On Nov. 1, A&M/UMe is set to release the Carpenters’ Christmas Once More, a new collection featuring 16 Carpenters holiday classics, personally curated by Richard Carpenter. This newly remixed and remastered set includes fan favorites such as “Merry Christmas Darling,” featuring the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, “Sleigh Ride” and “(There’s No Place Like) Home for the Holidays.” The album title is a play on the title of the duo’s 1973 pop smash “Yesterday Once More,” which was later used as the title of a 1985 hits collection by the duo.

The Carpenters have been associated with Christmas since 1970, the year they burst to stardom with “Close to You” (Billboard’s No. 1 Song of the Summer for 1970) and “We’ve Only Just Begun.” That holiday season, they released “Merry Christmas Darling,” a nostalgic Richard Carpenter-Frank Pooler ballad that reached No. 1 on Billboard’s annual Christmas Singles lists in 1970, 1971 and 1973.

The song remains a classic. “Merry Christmas Darling” ranked No. 41 on Billboard’s 2023 list of the 100 best Christmas songs of all time. Melinda Newman praised the song’s “dreamy reverie” and especially Karen’s lead vocal. “Her vocal on ‘Merry Christmas Darling’ as she longs for her loved one, who is away for Christmas and New Year’s Day, is pure, sublime perfection. She conveys the perfect mix of yearning, sadness and hope since she knows, even though it’s unspoken, they will be joyfully reunited after the holidays. Over 50 years since its release, it’s still the soundtrack for any college couples separated during the holiday break.”

“Merry Christmas Darling” was re-released in 1974 with a torchy ballad version of “Santa Claus Is Coming to Town” on the B side. It was released again in 1977 with “Christmas Song” on the B side. Also in 1977, the Carpenters headlined their first holiday TV special for ABC, The Carpenters at Christmas. In 1978, finally, they released their first holiday album, Christmas Portrait. It coincided with the release of a second holiday special for ABC, The Carpenters: A Christmas Portrait, which featured film legend Gene Kelly as a guest star.

Christmas Portrait has logged 66 weeks on the Billboard 200. Among the duo’s albums, only Close to You has logged more weeks on Billboard’s flagship albums chart (87).

Richard had a unique idea for creating a near-continuous work that would mix hymns, pop tunes, vocals and instrumentals.  He did some of the orchestral arrangements himself, while others were assigned to Peter Knight and Billy May.

“With Karen’s marvelous leads,” Richard has written, “combined with an oversize studio orchestra and chorus, terrific arrangements, and timeless music, Christmas Portrait was, and is, an almost incomparable Christmas album.”

Enough material was recorded during the Christmas Portrait sessions to allow for the release of a second Carpenters holiday album, An Old-Fashioned Christmas, in 1984, the year after Karen’s untimely death at age 32. In 1990, Christmas Portrait – The Special Edition combined tracks from both Carpenters’ seasonal LPs with some additional material. Now comes Christmas Once More, which will be available in multiple formats, including CD, black vinyl, limited-edition gold vinyl, digital download, streaming and ATMOS.

There have been numerous indications in recent years of the Carpenters’ continuing audience appeal. A 1998 compilation, Love Songs, rode the Billboard 200 for 25 weeks. Carpenters songs have been featured in several hit movies, such as 2007’s The Simpsons Movie (which memorably featured “Close to You”). Both “Close to You” and “We’ve Only Just Begun” have been voted into the Grammy Hall of Fame.

The Carpenters got an unexpected shout-out on a global stage in March 2023. While accepting an Academy Award for best original song for “Naatu Naatu” from RRR, M.M. Neeravaani said, “Thank you, Academy. I grew up listening to the Carpenters, and now here I am with the Oscars.” He then proceeded to sing his acceptance remarks to the tune of the duo’s Billboard Hot 100-topping smash “Top of the World,” a move that charmed the audience at the Dolby Theatre in Hollywood and the global TV viewing audience.

Here’s the track listing for the CD edition of Christmas Once More.

The results are in: Post Malone’s “I Had Some Help,” featuring a big assist from Morgan Wallen, is the official Billboard song of the summer.

The country crossover smash, which ruled the Songs of the Summer chart for all 14 weeks of its 2024 run, held off a hard-charging second-place finisher in Shaboozey’s eight-week Billboard Hot 100 No. 1 “A Bar Song (Tipsy)” — the second straight year that country titles finished in the chart’s top two spots, following Wallen’s “Last Night” and Luke Combs’ “Fast Car” cover claiming Nos. 1 and 2 in 2023, respectively. Meanwhile, Kendrick Lamar takes the No. 3 spot with “Not Like Us,” while Sabrina Carpenter lands twice within the top 10, with “Espresso” (No. 4) and “Please Please Please” No. 6.

How closely does this year’s chart align with our own anecdotal impressions of what the songs of the summer were? And which summer-defining songs and artists are notably missing from the final tally, if any? Billboard staffers answer these questions and more below.

1. Post Malone and Morgan Wallen’s “I Had Some Help” ranks as Billboard’s Song of the Summer. On a scale from 1-10, how would you rate both as a summer song, and as a defining song of THIS particular summer?

Katie Atkinson: I’m going to give it a 10 as a summer song. To prove its warm-weather bona fides, look no further than the music video, which ends with Post and Morgan singing from a truck bed during a parking-lot party as a massive American flag waves above them and fireworks take off in the night sky. It was basically tailor-made for a Fourth of July tailgate. Now for this summer in particular, I’m going to go with a 9. The top two songs from the past two summer charts have all been country, so a Nashville party-starter at No. 1 is proof-positive of the genre’s incredible popularity right now. I’m only shaving off one point because Sabrina Carpenter’s “Espresso” was my particular song of this summer and it just has that extra dose of sunshine – or extra shot of you-know-what.

Eric Renner Brown: “I Had Some Help” sounds like a hot, humid summer afternoon – it’s a 9 as a summer song. As a reflection of 2024, the song feels both in and out of sync with the broader music landscape. On the one hand, country had a massive summer, driven in part by crossover successes and new breakouts; as the lead single from Post’s big foray into country music, “I Had Some Help” is of a piece with that. On the other hand, Wallen’s presence takes me back to last summer – when the country star was even more dominant – and both him and Post feel out of sync with other major pop storylines from this summer like Sabrina, Chappell and Charli. I’d give it a 7 as the defining song of this summer specifically.

Kyle Denis: I’d say it’s a solid 8 as both a summer song and a defining song of this particular summer. In my opinion, the entire top five of Billboard’s Song of the Summer ranking was pretty spot-on. All of those songs are representative of what I heard and danced to while outside all summer. I don’t think any one song reigns over the others except maybe “Not Like Us.” This summer felt more driven by moments (Chappell Roan and Sabrina Carpenter phenomena, country music’s comeback on the singles chart, Brat Summer, Glorilla and Bossman Dlow’s respective 2024 runs etc.) than individual records.

Jason Lipshutz: A 7 and a 6. “I Had Some Help” certainly has a summertime tempo and sing-along chorus, inviting raised cups across backyard gatherings and beach hangs alike. And it was big this season, if not ubiquitous; that speaks more to the dissolution of the monoculture that makes it harder for a single song to act inescapable across every platform, but also to how its run at No. 1 on the Hot 100 was not the longest of this summer, coming in second to “A Bar Song (Tipsy).” Artists like Shaboozey, Sabrina Carpenter, Chappell Roan and Kendrick Lamar were just as present this summer as Morgan and Post, but the chart points worked out so that “I Had Some Help” finished above them all. 

Andrew Unterberger: A 9 song of the summer, and a 7 defining song on this summer. Both numbers raised at least a point by a friend’s recent barbecue where the song was played no fewer than four times (and went off each time).

2. The SotS ranking is neatly bookended by country – both by its top two songs (“I Had Some Help” and Shaboozey’s “A Bar Song (Tipsy)”) and its bottom two (Luke Combs’ “Ain’t No Love in Oklahoma” and Dasha’s “Austin”) – while other songs by Zach Bryan, Morgan Wallen and Kane Brown fall between them. Why do you think this was such a country-heavy summer? Did it feel that way to you anecdotally?

Katie Atkinson: It’s not just a country-heavy summer; it’s been a country-heavy past two years! But there is something about those four summer 2024 songs you mentioned that makes them perfect for a BBQ or pool party playlist – and they’ve all been in rotation for me all summer. I would also argue that three of the four (excluding Luke Combs’ twangy Twisters track) transcend genre, because I’ve heard them played in places I’ve never heard country before. So I think the crossover appeal did a lot of the heavy lifting.

Eric Renner Brown: For one, it’s an election year! Nothing gets those patriotic juices flowing – and the country music blaring – like candidates posturing over who loves the stars and stripes more. On top of that, next-gen genre stars like Wallen and Brown have finally solidified their spot atop country music while major non-country artists like Beyoncé and Post have given the genre most cultural cachet among yeehaw-skeptical audiences (Stereogum’s Chris DeVille even astutely noted that Sabrina’s album was, in a sense, “an awesome Kacey Musgraves album.”) Still, the basic fact remains that country is simply massive in many parts of the country; all summers are “country-heavy” summers, to an extent.

Kyle Denis: I think we’re reached the final stage of country music’s mainstream comeback to the top of Hot 100 with the way pop-facing artists and listeners are not just accepting, but also intentionally seeking out country elements in their music. This summer we’ve had both straight country songs (Combs, Malone/Wallen) and country-infused pop tunes (Sabrina Carpenter’s “Please Please Please,” for example) reach the Hot 100’s highest heights.

Anecdotally, country has less of a presence than the respective single runs of Kendrick Lamar, GloRilla and Bossman Dlow, but the genre was certainly a sound that was expected to pop up at some point during a night out or an evening drive. I wouldn’t have been able to say that even three years ago.  

Jason Lipshutz: We are seeing the full integration of country music into streaming platforms in real time: while genres like hip-hop and pop more naturally commanded Spotify and Apple Music during the 2010s as country listeners focused on radio blocks, that consumer habit has gradually shifted, and the country’s big summer hits are much bigger than they were a decade ago. The various personalities within the genre have certainly helped grease the wheels of this commercial explosion — Wallen, Bryan and Combs in particular are no-doubt superstars at this point, and all have prolific streaks — but the way that they are commanding daily streaming playlists is the key to understanding the past couple Songs of the Summer charts.

Andrew Unterberger: I don’t know if country is really towering over the mainstream the way our charts sometimes seem to imply, but I think it’s true that country always has a major radio presence — and more now than ever, given how many songs are crossing over to pop radio — and now it has finally fully caught up on streaming as well. With that kind of foothold in those two mediums, when a song really pops off, there’s really no limit to how big it can get, or how long it can stay that big for.

3. The only artist with two songs in the top 10 this year is Sabrina Carpenter: “Espresso” (No. 4) & “Please Please Please” (No. 6). Carpenter was unquestionably one of the defining pop presences of the season, but she vote-split a little with her multiple huge hits — do you think we’re getting to a point where we should be having an Artist of the Summer discussion as much as a Song of the Summer one? Would it have easily been Carpenter if we did?

Katie Atkinson: Please please please make it happen, Billboard charts team! It would be fascinating to see if we used our Artist 100 methodology just for the summer months whether it would have been Sabrina or maybe Morgan who would wear the summer 2024 crown, but I do think there’s value in seeing which musician rules the summer, not just what music.

Eric Renner Brown: The Song of the Summer conversation has expanded so much that sometimes I think it’s strayed too far from its genesis: The single omnipresent song that was inescapable at barbecues, beaches, and bars during the year’s warmest months. I wouldn’t say we shouldn’t have an Artist of the Summer discussion, but it feels like a different thing that doesn’t necessarily correlate to the Song of the Summer.

In fact, I don’t think having the Song of the Summer would necessarily be a prerequisite for being Artist of the Summer. No Charli XCX song achieved the cultural saturation that Sabrina’s big hits did this summer – and yet, Charli was the one getting promoted by one of the two major party candidates for president, and the one who had celebrities and influencers doing the “Apple” dance on TikTok. All that to say, no, I don’t think it would have easily been Sabrina – it would’ve been Charli, or even Chappell Roan, who felt far more present as an individual than Sabrina did.

Kyle Denis: I think I touched on it with one of my earlier answers, but artist of the year seems like a more accurate unit of measurement for this particular summer. I’m not sure Carpenter has it sewn up tho, Chappell Roan and Charli xcx certainly have some skin in the game – as do Lamar, Billie Eilish, GloRilla and Bossman Dlow.  

Jason Lipshutz: Probably — although you could make a case that Kendrick Lamar would stand alongside her thanks to his avalanche of diss tracks, and Chappell Roan is right there too with “Good Luck Babe!” all the various slow-burn smashes that she has accrued. Even Post Malone, who finished atop the chart with “I Had Some Help,” had another song, “Fortnight” with Taylor Swift, that finished in the top 20. This summer was full of artists who notched multiple smashes, instead of being satisfied with just one — although, with her two songs as dominant as they have been, Carpenter would probably earn my vote in the Artist of the Summer election.

Andrew Unterberger: It does seem to me that this summer was defined more by artists than by songs — and that while the Post Malone and Shaboozey songs were both enormous, I’m not sure the respective artists behind them really had an outsized seasonal presence otherwise — so yeah, I do think it would be interesting to have a separate discussion about that distinction. If there was an AotS debate to be had, Carpenter would certainly be in the mix, along with Charli XCX, Kendrick Lamar, Sabrina Carpenter and probably Taylor Swift.

4. What song (or artist) is absent from this year’s top 20 that you think was really necessary for understanding the summer in popular music?

Katie Atkinson: 100% Charli XCX. How can we end Brat Summer without a single Brat song on our summer chart? All these songs had an absolute chokehold on TikTok, but I think the one that should be on our chart to properly represent summer 2024 is “360,” which debuted on the Hot 100 in June and peaked at No. 41 in August – aka, a summer moment.

Eric Renner Brown: It’s Charli, baby! When you’ve got Jake Tapper unpacking the cultural significance of your album on CNN, you’re central to popular music.

Kyle Denis: Forgive me for invoking their names yet again, but GloRilla (“Yeah Glo,” “All Dere,” “Wanna Be,” “Bop,” “Finesse,” “TGIF”) and Bossman Dlow (“Get In With Me,” “Talk My Shit,” “Mr. Pot Scraper,” “Finesse,” “Shake Dat Ass,” “2 Slippery,” “Big One”).

Jason Lipshutz: “Apple” by Charli XCX. Although Brat Summer is not represented on the Songs of the Summer chart, Charli’s latest album was a lightning rod of interest and chatter, and “Apple” best crystallizes its viral reach, an immaculate pop gem that launched countless TikTok-ready movements. Runner-up goes to the “Girl, So Confusing” redo with Lorde, which is possibly the most fully realized pop remix of the 2020s.

Andrew Unterberger: Beyond Charli XCX — the obvious answer, since the season was basically renamed in her latest album’s likeness — it’s probably also worth mentioning the people’s champ Tinashe, whose early viral success with “Nasty” was seemingly willed to life by the collective consciousness of Pop Twitter. When it was clear the song was gonna hit the Hot 100, that was the first time I remember thinking that this was gonna end up being a pretty special summer for pop music. And it did!

5. We don’t have a Songs of the Autumn chart at Billboard (yet) – but if you could make a personal pick for a new and/or rising song to emerge as an early frontrunner for the late-calendar months, which would it be?

Katie Atkinson: After the unexpected folky resurgence that started the year (Benson Boone, Hozier, etc.), it feels like an artist like Mark Ambor could keep climbing up the chart as temperatures drop. His breakout hit “Belong Together” has so far peaked at No. 74 on the Hot 100, but with a recent push at radio and the release of his debut album Rockwood last month, his music could be soundtracking more than a few pumpkin spice latte runs this fall.

Eric Renner Brown: There’s no way Kendrick doesn’t put out another new song between now and his Super Bowl halftime show gig in a few months, right? For a Song of the Autumn, I’d put my money on what he or another Song of the Summer chart presence who I have a feeling might drop a fresh loosie –Chappell Roan – puts out. (This is also a referendum on the fact that some of the season’s A-list releases, including Halsey, Katy Perry, and Shawn Mendes, don’t exactly seem poised to launch a song into the upper range of the Hot 100.)

Kyle Denis: It would make my heart smile if any of the following songs got some love this fall: “Nissan Altima” (Doechii), “Sweep It Up” (Coco Jones), “Blick Sum” (Latto), “Lonely Is the Muse” (Halsey) and “Last of My Kind” (Shaboozey & Paul Cauthen). 

Jason Lipshutz: None of us have heard The Weeknd’s “Dancing in the Flames,” his new single arriving this Friday — but lest we forget, Mr. Tesfaye comes alive in the fall time. I’m expecting to hear that sensual croon while sipping my pumpkin spice latte. 

Andrew Unterberger: Can Pop Twitter do it again? If so, look to Addison Rae’s “Diet Pepsi,” a growing popheads favorite, to be one of the biggest songs of 2024 before year’s end.

It’s shaping up to be another spooky Friday the 13th. Eminem announced plans for his The Death of Slim Shady: Expanded Mourner’s Edition on Tuesday (Sept. 10).

The deluxe version of his 12th studio album will be hitting streaming services on Friday, and Em dropped off an ominous trailer to accompany the announcement.

The ominous clip finds Em in search of Slim Shady as he finds a missing poster for him on a milk carton that he leaves to spill across the gas station mart floor.

The Alchemist stars as the employee stuck with cleaning up Eminem’s mess while demanding he leave. “Ge the f–k out of here,” he said with a New York accent as the Jelly Roll-assisted “Somebody Save Me” plays over the store’s speakers. “Don’t come back. They don’t pay me enough for this s–t.”

Em captioned the post on social media: “MISSING: SLIM SHADY Have you seen him #TheDeathOfSlimShady Expanded Mourner’s Edition drops this Friday the 13th…”

MISSING: SLIM SHADY ‼️ Have you seen him? 👀 #TheDeathOfSlimShady Expanded Mourner’s Edition drops this Friday the 13th… pic.twitter.com/ts6It3nnGi

— Marshall Mathers (@Eminem) September 10, 2024

Fans were pumped up to hear that there’s more new music on the way after The Death of Slim Shady (Coup de Grâce) arrived in July. “LETS GO TDOSS WAS A MASTERPIECE MORE MUSIC,” one person wrote. Another chimed in hoping to see Em hit the road:”We want a tour old man.”

It’s still unclear how many additional tracks will be on the deluxe version along with if there are any special guests joining the Detroit icon.

Eminem released his The Death of Slim Shady album on July 12 with features from Big Sean, Jelly Roll, JID, BabyTron, Skylar Grey and more.

The LP — his first since 2020’s Music to Be Murdered By — debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 with 281,000 equivalent album units earned in the U.S. in the week ending July 18, according to Luminate. 

Billboard‘s International Power Players list recognizes leaders who are driving the success of the music business in countries outside the United States. Among the leaders selected from various countries in the music industry, Amazon Music’s Keisuke Oishi was chosen for the first time in 2024. To commemorate this, Billboard Japan interviewed Oishi about his focus since being appointed to his current position in January 2023.

First off, could you tell us a little about your career?

Keisuke Oishi: The two key words in my career have been “IT” and “media.” Through the synergy of these two areas, I’ve been taking on the challenges of providing various innovations to customers.

I joined Sony Corporation after graduating from university. At Sony, I worked in areas like supply chain management, finance, business administration, and business strategy for the PC/IT businesses. Then in 2014, I moved to Amazon, where I’ve been involved in the media business ever since. At Amazon, first I was responsible for the launching of digital video games in the retail division. In 2017, I was appointed head of the software business unit on top of video games. And two years later, I went on to be concurrently responsible for the packaged music business unit, so I’ve been involved in music since around 2019. Then, in January 2023, I was appointed Director and General Manager of Amazon Music Japan.

So you haven’t been in the music industry for your whole career.

Oishi: That’s right. But music has always been a very important part of my life, so it was a role I wanted to challenge one day. Amazon, on the other hand, is a company that places importance on what innovations can be made using technology while always keeping the customer first. That approach was the same before I got involved in music, and it remains the same today.

What have you been working on since January 2023?

Oishi: In my current position, I have three key tasks that I hope to contribute to the music industry, the artists, and our customers. The first is to expand the base of music listeners in Japan, and the second is to help customers enjoy music in new ways. Streaming services are for listening to music, but Amazon Music and Amazon have many points of contact that connect customers and artists. The third, and I think this is a challenge the entire Japanese music industry is facing, is to provide support for Japanese and other Asian artists as they expand their reach around the world.

There are various types of Amazon Music memberships, and you’ve made multiple improvements for those.

Oishi: We are always focused on creating the best experience for all Amazon Music customers. The level of streaming music penetration is still very low in Japan compared to the US and EU countries. But, looking at it another way that means it still has a lot of potential. According to LUMINATE’s data, music streaming has the highest levels of usage among Gen Z and Millennials. That means there’s room for growth among older generations. This is a challenge that the entire industry is facing. These are people who were once really into music, but due to work and lifestyle changes, they’ve disengaged. That’s true for my own generation, so I’ve been thinking about how we can make music a part of these people’s lives again. Our services aren’t limited to music streaming, but also CD and DVD purchasing and video streaming. We have a lot of different touch points like those, so we’re in an ideal position to deal with the challenge.

Secondly, I want to help customers enjoy music in new ways. Amazon is a collection of many different services, and since last year, we’ve been actively working to support artists when they come out with new releases. For instance, when a physical release is decided on, we set up a special sub-site and bolster our promotional efforts. When the interest of listeners shifts to streaming, we reinforce our promotion and marketing efforts in ways that are only possible with digital technology, like creating playlists that include interviews. We use that approach for roughly two or three months, building up connections between artists and customers. That’s something I think we’re uniquely positioned to do. This is one of the areas we’ve really enhanced over the past year.

Japan is one of the countries where both streaming and physical sales are growing, so it’s a great fit for Amazon.

Oishi: Exactly. Another example of that are our promotional campaigns which visualize the support fans provide to artists as they listen and share music and follow artists using our app. Users collect stamps using a stamp card-like feature, and when they collect all stamps, they can receive rewards. This feature was designed and developed by a team in Japan, but now it’s also being applied in other countries, in a few different ways.

And the live streaming of Fuji Rock Festival ’24, in July, was a combination of all three of the tasks I mentioned earlier.

It was streamed on Prime Video and Twitch, which generated a lot of buzz.

Oishi: I think the best way to enjoy a music festival is in person. However, there are a lot of people who can’t go, for one reason or another. I’d imagine there are also people who went in the past but can’t go now. To reach out to people like that, we streamed Fuji Rock Festival ’24 live on Prime Video and Twitch.

In addition to the live streaming of the event, we also created all kinds of touch points with customers, using every kind of approach—offline, online, digital, physical. For example, we ran an advertising campaign using Amazon Lockers and we sold original t-shirts. We tried to connect customers to music and artists through the Fuji Rock Festival in all kinds of ways.

Also, this year, we streamed Fuji Rock Festival ’24 worldwide. Every day, we think about how we can share wonderful Japanese artists with the rest of the world. One way we came up with for doing that is to stream the festival live, so that it could be viewed by music fans around the globe.

In addition to Japanese attendees, there were many people from other Asian countries at Fuji Rock. Which countries were people streaming it from?

Oishi: People viewed it in the US, Europe, and Latin America. Amazon Music has been streaming music festivals around the world, like Vive Latino in Mexico and Primavera Sound in Spain. Of those, Fuji Rock Festival ’24, which was live streamed on Prime Video and Twitch, was the most watched three-day music festival ever streamed live by Amazon Music.

That’s wonderful to hear. Are there plans to stream any other Japanese festivals?

Oishi: We also live streamed DEAD POP FESTiVAL 2024, YON FES, and Kyoto Daisakusen in August.

Last year, we enhanced our support for artist-led festivals and began streaming watch party-like events where viewers watch shows along with artists from Amazon Music Studio in Tokyo. Twitch supports comment sharing functionality, so artists can communicate and interact with fans. It’s very exciting. I believe that, over time, these connections between artists and fans will foster greater awareness of Amazon Music.

Speaking of sharing Japanese music with the rest of the world, Billboard Japan launched the “Global Japan Songs Excl. Japan” chart, which ranks Japanese songs being listened to worldwide excluding Japan. Being able to visualize what music is listened to is, I think, extremely important for Japanese artists making inroads overseas.

Oishi: I think the hit charts are really important for exposing people to new music. When I was a kid, I grew up checking the U.S. Billboard charts. I’d watch Billboard TOP40 on TV, and I even sent in postcards when I was little (laughs). When I was in junior high, I memorized around twenty years of annual charts. I’ve forgotten a lot since then, but I was a Billboard superfan, and Billboard charts were my window into foreign music. Now, overseas audiences may be discovering Japanese music through the charts, or through on-demand streaming, or through live streaming. I’m confident that if all of us in the music industry create these opportunities, we can provide greater opportunities for people to discover Japanese music.

—This interview by Seiji Isozaki and Naoko Takashima first appeared on Billboard Japan

On the second day of September, Charli XCX tweeted, “goodbye forever brat summer” — but it looks like she’s still got one last remix featuring Troye Sivan in the tank.

After keeping fans suspended in anticipation for weeks, the British alt-pop star finally shared a snippet of a “Talk Talk” remix with her Sweat Tour mate. In a video posted to X Monday (Sept. 9), the two stars dance around in a backstage area while lip-syncing along to the reimagined song, with Charli passing the camera off to Sivan when it comes time for his verse.

“OK, here’s the plan, I wanna fly you out to Amsterdam,” he sing-raps before detailing how he wants to get down and dirty with his love interest.

Based on the snippet, it seems as though Sivan’s verse picks up right where the original “Talk Talk” leaves off, with the “Rush” singer coming in right after Charli’s outro, where the song usually ends. Dua Lipa is also expected to appear on the track, although her voice isn’t audible in the new snippet; a few days after Charli reportedly shared a voice note from the “Levitating” artist on her private Brat Instagram account, Sivan’s “Rush” producers Zhone and Styalz Fuego said that they worked on the remix and tagged Dua on their Stories.

“Remember how I told you we were so back?” Fuego wrote, reposting Charli and Sivan’s snippet.

The original version of “Talk Talk” appears on Brat, which the singer dropped in June to critical acclaim. The project later peaked at No. 3 on the Billboard 200, Charli’s highest peak on the chart to date.

The musician has spent the summer boosting the album with a series of remixes, with the “Talk Talk” revamp following Brat collaborations with Addison Rae, Robyn, Yung Lean, Lorde and Billie Eilish. Teaming up with Sivan was only natural given their plans to embark on a joint tour this year, something the duo spoke about in a recent interview with i-D.

“Our shows at the moment are very different from each other and both speak to different elements of pop,” Sivan told the publication. “I think that the collision of it is going to be cool.”

Listen to a snippet of the “Talk Talk” remix below.

.@troyesivan pic.twitter.com/GgrNLvgFRt

— Charli (@charli_xcx) September 10, 2024