The old ways are dying. That was the message Spotify CEO Daniel Ek delivered during a headline-generating 2020 interview with Music Ally. “Some artists that used to do well in the past may not do well in this future landscape,” Ek said. “You can’t record music once every three to four years and think that’s going to be enough. The artists that are making it [today] realize that it’s about creating continuous engagement with their fans.”

Perhaps no artist exemplifies this ethos better than the Brazilian rapper Mc Gw. He makes his vocals widely available for sample-happy producers, and as a result, he has already appeared on over 3,700 releases so far this year. That’s more than 10 times as many as any other artist in Spotify’s top 500, according to the analytics company Chartmetric.

Mc Gw’s jaw-droppingly prolific release schedule, the growing popularity of his chanting vocals, and the rapid rise and mutation of the internet sub-genre known as phonk have combined to fuel remarkable growth on Spotify. He now has around 20 million monthly listeners, up from 3.7 million two years ago. He has become the 11th most popular artist in Brazil, according to Chartmetric.

“Before streaming, if you saw that [an artist with a ton of releases], you would think, ‘This super popular guy spends all his time running around different studios in São Paulo and everybody knows him,’” says Glenn McDonald, a former Spotify employee and the author of You Have Not Yet Heard Your Favorite Song: How Streaming Changes Music. “The fact that you can now take a shortcut to that by having your samples run around instead of you is pretty effective.” 

“If everybody did it,” McDonald continues, “it wouldn’t be as effective. But the first person who does it can temporarily get very successful that way.”

And that appears to be what’s happening to Mc Gw. He’s now collaborating with Ana Costa, a revered samba artist, and the producer DENNIS, whose “Ta OK” was a hit in Brazil last year. “It’s just scaling from there,” says Jake Houstle, co-owner of the label Black 17 Media, which has distributed a number of songs featuring Mc Gw. “All these opportunities are coming in, and they’re all based on the fact that people use his vocals on everything.”

Mc Gw grew up in Rio de Janeiro, listening first to more traditional musical styles — samba and pagode — before turning to Brazilian funk, also known as baile funk, in 2011. Baile funk is a home-grown descendent of Miami bass, typically characterized by a distinctive up-tempo rhythm and severely streamlined production that focuses the ear on the boisterous rapping. “My main influences are MCs from Rio: MC Didoo, Mc Frank, Mc Tikão, Mc Vuk Vuk, and Mc Smith,” Mc Gw says. (He responded to email questions with help from a translator.)

Mc Gw is an adaptable performer: 2017’s “Ritmo Mexicano,” which has over more than 260 million views on YouTube, nods to commercial reggaetón. And it’s actually a different genre that has played a crucial role in his rise in the last two years. Confusingly, this style is known as phonk, leading to a nomenclature nightmare — while Brazilian funk is different from American funk, and phonk is another thing altogether, all three share the same pronunciation.

Phonk has been around for more than a decade, one of several styles gobbled up by extremely online listeners. When the genre started to reach a wider audience in 2019 and 2020, it was bleak, militant music, with freeze-dried synthesizers and drums so grimy listeners reflexively reached for the Windex. Samples of Memphis hip-hop legends added a human jolt to the unforgiving tracks. 

Most of phonk’s biggest artists — like Kordhell, who has a platinum single in the U.S., and DVRST, whose song “Close Eyes” was synced in a commercial that played during the NBA playoffs — are faceless producers. The music thrives on TikTok pages devoted to weightlifting, careening cars, video game highlights, and anime edits, not on the live circuit. “It’s like a substance: Just keep pouring the phonk over my ears,” McDonald says.

The genre’s commercially popular wing often follows a specific formula, at least for a time. Phonk’s initial streaming hits sampled the likes of DJ Paul, a founding member of the group Three 6 Mafia, and Kingpin Skinny Pimp, a rapper who contributed to Three 6’s debut album and maintained a regional following. Other producers hoping for a phonk hit of their own also lifted vocals from the same sources. 

More recently though, Memphis rap textures are out of vogue, and Brazilian vocals are in favor. This has been a boon for Mc Gw. “Nowadays many phonk producers are using [my voice],” he acknowledges.

Mc Gw makes it easy for them to do so by creating packs of a cappellas that samplers can sift through on YouTube, SoundCloud and elsewhere. (They’re initially free, but producers may pay a price — in the form of a fee, a cut of publishing income, or both — for the sample after release, especially if the song is successful.) “He is essentially the Kingpin Skinny Pimp of this movement,” says Houstle, who estimates that close to a third of the phonk records that borrow Brazilian vocals lean on Mc Gw. 

The rapper enjoyed more name recognition as he was sampled more frequently. And to an extent, this fire fed itself: “As his notoriety grew, he started being placed on more and more songs,” Houstle explains. That helps increase his notoriety further, and the cycle continues. 

Just as TikTok creators use a trending sound in the belief that it will make them more likely to get eyeballs, phonk producers thought an Mc Gw sample would make their song more likely to attract listeners. “If I want to go find new songs that are popping in Brazil, I just scroll through his most recent releases,” Houstle continues.

One snippet of Mc Gw’s vocals found its way to the Argentinian producer S3ZBS, who dropped it into “Montagem – PR Funk” in 2023. This strident, 61-second anxiety attack of a song has nearly 400 million plays on Spotify alone. 

Mc Gw calls “Montagem – PR Funk” a new door that opened for me.” But that doesn’t mean walking through it was easy. 

Online music communities often operate without regard for music industry convention. Producers tend to sample first and ask questions later, obtaining official clearances after a release — rather than beforehand — if they clear them at all. “Montagem – PR Funk” was no different.

Black 17, which owes much of its recent success to embracing phonk, signed “Montagem – PR Funk” once it started to perform well on TikTok. The label almost immediately found itself in dispute with the owners of uncleared samples, according to Houstle. One was Mc Gw. 

Black 17 and Mc Gw’s team negotiated a deal — he was eventually added to “Montagem – PR Funk” as a primary artist — and they now work together regularly. Black 17 previously forged similar business relationships with DJ Paul and Kingpin Skinny Pimp when the phonk community started sampling them.

Mc Gw now employs several staff members whose primary job is to track down uncleared samples of him and negotiate deals with the producers behind the songs. This is a business necessity, the rapper says, since “currently almost 100 songs are released per week with my voice.” 

It’s impossible to catch them all, but if Mc Gw puts agreements in place at least with the songs that are earning noticeable streams, this continues to expand his reach, and ensures that he gets paid for the use of his voice. It’s an odd system, but for now it’s working. 

The rapper doesn’t only want to rely on the favor of sample-based producers; he is also hard at work on his own album, tentatively titled Phonk Nation. “Every day I’m in the studio,” Mc Gw says. “Thank God the phonk appeared — the work is being rewarded.”

Coldplay jumps from No. 37 to No. 1 on the Billboard Artist 100 (dated Oct. 19), becoming the top musical act in the U.S. for the first time in the chart’s 10-year history, thanks to the group’s new album, Moon Music.

The Artist 100 measures artists’ activity across key metrics of music consumption: album sales, track sales, radio airplay and streaming. Using a methodology comprising those metrics, the chart provides a weekly multi-dimensional ranking of artist popularity.

Released Oct. 4 on Parlophone/Atlantic Records, Moon Music launches at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 with 120,000 equivalent album units earned in its opening week, according to Luminate. The group earns its fifth leader, following Ghost Stories (2014), Mylo Xyloto (2011), Viva la Vida or Death and All His Friends (2008) and X&Y (2005).

Coldplay also debuts a song from the set on the Billboard Hot 100: “We Pray” featuring Little Simz, Burna Boy, Elyanna and Tini at No. 87. The band adds its 25th career entry on the chart, and second this year, after the new LP’s lead single, “feelslikeimfallinginlove,” hit No. 81.

Coldplay is the third group to top the Artist 100 chart this year, after TOMORROW X TOGETHER in April and Stray Kids in August. The last non-K-pop group to hit No. 1 was Slipknot in October 2022.

Rounding out the Artist 100’s top five, Sabrina Carpenter dips to No. 2, following four weeks on top; Taylor Swift holds at No. 3; Chappell Roan drops 2-4; and Morgan Wallen falls 4-5.

Also on the chart, Milli Vanilli debuts at No. 88 thanks to renewed interest in the duo’s catalog as three of the pair’s songs appear in Ryan Murphy’s new Netflix anthology series, Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story. Their EP 4, which comprises four of the act’s four seminal hits, including three Hot 100 No. 1s, concurrently debuts at No. 197 on the Billboard 200, marking their first appearance on the chart since 1990.

On one of the most notable nights of Billboard Latin Music Week 2024, Peso Pluma presented the prestigious Executive of the Year award to George Prajin, his manager and partner, to whom he dedicated an emotional and moving speech. Prajin, founder of Prajin Parlay and co-founder/COO of Double P Records, has been instrumental in Peso Pluma’s successful career. And during his speech, the artist revealed the deep personal and professional relationship that unites them.

After being introduced by Leila Cobo, Billboard’s content director for Latin/Español, the Mexican music superstar was moved to tears as he delivered his emotionally charged remarks during the private Latin Music Power Players 2024 event held in Miami Beach on Oct. 14. “You are the best person I have ever met in my life,” he said.

Peso highlighted Prajin’s tireless work, noting that he is a paternal figure in the artist’s life: “I told him yesterday coming into confidence, that I had, like, three dads in my life, and one of them is him. And you will always be, George. I love you like a father and you will always be that to me.”

“The talent and sacrifice that we put in is one thing, and all the doors that you have opened for us, and all the things that you have done so that we can have an opportunity to show ourselves as greats before other exponents of music and the industry, have been very important not only for me and for you as a person, but for an entire country, an entire generation,” he continued.

Billboard‘s Latin Power Players Executive of the Year award celebrates those leaders whose vision and strategies have left a significant mark on the music industry over the past year. In this case, Prajin has been recognized not only for his role in the artistic development of Peso Pluma, but also for his broader impact on Latin music. Under his leadership, Double P Records has been instrumental in consolidating new talent and creating innovative strategies to penetrate global markets, raising the profile of Mexican music.

Here is Peso Pluma’s full speech:

First, I want to thank you, George. I want to thank you for everything you’ve done for me, and not just for me, but for my family, for the whole band, for everything you’ve done for each and every one of us. The talent and sacrifice that we put in is one thing, and all the doors that you’ve opened for us, and all the things that you’ve done so that we can have an opportunity to show ourselves as greats to other exponents of music and the industry, have been very important not only for me and for you as a person, but for an entire country, an entire generation.

I just want to thank you for so much, for everything that you’ve given me. If it hadn’t been for you, I wouldn’t be where I am right now. If it hadn’t been for you, I wouldn’t have the things that I have now, and if it hadn’t been for you, many of the things that are happening to us together wouldn’t have happened. I want to let everyone here in this room know that George … I told him yesterday in confidence … it’s hard … I get nervous here with you, and I don’t get nervous when I’m in front of 20,000, 15,000 people. It’s hard not to have a broken voice when these things happen, but today is about you. Today I want to congratulate you for everything you’ve achieved in your career as a professional, not just in music, as a lawyer, as a person … you are a great human being.

You are the best person I’ve ever met in my path and in my life. You’ve helped me make the best financial, work and personal decisions. And I told him yesterday, in confidence, that I had, like, three dads in my life, and one of them is him, and you always will be, George. I love you like my father, and you always will be. Thank you very much, Leila, for giving me the space, and for giving me the time to be able to say these words. I’m not a person who navigates a script; I say what I feel and what comes from my heart at the moment. And I just want to say congratulations, George, and thank you. You are the f–king executive of the year.”

With Hispanic Heritage Month culminating on Tuesday (Oct. 15), Fat Joe has tapped Nicky Jam as the latest ambassador for his Rewind It 10 beard dye brand. 

The Latin superstar’s dark brown beard dye coloring package is now available at CVS, Sally Beauty, Amazon and the Rewind It 10 website. 

“I’ve been coloring my beard for years and tried all the other brands, but nothing looks more natural than Rewind It 10,” said Nicky Jam in a statement. “I love Rewind It 10. Thank you to Fat Joe and the whole team at Rewind for the opportunity – let’s go.”

Nicky Jam joins a decorated lineup of Rewind It 10 ambassadors, including Kansas City Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce (who is dating Taylor Swift), DJ Khaled, model Tyson Beckford, Tank, television personality Brody Jenner, MMA fighter Stephen “Wonderboy” Thompson and more. 

“Nicky Jam is truly a global icon in the music industry. He shattered the mold as a musician and now we’re proud to partner together to break new barriers in the hair and beard coloring industry,” Rewind It 10 co-founder Jeff Aronson added. “He embodies the essence of the product and is a perfect addition to our Rewind It 10 family to ensure we’re continuing to reach a wide-ranging array of consumers.”

On the music side, Nicky Jam unleashed his Insomnio album in September, featuring Sean Paul, Ryan Castro, Eladio Carrión and more. “I’m not going to be a singer for the rest of my life,” he told Billboard as part of his September cover story. “I think I’ll probably retire soon … Well, not retire. Singers never retire. You just tone it down.”

See Nicki Jam on a Rewind It 10 Box below: