicly criticized CBS’s parent company, Paramount, over its $16 million legal settlement with Trump.

Watch Springsteen’s speech and performance here and below.

Not for the first time, Moby is swinging out with frustration at Donald Trump’s administration.  

“The U.S. is being run into the ground by a staggeringly incompetent and corrupt administration,” the veteran electronic music artist writes in a social post. “Unbelievably dark dark times.”

Moby expands further with a video, in which he reminds the world outside of the United States that he and many others are as confused as they are.

“So a lot of my friends who live outside the United States keep asking me, ‘what the hell is going on in the United States? And the truth is, we don’t know,” he explains. “The United States is being run by the most corrupt, evil, incompetent administration. And nobody knows what’s going on. It’s dark dark times in the U.S.”

Moby’s voice is part of a growing chorus of artists who’ve used their platforms to criticize Trump and MAGA, a list that includes Bruce Springsteen, Jack White, Eminem and Billie Eilish.

Earlier this year, Moby posted a statement to social media offering advice on how people can respond following the killing of Alex Pretti by ICE agents in Minneapolis. “The question is not whether we should be outraged and horrified at what’s happening in the United States,” Moby says in the clip, posted Jan. 26, “but rather what are we going to do about it.”

The artist activist also outlined a solution, telling people to protest as it’s a “constitutionally established right and it’s a right that Trump and his administration are trying to take away from us.”

Ultimately, he insisted, get out and vote, “not just in the upcoming midterms, although that’s very important, but in all of the special elections that happen throughout the year.” He also advises to “stop supporting the scumbag corporations who support Trump and ICE. We all know who they are. Boycott them.”

His latest comments come as the U.S.  justice department announces an almost $1.8bn fund to compensate allies of Trump who allege they were unfairly investigated, and the Strait of Hormuz remains closed, forcing up gas prices worldwide, after the U.S. and Israel launched military campaigns against Iran in late February, without U.S. Congressional approval.

A career independent recording artist, Moby has landed 10 titles on the Billboard 200, plus two Billboard Hot 100 hits, and countless syncs. Not bad. On the other side of the Atlantic, however, he’s recognized as one of the leaders of his generation. In the United Kingdom, he boasts two No. 1 albums (1999’s Play and 2002’s 18), and 18 top 40 appearances on the national singles chart, and he has twice been nominated for best international male act at the BRIT Awards.

Check out Moby’s latest social post below.

Chance the Rapper took the stage at the Gordon Parks Foundation Annual Awards in NYC on Tuesday night (May 19) and delivered a stirring tribute performance to Muhammad Ali with “I Was a Rock.”

It was a star-studded night at Cipriani 42nd Street celebrating the foundation’s 20th anniversary and the life of the legendary photographer and civil rights activist Gordon Parks, who died in 2006.

Parks was one of the leading photojournalists narrating the Black experience in America starting in the 1940s and continued to publish until his death.

Chano was joined by Anthony Morgan’s Inspirational Choir of Harlem for a soulful performance, which included audio from a famed Ali interview in 1977 outlining his philanthropic plans for the future. He previously performed “I Was a Rock” in dedication to the boxing and social justice icon at the 2016 ESPY Awards.

“To be recognized in a space honoring Gordon Parks and Muhammad Ali is humbling. They told the truth through their work, and that’s always been the goal of mine too,” Chance told Billboard in April ahead of the event. “The tribute to Ali is really about honoring that spirit and showing gratitude to his legacy.”

The 20th-anniversary awards dinner and auction brought together various dignitaries with music, social justice, art and philanthropy.

Former NFL quarterback and civil rights activist Colin Kaepernick was a presenter, while Alicia Keys and Swizz Beatz served on a committee of co-chairs for the evening. Philadelphia Eagles quarterback Jalen Hurts was also present.

“We are so honored to be here continuously celebrating the legacy of Gordon Parks. He was a
Renaissance Man. No starts, no stops, just endless beginnings.” Alicia Keys said on stage after being presented with an original portrait of Parks.

John Legend was among the honorees for the night and Pharrell was fittingly called on as a presenter to welcome the singer to the stage. “In trying times like these, I feel a great sense of responsibility,” Legend said. “This award is a challenge for me and for us to get to work. Gordon Parks knew how to get to work, and he understood that seeing clearly was necessary for justice.”

According to a press release, the Gordon Parks Foundation raised $3 million through the awards dinner and auction to help advance the foundation’s causes.

Launched by Gordon Parks and Philip B. Kunhardt, Jr. in 2006, the Gordon Parks Foundation honors the legacy of the social justice efforts by Parks as a groundbreaking photojournalist with various educational and artistic initiatives. Fellowships and scholarships support students along with emerging artists and writers through the Gordon Parks Arts and Social Justice Fund, which was created in 2019.

Fans attending the opening dates of Harry Styles’ ‘Together, Together’ tour have shared concerns online about obstructed views from premium floor sections.

After the tour’s first two shows, which took place at Amsterdam’s Johan Cruyff Arena over the weekend (May 16 and 17), clips circulating social media showed some concertgoers struggling to see due to the height of the stage, equipment, and a large production set-up, prompting criticism over Styles’ ambitious staging design.

In a statement shared with Billboard U.K., a tour representative for Styles has said that areas of the staging are “being reviewed carefully” and the team is working to improve visibility concerns ahead of upcoming shows. 

“The floor concept was designed to give fans freedom of movement and the ability to experience the show from different positions, rather than being confined to one fixed viewing angle,” they said. 

“That open, free-flowing floor experience has always been an essential part of Harry’s live shows. A small area of the staging in specific floor positions appears to have had a restricted sightline. Those areas are being reviewed carefully and adjusted where possible in compliance with all safety restrictions.”

The sightline complaints have also fueled a broader online conversation around rising concert ticket prices and fan expectations for premium live experiences. While some attendees praised the staging – which sees Styles moving between multiple performance areas during a two-hour set – others argued that standing tickets should offer consistent views of the show, regardless of production elements. Styles has not addressed the backlash publicly.

The Together, Together tour, which will hit seven key global cities throughout 2026, remains one of the year’s biggest live music launches. Billboard U.K. attended the kickoff at Johan Cruyff Arena, describing the show as “a fervent, dizzying two-hour trip through Styles’ musical canon” and praising its more mature feel to the British singer’s previous live performances.

Following a further eight nights in Amsterdam, Styles will take the trek onward to London for a record-breaking 12 shows at Wembley Stadium, before continuing with additional stadium dates in São Paulo, Mexico City, Sydney and Melbourne. Throughout the fall, the 33-year-old will play 30 sold-out nights at New York City’s Madison Square Garden.

The Together, Together tour marks Styles’ first major live run since the release of his fourth album Kiss All The Time. Disco, Occasionally in March, which hit No. 1 on both the Billboard 200 and the Official U.K. Albums Chart. The stadium trek follows his 169-date Love On Tour cycle, which ran between 2021 and 2023 and established the former One Direction member as one of the most in-demand live acts of the past decade.

A shiny new toy — namely a Dolby Atmos for his home studio in Los Angeles — has revived Motley Crue drummer Tommy Lee‘s interest in some of his old musical playthings.

On Friday (May 22), Lee will release Tommyland Rides Again, a freshly refurbished and expanded treatment of 2005’s Tommyland: The Ride, his second solo album after his short-lived side project Methods of Mayhem. Filled with guests — including Nickelback’s Chad Kroeger, Good Charlotte’s Joel Madden, Backstreet Boys’ Nick Carter, Sum 41′ Deryck Whibley, Dave Navarro of Jane’s Addiction, Andrew McMahon (Something Corporate, Jack’s Mannequin), Fuel’s Carl Bell and others — the 12-song set peaked at No. 62 on the Billboard 200 and hit the Hot 100 with the Butch Walker collaboration “Good Times,” which was the theme for that year’s NBC/VH1 reality series Tommy Lee Goes to College.

“A couple years ago, my kids were tripping out and like, ‘Dad, you gotta re-release this,’ ’cause it was 20 years since it came out,” Lee tells Billboard via Zoom. “I didn’t really think much of it, but then the studio got done being built and I was like, ‘I wanna remix some of my stuff’ — one being Tommyland: The Ride, for its anniversary.

“So I learned the process, and once you hear Dolby Atmos, it’s insane. I’ll never listen to regular stereo again. And now we’re going down the rabbit hole and I’m remixing anything.”

At the time of its release, and with its guest list, Tommyland: The Ride was a kind of snapshot of rock music circa 2005. More in the realm of Lee’s 2002 solo debut Never a Dull Moment than Motley Crue’s heavy glam rock or the industrial roots of Methods of Mayhem, Tommyland was decidedly more melodic and focused on songcraft, even downright gentle in spots. “Whenever I do something solo, without Motley Crue, I’m like a little kid in a sandbox,” Lee explains. “It’s just you, and you sort of have the freedom to do whatever it is that’s blowing your skirt up.

“The cover art kind of says it all; it’s basically a, like, roller coaster (track) going into my ear, into my f***in’ crazy, eclectic musical styles mind, and that’s what it’s always been.”

In addition to the new mix, Tommyland Rides Again adds another track, “Stupid World” with Chad Tepper, an uncharacteristically topical song that Lee wrote during the Covid pandemic. “I found a bunch of stuff,” Lee says, “and the second I heard it I was, ‘I gotta do this. The timing couldn’t be better,’ just because of the content. It’s really about how ridiculously stupid the world we live in has become. Things have gotten even crazier since (he wrote it), and I was like, ‘I’m rolling with this. This is meant to be, ’cause shit’s pretty stupid right now.

“I mean, nobody knows what’s real anymore, whether it’s a photograph or a video, a political statement or…just everything. Nobody knows if anything is real, and that’s a really f***in’ stupid place for us all to be in.”

As excited as he is to present the newly mixed Tommyland to the world — he recommends “Hello Again” and the helicopter effect on “Trying To Be Me”  — Lee acknowledges that rock music, and the industry in general, was “in a very different place” when the album first came out.

“Back then there was space for things, for music and videos to come out and be heard and seen and paid attention to,” he says. “Now…Spotify releases, what, a half a million songs a day? More? Who the f*** is listening to that? We’re f***ing inundated with content, not only music but all the arts. So how does someone cut through all the static to actually find something that they love?” Nevertheless, Lee notes, he’s still inspired to keep creating amidst those challenges.

“It does inspire me to make things really special so that they do stick out from the static,” he explains. “There’s so much noise out there that it inspires me to be better. But it also bums me out because we are where we are. You can’t really undo it. So it’s definitely more for me, 100 percent.”

Lee did enjoy the trip down memory lane in revisiting Tommyland for its new edition. “It still means what it meant to be then,” he says, including the presence of his various guests. The Nick Carter appearance raised eyebrows at the time, but Lee maintains that it was as natural as having any of the rockers on the set.

“It wasn’t like I sat around saying, ‘Who do I want to collaborate with?’ It just kind of happened track by track,” he recalls. He met the Backstreet Boy when both were featured on an episode of MTV’s Punk’d, “and we became really, really cool friends. I was working on this tune (‘Say Goodbye’) around that time and we were at my house and I played it for Nick, and he just started singing and I was like, ‘Oh, shit, what are you doing for the next couple days, bud?’ He’s such a cool guy, such an incredible voice. I was like, ‘Let’s do it. I’m probably gonna hear a bunch of flak from some metal heads, but f*** them!’”

As Tommyland Rides Again comes out, Lee is remixing more of his catalog, including his other solo albums and his Methods of Mayhem releases. He’s eyeballing some brand-new material for 2027 and also “wouldn’t mind having a crack” at remixing some Motley Crue in Dolby Atmos.

Before all that, however, he’ll be on the road with the Crue for a The Return of the Carnival of Sins! summer tour, celebrating the 20th anniversary of that concert tour and the band’s 45th anniversary. The 33-date mostly amphitheater trek, which also includes Tesla and Extreme, begins July 17 near Pittsburgh and wraps Sept. 25 in Ridgefield, Wash.

“It’s gonna be fun,” Lee predicts. “The last run we did was all stadiums, which was f***ing phenomenal. But I really do love a good outdoor amphitheater, shed vibe. That’s always fun in the summer.” Motley Crue also polled fans for setlist suggestions, which he says “made us go back and dust off four or five tunes that we haven’t played in a long time, so I think the fans are gonna be pumped.” He declined to name what they are, however.

The group has also released some new songs in recent years — “Dogs of War,” “Cancelled” and a cover of the Beastie Boys’ “(You Gotta) Fight For Your Right (to Party)” — but Lee says Crueheads will have to be patient for more. “We’re always writing, and we do have some stuff kicking around,” he notes, “but right now the only thing in front of us is going out to do these summer dates. But after that I think it’s safe to say you’ll probably be hearing some new stuff in ’27.”