Pat Benatar and Neil Giraldo are hoping their stage musical, Invincible, will prove to be just that as they continue to work on it — amidst several other projects the couple has going, both together and separately.

The production, an adaptation of William Shakespeare’s Romeo & Juliet built around the pair’s songs from Benatar’s albums, debuted to mixed reviews during late 2022 at the Wallis Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts in Beverly Hills, Calif. — not long after Benatar and Giraldo were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Now they’re planning to bring it to New York this fall — not in performance, but to make what they say will be significant changes before bringing it back to the boards.

“The place we’re at right now is about tearing it to shreds and starting over,” Benatar tells Billboard. “We have the liberty to do that because we haven’t gone to even off-Broadway or anything like that. So we’re tearing it apart, doing a similar show but with a lot of different elements to it.”

Giraldo predicts that the next incarnation of Invincible — which includes such Benatar favorites as “Hell Is For Children,” “Love Is a Battlefield,” “Heartbreaker,” “We Belong” and, of course, the title song — will be “different and the same at the same time. It will take it in a little different direction, maybe go back to the very beginning. I think we got too far in the weeds with it and it started getting a little messy. So maybe we’ll be going back to breaking the rules a little bit, trying to be brave.”

Benatar says the greatest lesson came in the way the duo’s songs were adapted within the original version of the show. “The goal for the production we did was to do a hybrid of taking our music and reinventing it into a more theatrical form,” she explains. “Some of the songs didn’t really work like that. Some of them can be augmented; ‘We Live For Love,’ for example, ‘We Belong,’ things like that work well in a theatrical form. But we learned that some of the arrangements that are on the original (recordings) are very exciting and actually work better (in the musical) if we keep them closer to the original. That was kind of a surprise, and a big lesson to learn. But that’s something you can’t learn until you put it in front of human beings to see it.”

Neither is discouraged by the need to reboot, however. “It was a learning experience for us,” Giraldo acknowledges. “We made mistakes. We learned great things along the way. It’s a different kind of (endeavor) to be sure.” Benatar, meanwhile, affirms that “it’s been exciting. It’s been fun. You just keep evolving ’til we get to the place we feel like it’s time to put it out there.” They’re not saying when that might be, but she has a where in mind — Cleveland, which is Giraldo’s hometown.

“We love it there,” Benatar says. “It’s a home kind of thing, as good as New York to us as a family place. It’s always fun to go there; the audiences are amazing, really receptive. So that’s possibly the first place to open in this (next) form.”

The revived Invincible is just one project Benatar and Giraldo – who return to the road Saturday, July 6, In Atlantic City with dates booked through mid-August — have targeted for the near future.

Next year will also see the release of a children’s book the two are writing and composing companion songs for. They’re keeping details, including the title and publication date, under wraps for now, but it’s inspired by the relationships they have with their three grandchildren, two girls and a boy. “It’s about everything we do and everything they do…and it’s about music,” Benatar says. “It’s sweet.”

On his own, meanwhile, Giraldo is continuing work on two long-gestating endeavors — a memoir and an all-star holiday album he’s been working on with some of his musical friends. He’s also recording an album with former Benatar band drummer Myron Grombacher, a friends from his early days in Cleveland and in Rick Derringer’s band. The guitarist says the two plan to reconvene after he and Benatar tour this summer, working as just the two of them, but they’re open “to have some guest people on board” if it feels appropriate. “We’ve got about 21 songs,” Giraldo reports. “We were childhood friends, so this is what we do — just make music, have a great time playing and do the best you can.”

It’s been a minute since Benatar and Giraldo have released new music of their own as well. Their last full album was Go in 2003, while there have been some one-off singles and soundtrack contributions between 2015-2020 — most recently “Together.” They also joined Dolly Parton for her version of “Heartbreaker” from last year’s Rockstar album.

“That’s a possibility, if the time feels right,” Giraldo says. “It’s not like we don’t have a lot of material. We do have a lot of songs. Here’s the deal…the best records, I believe, are done in 29 days; you just get in there, do it and get done. You have to be able to block that time out so your primary focus is on that recording. That is the most difficult part. As you get older…it’s hard to find that block.”

Benatar, however, sounds ready for it. “We have about 125 songs around, waiting to be recorded,” she says, laughing as she adds, “If you can get my husband in there to do it, please be my guest.”

Pearl Jam lands two straight No. 1s on Billboard’s Mainstream Rock Airplay chart for the first time, as “Wreckage” rises to the top of the July 13-dated tally.

The song follows the four-week reign of the group’s “Dark Matter” starting in March.

The Eddie Vedder-led band now boasts five career Mainstream Rock Airplay rulers. It first reigned with “Daughter” in 1993 and also led with “Better Man” in 2005 and “Given To Fly” in 1998 prior to its two 2024 No. 1s.

As previously reported, the act’s 26-year break between No. 1s set the record for the longest in the list’s 43-year history.

Concurrently, “Wreckage” lifts into the top five (6-5) of Alternative Airplay, where it’s the first song by the band to reach that mark since “Sirens” peaked at No. 4 in 2013. It’s also at its No. 3 high on Adult Alternative Airplay for a third straight week.

On the all-rock-format, audience-based Rock & Alternative Airplay chart, “Wreckage” spends a third week in a row at its No. 2 best, as it racked up 6.1 million audience impressions in the week ending July 4, up 2%, according to Luminate. “Dark Matter” led for three weeks.

“Wreckage” debuted at No. 1 on the multimetric Hot Hard Rock Songs list dated May 4. It placed at No. 6 on the July 6-dated tally; in addition to its radio airplay, it drew 320,000 official U.S. streams in the week ending June 27.

“Wreckage” is the second single from Dark Matter, Pearl Jam’s 12th studio album. The set launched at No. 1 on the Top Rock & Alternative Albums ranking dated May 4 and has earned 102,000 equivalent album units to date.

All Billboard charts dated July 13 will update on Billboard.com on Tuesday, July 9.

On the Fourth of July, the United States celebrates its independence. And in a week, Katy Perry will celebrate hers.

On Independence Day, the 39-year-old pop star teased the upcoming arrival of her comeback single “Woman’s World” by sharing a snap from a recent patriotic photo shoot. In the picture, she sports a strappy leotard with red, white and blue sparkles forming an American Flag pattern on the chest.

With a red bandana in her hair, she flexes her right bicep like a modern-day Rosie the Riveter. “BB UR A FIREWORK 🎆,” the singer captioned the post, a nod to her 2010 smash “Firework,” which topped the Billboard Hot 100 for four weeks.

“and speaking of work, WOMAN’S WORLD IS GOING TO WORK IN ONE WEEK,” she added. “HAPPY 4TH 🇺🇸”

As Perry mentioned, “Woman’s World” arrives July 11. The track marks her first proper release since 2020’s Smile, which reached No. 5 on the Billboard 200.

The recently retired American Idol judge first announced the track mid-June, with Perry sharing its cover art — a campy photo of her wearing a white bikini and robotic Pegasus legs — and a snippet of the dance-pop anthem. “Sexy, confident, so intelligent/ She is heaven-sent, so soft, so strong,” she sings in the clip over a rippling electronic drum beat.

Later that month, Perry unveiled even more of the song’s lyrics by wearing a dress with a seemingly endless train to Paris Fashion Week. “She’s a winner, champion/ Superhuman, number one/ She’s a sister, she’s mother,” read words printed on the fabric. “Open your eyes, just look around and you’ll discover/ You know/ It’s a woman’s world and you’re lucky to be living in it.”

See Perry’s post below.

BB UR A FIREWORK 🎆

and speaking of work, WOMAN’S WORLD IS GOING TO WORK IN ONE WEEK HAPPY 4TH 🇺🇸 pic.twitter.com/uWDCsU9XG3

— KATY PERRY (@katyperry) July 4, 2024

Our interview starts with one of the many stories that make up the legend of Paul Anka. For the soon-to-be 83-year-old, the tale is one of many he enjoys regaling people with from his generations-spanning career, where he’s been both in front of the mic (he first topped the Billboard Hot 100 as a teen idol in 1959 for four weeks with “Lonely Boy” and recently wrapped his Seven Decades tour) and behind the pen (he wrote the English lyrics for Frank Sinatra’s “My Way” and co-wrote Michael Jackson’s “Love Never Felt So Good,” and even has credits on modern hits by Drake and Doja Cat). No wonder there’s a long-in-the-works Broadway show dedicated to his songbook.

Now, the Canadian singer-songwriter is adding ‘podcast host’ to his stacked resume. Dubbed Our Way (naturally), his podcast is produced by iHeartMedia and showcases Anka alongside co-host and friend Skip Bronson talking shop with an eclectic array of guests including Michael Bublé, Clive Davis, Sebastian Maniscalco and Jason Bateman. (Bateman, who co-hosts the SmartLess: On the Road podcast alongside Sean Hayes and Will Arnett, also happens to be Anka’s son-in-law.) It’s the perfect medium considering Anka is bursting with stories: butting heads with Jerry Lee Lewis, hanging out with the Rat Pack in Las Vegas steam rooms, having Michael Jackson crash at his house. Did we mention the time Vladimir Putin sang to him?

Wondering where to start, let’s allow Anka to take the lead considering he recently added ‘interviewer’ to his skill set: “I brought The Beatles to the United States,” Anka declares. “We can start there.”

Let’s talk about you bringing The Beatles to America.

Well, I got my start before them. I got lucky in ‘55; I was the luckiest teenager in the world and became an international creature traveling all over the world and wound up settling down with my wife in France, may she rest in peace. On one occasion in the early ‘60s, I went to Paris to see a friend of mine working at the Olympia Theater. In the course of it all, an announcer came on: “Ladies and gentleman, The Beatles.” I’m going, beetles? But these four guys came on. Being a musician, I was like, “Wow. What’s happening here?” So when I performed at the Olympia myself, they showed up to see me. We continued the relationship into London where we hung out socially. When I came back to New York where I was living part time, (I talked to) my agents at General Artists and I said to them, “There’s these guys! There’s something going on there.” I kept hounding them, and they went over and met with their manager Brian Epstein, and it evolved from that. They came over to Sullivan in ‘64 and all of the sudden music was a thing, like on Madison Avenue. When I was hopping around, it was a smaller industry.

Before The Beatles, you were a teen idol. Did you take full advantage of that?

It’s kind of like how it is today: same bullsh-t, more lights. But back then, we were under the thumb, if you will, of agents and managers because it was all new. I couldn’t leave my hotel because there’d be thousands of kids outside. I was living the dream but saying, “What’s going on here?” I was hiding away trying to deliver three albums a year.

Did you date any of the starlets of the era?

Starlets? Not really. I’m 15, 16 and 17. The only time I ever got serious was with Annette Funicello, a product of Disney who evolved to become America’s sweetheart. I wrote an album for her and we traveled together on tour. But much to the chagrin of the Disney people, I was trying to make the best of the situation. They had people around watching us and trying to curtail it. She wanted to get married and I didn’t, we were too young. Ultimately, she married my agent, Jack Gilardi.

Was there anybody you worked with or met who was most unlike their public persona?

Good question. Well, I knew everybody. We all traveled together and there weren’t a lot of venues. People like Sinatra, Sammy Davis Jr. and Dean Martin, I saw their gentle sides; they were caring. Someone like Jerry Lee Lewis was wilder than I thought. I had to travel to Australia with him and he didn’t like me much. The most gentle, though, was Buddy Holly, who was my friend. We became very close and I knew everything going on in his life. We were going to start a company, and my manager booked him on that tour when he ultimately died [in a plane crash on Feb. 3, 1959, alongside Ritchie Valens and J.P. “The Big Bopper” Richardson].

What was it like when you found out his plane had crashed? I know you even wrote a song for him, 1959’s “It Doesn’t Happen Anymore.”

It was devastating to all of us. We were very close. Unlike today, I’m not sure how close people are with each other when egos and narcissists emerge in the industry. But back then we were a bunch of close kids. Buddy was probably more talented than all of us. His music influenced us, too.

Who else influenced you at that time?

There was also The Everly Brothers, another major influence. But I’d go on tour with them and they wouldn’t even talk to each other; there was real hatred, fighting and carrying on, then they’d go on stage and that was it. So they were great guys, but they couldn’t be together or socialize and that was very sad to us. Chuck Berry was another wild man; we loved Chuck and his talent, and then we realized he was a real womanizer. It got to a point where if we had to take a bus from New York to a distant state, he was always wanted for something or other by the cops. So he had to be flown over two or three states where he was wanted, and then we’d have to pick him up. He ultimately went to jail at the end of that tour.

Tell me about your first time meeting Frank Sinatra.

For all of us, he was on our radar as someone we wanted to emulate: be like him, dress like him, play his same places. It was always Sinatra, Sinatra, Sinatra. He made it difficult for anybody to stand in front of a band after him. The first time I met him socially was at Trader Vic’s, the restaurant. I left my table and went over to introduce myself, intimidated to death. He was very kind and very nice to me. Once I started working in Vegas and hanging out in the steam room with him, we were friends. But I’m still very young. I’m still a kid in the steam room with all of these guys walking around nude trying to avoid eye contact.

What would go on in the steam room?

Unimaginable. I’ll leave it at that. Everybody’s walking around, having laughs, talking business. There were moments when certain times we’d have girls come in and meet us late at night. We were free back then — nobody was afraid of the press the way they are today. I wasn’t really asserting myself. But I certainly absorbed it, enjoyed it and went with the flow. I’ve seen a lot of experiences with him. When you went out with him, you brought your passport because you’d never know where you’d wind up. I saw a show with him in Philadelphia and he had his Learjet waiting. He said, “Come to New York tonight and stay with me.” When we got to New York, he said, “Let’s go to the boat” and we were going up and down to Connecticut. So the one night out turned into a week. It was monumental to me, because I had never spent so much quality time with him like that. We’d go out and there’d be cherry bombs being thrown around. It’d be a lot of frolicking around.

Another time we were in the Fontainebleau in Miami. There’d be holes in the wall, because the FBI was always trying to bug him which pissed him off. We got in there one night and it was late. He said, “Empty the terrace” and threw all these lawn chairs over the terrace on the beach. It was all kinds of fun stuff like that. There was nobody like him.

Is there a song you wrote that you wished Sinatra had recorded?

Well, one of the last ones he recorded but didn’t come out at the time, “Leave It All To Me.” It was actually only released a year ago or so. I kept pushing it and he finally recorded it, but he wasn’t well at that time and he left the studio early. They tabled it for a while and then put it out. So there you go!

Throughout your career you always championed artistic expression. I’m thinking of your album of rock covers, for example. But I wanted to ask you about two different moments, and very different artists. What did you think when Doja Cat sampled “Put Your Head On My Shoulder” for her song “Freak”?

Well, “Shoulder” started before Cat came along. It had a life before her and was very hot on TikTok. But I thought she was talented and knew her manager. They sent it to me for approval and I said, “Why not?” So I signed off on it and away she went and gave it that next life, if you will. I was in full accord. But we’re suffering badly from the music business today, there are no real great heroes happening with it. It’s all about (Daniel) Ek right now and streaming. The music industry is just not what it was anymore. So it’s getting very difficult to sell, so I said let Doja Cat go with it and see what happens. It’s very difficult for anybody to really be heard and seen today.

From one spectrum to another, Sid Vicious recorded a punk cover of your iconic song “My Way,” which famously featured at the end of the movie Goodfellas. How did that come about?

Sid called for a license and I said “no” originally to that, then said, “Why did I say that?” He was sincere. So I said, “Let me think about it.” I had to live with it for a while obviously. Once I computed everything and looked at it hard, I said, “Yeah, go.” And I approved it. Later (the director Martin) Scorsese called for a license to use it. I admire Marty greatly, he’s one of our greatest directors and I loved the cast.

Did you check in with Sinatra for that? After all, it’s by all accounts an insane cover of one of his signature songs.

No, an artist would have no say in that whatsoever unless you use his record. There were certain artists he would verbalize (not liking), but I’ll leave that alone. They were more in another vein. He didn’t like rock n’ roll music from the inception, we all know that. But in terms of “My Way,” I got no feedback on something that he disliked.

The legacy of “My Way’ is still going strong. In the past year alone, the song opened the broadcast of Super Bowl LVIII, was played at Alexei Navalny’s funeral, and is featured in the trailer for the new Brad Pitt and George Clooney movie Wolfs. What are your thoughts on this endurance?

Well, there’s actually a major documentary coming out about “My Way” which I think is going to Cannes next year. I can’t tell you what really jarred me aside from the Vicious record. I’ve been pleasantly surprised by many of the versions: the Gipsy Kings’ version is amazing, Brook Benton, Nina Simone’s version is amazing. I wrote when I was 25 after Sinatra told me was quitting. When I went to write it in New York, it was a spiritual moment; I don’t know where the hell it came from. What really jarred me in relation to the song, is when I started to hear what was happening in the Philippines where they take their karaoke seriously: one person who sang “My Way” got killed, then another person got shot. I think it’s up to eight or nine people who got shot because they sang it wrong! I went to the Philippines just a few months ago and they said, “Yeah, it’s for real! If they don’t like the way you sing it, they shoot you.” And of course I’ve sung it all over the world, to presidents. To Putin.

Wait, you have to tell me what it was like singing to Vladimir Putin.

I had been to Russia a few times before, but singing to him (at a charity event in 2010) and knowing his station in life and his vibe was monumental and moving. He’s into the song, like a lot of others, for whatever reason. It was unlike anything I’ve ever done, and it paid off because I went to the Hermitage Museum with him after until three in the morning eating the greatest caviar I’ve ever had in my life.

What did you talk about?

He was gracious. He didn’t speak English that well, so there were interpreters and bodyguards. It was really about music. He loves the song “Blueberry Hill” by Fats Domino and played it on the piano.

You’re saying Putin played it on the piano?

Yeah, and he sang it. But we also talked about the art that was on the wall. But you have to be careful when you talk, especially with someone who’s not fluent with you. You want to keep civilized without him thinking, “Why am I being asked this?”

One more person I wanted to ask you about is Michael Jackson. He’s now this mythic figure, but what was Michael like one-on-one?

I go in with the Jackson family because they’d come to Caesars Palace to see me or Sinatra when he was much younger. But when he started to take off, I was with Sony Records when he was there. In the early ‘80s I was doing an album of duets and I got a call that he wanted to be part of the project. We already had people like Michael McDonald and Kenny Loggins, but I liked how Michael was evolving. He came out to my house in Carmel, California and stayed with us; that’s when I really got to know him. You know immediately this is a talented person. I was listening to the sounds and arrangements in his head and I’d be banging away at the piano, feeling it differently than anybody else I had worked with. He had that honest innocence. Michael was a sponge too, he wanted to know everything that I could teach him. We talked a lot of shop. We even had conversations about plastic surgery… We know where he went with that. I remember him being competitive with the Osmonds at the time. But I loved Michael; he had a sincerity, a love and a passion for show business and what he was doing.

We wrote three songs, including “This Is It” and “Love Never Felt So Good.” Years later, Drake showed up at my house to work on another track, “Don’t Matter To Me.” Working with him was different because he was all computer stuff. But the only negative part for me with Michael was when he took the tapes out of my studio, because Thriller was taking off and he changed his mind about what we worked on. But I was already into it, spent my money and was getting ready to sweeten them. I ultimately got my tapes back. All of the other stuff with Michael is none of my business, it’s all unfortunate. The Michael I knew was gentle, complimentary and a friend. And that was it.

You went from records to the streaming era as host of the Our Way podcast. What’s it like navigating the show? Do you enjoy interviewing people?

I like it conceptually, and I was living vicariously through it with my son-in-law Jason Bateman who has the best one, SmartLess. I was approached a few times after I did that one, and Howard Stern. I like to talk very openly and honestly, so timing is everything in my business and now I have talked to people like Clive Davis, Gayle King and Bill Burr, and sit there for an hour and a half and just talk. But what I also like is that I’m a listener, and I love it.

You were always the young guy working with these older artists. How do you feel now that it’s flipped?

Well, it’s great living both sides. It’s gratifying that I’m here still doing what I love, and still working and advising. Someone like Michael Bublé has been a dear friend and we talk constantly. Young people don’t understand how we’d go in the studio without any technology except a piece of tape, then rehearsed and rehearsed until we got it. Instead of now, “Oh, we’ll take a year to do this.” But giving wisdom and direction is very heartwarming. The greatest thing in life and my biggest thrill is when you give and see what it does for people. When I was a kid, even the guys I was hanging with like Sinatra or Dean Martin, nobody came from a sophisticated background. We all got lucky and found our groove and vibe. Now I wear the hat of the guys I witnessed; you become who you see. At my age right now, I still do that. And while I enjoy it, I also don’t look at life through a rearview mirror. If you stand still, they throw dirt on you.

Even at 46 years old, Tom Brady can still sling it. TB12 helmed the quarterback position for a beach football game prior to Michael Rubin’s July 4 White Party in the Hamptons, N.Y.

Plenty of star power suited up as Travis Scott proved to be Brady’s go-to receiver on one side. On the other, Quavo had a connection working as a wide receiver with Houston Texans star QB C.J. Stroud.

Footage emerged of La Flame catching a touchdown pass and going the distance from the Patriots legend. “What it look like. What we doing?” a pumped-up Scott said after spiking the football in the sand end zone.

Quavo returned the favor hauling in a pass from Stroud. Other NFL talent on the field included Odell Beckham Jr., Micah Parsons and Damar Hamlin, who picked off Brady for six in the other direction.

Comedian-actor Druski sat out from participating in the game, but he’s always good to lend his hilarious commentary to whatever’s going on in the world. “Ay, good game boys. Y’all did good. Y’all boys got them reps in,” Druski said while rocking a Nike visor and Anaheim Angels jersey.

The White Party festivities continued as celebrities filled the Hamptons mansion. Rubin had a few decorated artists take the make-shift stage with Mary J. Blige, Drake, Lil Wayne and more performing at the party celebrating Independence Day.

Drizzy sang along to his “Girls Want Girls” hit with Lil Baby, which reached No. 2 on the Billboard Hot 100, but it’s unclear if his night was crashed by Kendrick Lamar dropping the visual to his 6 God diss “Not Like Us” on July 4.

Watch some highlights from the beach football game below.

Travis Scott, Quavo, Tom Brady, OBJ, & Druski playing football 🏈 😂 pic.twitter.com/PzF92B7pdk

— Bobbalam (@notbobbalam) July 4, 2024

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