The long wait is over: The Cure have released their new song in over 16 years and confirmed the release date for their upcoming 14th album.

“Alone” will appear on the upcoming LP Songs From a Lost World, which is set to be released Nov 1, 2024 via Polydor/Fiction. Listen to the track below.

The track appeared as the opening song on the band’s Shows of a Lost World global tour throughout 2022 and 2023. The album has been long in the making, with its original release dates mooted for 2019. The album’s tracklist will be revealed in the coming weeks on the band’s social media channels.

Speaking about the song, frontman Robert Smith said that “Alone” was “the track that unlocked the record; as soon as we had that piece of music recorded I knew it was the opening song, and I felt the whole album come into focus.”

He added: “I had been struggling to find the right opening line for the right opening song for a while, working with the simple idea of ‘being alone’, always in the back of my mind this nagging feeling that I already knew what the opening line should be… as soon as we finished recording I remembered the poem Dregs by the English poet Ernest Dowson. That was the moment when I knew the song – and the album – were real.”

Songs From a Lost World was produced by Smith and Paul Corkett, who co-produced The Cure’s 2000 album Bloodflowers. The album features contributions from Smith, Simon Gallup (bass), Jason Cooper (drums), Reeves Gabriel (guitar) and Roger O’Donnell (keyboards). The latter recently announced he’d been diagnosed with rare and “aggressive” blood cancer a year ago, but added that “I’m fine and the prognosis is amazing”.

In recent weeks the band had been teasing the release of Songs From a Lost World to fans via mystery postcards and puzzles. Smith has been revealing details of the LP for many years, and speaking to the Los Angeles Times in 2019, he blamed himself for some of the delays. “I keep going back over and redoing them, which is silly. At some point, I have to say that’s it. It’s very much on the darker side of the spectrum,” Smith added.

“I lost my mother and my father and my brother recently, and obviously it had an effect on me. It’s not relentlessly doom and gloom. It has soundscapes on it, like Disintegration, I suppose. I was trying to create a big palette, a big wash of sound.”

Kylie Minogue’s red-hot moment isn’t cooling off anytime soon.

Australia’s “princess of pop” started her week in Singapore, where she performed for the crowds gathered for the Formula 1 Grand Prix, and fulfilled a lifelong dream when she waved the chequered flag.

Then, on Thursday, Kylie’s name was called out — five times — when the nominations for the 2024 ARIA Awards were announced. Only Royel Otis (with eight) and Dom Dolla (six) collected more nods.

Next month, the Melbourne-raised pop veteran releases Tension II, Kylie’s 17th studio album and the sequel to her 2023 hit Tension, which led the national charts in the United Kingdom and Australia, and peaked at No. 21 on the Billboard 200.

Tension II is scheduled to arrive Oct. 18, and is led by “Lights Camera Action,” the lead single due out this Friday, Sept. 27.

There’s no slowing down for Kylie who, in the early months of 2025, embarks on a global tour.

Choosing which songs to stack in her setlist is a “juggling act,” she tells ABC Breakfast in her homeland. It’s “the hardest part of every tour.”

Of course, Kylie will deliver “the biggest hits and leave some space for some oddities. Not just the same old songs you’ve heard time and time again on tours,” she admits.

The global success of Tension hit “Padam Padam” was both “mind-blowing” and “life-changing,” says Kylie. “I didn’t set out to do that. I just consistently worked and consistently try and keep achieving.”

Tension II has “a similar vibe” to its predecessor, Minogue confesses, and features “a few random collaborations which I’ve really enjoyed,” with The Blessed Madonna, Orville Peck, Bebe Rexha, Tove Lo, and fellow Aussie Sia among them. “You feel like some of the pressure’s off you when you share the load.”

Kylie can apparently do no wrong. Earlier in the year, she scooped the Global Icon Award at the BRIT Awards, becoming just the second woman to win it following Taylor Swift in 2021, and went on to win the Billboard Women in Music Icon Award.

Kylie landed a Grammy Award (best pop dance recording) for “Padam Padam,” completed her inaugural Las Vegas Residency, and signed with United Talent Agency (UTA) for live representation in the U.S. and Canada and acting roles worldwide.

The Tension Tour 2025 is scheduled to kick off Feb. 15 at RAC Arena in Perth, Australia, following by pan-Asian dates in March, and a trek through the U.K. and Europe in May.

The music of Sophie lives on through her self-titled final album, which surprised dropped late Wednesday.

Released through Future Classic and Transgressive, the posthumous SOPHIE collection is stacked with collaborations with close friends, and houses previously-released cuts “Reason Why” (featuring Kim Petras & BC Kingdom), “Berlin Nightmare” featuring Evita Manji, “One More Time” ft. Popstar, “Exhilarate” ft. Bibi Bourelly, and “My Forever” ft. Cecile Believe.

Hannah Diamond worked with Sophie on the album track “Always and Forever,” recorded in London during the 2020 lockdown. “It ended up being the last ever day that I saw her in person,” Diamond remarks.

Sophie, an important figure in underground pop and dance music, died the following year, at the age of 34.

“Our beautiful Sophie passed away this morning after a terrible accident,” read a statement at the time, issued by Future Classic. “True to her spirituality she had climbed up to watch the full moon and accidentally slipped and fell.”

Born and raised in Glasgow, Scotland, Sophie Xeon inherited an interest in dance and electronic music from their father, and started recording their own music at a young age. In the early ’10s, they struck up an association with a few artists on the PC Music label, soon to be at the experimental pop vanguard, and released their debut single “Nothing More to Say” in 2013.

Over the next decade, Sophie appeared on and helmed a slew of recordings, including 2017’s “It’s Okay to Cry,” ultimately named by Billboard as one of the best songs of the year.

Following Sophie’s passing, pop cult favorite Rina Sawayama remembered the late artist as “the sweetest – an icon and a visionary,” adding, “the world and our community has lost a beautiful soul.”

SOPHIE is released as a double vinyl, with each side representing a different section of the album. The wax comes in standard black as well as translucent neon pink, clear, and silver and is available to order here.

Stream SOPHIE in full below.

Kelly Clarkson is part of the Pink Pony Club!

The superstar covered Chappell Roan’s “Coffee” for her latest Kellyoke installment during her talk show on Wednesday (Sept. 26). “If I didn’t love you, it would be fine/ I’ll meet you for coffee, only for coffee/ Nowhere else is safe, every place leads back to your place,” Clarkson mused the melancholy lyrics backed by her instrumentalists, My Band Y’all.

Roan has skyrocketed to fame in the months since she dropped her debut album The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess last year. After a series of headline-making performances — including at Coachella and Gov Ball 2024 — the 14-track project earned a new peak of No. 5 on the Billboard 200 last month.

The album features the track “Coffee” as well as breakout hits “HOT TO GO!,” “Red Wine Supernova,” “Casual” and “Pink Pony Club.”

“It feels like I was right all along,” Roan recently told Jimmy Fallon of her musical rise during an appearance on his late-night talk show. “I feel kind of like, I made it already when people showed up to my concert a few years ago … everything else has been a cherry on top.”

Watch Kelly Clarkson perform Chappell Roan’s “Coffee” below.

Macklemore has released a statement after leading a “f— America” chant at Seattle’s Palestine Will Live Forever Festival over the weekend.

Macklemore performed his new song at the event, “Hind’s Hall 2,” the sequel to his May song of the same name whose proceeds are given to the United Nations Relief and Words Agency (UNRWA), which provides assistance to Palestinian refugees. “Straight up, say it, I’m not gonna stop you,” told the crowd in a fan video from the show. “I’m not gonna stop you… yeah, f–k America.”

On Tuesday (Sept. 24), the rapper was dropped from Las Vegas’ Neon City Festival lineup.

In his statement, released on Wednesday, Macklemore explains his mindset leading up to the performance. “My thoughts and feelings are not always expressed perfectly or politely. Sometimes I slip up and get caught in the moment. Saturday night was one of those times,” he began his lengthy statement posted to social media.

“Unfortunately, the historic event in my hometown that brought thousands of people together to raise awareness and money for the people of Palestine has become overshadowed by two words,” he continued, noting that he hasn’t been “OK” in the months since the Israel-Hamas war has broken out. ” I have been in utter disbelief with how our government is showing up at this moment in history. I don’t think I’m alone,” he wrote, “Some days I don’t know how to love something that is hurting others so much. I don’t think I’m alone.”

He continued, “And some days I wake up, see another couple billion dollars given to Israel, or another refugee encampment destroyed, or a father holding a limb from his martyred child, or another speech from a politician justifying the right of Israel to ‘defend itself’ while denying Palestinians the right to exist, and I say to myself…. ‘F— America.’ I don’t think I’m alone.”

Macklemore concluded his statement, “I’ve slipped in front of the world before. I’m sure I’ll do it again. But they will not silence my voice, and they will not close my heart. I’ve lost endorsements, I’ve lost shows, I’ve lost business ties. I am still here, unwavering in my support for a Free Palestine. I care about humanity and this earth too much to turn back now. My intent always comes back to the pursuit of peace, love, equality and liberation for all. And that isn’t radical, it’s human. I don’t think I’m alone.”

See Macklemore’s powerful statement in full below.