Joe Budden is making bank, at least according to what he told The New York Times.

In a profile published Tuesday (July 22), the rapper-turned-podcaster revealed that his media company — the Joe Budden Network — is averaging $1.04 million per month so far in 2025 on membership platform Patreon, boasts 70,000 paid subscribers and is on pace to clock around $20 million in overall revenue by the end of the year, with that last number provided by chief executive Ian Schwartzman.

The subscription money alone is more than likely going to exceed $12 million, which will make Budden Patreon’s top earner, a Patreon spokesperson told NYT.

Budden’s manager and business partner Schwartzman also told the publication that they sell their own ads instead of linking up with networks such as Wondery, iHeart and SiriusXM, where content creators have to share the revenue. This helps the Joe Budden Network to work with a maximum of three sponsors at a give time in an effort to not bombard the audience with ads.

The money the network brings in allows the company to set aside $1.5 million for the podcast’s cohosts Lamar “Ice” Burney, Trevor “Queenzflip” Robinson, Melyssa Ford, Antwan “Ish” Marby, Parks Vallely and Marc Lamont Hill, according to the NYT.

Schwartzman tells Billboard that he and Budden felt the need to share their revenue in a way to motivate fellow content creators.

“Yes, the numbers are real,” he says of the NYT reporting. “In fact, we didn’t want to share our income. The only reason we did was to show creators — signed or independent — that there is an alternative path. One that doesn’t require you giving up control and ownership. A path that produces fruits just as great as any traditional method and in some cases even better.”

Patreon also confirmed to Billboard that Budden is indeed their top earner, and CEO Jack Conte gave a statement applauding The Joe Budden Network for inspiring creators. “Joe and his team are very much on the same mission Patreon is on: inspiring other creators to do what they do best, follow their passion, build a deep community, all while maintaining creative independence,” Conte says. “By Joe providing this level of access highlighting the success of his business over the last few years, he’s showing creators that it’s possible to maintain ownership and cultivate sustainable businesses while staying true to his soul. Joe has continued to bet on himself and invest in his business and community on Patreon and is seeing the pay-off.”

In June, Budden seemingly revealed on his Instagram how much the pod was making through Patreon subscriptions when he was trying to highlight how many visits the Patreon gets. He blacked out the breakdown of the money he brings in on his creator account. However, someone was able to doctor his screenshot where it showed that the podcast appeared to bring in around $900,000 that month.

Last year, rapper Doe Boy asked Budden on the podcast how much he’s made since he started podcasting, with the Jersey City rapper claiming that he’s made “about $4 million” in 10 years. “I think about 4 mill. Early on, we was doing it for free,” he said. “Then, we hit a little lick, Spotify. Then, n—as left, the building crumbled a little bit. My friends came, saved the day. Probably about three-and-a-half to four-and-a-half million.”

BLACKPINK came to Rogers Stadium for the first of two nights on the Toronto leg of their Deadline World Tour on Tuesday night.

As hard as it is to believe now that Toronto is one of North America’s top concert markets, it was the superstar K-pop girl group’s first time playing in the city. BLACKPINK has been in the area, playing in nearby Hamilton in 2019 and 2022, but they made sure to make this first proper Toronto date count.

Unlike Coldplay, who made headlines for their less-than-stellar comments about the new venue earlier this month, BLACKPINK mostly had good things to say. Though she did mention that the venue was hard to get to, BLACKPINK’s ROSÉ called the stadium “beautiful” and said she was pleasantly surprised at the weather. She said the view from the stage was “like a painting,” with the clear sky above and the vast 50,000-strong crowd lit up with their signature glowing pink light sticks. (Many fans shelled out $80 or more for them at the limited-edition merch pop-up at Yorkdale mall or elsewhere.) The multigenerational audience was ear-piercingly loud, cheering, dancing and singing along — in English and Korean — for nearly the whole show.

It seemed to have put the four members of BLACKPINK in a good mood. At the end of the concert, the singers converged onstage for their encore. After a small set of songs, Jennie turned to her bandmates and suggested they play “APT.” ROSÉ had already played that Bruno Mars collab in her earlier solo set (every member got one), but Jennie wanted to play it too. “It seems fun, and I miss it every time,” she said.

So, they did it again, for the first time as a group. All four members smiled and bopped while doing the signature hand dance inspired by a Korean drinking game. At one point, the three members held up a mic to Jisoo, who didn’t know the lyrics but laughed it off. It was a rare moment of spontaneity for a stadium pop show.

Though it never topped the charts in the U.S., “APT.” hit No. 1 on the Billboard Canadian Hot 100 and stayed there for seven weeks, so it made sense to play it twice in Canada. But between their burgeoning solo careers and their group projects, there are plenty of BLACKPINK hits to fill a 28-song set.

The night was split up into five acts, with interstitial videos of the four girls in cowboy hats on a road trip. Three of the acts were full-group sets, complete with backup dancers and plenty of fireworks (the benefits of an outdoor venue). The other two were split between solo sets — first Jisoo and LISA, then Jennie and ROSÉ. Though they’re one of the signature current K-pop groups, they’re starting to build big profiles individually across the globe. ROSÉ is a chart-topping hit artist, Jennie played Coachella this year, Jisoo’s profile is growing, and LISA was a cast regular on the latest season of the hit HBO show The White Lotus (and she was also Billboard’s first global cover star last year).

That gave the concert a natural flow, with something to latch onto during every set. They played well off the audience too, at one point leading a lightstick wave throughout the stadium while LISA ran laps around the massive stage. Later, the screens fixated on audience members during a dance challenge to some of BLACKPINK’s biggest hits. Fans played along well — though, as Coldplay recently learned, such stunts can be risky.

The other biggest hit of the night seemed to be BLACKPINK’s “Jump,” the band’s newest single that is currently leading the Billboard Global 200. With its references to classic pop girl group forebears, the Spice Girls, and a catchy dance-along beat drop break, it’s an easy crowdpleaser. Like “APT.,” they played it twice throughout the night. But this one was planned.

This article was originally published by Billboard Canada

After over a year of waiting, Chappell Roan fans think that the singer is officially on the verge of properly releasing her live-only song “The Subway.”

In a series of photos shared on social media Wednesday (July 23), fans spotted posters hung up around New York City featuring the “Pink Pony Club” singer’s face and containing a series of cryptic clues that appear to point to something arriving next week.

On one flyer, Roan is seen sporting a wig with blunt bangs, with the text reading, “Going through a breakup? Get bangs!” Eagle-eyed fans noticed a clip also stuck in Roan’s hair, with the words “best before August 1” printed on them. While nothing on the poster specifically mentions her song “The Subway,” fans guessed that its appearance in New York seems to point to the unreleased track.

That speculation reached a fever pitch when a verified Instagram fan account shared a clip using studio-quality audio of the beloved song, while feature snippets of what appear to be a music video to go along with the track. “I made a promise, if in four months this feeling ain’t gone,” Roan sings over the clip, as a moving truck with the license plate reading “THE SBWY” barrels down a gravel road. “Well, f–k this city, I’m movin’ to Saskatchewan.”

Billboard has reached out to Roan’s representatives for confirmation.

Roan first debuted “The Subway” during her headline-making set at Governor’s Ball in 2024, and has continued to regularly perform the track live during her live performances since. This also wouldn’t be the first time Roan teased a song months before releasing it — earlier this year, the singer dropped her country anthem “The Giver” after first performing it on Saturday Night Live in November 2024.

Los Angeles-based streetwear brand Pleasures has released a new Daft Punk collaborative collection featuring clothing, home goods, gaming equipment and other items sure to make fans drool.

The collection borrows some of its imagery from the duo’s 2003 film Interstella 5555, their Random Access Memories-era iconography, the video for “Da Funk” (specifically its anthropomorphic dog Charles) and more. The collection features pants, jackets, t-shirts, shorts, hats, bookends, a dartboard, soccer ball, gaming pad and more. See select items from the collection below, and see all the items here.

The collection was debuted at a pair of pop up party’s in Daft Punk’s hometown of Paris and in Los Angeles in June and July before officially going on sale last Wednesday, July 16. While many of the items are already sold out as, as Daft Punk fans have swarmed to them in typically rapid fashion, many remain available.

Founded in 2015, Pleasures is also currently selling collaborative lines with Joy Division and Slipknot.

Daft Punk memorabilia is a phenomenon among fans. When the pair announced their breakup in 2021, the secondary market for merchandise and collector’s items skyrocketed online. In the days after the February 22, 2021 announcement Billboard reported that fans were flocking to stores like eBay and Etsy, where “a sealed two-LP copy of the band’s 2013 album Random Access Memories was up to $355 [48 hours after the news], a limited-edition action-figure set was going for $406 and sellers were asking astronomical prices for rare memorabilia, like a “Get Lucky” condom for $10,000.”