New Music Latin is a compilation of the best new Latin songs and albums recommended by Billboard Latin and Billboard Español editors. Check out this week’s picks below.

Thalia, Todo Suena Mejor en Cumbia (Sony Music Latin)

From the opening chords of “Ojitos Mexicanos,” which opens the album, Thalia — recognized this year with the Icon Award at Billboard’s Women in Music — takes us on a journey that blends past and present, with covers of classics such as ABBA’s “Dancing Queen,” Son By Four’s “A Puro Corazón” (reimagined here as “Cariño Mío”) and Daniela Romo’s “Todo, Todo, Todo” (featuring Yuri), alongside exciting new tracks and collaborations. Highlights include “Nueva Herida” with Valen — one of the rising voices of cumbia in Argentina — and “Me Fui Queriéndote” with Matisse, both tracks were co-written by the Mexican superstar.

The album also features “Aquí Es Mi Lugar” with Grupo Máximo and, of course, “Yo Me Lo Busqué” with Los Ángeles Azules, which reached No. 1 on the Regional Mexican Airplay chart upon its release in May 2025. Having flirted with cumbia music throughout her career via major hits like “Piel Morena” and “Amor a la Mexicana,” Thalía now cements her love for the genre with a full-length album, gifting her fans a nine-track collection that is sure to have them dancing with joy. — SIGAL RATNER-ARIAS

Tokischa, AMOR & DROGA (Sol Entertainment Group/Warner Music Latina)

It’s hard to grasp that Tokischa’s first full-length album is Amor & Droga, given that the Dominican artist has been so steadily pushing out singles over the past five years. Amor & Droga, however, breaks rank. Produced in part with a cadre of top-line DJs,  Amor & Droga is as much about partying as it is about reflecting, but its production is elevated and textured, clearly part of an all-encompassing effort to show Tokischa as a sophisticated artist with a gravitas that supersedes her wild antics (like the breast-bring dress she wore at Premios Lo Nuestro).

Instead, here we have layered tracks like “Mi Novio,” a pulsating dance number with Diplo that spells out a toxic, abusive relationship, contrasting with “Surfboard,” a Bonafide love song that describes Tokischa’s current relationship. In the middle, tracks like “Perreo Llorando” — on the juxtaposition of success and pain — highlight how the dance floor and the raunch can coexist with elegance and soul.  — LEILA COBO

Edén Muñoz & Christian Castro, “Osadía” (EMC Music/Sony Music)

The regional Mexican star and the pop icon achieve a superb fusion of styles and voices in “Osadía,” a track about a breakup in which one party emerges more wounded than the other. Muñoz — who serves as both songwriter and producer — opens with his signature accordion, paving the way for elegant orchestration in which trumpets take center stage, supported by guitars and piano. Castro, returning to the recording studio after a long absence, demonstrates that his vocal power remains entirely undiminished. “I’ve been left without myself, without you, without us both/ And if anyone asks me, I don’t know what happened/ I’ve earned myself a wound/ While her smile returned — and she didn’t even say thank you,” they both sing with passion. — TERE AGUILERA

Nanpa Básico, Que Tin y Que Tan (5020 Records)

A Colombian rap star breaks expectations with an authentic 22-track journey, using the playful Medellín slang of “Tin” and “Tan.” Que Tin y Que Tan sweeps listeners through a wave of sounds, fusing rap, ballads, afrobeat, and more, all united by Nanpa Básico’s signature introspection and emotional honesty. The album builds on his evolving sounds, balancing raw, stripped-back moments with dense, layered arrangements. Sometimes his voice stands alone in the spotlight; other times, as in “Si Usted Quiere,” live guitar, trumpe, and keyboards create a rich, immersive backdrop.

Each track is thoughtfully crafted with his all-Colombian collaborators: Kapo brings guitar-driven soul to “AMIMA”; Camilo lends sweetness to the heartfelt ballad “EVAMARÍA”; DFZM turns “En Tu Boca El Humo Me Sabe Mejor” into a poetic ode to love’s transformative power; Miky La Sensa paints dreams of perfection in “No Salgas El Viernes”; Maisak explores self-reflection and the search for peace in “Diálogos de Paz”; and Kris R blends apology and trap in “Cariñitos y Flores.” — INGRID FAJARDO

Gusi, Vallenato Social Club (Gusi)

For the past two years, Gusi focused on gathering the most popular names in the vallenato music realm to bring to life his new album Vallenato Social Club. Crafted with the intention to honor the Colombian genre’s roots, but also introduce it to a new generation with its modern fusions, the 12-track set goes beyond a cultural statement. With brand new songs, such as “Son Para Ti,” “A Tu Medida” and “Acabaste Conmigo” — all composed and produced by Gusi himself — the set fuses traditional vallenato music with genres such as merengue, son and paseo.

“It’s a meeting point. It’s a way to honor our roots, unite generations, and show that vallenato is alive, evolving, and ready to conquer new hearts,” Gusi says in a press statement. “This project is born from a deep respect for the genre, as a space where vallenato is lived, shared, and connects us all.” Vallenato giants Elder Dayán Díaz, Alfredo Gutiérrez, Jean Carlos Centeno, Luifer Cuello, Iván Villazón, Jorge Celedón, Karen Lizarazo, Rafa Pérez, Diego Daza, José Martín Bernier, Felipe Peláez and Peter Manjarrés all join Gusi on Vallenato Social Club. —— JESSICA ROIZ

Manuel Carrasco, “Oh Si Pudiera” (Universal Music Spain)

In “Oh Si Pudiera,” Manuel Carrasco previews the sound of Pueblo Salvaje I, his upcoming studio album — a blend of rumba, flamenco and gospel set against a folk foundation that invites listeners to experience it live in concert. The track opens with a rumba rhythm setting the pulse, driven by rhythmic handclaps that gradually give room to a gospel-infused soundscape. “To see life the way children play it,” the Spanish musician sings, in a verse that flows effortlessly and serves to fully establish the song’s tone. Carrasco himself summed it up on social media as a refusal to look the other way — a sentiment also palpable in lines such as “let them shoot, for I will rise from the ground” — without ever losing its sense of lightness. The song navigates the space between the intimate and the collective, radiating an energy that already feels stadium-ready. — FRANCHESCA GUIM

Los Ángeles Azules & Belinda, “Por Ella” (SALXCO Records/OCESA Seitrack)

The iconic cumbia group and the pop superstar join forces for a second time—to energize the World Cup with a festive, distinctly Mexican track, set to the unmistakable style that characterizes both artists. Belinda’s melodious voice blends with the accordion, electric bass, timbales and saxophone, resulting in a masterful piece of cumbia — the musical genre that unites Latin America — which will ring out to cheer on the 2026 FIFA World Cup. “What I would give for her/ For her/ So that she might shine here in my heart just like the stars/ So beautiful/ And to give her a kiss when I hold her in my arms/ To shout that I love her/ So that it can be heard all the way to heaven,” goes the chorus. The song’s accompanying music video serves as a colorful tribute to Mexican culture — and, in particular, to Mexico City, one of the official host cities for the planet’s most important soccer tournament. — NATALIA CANO

Camila Fernández, “Suéltame” (FONO)

The heiress of the Fernández dynasty presents a ranchera ballad with pop undertones, creating a modern sound while still honoring the foundations of the genre, accompanied by vihuela and trumpets. “Suéltame” speaks of a relationship sustained merely by habit — one that has ended and cannot be salvaged, even if moving past it will take time. There are no villains, only the courage to move forward. Through her vocals and distinctive style, Fernández infuses the track with just the right amount of drama to stir deep emotions in lyrics such as: “A half-hearted kiss and a feigned smile/ Promises that turned into empty words/ That is all that remains of the two of us.” — T.A.

Check out more Latin recommendations this week below:

Taylor Swift’s “Elizabeth Taylor” hits the top 10 on Billboard’s Adult Pop Airplay chart, extending one record and contributing to a first over the survey’s 30-year history.

The song ascends a spot to No. 10 on the April 25-dated chart, becoming Swift’s record-furthering 35th top 10. Dating to the list’s start in March 1996, the superstar widens her lead over Maroon 5, the runner-up with 28 top 10s. P!nk places third with 20.

Meanwhile, “Elizabeth Taylor” joins two other Swift hits in the current Adult Pop Airplay top 10, making for a back-to-back-to-back block. “Opalite” ranks at No. 8 and “The Fate of Ophelia” is No. 9. The songs topped the chart for three weeks in February-March and four weeks last November-December, respectively. Swift makes history as the first artist ever to claim three spots in the chart’s top 10 simultaneously.

Highlighting Swift’s support at radio, all three songs were among the 10 most-played tracks on WBMX (Mix 104.1) Boston in the April 10-16 tracking week, according to Mediabase, which provides data to Luminate for Billboard’s airplay charts.

Numerous artists have doubled up in the Adult Pop Airplay top 10, starting with Alanis Morissette in July 1996 (thanks to “Ironic” and “You Learn”). Swift scores her record 80th week with multiple titles in the region, followed by Ed Sheeran with 59 weeks with two top 10s together and Justin Bieber with 48.

“Elizabeth Taylor,” “Opalite” and “The Fate of Ophelia” are from Swift’s Republic Records album The Life of a Showgirl, which launched last October with a record-shattering 4.002 million first-week equivalent-album units in the United States, according to Luminate, becoming her 15th Billboard 200 No. 1, the most among soloists. “Elizabeth Taylor” simultaneously debuted at its No. 3 high on the Billboard Hot 100, as the set’s songs infused the chart’s top 12 spots, the most ever for an artist from No. 1 on down in a single week.

All charts dated April 25 will update Tuesday, April 21, on Billboard.com.

D4vd has not been on the rosters of Sony Music Publishing or The·Team (formerly Wasserman) for some time, Billboard has learned, following the singer’s arrest on suspicion of murdering Celeste Rivas Hernandez, the teenage girl whose dismembered body was found in his car last fall.

The “Romantic Homicide” singer-songwriter, who was arrested by the Los Angeles Police Department on Thursday (April 16), was previously represented by Sony for publishing and The·Team for touring. It’s not clear when exactly he was dropped from the two rosters. Reps for his labels, Interscope and Darkroom Records, did not immediately return inquiries as to whether D4vd is still signed, though he’s been scrubbed from both companies’ websites.

D4vd’s name has been connected to Rivas since September, when Los Angeles police discovered her partial, decomposed remains in the front trunk of an impounded Tesla registered to the singer. Rivas had gone missing from her home in Lake Elsinore, Calif., at the age of 13 in April 2024. It’s unclear how old she was at the time of her death.

D4vd has not yet been officially charged with any crime. He is currently being held without bail at a Los Angeles jail on suspicion of murder, and police say the case will be presented to the District Attorney’s Office for possible charges on Monday (April 20).

Three attorneys representing D4vd — Blair Berk, Marilyn Bednarski and Regina Peter — said in a statement Thursday: “Let us be clear — the actual evidence in this case will show that David Burke did not murder Celeste Rivas Hernandez and he was not the cause of her death. There has been no indictment returned by any grand jury in this case and no criminal complaint filed. David has only been detained under suspicion. We will vigorously defend David’s innocence.”

D4vd’s career took off in 2022 after his first single, “Romantic Homicide,” went viral on TikTok and eventually hit No. 33 on the Billboard Hot 100. After releasing two EPs and opening for SZA’s blockbuster SOS tour in 2023, D4vd dropped his debut album, Withered, last April. The album debuted at No. 13 on the Billboard 200, and he embarked on a headlining tour in August.

But the tour was cut short, and a deluxe version of Withered shelved, after Rivas’ remains were found in D4vd’s Tesla in September. After police responded to reports of a “foul odor” coming from the car in a Hollywood tow lot, they discovered two black bags containing severed, decomposed body parts that were later identified as Rivas — including a head, torso and limbs.

A grand jury in Los Angeles spent many months reviewing the case. D4vd was confirmed as a suspect in the investigation in February, when the singer’s family members filed public court petitions seeking to avoid testifying before a grand jury.

When Elizabeth Matthews thinks about the most unforgettable concerts of her life, her mind goes back to Ann Arbor, Mich., in February 1983, when her high school basketball coach scored free tickets for the whole team to see Prince on his 1999 tour.

But there was a catch.

“She agreed that we would all be the janitors after the show,” Matthews recalls. “We got to see Prince for free, and then we had to clean up the Crisler [Center] with our brooms.”

Matthews was happy to pitch in — and it proved to be an early sign of the work she’s willing to do behind the scenes for songwriters.

Since 2015, Matthews has led ASCAP, the performing rights organization that licenses, collects fees, tracks and distributes royalties for songs played on the radio or streamed online to its 1.1 million member songwriters, composers and publishers in the United States.

Founded 112 years ago, ASCAP is the only U.S. PRO that still operates on a not-for-profit basis, following BMI’s conversion to a for-profit company in 2023. ASCAP issues collective licenses, which allow businesses to play some 20 million songs written by legendary artists like Beyoncé, Jimi Hendrix, Mariah Carey, Neil Young, Paul McCartney, Philip Glass and Stevie Wonder; newer writers including KPop Demon Hunters’ EJAE, Lola Young, Chappell Roan, Noah Kahan and Amy Allen; and Latin music stars such as Marc Anthony, Daddy Yankee, Feid, Myke Towers, Romeo Santos, Becky G, Sebastián Yatra and Xavi.

“As an artist, songwriter and vocal producer, I really value organizations that support music creation and advocate for our rights,” says EJAE, who joined ­ASCAP in 2025, adding that she especially appreciates the support and resources it provides women and Asian music creators. “Beth and her team have been very supportive of me and the causes I care about. I appreciate their excitement about supporting songwriters of all genres and backgrounds, especially in an industry where Asian representation in songwriting isn’t always prevalent.”

ASCAP has no debt on its balance sheet, and its not-for-profit model translates to a payout ratio of around 90 cents per dollar collected, with the rest going to operating expenses. It is the highest among U.S. PROs, and, as ASCAP chairman/president Paul Williams puts it, makes Matthews “a greater expert on the care and feeding of music creators” than anyone else.

Under Matthews, ASCAP’s revenue and the royalties it distributes have risen to all-time highs. For the past 10 years, revenue grew by a compound annual growth rate of 6.7% and distributions rose by 7.3%. In 2025, that translated to $2 billion in revenue and $1.8 billion in royalties to members.

“What we do matters to more than a million people and their lives. If we screw this up, they can’t pay their bills,” Matthews says, speaking on a Friday afternoon in ASCAP’s Midtown Manhattan office. “We take quite seriously our obligation to work as hard as humanly possible to protect their rights, to advocate for them, to push on negotiations and licensing, to collect as fast as possible, to match and process as fast as possible and to get people paid. Because on the ground, it’s about paying the rent and buying food and paying tuition.”

That concern stems, in part, from Matthews’ recognition of the precarious future songwriters face. AI poses a threat to the job security of nearly all composers, lyricists and songwriters. Leading tech executives have called for the wholesale elimination of copyrights, and at least one head of a major music company (Warner Music Group’s Robert Kyncl) recently told investors it is working to find ways to bypass ASCAP and BMI to increase the portion of its digital music publishing rights that it directly licenses.

Amid ongoing uncertainty about the copyrightability of AI music and legal battles between major music companies and the leading AI music platform, Suno, Matthews has emerged as a leading advocate in music seeking to shape federal policy around generative AI.

She is a self-described pessimist, but she’s not a catastrophizer. Matthews acknowledges that it’s a hard time to be a musician — but says it’s always been hard. Her friends and colleagues say she barely sleeps, but not because she’s an insomniac: The tall, athletic, blue-eyed blonde with teenage daughters is a voracious reader. She is up at odd hours because she is reading up on the oil markets — during the week in March when Billboard interviews her — and gaming out risk scenarios to predict and forestall the worst possible outcomes.

“If you have gone through scenario planning, mapping from the worst- to best-case scenarios, you get a sense of control,” Matthews says. “If you’ve already envisioned the entire East Coast grid going down, you’ve already walked through ‘How quickly could we get people paid?’ It gives me a greater sense of calm and control because I’ve already gone through the psychological exercise. I don’t like surprises.”

Matthews’ friend and fellow ASCAP board member Michelle Lewis describes her preparation-oriented mind differently.

“In the zombie apocalypse, hopefully you’re with Beth,” says Lewis, executive director of Songwriters of North America (SONA). “She knows where the exits are, her phone is charged and she has good snacks. She’ll get you out of there alive, and it will be a little cushy, too.”

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Matthews may now stand among the most powerful women in the music industry, but her path to the music world unfolded gradually.

She attended Purdue University in Indiana and later Emory University School of Law in Atlanta. Matthews graduated into the tech revolution of the 1990s, working in the technology business group at the white-shoe firm Milbank Tweed Hadley & McCloy (now Milbank LLP) and later joining the intellectual property and corporate law group at Chadbourne & Parks.

In 1998, she started at MTV Networks, ­eventually rising to the role of executive vp/deputy general counsel at Viacom Media Networks handling business and legal affairs for all commercial deals involving MTV, Comedy Central, VH1, Nickelodeon and other Viacom channels. Working alongside former MTV CEO Judy McGrath and former Viacom president Van Toffler, Matthews says the job was a “master class in … different types of [media] businesses and transactions.”

In 2013, Matthews joined ASCAP as general counsel/executive vp and was quickly named to replace John LoFrumento, who had led the organization for 17 years when he retired at the end of 2014.

She launched a strategic growth plan, a signature of her tenure that has roughly doubled ASCAP’s membership and revenue. She initiated a full-scale cloud migration for ASCAP’s back-end technology eight years ago, a move Matthews says was essential to “navigate the volume of performances that we have to ingest, process, match and pay out.”

“We were going from a couple of hundred million to trillions with a T,” Matthews recalls. “You have to get ahead of that curve, so your systems don’t break.”

Future-proofing ASCAP’s system was at the top of Matthews’ mind in February 2020, when, weeks before many Americans could envision the widespread COVID-19 closures that would become a way of life, ­ASCAP began doing work-from-home drills with its staff.

Matthews and key members across the organization instructed employees to take home laptops and other essential items on two different occasions in the month before March 12, 2020, when New York declared a state of emergency. Staff tell Billboard that preparation was key to ASCAP’s ability to operate without material interruption in the early months of the virus’ spread.

“When people practice and train for events, then it’s like muscle memory when they actually have to execute protocols,” Matthews says. “We see this time and time again in various contexts including security.”

ASCAP’s work with several hundred thousand licensees and international partner PROs processing payments, using internal proprietary systems and third-party platforms provided by Oracle, AWS and Salesforce, has forced it to adopt serious ­cybersecurity protocols. Speaking at the Mondo.NYC conference in October 2025, Matthews said ASCAP practices frequent “red team drills” where ex-governmental anti-cyber crime experts run them through hacking and ransomware emergency drills.

Other tech initiatives that Matthews has championed include ASCAP’s collaboration to strengthen Songview, a public online database of performance copyright ownership and administration shares, which ASCAP and BMI launched in 2020. Last September, SESAC and GMR (the invite-only PRO founded by Randy Grimmett and Irving Azoff) began sharing their catalogs and information with Songview to provide access to the ownership and administration data for more than 38 million songs.

One outside event that spurred GMR and SESAC to join Songview was the Notice of Inquiry (NOI) launched by the U.S. Copyright Office in February 2025 after congressional questions about new PROs, which it said lacked “transparency.”

ASCAP mobilized its membership to submit more than 4,600 letters to the Copyright Office in defense of the PRO system. ASCAP’s own letters to the Copyright Office stressed that the PRO market was healthy and competitive, and that a government-run version of Songview was not necessary.

The Copyright Office resolved the NOI around Thanksgiving in a letter in which it recommended no changes for ASCAP or other PROs and cautioned against further regulation, given that GMR and ­SESAC had agreed to join Songview.

Matthews leaned on her early career experience — when law was rapidly adapting to technology — again late last year when ASCAP joined BMI and SOCANin adopting policies to accept the registration of musical compositions that are partially generated with AI tools. In a joint announcement, the three PROs committed to continually reject fully AI-generated works, but said that musical works that fuse elements of AI-generated musical content with elements of human authorship deserve to earn royalties and be included in the repertoires licensed by each of the societies.

“You’re seeing the marketplace sort of crawl to a higher level of comfort with partially created AI works, because when you think about it, AI has been used for a very long time,” Matthews said at the Mondo.NYC conference just days after the policy was announced.

Internally, Matthews says ASCAP is examining how AI can improve its software development work, such as by writing code and eliminating duplicative tasks to free up staff “to work on more complicated endeavors to hit some of the challenges of scale.”

At any given time, ASCAP’s staff of several hundred is working on its “issues of scale,” and colleagues say it’s Matthews’ primary focus for the future.

“I have a theory that at the end of the day when Beth goes home and gets into bed, she glows in the dark for about four hours before her core cools off,” ASCAP’s Williams jokes.

Matthews’ team members says they’re comforted by their belief that the ASCAP CEO can see around corners. SONA’s Lewis, who is also a songwriter, says that style of optimism stemming from preparedness is exactly what the group needs.

“She is always considering all the angles,” Lewis says, noting the 4 a.m. text messages she occasionally receives from Matthews. “We have a leader who has really thought this through and knows that despite all of the obstacles we’re going to come out of this OK.”

This story appears in the April 18, 2026, issue of Billboard.