Bobbie Jean Carter, the sister of Nick and Aaron Carter, has died. She was 41.

Bobbie Jean’s sister, Angel Carter, confirmed her sibling’s passing through Instagram on Sunday (Dec. 24).

“To my older sister Bobbie. You had a great sense of humor, and a lively spirit. Growing up, I was your baby, and you were my best friend,” she captioned a montage of childhood photos. “Life wasn’t fair to you, that I know. Sometimes, it feels like you didn’t have a shot, no matter what.”

Angel’s remembrance also referenced the substance abuse-related deaths of her sister Leslie, who died in January 2012 at age 25, and her twin brother, Aaron, who passed away in November 2022 at 34 years old.

“Experiencing innocence instead of being burdened by trauma, pain, and suffering is incredibly important for children, particularly at such a young age,” she continued. “I know why Leslie, Aaron, and now you ended up in the circumstances that you did. I share that pain we experienced during our childhood and I’m sorry you didn’t have an opportunity for a better life.”

The cause of Bobbie Jean’s death had not been provided at press time, but Angel asked her Instagram followers to “break down barriers” and “reduce stigmas” around mental health.

“The generational dysfunction stops now,” she wrote. “Please visit @onoursleevesofficial to learn more about how you can get involved, and how to be there for your loved ones.”

Bobbie Jean served as a wardrobe stylist and makeup artist during Aaron’s tours in the early 2000s, according to TMZ. She also appeared on the Carter family’s 2006 E! reality TV show, House of Carters, where her struggles with addiction and substance abuse were documented. Since then, she has led a relatively private life outside of the spotlight, but was arrested on alleged drug and theft charges earlier this year.

She died in Florida on Saturday morning (Dec. 23), TMZ reports, citing her mother, Jane Carter.

“I am in shock from learning of the sudden death of my daughter, Bobbie Jean, and I will need time to process the terrible reality of this happening for the third time,” Jane told the outlet, referencing the deaths of Bobbie Jean, Leslie and Aaron. “When I am able to think clearly, I’ll release a fuller statement, but until then, I would request to be left to grieve in private.”

She continued, “[H]owever deeply a parent feels the loss of a child, the suffering of a young child at the loss of a parent must be much greater. So, I would ask the sympathetic to say a prayer for my precious 8-year-old granddaughter Bella, who previously lost her father and is now also left without her mother.”

Bobbie Jean is survived by a daughter, Bella.

See Angel’s tribute to her sister below.

Rapper Travell “G. Dep” Coleman, who walked into a New York police precinct in 2010 and admitted to committing a nearly two-decade-old cold case murder to clear his conscience, has been granted clemency by Gov. Kathy Hochul.

Now 49, Coleman has served 13 of a 15-year-to-life sentence. With his sentence being commuted by the Democratic governor, he will now be allowed to seek parole earlier than his original 2025 date.

Coleman is one of 16 individuals granted clemency by Hochul in an announcement made Friday (Dec. 22). They include 12 pardons and four commutations. It marked the third time Hochul has granted clemency in 2023.

“Through the clemency process, it is my solemn responsibility as governor to recognize the efforts individuals have made to improve their lives and show that redemption is possible,” Hochul said in a written statement.

The rapper earned an associate’s degree while in prison and facilitated violence prevention and sobriety counseling programs, while also participating in a variety of educational and rehabilitative classes, according to Hochul’s office. His clemency application was supported by the prosecutor in the case and the judge who sentenced him.

As G. Dep, Coleman had hits with “Special Delivery” and “Let’s Get It” and helped popularize a loose-limbed dance called the Harlem shake in the early 2000s. The rapper was one of the rising stars of hip-hop impresario Sean “Diddy” Combs’ Bad Boy Records label in the late 1990s and early 2000s. But his career slumped after his 2001 debut album, Child of the Ghetto, and the rapper became mired in drug use and low-level arrests, his lawyer said in 2011.

Attorney Anthony L. Ricco said at the time that Coleman “had been haunted” by the 1993 fatal shooting of John Henkel and decided to confess to shooting someone as a teenager during a robbery in East Harlem. Henkel was shot three times in the chest outside an apartment complex.

His brother, Robert Henkel, had demanded Hochul reject the urgings by prosecutor David Drucker to release Coleman, calling it a “farce.” He told the New York Post that “it is one thing to seek (clemency) for drug crimes — but not murder.”

Imagine a land where it’s never cold but Christmas celebrations, and the holiday music associated with them, last for months. Such is life in the Philippines, where Christmas songs are played from Sept. 1 through the holiday itself, generating good cheer — and royalties for rightsholders — for almost a full third of the year.

The global pattern of Christmas music consumption is that countries with colder weather start listening to it earlier, which generally translates into more streams, according to internal data from a major label shared with Billboard. The Philippines is the giant exception.

The country, which has a population of 109 million — a bit less than a third that of the U.S. — was the sixth biggest market for holiday music for Spotify in 2021, according to the company, after the U.S., Germany, the U.K., Canada and Sweden. (This data is skewed by the popularity of Spotify itself in various markets, and it and YouTube are the dominant platforms in the Philippines.) It’s also Sony’s sixth biggest market for streaming holiday catalog music, according to that company. In general, the Philippines is the 32nd-biggest market for recorded music revenue, according to the trade organization International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI).

One reason for the popularity of Christmas music in the Philippines is that it’s a predominantly Roman Catholic country — the only one in Asia — because it was ruled Spain from the 16th century to the end of the 19th century. Later U.S. rule brought English and an immersion in American pop culture. One popular saying has it that the country spent “300 years in a convent, 50 years in Hollywood.”

The Christmas season traditionally starts in what Filipinos call the “ber” months — SeptemBER, OctoberBER and so on — when the weather turns a bit cooler and workers look forward to a bonus 13th month of pay.

“There’s a stereotype that we can all sing, and we have a very communal culture,” says Victoria Maria Malong, Warner Music Philippines’ marketing & audience engagement director, domestic. “So we have lots of Christmas parties, with lots of food and singing — sometimes drunken singing.”

The big Christmas hits in the Philippines are mostly the songs you would expect — there’s a lot of “lean-back listening,” driven by playlists, according to Sony. “In terms of Christmas songs, it’s mostly the same around the world,” says Enzo Valdez, managing director of UMG Philippines Inc. (Universal Music Group’s business there goes by that name, since there’s an independent label Universal Records in the country.)

There’s one major exception, in the form of Jose Mari Chan, a performer, songwriter, and businessman known as the King of Philippine Christmas Carols. Although music isn’t his main job — he also runs a sugar company owned by his family — Chan is one of the country’s iconic singers, who is known for holiday songs like “A Perfect Christmas” and especially “Christmas in Our Hearts.” His biggest Christmas album, Christmas in Our Hearts, came out on Universal Records — the local company — but is now distributed by Ingrooves, which is owned by Universal Music.

As the dominance of streaming drives Christmas recordings to the top of the charts every year in the Philippines, just as it does in the U.S., Chan has become an online harbinger of the season, albeit one that appears earlier than Mariah Carey. Memes of Chan peeking through an opening door start to appear around Sept. 1, and he has capitalized on this success. In a country where tours of malls are part of promotion and endorsements are an important revenue stream, Chan has signed a deal with Uniqlo that has him singing the chain’s Christmas jingle, and appearing at events.

Playlist promotion works much the same as in other markets, and preparation for holiday music marketing starts in the summer. Sony Music has a Christmas music team with a core of eight to 10 executives that expands to about 30 internationally. “It’s international music and some of ours,” Malong says, “so it’s Mariah Cary and Jose Mari Chan and our challenge is to put [Warner Music Group artist] Michael Bublé into the conversation.”

Emerging local artists want to be part of that, too, and “we also have a lot of younger acts who are making new Christmas songs,” Valdez says. The duo Ben and Ben collaborated with Chan, and the young singer Juan Karlos has a new song, “Maligayang Pasko” (Merry Christmas in Tagalog, a dominant language), which came out November 10. Now, Valdez says, “Karlos plans to do a full Christmas album next year.”

Kiss fans will have to wait a little longer to see the band’s first avatar performance.

On Friday (Dec. 22), the legendary rockers — who played their final concert at New York’s Madison Square Garden earlier in the month — shared a teaser clip through social media revealing the date of their digitized characters.

“50 years is a long time, and what the future holds is in the making,” Kiss captioned the clip on X (formerly Twitter).

The 25-second teaser includes previously seen footage of Kiss’ digital avatars and concludes with the message, “2027 A Show Is Coming.”

During their the last concert of their End of the Road farewell tour on Dec. 2, Kiss made a surprise announcement that they will continue on as digitized versions of themselves going forward.

After the concert, the quartet — comprising co-founders founders Paul Stanley and Gene Simmons as well as guitarist Tommy Thayer and drummer Eric Singer — shared a two-minute video on YouTube teasing their next chapter.

“The future is so exciting,” Simmons says amid behind-the-scenes snippets of the band wearing motion capture suits to develop their high-tech avatars. Stanley adds, “We can live on eternally.”

Kiss’ avatars were created by George Lucas’ Industrial Light & Magic, in partnership with Sweden’s Pophouse Entertainment Group, according to the Associated Press. The companies recently collaborated on the ABBA Voyage show in London, a virtual concert performed by the Swedish pop group.

“Kiss could have a concert in three cities in the same night across three different continents. That’s what you could do with this,” Pophouse CEO told the AP.

In a roundtable interview, Stanley noted that Kiss “deserves to live on because the band is bigger than we are,” adding, “It’s exciting for us to go the next step and see Kiss immortalized.”

Simmons pointed out that the forthcoming digital band will be able accomplish things the original members couldn’t dream of doing.

“We can be forever young and forever iconic by taking us to places we’ve never dreamed of before,” the bassist said. “The technology is going to make Paul jump higher than he’s ever done before.”

See Kiss’ announcement on X below.