Billie Eilish & Rosalía’s Spanish-Language Collab Tops Favorite New Music Poll

Billie Eilish and Rosalía’s new Spanish-language collaboration, “Lo Vas a Olvidar,” has topped this week’s new music poll.

Music fans voted in a poll published Friday (Jan. 22) on Billboard, choosing the tag-team bilingual effort as their favorite new music release of the past week.

“Lo Vas a Olvidar,” in which Eilish completely stuns by singing in Spanish, brought in nearly 36% of the vote, beating out new music by Diplo and Mark Ronson’s Silk City duo featuring Ellie Goulding (“New Love”), Sabrina Carpenter (“Skin”), Anuel AA and Ozuna (“Los Dioses”), and others.

After hinting that a collaboration was in the works in spring 2019, Eilish and Rosalía dropped the dreamlike track in which the two music stars showcase their vocal chemistry by trading off slow-tempo verses filled with hazy melodies and melancholic lyrics.

“I remember when we were writing the song, I remember her saying something about, ‘It should be in English.’ And I was like, ‘No, no, no. It should be in Spanish. It’s so beautiful.’ And I’ve always loved music that isn’t in English,” Eilish recently told Apple Music’s Zane Lowe.

The music video for “Lo Vas a Olvidar,” filmed by award-winning director Nabil, shows Eilish and Rosalía’s powerful performances in a somber setting.

Placing second on the past week’s tally was the “other” category with close to 17% of the vote, followed by “New Love,” a shimmery house anthem by Diplo and Ronson’s Silk City, featuring vocals by Goulding. The collab brought in nearly 16% of the total vote.

“The song is about losing yourself on your own, not needing to be seen, knowing that the one that got away could be just as happy as this too,” Goulding said in a statement. “The main concept is dancing on your own not needing to be seen.”

See the final results of this week’s new music release poll below.

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Eminem Unleashes ‘Higher’ Music Video With Cameos From Dana White & Michael Eaves

The UFC’s Dana White and ESPN’s Michael Eaves co-star in Eminem’s new music video for “Higher.”

The video debuted on Saturday (Jan. 23), ahead of that night’s Dustin Poirier vs. Conor McGregor UFC event.

In the clip, which features a mock SportsCenter interview segment midway through, Eminem gets ready for “a battle for the ages” — amping himself up with “Higher,” off of the rapper’s Music to be Murdered By – Side B album.

“All I know is every time I think I hit my ceiling/ I go higher than I’ve ever f—in’ been,” Eminem sings in the chorus.

“We have always been interested in fostering the synergy between music and sports and along with ESPN we have created many great moments together,” David Nieman, VP of sports and gaming for Interscope Geffen A&M said in a statement. “Working together to amplify Eminem’s artistic vision in such a unique way for this highly anticipated UFC event is absolutely a high point.”

Watch Eminem’s “Higher” video below.

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Justin Bieber Reflects on His DUI Arrest in 2014: ‘God Has Brought Me a Long Way’

Justin Bieber is spending some time reflecting on his past mistakes.

The 26-year-old pop superstar took to Instagram on Saturday (Jan. 23) to look back on getting arrested in 2014 and how his relationship with God has helped him become a better person.

“7 years ago today I got was arrested, not my finest hour. Not proud of where I was at in my life. I was hurting, unhappy, confused, angry, mislead, misunderstood and angry at god,” Bieber wrote alongside a photo of himself hunched over in handcuffs.

On Jan. 23, 2014, Bieber was arrested in Florida for drag racing on a Miami Beach street in a yellow Lamborghini and failing a sobriety test. He was later charged with driving under the influence, resisting arrest and driving with a suspended license.

“All this to say God has brought me a long way,” Bieber continued in his post. “From then til now I do realize something.. God was as close to me then as he is right now. My encouragement to you is to ‘let your past be a reminder of how far god has brought you. Don’t allow shame to ruin your “today” let the forgiveness of Jesus take over and watch your life blossom into all that God has designed you to be.”

Following the arrest, Bieber was able to avoid jail time by pleading guilty to a lesser charge of reckless driving. The singer also made a charitable donation and agreed to take anger management classes.

This isn’t the first time Bieber has reflected on his past arrest. In 2017, the singer wrote on Instagram that he had done a lot of growing up since his DUI.

“I LOVE THIS because it reminds me IM NOT EXACTLY WHERE I WANT TO BE BUT THANK GOD IM NOT WHERE I USED TO BE!! THE BEST IS YET TO COME DO YOU BELIEVE IT?” he captioned a side-by-side picture of his mugshot and a current selfie.

See Bieber’s latest reflective Instagram post here.

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Justin Timberlake & Ant Clemons’ ‘Better Days’ Feat. Kirk Franklin Breaks Shazam Record After Inauguration

Following the festivities of the Biden-Harris inauguration on Jan. 20, “Better Days” — a duet by Justin Timberlake and Ant Clemons, which was released to streaming services featuring Kirk Franklin — has topped the record for most-Shazamed song in a single day in the United States.

“Better Days” was performed by Timberlake and Clemons during the Celebrating America primetime inaugural special honoring President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris.

According to stats released by Shazam, the song was Shazamed more than 90,000 times within 24 hours of the performance, bringing it to No. 1 on the U.S. Shazam chart and breaking previous records held by “Have You Ever Seen the Rain” by Willie Nelson (heard on Big Little Lies) and “Jenny of Oldstones” by Florence + the Machine (heard on Game of Thrones).

As Billboard previously reported, on the sales front, “Better Days” also saw immediate gains after Wednesday’s inauguration programming. On Jan. 20, the song sold 13,000 downloads, a gain of 15,351% compared to its sales on Jan. 19.

Earlier in the week, Timberlake said he and Clemons had been “deeply honored to perform our new song” for the event “as a celebration of everything this administration represents… as well as a reminder to keep our eyes on the road ahead. We have a lot of work to do, but I’m feeling very hopeful for this country right now.”

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Cardi B Plans to Just ‘Enjoy Life’ in This Show-Stopping Dress

Cardi B stepped out to go shopping in a head-turning ensemble that she happily showed off on Instagram this weekend.

“Enjoy life,” the rapper, dressed in a unique Pierre-Louis Auvray gown, wrote in a post featuring a clip of herself strutting over to her car on Saturday (Jan. 23).

The statement dress was part knit and part sheer, and it hugged Cardi’s body.

“Majin Buu & Goku,” she captioned a photo of herself in the dress, with Offset by her side.

The pair were photographed out in Los Angeles with their masks on (with Cardi’s matching her red dress, of course).

While social media buzzed about the fun, bold look on Saturday, Cardi took a moment to shoot down a negative comment.

“I’m just tryna figure what man is ok with their woman/girl/gf/wife walking out in public with her a– and g string showing,” one person tweeted Saturday , to which Cardi replied: “A confident one who know his b—- a star and bad.”

In another tweet, Cardi clarified her look’s inspiration: “I wasn’t dress like a human anatomy I was dress as a alien. Is very disrespectful to compare human to aliens.”

See her show off the full outfit on Instagram.

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JoJo Siwa Opens Up About Her Personal Life: ‘I’m Really, Really Happy’

Two days after trending on TikTok with her lip-sync performance to Lady Gaga’s “Born This Way,” JoJo Siwa hopped on Instagram Live with a beaming smile to give a glimpse into her personal life.

Siwa’s grin was unwavering as she gushed about the kind messages she’s received in reaction to her latest social media posts.

“I have gotten the most endless amount of love and support. I’m just … I’m really, really happy,” the viral star said on Saturday (Jan. 23). “Now that the world gets to see this side of my life, it makes me really, really happy. I’ve been happy in this land for a minute now. Now that I just get to share that with the world, it’s awesome.”

Later on in her live session, she added, “It’s been 48 hours of the world knowing. It’s been the best 48 hours.”

Siwa took a moment to give a thoughtful answer to a follower’s question of “What label are you?”

“The reason why I’m not ready to say this answer is because I don’t really know this answer,” she candidly said. “I think humans are awesome. I think humans are really incredible people. Right now, I’m super duper happy and I, you know, want to share everything with the world, I really do, but I also want to keep things in my life private until they are ready to be public.”

“Right now what matters is that you guys know that no matter who you love, that it’s OK. It’s awesome, and the world is there for you. There are so many people that are there for you. I know everyone’s situation is different and it might be harder for some people and it might be easier for some people to come out or be themselves, but I think coming out has this stigma around it — that it’s this really, really, really scary thing — but it’s not anymore. There are so many accepting and loving people out there that it’s OK. Of course people are going to say it’s not normal, but it’s your normal. Nothing is normal. Literally not one thing about anybody is normal, and it’s OK to not be normal, it’s OK to be a little different, it’s OK to be a little weird, it’s OK to be a little strange … I think a lot of people are afaid of being different. That’s something we should never, ever be afraid of. That’s something we should be proud of and that we should celebrate,” said Siwa on Instagram Live.

Siwa said she’d also received questions like “How long have you been a part of the community?” and “How long have you been whatever you are?”

Her response: “I don’t know. I think my whole life. Because my whole life, I have really, really been, I just liked people, but I never have fallen in love before. But I always believed that my person was just going to be my person. If that person happened to be a boy, great! And if that person happened to be a girl, great! I think I’m just really happy. I think in life you know when you meet your person, I really do.”

As she continued to let fans in to bits of her personal life during the live chat, Siwa was happy to share how supportive her parents have always been.

“My parents have known,” she pointed out. “My mom said that she’s known for the last two years. She’s like, ‘I just know with you.’ She was like, ‘About two years ago was when I was like, yeah, I don’t think that you only like boys. And that’s totally OK.’ They just have always been so everything and so over-the-top.”

Watch a replay of her full Instagram Live here.

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U.K. Nurse Tells Kate Middleton About Being Asked to Sing Bon Jovi to Dying COVID Patient

The Duchess of Cambridge Kate Middleton praised nurses from U.K. hospitals performing “acts of kindness” for their COVID-19 patients in a new video — including one wife’s musical request.

The Duchess hopped on a video call with nurses from University Hospitals Coventry and Warwickshire NHS Trust and commended them for “going that extra mile” apart from their usual job duties. A senior nurse, Vasu Lingappa, told her about one of his dying patients and how the patient’s wife asked him to sing Bon Jovi while holding his hand.

“She said, ‘I can’t come to see you. But can you make sure you sing Bon Jovi and hold his hand?’ If I sing Bon Jovi in my accent, it won’t be appropriate,” Lingappa recalled with a laugh to Middleton. “So I took my phone out and played a YouTube video of Bon Jovi, and I held his hand.”

“That’s what matters so much now, these acts of kindness to the patients that you’re looking after, that are in your care, that family members aren’t able to be there,” Middleton told the nurses after hearing his story.

See the Duchess’ heartwarming video call below:

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Paris Jackson Unveils ‘Eyelids’ Video With Manchester Orchestra’s Andy Hull

Paris Jackson shared an emotional visual on Friday (Jan. 22) to accompany her collaboration with Manchester Orchestra’s Andy Hull, “eyelids.”

The black-and-white vignette finds the duo standing — first separately, then back-to-back — in a dark room as a light circles them. “Now I don’t know your name / It wouldn’t matter if I did anymore / Now I don’t know your name / I’m afraid of what’s under the floor,” they belt in the heartbreaking chorus.

Jackson worked with Hull throughout the process of writing, producing and recording her debut album Wilted, which was released in December 2020. “Manchester Orchestra was the soundtrack to the most vital time in my life in regards to mourning and becoming who I am today,” she told Billboard of working with one of her personal heroes. “[Hull’s] voice has guided me through some of the roughest times where I really had to lean into healthy coping skills, and to hear [him] singing lyrics from my heart was one of the coolest things in the world. I remember just being so blown away that I physically leaned back in my chair and was gripping the armrest.”

Watch the “eyelids” music video below.

 

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Is the SAG Award for Outstanding Movie Cast a Good Predictor for Best Picture Oscar?

When the Screen Actors Guild nominations are announced on Feb. 4, all eyes will turn to the top category: outstanding performance by a cast in a motion picture. That is often looked to as a leading bellwether for the Academy Award for best picture.

Last year, Parasite won the SAG Award for outstanding cast (a first for a film not in English) en route to its Oscar win for best picture (again, a first for a film not in English).

But the two awards don’t always go hand-in-hand. Of the 25 films to win the SAG Award for outstanding performance by a cast in a motion picture since the category’s inception in 1995 (the awards show’s second year), 12 have gone on to win the Oscar for best picture, 12 have gone on to be nominated for best picture (but not win), and one wasn’t even nominated for an Oscar for best picture. (That was Mike Nichols’ 1996 farce The Birdcage.)

Looking at it from the other direction, of the last 25 Academy Award winners for best picture, all but three were at least nominated for the SAG cast award. The three Oscar winners for best picture that were not SAG-nominated in the cast category were Braveheart (1995), The Shape of Water (2017) and Green Book (2018).

Are there any patterns to what types of films do best in the top category at each show? Speaking very broadly, big, epic films seem to do better at the Oscars. These include Braveheart, Titanic and Gladiator. Smaller, more intimate films seem to do better at the SAG Awards. These include The Full Monty, Sideways and Little Miss Sunshine.

The five films that seem to have the inside track for SAG nominations in the cast category this year are The Trial of the Chicago 7, One Night in Miami, Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom, Da 5 Bloods and Mank.

Other strong contenders include Minari, The Prom, Promising Young Woman, Sound of Metal and Judas and the Black Messiah.

Here are all the SAG winners for outstanding performance by a cast in a motion picture, separated into three categories based on how well the films did at the Oscars. Note: In the second and third categories, the second title on each line is the name of the film that won the Oscar for best picture.

Won the SAG Award; won the Oscar for best picture

Shakespeare in Love (1998)
American Beauty (1999)
Chicago (2002)
The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003)
Crash (2005)
No Country for Old Men (2007)
Slumdog Millionaire (2008)
The King’s Speech (2010)
Argo (2012)
Birdman (2014)
Spotlight (2015)
Parasite (2019)

Won the SAG Award; nominated for the Oscar for best picture

Apollo 13 (1995); Oscar: Braveheart
The Full Monty (1997); Oscar: Titanic
Traffic (2000); Oscar: Gladiator
Gosford Park (2001); Oscar: A Beautiful Mind
Sideways (2004); Oscar: Million Dollar Baby
Little Miss Sunshine (2006); Oscar: The Departed
Inglorious Basterds (2009); Oscar: The Hurt Locker
The Help (2011); Oscar: The Artist
American Hustle (2013); Oscar: 12 Years a Slave
Hidden Figures (2016); Oscar: Moonlight
Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri (2017); Oscar: The Shape of Water
Black Panther (2018); Oscar: Green Book

Won the SAG Award; not even nominated for the Oscar for best picture

The Birdcage (1996); Oscar: The English Patient

SAG Trivia

Of the 25 winners of the SAG cast award, the film with the largest ensemble cast was Gosford Park (20 actors shared the award). The film with the smallest ensemble cast was Sideways (just four actors — Thomas Haden Church, Paul Giamatti, Virginia Madsen and Sandra Oh — shared the award).

Black Panther is the only superhero film to win the ensemble cast award.

The Full Monty, The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King and Parasite are the only winners not to be nominated in any other category at the SAG Awards.

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Luke Bryan Wanted This Top 10 Country Hit, But Morgan Wallen Got It First: ‘Sorry, Luke’

Morgan Wallen has had a successful streak on the Billboard charts this week, and another country superstar wanted to get his hands on one of his new hits: Luke Bryan.

“Sand in My Boots” is the first track on Wallen’s Dangerous: The Double Album, which topped the Billboard 200 and Top Country Albums in the week ending Jan. 23, and it hit No. 8 on the Hot Country Songs chart. Wallen chatted with his frequent collaborators HARDY, who co-wrote “Sand in My Boots,” and Charlie Handsome on Apple Music Country’s Happy Hour Radio on Friday (Jan. 22) about how the song came to be and how both Wallen and Bryan “fell in love” with it.

“I just had that idea in my phone for forever. And I went in to write with Ashley Gorley and Josh Osborne at Smack, right across the street from Big Loud. And I just had this idea called ‘Sand in My Boots,’” HARDY said. “I just had this idea about just a summer love kind of thing. And I wanted to call it ‘Sand in My Boots.’”

“I listened to it. I immediately fell in love with it, man,” Wallen chimed in about his initial reaction to hearing the demo. “I knew I was going to have to change some of your Mississippi sh– off of there, but that’s all right,” Wallen laughed.

However, that “summer love kind of thing” wasn’t meant to be between the song and Bryan. HARDY told Wallen during the interview that the “Play It Again” hitmaker “fell in love with it too,” but he and Wallen didn’t know how he had even heard the demo.

“We were all like, ‘Man, we wanted you [Wallen] to have it. We thought you could make it cool.’ So he missed out, dawg,” HARDY said.

“Sorry, Luke,” Wallen teased at the end.

Since Wallen is still slated to open for Bryan’s Proud to Be Right Here Tour this summer, maybe they’ll get to perform “Sand in My Boots” together soon.

Listen to their entire conversation on Apple Music Country’s Happy Hour Radio here, and listen to “Sand in My Boots” below.

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