David Gilmour raised some eyebrows during the summer. In an electronic press kit shared with press, the Pink Floyd guitarist commented that his new album, Luck and Strange, is “the best album I’ve made since Dark Side of the Moon, since 1973.”

That’s certainly a bold comparison — though in subsequent conversation Gilmour notes that Dark Side‘s successor, Wish You Were Here, is actually his favorite Pink Floyd album. But it nevertheless made clear how happy he is with his fifth solo album, and first in nine years.

“The album feels like a solid body of cohesive work,” Gilmour, 78, tells Billboard via Zoom from the Astoria Recording Studio, in a houseboat docked on the Thames in London that he bought in 1986. “It’s the cohesiveness of the whole thing — the writing, the work, the thrill it still gives me to listen to it all the way through as an album. There’s a consistency of thought and of feeling that runs through it that excites me in a way that makes me make those comparisons.”

The nine-track Luck and Strange is, he adds, the product of a “liberation” he felt going into the studio.

Gilmour was working on new material when the pandemic hit in 2020, bringing the world to a stop — but also opening some new vistas for him and his family. Gilmour’s wife and frequent lyricist Polly Samson published a novel, A Theatre For Dreamers, the week of lockdown, which scotched planned promotional appearances. Their son Charlie came up with the idea of doing livestreams, during which Gilmour would play some songs by Leonard Cohen, who was a character in the book.

“It started pretty much only on Holly’s book as a focus,” Gilmour recalls, “but then it became broader. We got our daughter Romany to sing along and play with me, and that showed me that we have got that lovely sort of family tonality that happens — Beach Boys, Everly Brothers, other people. These artists that we loved in the past. All these things came together to create a different mood and a different feeling for the making of this album. It left me feeling I don’t need to stick with any pre-rule book or anything that’s gone before. I can be freer to do anything I feel like. That became emphasized for me.”

As he set out to make Luck and Strange in earnest, Gilmour veered from previous collaborators such as Roxy Music’s Phil Manzanera, Chris Thomas and Bob Ezrin and brought in a new (and younger) face with Charlie Andrew, a Music Producers Guild Award winner who worked with alt-j on its Mercury Prize-winning An Awesome Wave, James, Bloc Party and others. One of his first questions — “Do we need another guitar solo here?” — made clear that Gilmour was open to fresh input this time out (though rest assured there are plenty of guitar solos on the album).

“His lack of being over-awed by my reputation was a big plus for me,” Gilmour says. “Pink Floyd wasn’t one of his influences…but (Andrew) liked the music I was working on, and I liked him. Polly liked him very much; she found him, really, and my acceptance of what he was showing me and the direction he was proffering was an interesting and exciting way for us to be moving forward.”

“I didn’t specifically know a lot of his previous work, and I purposefully didn’t immerse myself in it as I just wanted to come at it with a fresh angle,” Andrew tells Billboard. “All I tried to do is keep it coherent as a body of work and make sure that there’s a flow to it. When we started out one of the first things I asked David was, ‘What are we making this for?’ For me, there’s more to it than ‘here’s a bunch of songs’ and just release them. I think it should be a bit more of one whole thing. I know David thinks the same.”

Luck and Strange — recorded primarily at Mark Knopfler’s British Grove Studios — also features drummers Steve Gadd, Adam Betts and Steve DiStanislao and keyboardist Roger Eno and Rob Gentry, along with longtime bassist Guy Pratt, who started playing with Pink Floyd in 1987 and has remained by Gilmour’s side ever since. (He’s also part of Pink Floyd drummer Nick Mason’s Saucerful of Secrets band.)

“It felt much more like a family,” Gilmour says, “much more like a group of people working toward a common end than I’ve felt for quite awhile.”

While not a concept album, Gilmour acknowledges that themes of mortality and retrospection unite Luck and Strange’s mostly midtempo songs — two of which, “Black Cat” and “Vita Brevis,” are instrumentals, and one a cover of the Montgolfier Brothers’ “Between Two Points,” sung by daughter Romany. She plays harp on the album as well, while son Gabriel Gilmour provides some backing vocals. “You discover the record as you work on it,” producer Andrew notes. “You don’t start it knowing exactly what it’s going to be. I really wanted to understand what the lyrics were focusing on, and Polly has been an incredible help in that regard, taking me and the musicians through the lyrics and what they mean.”

Particularly poignant is Luck and Strange‘s title track, which began in 2007 and includes the late Pink Floyd keyboardist Richard Wright, who was part of Gilmour’s touring band at the time.

“It’s wonderful to have a track that he’s actually a part of,” says Gilmour, who included a lengthy “barn jam” version of “Luck and Strange” as a bonus track. “Rick’s unusual playing style pours out of it and makes me sad that he’s not around to take more part in what I’m doing. Obviously, I worked on it later to add in these bridges and choruses and things. I don’t know why, in 2015 or ’14, that I didn’t listen to that track and go, ‘Yeah, let’s go,’ but this time it demanded to be heard and worked on, so we did.”

As Luck and Strange comes out Gilmour is gearing up for a tour, his first in eight years, that begins Oct. 9 with the first of six shows at London’s famed Royal Albert Hall. He’ll also play four Los Angeles area dates — starting Oct. 25 at the Intuit Dome in Inglewood, Calif., and moving to three concerts at the Hollywood Bowl — and five at Madison Square Garden in New York, wrapping up Nov. 10.

“I’m thinking more modern times than old times,” Gilmour says of the setlist, “but there’ll be some songs from the ‘70s, ‘80s, ‘90s. All the way through, there’ll be some stuff, but I’m focusing perhaps a bit more on the new album and the newer material.” And, he hopes, there will be more new material in less than the nine years he took before making Luck and Strange.

“My intention is to gather some of these people together and get back and start working on something else in the new year,” Gilmour says. “What you want is a few things to get started with and hope it all starts flowing, and that’s what I’m hoping will happen.”

Both repping Griselda, Buffalo’s Daringer and Brooklyn’s Streetz continue rap’s age old “He’s the DJ (or producer), I’m the rapper” tradition that has worked so well in the past and in recent years.

Today, not only did they announce the title and the date of their long rumored project, they also dropped off “Starbvxkz,” the lead single and video. Directed by Rome’s manager Coach Bombay 3000, the video features the duo in the ends of West London (the White City projects in Shepard’s Bush to be exact) as Rome raps like a box cutter to grill over signature Daringer production. “Play the hall with the soft and the hard stuck/Couple 8-Balls, I’m met the call by the Starbucks,” Rome raps on the chorus.

Earlier this year in May, Rome dropped the Buck 50 EP alongside producer Wavy Da Ghawd while Daringer contributed to Action Bronson’s album JOHANN SEBASTIAN BACHLAVA THE DOCTOR and Conway the Machine‘s Slant Face Killah. The last album he fully produced alongside a rapper was 2022’s Black Vladimir with Queen’s MC and Bronson affiliate Meyhem Lauren. He’s also been linked with Houston’s Sauce Walka, but that long rumored project has yet to materialize.

The duo first linked up on the Brooklyn rapper’s Griselda Records debut Kiss the Ring and have built an undeniable chemistry that inspired them to lock in and craft a full-length project together. Hatton Garden Holdup (named after London’s diamond district) is slated to drop Oct. 4 and boasts features from ScHoolboy Q, Conway the Machine, Meyhem Lauren & Cormega.

Cage the Elephant continues to climb the ranks of the acts with the most No. 1s on Billboard’s Alternative Airplay chart, claiming its 12th ruler on the Sept. 14-dated list with “Rainbow.”

The song jumps 3-1, becoming the rockers’ third leader in a row, following “Neon Pill” earlier this year and “Skin and Bones” in 2021.

The band has strung together three consecutive No. 1s for a third time. First came the run of “Back Against the Wall,” “In One Ear” and “Shake Me Down” in 2010-11, followed by “Cigarette Daydreams,” “Mess Around” and “Trouble” in 2015-16.

With 12 No. 1s, Cage the Elephant slots into a tie with Foo Fighters and Linkin Park for the third-most leaders in the Alternative Airplay chart’s 36-year history.

Most No. 1s, Alternative Airplay:
15, Red Hot Chili Peppers
13, Green Day
12, Cage the Elephant
12, Foo Fighters
12, Linkin Park
10, Twenty One Pilots
8, U2
8, Weezer
7, The Black Keys
7, Imagine Dragons

“Rainbow” concurrently tops Adult Alternative Airplay for a second straight week. On the all-rock-format, audience-based Rock & Alternative Airplay chart, it rises 6-4 with 3.3 million audience impressions in the week ending Sept. 5, according to Luminate.

“Rainbow” is the second single from Neon Pill, Cage the Elephant’s sixth studio album, following the title track. The set bowed at No. 7 on Billboard’s Top Alternative Albums chart dated June 1, making the band’s sixth top 10, and has earned 62,000 equivalent album units to date.

All Billboard charts dated Sept. 14 will update on Billboard.com Tuesday, Sept. 10.

Migos members and childhood friends Quavo and Offset had a falling out in 2022, leading to the Georgia trio’s disbandment. They’ve been slowly mending their relationship since, with Offset wishing Quavo a happy birthday earlier this year (“Happy gday my brother @quavohuncho love you 4L,” he wrote on his Instagram Stories back in April) and the duo reuniting last spring for a one-off performance at the 2023 BET Awards following the November 2022 fatal shooting of their bandmate TakeOff.

Now, the sudden death of another peer, Rich Homie Quan — who died Thursday at age 33 — inspired the two to have a much-needed conversation. On his IG Story, Quavo revealed that he and Offset had a “good convo with my bro,” alongside a prayer-hands emoji.

The reason as to exactly why the group fell out remains murky, but Quavo and the late Takeoff hinted at “loyalty” being at the center of the breakup while sitting down with Revolt’s Big Facts podcast to promote their album Only Built for Infinity Links.

“I just feel like we want to see our career as a duo, you know what I’m saying?” Quavo said. “Because you know, we just came from a loyal family, sh– that’s supposed to stick together. And sometimes, when sh– don’t work out, it ain’t meant to be.”

Takeoff added: “We don’t know all the answers, you feel me? God knows. We pray a lot, you know? Whatever ain’t right and however you supposed to see it fit, you put it back together or however you do it, we pray. So only time will tell. We always family now, that ain’t gon’ change.”

“We gon’ stand on loyalty, you know what I mean?” said Quavo. “We stand on real deal, real deal loyalty, and sometimes that sh—t ain’t displayed. This ain’t got nothing to do with no label, no paperwork, no QC, no nothing. This got something to do with the three brothers. And sh–, it is what it is. Right now, we gon’ be the duo ’til time tell.”

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The late Rich Homie Quan, Young Thug and Migos were instrumental in ushering in a new era of Atlanta rap that has since dominated the genre. Quavo posted throwback pictures of their time climbing up the ranks on his IG Story after he learned of his friend’s death. “May God be with us. Never saw this being apart of our journey,” he wrote in reference to the unfortunate deaths of his nephew Takeoff and Rich Homie Quan.