As the WNBA continues to soar, courtesy of its tremendous female athletes, rising young talents, and nail-biting moments, one team exudes a swagger and moxie that has been hard to replicate all season long: the New York Liberty.

Not only are the Liberty backed up by two-time league MVP Breanna Stewart, three-time All-Star Sabrina Ionescu, and five-time All-Star and former MVP Jonquel Jones, but they also have the hip-hop world championing their every move and dribble along the way. And now, the team stands on the brink of a historic triumph: clinching its first-ever title in franchise history, after a hard-fought Game 3 victory Wednesday night (Oct. 16) against the Minnesota Lynx in the WNBA Finals.

“The New York Liberty is restoring the feeling of pride in the streets of New York,” Ja Rule tells Billboard over email after performing at halftime of Game 2 of the Liberty’s semifinals series against the Las Vegas Aces earlier this month. “Watching Breanna Stewart take someone in the post, and the crowd erupts, is the similar feeling to hearing the distant roar of the cheers from inside Yankee Stadium through the adjacent blocks outside of the Bronx when Derek Jeter slaps a home run! In translation: New York, we are back, baby! And we are on the backs of the New York Liberty.”

What originally was the home that Jay-Z built in 2012 when he christened the Barclays Center as a former part-owner of the Brooklyn Nets has morphed into a basketball wonderland operated by the Liberty. After reaching the WNBA Finals last year, there’s been a growing appetite for seeing the team compete, especially amongst hip-hop stars. Since then, the Liberty has had Swizz Beatz, Alicia Keys, Common, Jennifer Hudson, Fat Joe, and A Boogie wit Da Hoodie attend its games on multiple occasions, cheering them on from the sidelines.

This connection to hip-hop royalty is not just a massive win but a source of pride for Liberty, whose chief brand officer, Shana Stephenson, wanted to take the next step: inviting artists to perform at the team’s home games. Stephenson, a born-and-raised New Yorker, is an avid lover of ’90s hip-hop and saw an opportunity to bridge the gap between her two loves, women’s sports and music.

“New York is full of rich culture, and hip-hop is a key ingredient,” she says. “Basketball and hip-hop go hand in hand in hand. As someone who loves hip-hop and grew up in ’90s hip-hop, it made sense to me.”

Last year, in honor of 50 years of hip-hop, Stephenson sought ways that the Liberty could pay homage to the genre’s most respected trailblazers. She accomplished that last August when the Liberty held a concert celebrating 50 years of women in hip-hop, and enlisted MC Lyte and Rapsody as the night’s performers. Stephenson’s love for legacy acts continued this year when the Liberty stormed into the Finals for a second consecutive season. With the stakes higher than ever, she tapped acclaimed rap stars Rick Ross and Jadakiss to perform at Game 1 and 2 of the Liberty Finals home games, with the latter being in front of a record-setting crowd of 18,000 fans.

And while the Liberty franchise has reveled in watching a hip-hop’s “Who’s Who” taking centerstage during their games, it has also used its halftime performances as a platform for emerging talent, especially those from New York to take advantage of.

“We see this as a platform for up-and-coming artists looking to get their music out there and in front of a different audience,” says Stephenson, who has had Cash Cobain, Maiya The Don, Lola Brooke, and more perform. “And we know that even though they aren’t as mainstream, they also still have followings, whether it’s cult followings or underground followings. That’s also an opportunity for us to tap into their core fan base, who might not be as familiar with the Liberty or fans of the WNBA. We see that as mutually beneficial.”

“It’s beautiful,” adds Maiya the Don. “For a long time, women’s sports, especially basketball, didn’t get the shine they deserved, but now the hip-hop community is showing love in a way that’s lifting these women up. It’s dope to see artists, especially in hip-hop, recognizing their greatness and supporting them. There’s a natural connection between basketball and hip-hop, so it’s about time the ladies got that same recognition. And honestly, it’s empowering. They’re paving the way for all of us to get the respect we deserve in our lanes.”

With the Liberty just one game away from potentially winning its first championship in franchise history, Stephenson envisions a future of even greater success. She dreams that icons like Beyonce, Kendrick Lamar, Jay-Z, Rihanna and LL Cool J will one day grace the Liberty’s court at Barclays Center, further solidifying the bond between the Liberty and the culture.

“This is a championship we’re aiming for,” says Stephenson. “It doesn’t matter that it’s the WNBA; it doesn’t make it any less than if the Nets were competing for an NBA championship, or the Yankees or Mets competing for an MLB championship; it means a lot in the sports world to be recognized as the best. For everyone wanting to cheer us on, be supportive, be in the building for that, and know that a halftime performance can motivate the fans and players, it means a lot.”

Members of 2 Live Crew have won a jury verdict allowing the hip hop legends to regain legal control of much of their catalog from a small record label that owned their copyrights for decades.

After years of litigation, a Florida federal jury said Wednesday that Uncle Luke (Luther Campbell) and the heirs of Fresh Kid Ice (Christopher Wong Won) and Brother Marquis (Mark Ross) were entitled to invoke copyright law’s “termination right” – a provision that allows creators to take back their works decades after they sold them away to a company.

Attorneys for Lil Joe Records, which bought the band’s catalog out of bankruptcy in the 1990s, argued that termination didn’t apply to 2 Live Crew’s albums. Lawyers for Campbell and his late bandmates argued back that the right to terminate was “inalienable” and couldn’t be forfeited.

In Wednesday’s verdict, the jurors sided with 2 Live Crew, finding the band members had lawfully regained control of the five albums at issue in the case — including their provocative 1989 record As Nasty as They Wanna Be, which reached No. 29 on the Billboard 200 and was certified platinum.

In a statement to Billboard, 2 Live’s attorney Scott Alan Burroughs said he and his clients were “extremely pleased” with the outcome: “Our team has fought this battle for nearly four years and are thankful to have had the opportunity to present our case to the jury and see justice served. The verdict was a total and overwhelming victory for our clients and artists everywhere.”

Meanwhile, Richard Wolfe, lead counsel Lil Joe Records and label owner Joe Weinberger, vowed to appeal the verdict, saying it dealt with novel legal questions about the interplay between termination rights and federal bankruptcy law.

“Since this is a matter of first impression …  which has never before been heard by any court, it may go to the Supreme Court,” Wolfe told Billboard. “The bankruptcy code is clear that all assets of a bankrupt party are part of the bankruptcy estate. All means all.”

The verdict was first reported by Law360 and confirmed by Billboard.

2 Live Crew, a pioneering hip hop group known for the backlash sparked by its sexually-explicit lyrics, is just the latest classic act to use the termination right, which typically kicks into action 35 years after a song was released.

Jay-Z has already invoked it to win back control of his debut album Reasonable Doubt, a fact revealed during a recent legal dispute over Damon Dash’s stake in Roc-A-Fella Records. Earlier this year, Cher won a legal battle with Sonny Bono’s widow over whether termination trumped a decades-old divorce settlement. And before that, groups of artists filed class actions against Universal Music Group and Sony Music Entertainment, seeking to win back control of their masters en masse.

2 Live’s dispute kicked off in November 2020, when Campbell and other members notified Lil Joe that they planned to invoke termination and take back control of their music. Lil Joe and Weinberger had  purchased 2 Live Crew’s catalog when the group’s previous label, Luke Records Inc., went bankrupt in 1995. When the two sides could not come to terms, Lil Joe sued the members in federal court.

During the case, the label argued that the bankruptcy sale, which had been signed by a judge, made clear that the album rights were “free and clear of any and all liens” or other caveats. The company also argued the albums were created as “works for hire” – meaning Lil Joe had always been the legal owner of the copyrights, and there were no rights to 2 Live to take back in the first place.

But at the trial this month, 2 Live’s attorneys told a different story. As reported by Law360, Burroughs argued the group had “trusted” Weinberg but that he had “betrayed them and steered them into bankruptcy,” where he was able to purchase the rights to their music on the cheap. He called the story a “tale of deceit and dishonesty that wouldn’t be out of place in a Netflix movie.”

Lil Joe can appeal the outcome, first by asking the judge to overturn the verdict and then by taking the case to a federal appeals court. Such proceedings could take months or even years, depending on how higher courts rule.

Auditions for Simon Cowell‘s Britain’s Got Talent were postponed Thursday (Oct. 17) in light of Liam Payne‘s shocking death the day prior.

The decision was confirmed by Applause Store, which handles ticketing for the talent competition show, on X the morning auditions were set to take place in England. “Due to the tragic passing of Liam Payne, BGT has decided to postpone today’s auditions in Blackpool,” the company wrote. “We apologise for any inconvenience this may cause.”

According to the audition venue’s website, Thursday was supposed to have been the final of three back-to-back days’ worth of auditions in the city. At press time, the show has not indicated when the auditions will be rescheduled.

Cowell launched Britain’s Got Talent in 2007, three years after he started the U.K. version of The X Factor. The late “Strip That Down” singer — who died at 31 years old Wednesday (Oct. 16) after falling from the third floor of a hotel in Buenos Aires, Argentina — got his start in 2010 on the latter talent program, which placed him in the group One Direction with fellow contestants-turned-bandmates Harry Styles, Niall Horan, Zayn Malik and Louis Tomlinson. The band went on to have four No. 1 albums on the Billboard 200 and six top 10 hits on the Billboard Hot 100 before parting ways in 2015, after which Payne embarked on a solo career.

In the wake of his death, The X Factor shared a touching tribute to the late pop singer. “We are heartbroken by the sad passing of Liam Payne,” read a message posted to the show’s social media accounts Wednesday. “He was immensely talented and, as part of One Direction, Liam will leave a lasting legacy on the music industry and fans around the world. Our thoughts are with his friends, family and all who loved him.”

Countless musicians, entertainment industry peers and fans have also taken to social media to mourn Payne in the past 24 hours, including Zedd, Paris Hilton, Charlie Puth, the Backstreet Boys, Ty Dolla $ign and more. The “Get Low” artist’s family shared a statement with the BBC Thursday. “We are heartbroken. Liam will forever live in our hearts and we’ll remember him for his kind, funny and brave soul,” the message read. “We are supporting each other the best we can as a family and ask for privacy and space at this awful time.”

See Applause Store’s tweet below.

The music’s industry’s newest leadership and wellness conference, organized by jump.global, will return for its second year Nov. 17-20 in Los Angeles. Today (Oct. 17), the conference announced its final keynote speaker, Kei Henderson.

Henderson will deliver a featured interview on Nov. 19, sharing stories about music management, founding a label and also the importance of taking time off – in 2019, Henderson took a partial hiatus from the music industry to prioritize her mental health. 

“Conferences like this are more than necessary for the music industry, and I feel incredibly honored for the opportunity to share my journey with like minds,” Henderson said in a statement to jump.global. “We need more spaces that are not just about the highlight reel, but the real.”

Henderson joins a previously announced lineup of speakers including Michelle Jubelirer, former chair and CEO of Capitol Music Group, and Jacqueline Saturn, president of Virgin Music Group North America and evp of global artist relations. Jubelirer will speak with Bandier Program director, Bill Werde, while Saturn will speak with her sister Samantha, appearing together on stage for the first time. 

Launched last year, the jump.global Annual Summit operates as an end-of-year personal and professional development conference and retreat for the music industry. The conference brings together coaches and professionals to lead workshops, keynotes and panels on topics such as financial wellness, mental health, effective leadership and more.

Most notably, the summit does not list any speakers or attendees with their titles or company names on-site, aligning with its guidelines and tagline that “your first and last name matter more than your job title.”

“The summit is [provides] the rare opportunity to focus on executive development, instead of artist development,” says jump.global Founder Nick Maiale. “We’re so excited to return for a second year and provide a safe space for everyone — whether you’re part of a music team, longtime friends from your internship days, a consultant growing your business, an HR professional, or someone seeking inspiration.”

Badges can be purchased here.