For the past few months, things seem to have only been getting better for Sabrina Carpenter. Last summer, while opening on Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour, she began going viral for the city-specific outros she would tack on to the end of her song “Nonsense,” a true fan-driven hit that reached No. 56 on the Hot 100 and No. 10 on Pop Airplay. Next came “Feather,” off the deluxe edition of her Emails I Can’t Send album, which went even further, reaching No. 21 on the Hot 100 and becoming her first-ever Pop Airplay No. 1 earlier this year.

But that was just the beginning. “Espresso,” her single she released on top of her Coachella performance in April, exploded to No. 2 on the Hot 100 and No. 1 on the Global 200, cementing her as the pop superstar of the moment, crowned accordingly with a performance (and skit appearance) on Saturday Night Live. But her latest single, “Please Please Please,” then went even further — after debuting at No. 2 on the Hot 100 and giving her the top two songs on the Global 200, “Please Please Please” then ascended to the top of both charts, giving Carpenter her first-ever Hot 100 No. 1 and the distinction of replacing herself atop the global charts.

The momentum has been dizzying — with every level conquered, another fell right after. Or, as Island Records vp of A&R Jackie Winkler puts it, “‘Nonsense’ walked so ‘Feather’ could jog, then ‘Espresso’ ran so that ‘Please Please Please’ could start a stampede.” And the success earns Winkler, who originally signed Carpenter to Island and has worked with her ever since, the title of Billboard’s Executive of the Week.

Here, Winkler talks about the building success of each of these songs, Carpenter’s evolution as a songwriter, the way that A&R has evolved over the years — and what will come next. “I think this album is going to blow people away,” Winkler says of Carpenter’s forthcoming Short N’ Sweet, due out in August. “If you like ‘Please Please Please’ and ‘Espresso,’ just wait for what’s in store.”

This week, Sabrina Carpenter’s “Please Please Please” reached No. 1 on the Hot 100, her first-ever song to top the chart. What key decision did you make to help make that happen?

Sabrina and Jack Antonoff had known each other personally for some time, so it was a natural progression for them to eventually work together. Given the chemistry that Sabrina and Amy Allen had already built, putting the three of them together felt like the perfect musical combination to undoubtedly yield something exceptional. It’s also fun to share the success of this song with David Gray and Jenn Knoepfle at UMPG who were instrumental in connecting the dots.

“Please Please Please” also hit No. 1 on the Global 200, replacing “Espresso,” which was No. 1 last week. Why do you think these songs are resonating, and working so well, around the globe?

To put it simply, the two songs speak for themselves. The first time I heard “Please Please Please” and “Espresso,” both sounded like hit records to me. The extraordinary nuances of Sabrina’s vocal delivery and quick-witted lyrics, combined with Jack Antonoff and Julian Bunetta’s brilliant productions, all play an essential role in what makes these songs so infectious and undeniable. They are especially bold, and nobody could pull them off as fearlessly and authentically as Sabrina.

Since last year, Sabrina has been on an increasingly-ascendant run up the charts, from “Nonsense” to “Feather” to “Espresso” and “Please Please Please.” How have you worked with her to help her develop her sound in the past year to reach this level?

It really feels like all four songs came at the perfect times in her career. “Nonsense” walked so “Feather” could jog, then “Espresso” ran so that “Please Please Please” could start a stampede. At the core, the music Sabrina makes is perfectly reflective of who she is as a person, and all the quirks and character are what give her such a strong musical identity. Writing with her friends has always felt like the most effortless way to allow her to be herself, so protecting that process at all costs will remain a vital part of her ever-evolving sound.

You originally signed Sabrina to Island several years ago. How have you seen her develop as a songwriter and as an artist since then?

From day one, Sabrina’s superpower has always been knowing exactly who she is and the type of musical collaborators she’s wanted to work with. I’ve witnessed her develop into an extraordinary songwriter who has not only coined entirely new phrases, but also infiltrated popular culture around the world with her lyricism alone. One of the most rewarding parts about seeing her succeed is that none of this has happened by skipping steps or catching a lucky break. It is all owed to her remarkable talent, the music itself and the relentless detail put into every aspect of her creative campaign. [Island co-CEOs] Justin Eshak and Imran Majid are ambitious leaders who strongly encourage our artists and our Island Records staff to take risks musically and strategically, which has made this journey even more gratifying as we continue to charge forward with no limitations.

With such a string of successful singles, how does that influence your approach to her upcoming album?

I think this album is going to blow people away. If you like “Please Please Please” and “Espresso,” just wait for what’s in store. Every ounce of the album oozes with Sabrina’s personality — funny, sincere, cheeky and intelligent, but above all, it’s honest. There isn’t a single song on the album that one could mistake for another artist, which is by far my favorite part. 

How has A&R changed over the course of your career, and how has technology changed the role?

Technology continues to be a valuable tool for us to perform our jobs more efficiently. Since the start of my career, our access to information, data and even resources used to break artists have multiplied; however, my approach to signings, choosing singles and pairing creatives has never wavered from following my gut instinct. What will remain constant in A&R is the importance of maintaining genuine relationships, remaining selective and staying true to finding artists with longevity, a point of view and an unparalleled vision. 

Mustard is riding high off the success of Kendrick Lamar’s “Not Like Us,” which gave the Cali bounce producer his first Billboard Hot 100 No. 1 hit.

The Los Angeles native pulled up to Billboard News recently to put the whirlwind of the last couple of months into perspective. Mustard was wondering how he was going to pick up a buzz heading into his album, before the Drake-dissing “Not Like Us” seemingly fell out of the sky in May and gave him an ace in the hole.

Mustard had long wanted to land a placement with Kendrick Lamar to the point that he’d pepper the Compton rap dignitary with five beats at a time on some days.

“I keep saying it and I can’t say it enough — it’s gotta be God,” Mustard says, crediting a higher power. “What am I gonna do to get myself back hot? … How are we gonna spark to where people are like, ‘I wanna hear Mustard again.’ … Then the song came out. There’s my rollout.”

He continued: “I’ve been literally trying to get a song with him for years… Before I even made that beat, I got to a point where I was like, ‘I’m gonna send five beats a day.’ I maybe sent him five beats a day for maybe three months. I’m still doing it right now just in case he wants to record something. I sent him that beat and then I think that day I would make it a point just to go to the studio to make a couple of beats to send to him.”

Mustard cooked up the “Not Like Us” beat and sent it over to Kendrick in early April before running to his manager’s birthday dinner.

“I started chopping it up and I sped it up and I did the drums and I was like, ‘This is fire.’ … I sent him the beat and I was going to my manager’s birthday party and that was April 6,” he recalled. “He never responded until 12 at night and was like, ‘This is fire.’”

Mustard admitted: “I don’t think I even understood how big it was until it went No. 1 (on the Billboard Hot 100). I was like, ‘This is the biggest song I ever had in my life.’ I just wanted a song with Kendrick.”

The 10 Summers Records boss is rolling into his upcoming album, Faith of a Mustard Seed, which he revealed was named by the late Nipsey Hussle. He continued the album rollout on last Friday (June 21) with the release of “Parking Lot” feat. Travis Scott.

“When I was doing Perfect Ten, I remember the last conversation I had with Nipsey, he was telling me to name that album Faith of a Mustard Seed,” he added. “We talked for hours that night and I always kept that in the back of my head.”

Watch the full 20-minute interview with Mustard below, which also finds him touching on the losses he’s recently endured, how it was to work with legends like Mariah Carey and Rihanna, plus much more.

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Getting a natural-looking tan doesn’t have to require lounging in the sun with little to no sunscreen — Tarte’s popular bronzing drops have developed a cult following for providing a glowing, sun-kissed appearance with no soaking under the sun’s rays required.

The benefits of using a bronzer go beyond just giving you a tanner appearance. The makeup product also helps to even out your skin tone and has a formula boosted with moisturizers to give skin a more nourished and plumper appearance. For a limited-time, QVC is upgrading your makeup routine with a major beauty deal by offering the viral Key Largo Glow Drops bundled with Tarte’s Hydrating Primer. When purchased separately, the two products are $53 each, but this deal gets you both for just $35.

Keep reading to shop the deal.

Tarte Key Largo Glow Drops With Hydrating Primer

Buy Now on qvc $35

QVC’s deal gets you the Key Largo Glow Drops and Hydrating Primer for under $40. The brand recommends mixing equal parts of the primer and bronzer drops together before applying to your skin. Once applied, the primer will keep the bronzer looking fresh for up to 12 hours while using ingredients like coconut jojoba extract, grapeseed extract, olive oil, sunflower seed oil and meadowfoam oil to hydrate your skin, creating a smoother appearance.

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Reviewers rave over how the glow drops and primer combined are “so silky” when applied and leave behind “no streaks.”

While QVC’s bundle comes in the shade Rich Bronze, there are four total colors you can stock up on through Ulta and Sephora, which TikTok user @itsmekelc shows off in a video you can see here.

TikTok hasn’t been able to stop gushing over Tarte’s bronzing drops and its “natural” look. User @sarah_wolak even racked up more than 48,000 views for a review video of the makeup product.

“It’s not patchy, I don’t think it looks orange at all – I think it looks quite natural,” the TikToker said in the video. “It blended in beautifully, it didn’t stick to any of my dry patches.”

For more product recommendations, check out ShopBillboard‘s roundups of the best setting spray, freckle pens and makeup tools for beginners.

Diplo is facing a civil lawsuit accusing him of violating “revenge porn” laws by sharing sexually-explicit videos and images of a former romantic partner without her permission.

In a complaint filed Thursday in Los Angeles federal court, an unnamed Jane Doe accuser claimed that the DJ (real name Thomas Wesley Pentz) recorded their sexual encounters and shared the materials with others on Snapchat “without plaintiff’s knowledge or consent.”

“Plaintiff brings this action to recover for the emotional and physical injuries she endured because of Diplo’s actions and to make sure no one else is forced to suffer the privacy invasions and physical and mental trauma she felt and continues to feel to this day,” the woman’s attorneys write.

In her complaint, the woman claims she had consensual sexual relationship with the DJ from 2016 to 2023. During that time, she says she occasionally “gave defendant Diplo permission to record them having sex, but never gave him permission to distribute those images and videos to third parties and reiterated that he was not to record them without her explicit consent.”

“Plaintiff trusted defendant Diplo and believed that he would respect her wishes to keep their sexual images and videos confidential and that he would not record them having sex without her consent,” her lawyers write.

But last fall, the woman says she was contacted by someone claiming to be in possession of images and videos of “plaintiff and defendant Diplo having sex.” She says the materials, allegedly shared over Snapchat five years earlier, depicted her “genitals, buttocks, and face,” as well as her voice.

After the incident, Jane Doe says she reported Diplo’s actions to the New York Police Department, which later “issued a warrant for defendant Diplo’s arrest for dissemination of intimate images and/or videos depicting Plaintiff.”

In an email to Billboard, the NYPD confirmed that a report had been filed and that there was an active investigation, but declined to comment on the claims of an arrest warrant: “There is a criminal complaint on file for unlawful dissemination for a suspect with the name of Thomas Pentz which is currently being investigated by NYPD detectives.”

In 2022, when Congress reauthorized the Violence Against Women Act, lawmakers created for the first time a federal law banning the disclosure of “intimate” images without the consent of those depicted in them. The lawsuit accuses Diplo of violating that provision, as well as an earlier revenge porn law enacted by the state of California.

Both representatives and an attorney for Diplo did not return requests for comment.

Diplo was previously accused of revenge porn by another woman. In 2020, he was sued by a woman named Shelly Auguste over claims that he had distributed nude photographs of her without permission. His attorneys called it a “smear campaign” and sued her back for stalking, trespassing, and distributing private materials. That litigation is ongoing.

In the rock history, the Toronto Rock and Roll Revival festival in 1969 is legendary. But for Klaus Voormann, who played bass in John Lennon and Yoko Ono’s Plastic Ono Band, it was something of “a joke.”

The story of the band’s ad hoc first concert on Sept. 13, 1969, at the University of Toronto’s Varsity Stadium has been oft told, and is the subject of a new documentary, Ron Chapman’s Revival69: The Concert that Rocked the World, out now via a variety of platforms.

Using footage shot on that day by legendary documentarian D.A. Pennebaker, it chronicles how festival organizers, fretting over low tickets sales and indebted to a motorcycle gang financier, put in a last-minute call to England and convinced Lennon to agree to fly from London to Toronto on short notice and play on the same bill as his rock n’ roll heroes — Chuck Berry, Little Richard, Jerry Lee Lewis, Bo Diddley, Gene Vincent and more — as well as the Doors and Chicago.

Lennon, however, had no band, so he rounded up a crew that included Eric Clapton (after Beatles mate George Harrison declined), Voormann — a friend from the Beatles’ early Hamburg days who designed the album cover for Revolver and was playing in Manfred Mann — and fledgling drummer Alan White, whom he saw play in a London club (and who famously hung up on Lennon’s first phone call). With minimal rehearsal — a bit on the plane ride over and backstage — the troupe played a rough and tumble set of covers, The Beatles’ “Yer Blues,” Lennon’s not-yet recorded “Cold Turkey” and “Give Peace a Chance,” as well as two Ono songs, including the lengthy, free-form “John John (Let’s Hope For Peace).”

As Lennon’s first full-scale concert performance since the Beatles’ last show on Aug. 29, 1966, in San Francisco, it was a bit loose, and it’s preserved on the Live Peace in Toronto 1969 album released three months later. With Revival69‘s release, Billboard spoke to Voormann — who also appears in the film and played on the John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band album that followed in 1970 — to recount his memories of the auspicious event.

An Unexpected Call

“John called me, and he never called me before, not so much. He’d seen me play bass and he knew I played for Manfred Mann, but I had never played for him or anything. So out of the blue he called me and said, ‘I’m putting a band together. It’s called the Plastic Ono Band. You want to play bass in the band?’ And I said, sort of, ‘What’s this Plastic Ono Band?’ I had no idea what was gonna happen, and I’d never met Yoko, so it was really very strange.

“So he said, ‘Well, Eric Clapton is going to do it, and we’ve got a little drummer in mind called Alan White.’ I didn’t know who he was, just a kid. ‘That’s it, just the four of us and Yoko and we are the Plastic Ono Band.’ I said ‘OK, let’s do it’ and (Lennon) says, ‘Great. I’ll see you at the airport tomorrow!’ (laughs)

“He just jumped into the cold water, not knowing what was gonna happen, no rehearsal. We didn’t know what we were going to play…but here’s the Plastic Ono Band and we go to Toronto to this festival tomorrow. We didn’t have any stage performance. We didn’t know what songs John was gonna do. He said, ‘Well, there’s Chuck Berry and Little Richard and Jerry Lee Lewis and all these great (artists) and we are just playing rock n’ roll.’ And I thought it was a little far-fetched. This is John Lennon, who played in the Beatles, and this is the first time he’s gonna be out there and presenting something new, and…we just go on stage and play? How does somebody like John Lennon get out there with a band that never played together?

“So we went to the airport, and before we got onto the plane we stood there and we were waiting for Eric Clapton and nobody could find Eric. It was getting really close to (boarding); John said, ‘Well, if he isn’t here in 10 minutes, we’re gonna go home,’ and then Yoko says, ‘No, no, no, let’s do it. It’s for peace. We’ve got to do it.’ So Terry Doran, who was sort of the road manager, he actually got a hold of Eric. He was asleep. I don’t think he realized that this thing is really going to happen. So he came and we all got on the plane, and the plane was very full. It was packed.”

The Friendly Skies

“We were lucky; they arranged for us to sit in the last row of the plane, which was right next to the engines, and it was really loud back there. John and Yoko were in first class, but he came back and we tried to (rehearse) a little bit. It was just hilarious, just a joke, trying to rehearse the songs. I played an electric bass, no amplifier. John had a semi-acoustic guitar, Eric had a semi-acoustic guitar. It was maybe a little bit of John singing “Money (That’s What I Want)” or something like that. But there was no rehearsal. We all knew the songs, yes, of course. We could play any rock n’ roll — I could, Eric could, Alan White had no idea if he could. (laughs) It was just a joke, really. Just a joke.

“We all didn’t know Yoko at all — Eric didn’t, I didn’t, Alan White didn’t. John did, of course, but I don’t know if he knew exactly what Yoko was gonna do. So when we were on the plane and rehearsing for maybe an hour, Yoko came down the aisle, ‘Can we rehearse my song now?’ And John stood up: ‘Come on, Yoko, let’s have a cup of tea.’ He didn’t even let us hear what she had in mind. He didn’t tell us what song we were gonna do, what noises we were gonna do. We had no idea.

“We came off the plane, got into the cars, the limousines, and the motorbikes were escorting us to the stadium. We went in the stadium and went back into the dressing room, and we had one amplifier for the three of us, and the drummer. There was no bass drum, just a snare and a hi-hat and a cymbal. That’s all there was. So it was another Mickey Mouse attempt to have a rehearsal. So had a bit of rehearsal and one person who came in I recognized — that was Gene Vincent. But apart from him I just walked up to the stage, went up on the stage, did the whole concert, went back to the dressing room, got my clothes, packed the bass into a case and got back into the limousine and we were off. I didn’t see anybody. I can’t tell you about any conversations with other musicians or anything. I didn’t see any of those. John, of course, they were all getting on his case, but I was completely out of that. People were not interested in Klaus Voormann. It wasn’t important to me, either, so I was happy to get out of this place.

“I think (Lennon) only really realized what he was doing when we were there, just about to get up on stage. He had his lovely white suit on and we were walking (to the stage) and he said, ‘Wait a second’ and went in the corner, and he puked. He threw up. He was very, very nervous. He didn’t even have a very good voice. HIs voice was nearly gone. So there we were with a singer, John, going up there and not having a strong voice and we just walked on the stage and played.”

Rock n’ Roll Revived

“I felt sorry for John. He really felt out of place on stage, when I see it now. John never was a frontman on stage. People don’t realize (that) when you’re with a band you may do a little bit of saying, ‘Here’s the next number…’ He was never the frontman who was actually organizing a stage persona. He never had that. He was doing ‘Cold Turkey,’ and it was such a stupid version, the way we played it. When I heard the song I was so excited; ‘We can go in the studio and make a great version of this song!’ And later on we did. I loved the record but what he played on stage was just terrible…and the audience didn’t applaud. John was dreaming, ‘Wake up!’ Telling people to wake up and participate.

“And then, of course, the big surprise came when suddenly…we had no idea if Yoko was singing classic opera or what she was gonna do. Suddenly this screaming started. ‘What’s this?!’ We couldn’t believe it. It was just…ridiculous. John said, ‘Well, when Yoko’s number comes we kind of play an E chord,’ so we played in E and just fiddled around on our instruments. We had no idea what was gonna happen. So we were just improvising, making strange noises on the guitar, on the strings. And I had flat-wound strings, so I couldn’t do many noises. If I would’ve had a flute or any crazy instrument I could’ve improvised something, but with my bass there was not much I can do.

“I knew that Yoko very much wanted to come to spread the message of peace, which is a very nice thing to do. So you had her lying there (on the stage) and she was really like a dying bird. She was croaking, making all these noises. I was standing behind her, and I could really see this woman was really trying as hard as she can out of her little body to let the people know there’s a war going on and people are dying and bombs are falling, and that was the feeling I got out of it. The audience didn’t quite get it, of course. They wanted to see John and they didn’t care about Yoko, and suddenly there was this woman making these noises.

“And Yoko is amazing. She had no…how can I say it? At that particular time she had no feeling for an audience. The charisma that comes across if a Little Richard gets up there or a Chuck Berry, they have their tricks to get the audience, and she had no idea what stage presence really was. She learned that much later, but at the time, no. And of course you had a rock n’ roll audience, not an artistic type of audience. People wanted to hang out and have a party, and then there’s Yoko trying to spread that message. It was really tough. I’m really proud of her that she actually did this. When you see the documentaries you can at least see the effort she was making to tell the people, ‘Please make peace.’ That’s what she was trying to do.”

No Encore

“I think we pretty much soon forgot about it and didn’t even talk much about it. All I remember is after (the show) we drove a long drive in a limousine to a huge mansion of some guy, it must’ve been the guy who put the concert together. He had a golf course in his garden, and I remember Terry Doran driving a golf cart and said, ‘This f–king thing doesn’t pull the d-ck off a chocolate mouse!’ (laughs) It was so slow and he wanted to ride pretty quick on it. I remember sitting at a swimming pool and somebody took some photos. We had fun. We were laughing. But there was no talk about the concert or anything. We were just ready to go back home.”