Nick Cave has already sorted the soundtrack for his funeral, with Kanye West apparently set to accompany the somber scene.

Cave’s musical request was made via his Red Hand Files website in which he responds to letters from fans. One letter, from Helen in the U.K., reflected on Cave’s choices for his recent appearance on BBC Radio’s Desert Island Discs segment, in which listeners choose the songs to accompany them on a desert island. Cave’s eight songs included cuts from Bob Dylan and Johnny Cash, T. Rex, Nina Simone, John Lee Hooker, Karen Dalton, Tim Rose, Kanye West, and The Saints.

Helen’s letter went on to ask Cave about how he deals with hypothetical questions related to loss and guilt, while another inquiry from Damian in the U.S. asked about the song he would like to be played at his funeral.

Following a lengthy rumination on his own experiences with grief, Cave closed his response by answering Damian’s question with a track from 2013’s Yeezus album: “Please, ‘I Am A God’ by Kanye West”.

It’s not the first time that Cave had professed his love of West, with another Red Hand Files response from January 2020 seeing West described as “our greatest artist” by the Australian musician.

“Making art is a form of madness – we slip deep within our own singular vision and become lost to it,” Cave wrote at the time. “There is no musician on Earth that is as committed to their own derangement as Kanye, and in this respect, at this point in time, he is our greatest artist.”

Months after that praise, a fan named Vassilis inquired via Cave’s site about whether West’s 2021 album Donda had been “delayed because you both took the last-minute decision to include a track you have been working on together”. Cave’s response was much shorter and succinct than his typical responses: “Dear Vassilis, No. Love, Nick.”

Vince Guaraldi’s soundtrack to the 1975 animated TV special Be My Valentine, Charlie Brown, debuts across an array of Billboard album charts (dated Feb. 1), including top 10 arrivals on Jazz Albums, Traditional Jazz Albums and Indie Store Album Sales. It also takes a bow on the Kid Albums and Top Album Sales charts.

This is the first time the complete soundtrack to the special has been released, as only select tracks from the program have been released previously.

Be My Valentine, Charlie Brown marked the 13th animated Peanuts special, and premiered on CBS-TV on Jan. 28, 1975. It garnered an Emmy Award nomination for outstanding children’s special.

The soundtrack was issued nearly 50 years to the day after the program’s debut – as the album arrived on Jan. 17, 2025. The 30-track album was released via streaming services, as well as to purchase as a digital download, CD and across three vinyl variants (a standard black vinyl, plus a red-colored edition and pink-colored edition).

Be My Valentine, Charlie Brown enters at No. 7 on Traditional Jazz Albums, No. 9 on the overall Jazz Albums ranking, No. 9 on Indie Store Album Sales, No. 18 on Kid Albums and No. 48 on Top Album Sales. The set earned a little over 2,000 equivalent album units in the U.S. in the week ending Jan. 23, according to Luminate, with nearly all of that sum driven by traditional album sales.

Be My Valentine, Charlie Brown is the latest in a series of from-the-vaults Peanuts soundtrack releases Lee Mendelson Film Productions, the company that produced more than 50 Peanuts animated specials. In recent years, the studio has released Guaraldi’s companion albums to You’re Not Elected, Charlie Brown; It Was a Short Summer, Charlie Brown and A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving.

The first Peanuts animated special, 1965’s A Charlie Brown Christmas, launched the evergreen soundtrack album of the same name from Vince Guaraldi Trio. That set has spent more than 100 nonconsecutive weeks at No. 1 on the Kid Albums chart and has visited the top 40 of the all-genre Billboard 200 in every holiday season for the last 10 years.

Jelly Roll will play a headlining benefit show to support first responders who have bravely faced the wildfires that ravaged parts of greater Los Angeles earlier this month.

The “I Am Not Okay” hitmaker will lead the benefit concert on Saturday at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, California, and is inviting only first responders and their families/guests to attend.

TMZ first reported the benefit show, and Billboard has independently confirmed the event.

The show, which is set to begin at 8 p.m. on Saturday, is said to possibly include some unnamed “friends” of Jelly Roll who will also take part. According to TMZ, tickets for the show are free, and Los Angeles first responders were offered up to four tickets for themselves, family and friends.

This isn’t the only benefit concert Jelly Roll is performing at connected to supporting those impacted by the wildfires. The six-time Billboard Country Airplay No. 1 hitmaker will also take part in the massive FireAid benefit concert, which will take place at Intuit Dome and the Kia Forum on Thursday (Jan. 30) and also features Billie Eilish, Olivia Rodrigo, Lady Gaga and more.

Antioch, Tennessee, native Jelly Roll has been steadily piling up accolades over the past few years, including seeing his current album Beautifully Broken debut atop the all-genre Billboard 200 chart. Along the way, he’s also secured a CMA Award win for new artist of the year and earned four Grammy nominations, as well as a nomination for the CMA’s coveted entertainer of the year honor.

But Jelly Roll has been keen on blending music and mission from the beginning, working to help others and shining a light on those who are struggling with various trials, whether that be depression, addiction or incarceration. On tour, he regularly visits jails in the cities where his tour stops. His most recent No. 1 party, for his song “I Am Not Okay,” was held at the Riverbend Maximum Security Institution in Nashville, where he performed for inmates and offered them encouragement.

In the 50-year history of Saturday Night Live, the show’s myriad musical highlights have been paired with plenty of controversies, but creator and producer Lorne Michaels has asserted that no musical guest has ever been barred from returning.

Michaels’ claims emerged in the new three-hour documentary Ladies & Gentleman… 50 Years of SNL Music, which premiered on NBC on Monday (Jan. 27). Alongside notable revelations in regards to the show’s musical history (including the fact that no one seems to know the melody to the SNL theme song), Michaels pushed back at long-standing reports that numerous artists have been banned from the show for various reasons.

“I’ll read it sometimes in the Post, ‘So and so’s banned for life,’” Michaels explained. “We’ve never banned anyone. We’re way too crass and opportunistic. If something’s hot, we’re going to go for it and have it on.”

Though it’s not exactly clear where the reports that artists have been banned from SNL have emerged from over the years, a number of controversial appearances make it easy to see why bans would be expected.

One of the earliest incidents of an apparently banned performer came from a December 1977 episode in which Elvis Costello stepped in for the Sex Pistols. Despite planning to perform “Less Than Zero”, Costello switched up his set at the last moment and instead performed “Radio Radio” – a track that was critical of commercial radio in his native U.K. Undeterred by the negative reaction his appearance generated from the show’s staff, Costello later returned to the show in 1989, 1991, and again in 1999 where he parodied his first performance alongside the Beastie Boys.

Among the most notable examples of controversial musical guests was that of Sinéad O’Connor, who tore up an image of Pope John Paul II during an a cappella performance of Bob Marley’s “War” in 1992. Protesting sexual abuse within the Roman Catholic Church, O’Connor’s urging for viewers to “fight the real enemy” became one of the most infamous moments on the show’s history.

Other instances also include Los Angeles punk outfit Fear appearing on the show at the insistence of John Belushi in 1981, with their rowdy set reportedly causing $500,000 in damage. A 2004 performance from Ashlee Simpson also gained international notoriety after she was revealed to be lip-syncing due to illness, though she would later return the following year without incident.

The nascent documentary also featured further information about Rage Against the Machine’s 1996 performance, in which they appeared alongside then-presidential candidate Steve Forbes. 

Following a version of “Bulls on Parade” (which was planned to feature upside-down American flags hung from their amps until stagehands intervened), bassist Tim Commerford vented his frustration by throwing one of the flags into Forbes’ empty dressing room. The incident caused the Secret Service to respond on behalf of the billionaire, locking the band down in their dressing room until the completion of the show.

The 50 Years of SNL Music documentary – which is co-directed by Oscar-winning Roots drummer Questlove – is part of SNL’s 50th anniversary programming, and arrived following the premiere of SNL50: Beyond Saturday Night on Jan. 16.

Mac Miller’s Balloonerism bows at No. 1 across multiple Billboard album charts, including Top Album Sales, Top Rap Albums, Vinyl Albums and Indie Store Album Sales. Plus, seven of the album’s tracks dot the Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs chart. Balloonerism’s songs date back to 2014, but the project was shelved in favor of other releases.

Balloonerism is the second No. 1 on Top Album Sales for Miller, who died in 2018. It’s also his third leader on Top Rap Albums, his sixth chart-topper on Vinyl Albums and his first on the Indie Store Album Sales ranking.

Balloonerism sold a little over 41,000 copies in the U.S. in the tracking week ending Jan. 23, according to Luminate. Vinyl sales comprise the bulk of that sum – 32,000, marking his best sales week ever on vinyl.

Billboard’s Top Album Sales chart ranks the top-selling albums of the week based only on traditional album sales. The chart’s history dates back to May 25, 1991, the first week Billboard began tabulating charts with electronically monitored piece count information from SoundScan, now Luminate. Pure album sales were the sole measurement utilized by the Billboard 200 albums chart through the list dated Dec. 6, 2014, after which that chart switched to a methodology that blends album sales with track equivalent album (TEA) units and streaming equivalent album (SEA) units.

On Top Album Sales, Miller triumphs over a surging Gracie Abrams, whose The Secret of Us vaults 33-2 with 21,000 sold (up 689% after the vinyl and CD release of a deluxe edition of the album). Rounding out the rest of the top 10: the Wicked soundtrack (moving 2-3), Stray Kids’ HOP (5-4), Chappell Roan’s The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess (3-5), Sabrina Carpenter’s Short n’ Sweet (holding at No. 6), Billie Eilish’s Hit Me Hard and Soft (9-7), ROSÉ’s Rosie (11-8), Fleetwood Mac’s Rumours (13-9) and Tyler, The Creator’s IGOR (15-10).

On the Billboard 200, Balloonerism debuts at No. 3 – the eighth top 10-charting set for Miller on that ranking.

Miller On the R&B/Hip-Hop & Rap Charts: Miller earns his third No. 1 on the Top Rap Albums chart. He first ruled with Blue Slide Park in 2011 and followed with The Divine Feminine in 2016, both of which led for one week. On the Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums list, Balloonerism debuts at No. 2 andgives the late rapper his seventh top 10 effort. In addition to the No. 1s Blue Slide Park and The Divine Feminine, he also reached the region with Watching Movies With the Sound Off (No. 3 in 2013); GO:OD AM (No. 2, 2015); Swimming (No. 3, 2018) and Faces (No. 3, 2021).

Seven of Balloonerism’s tracks land on the Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs chart, led by a No. 16 debut for “Funny Papers.” The arrival instantly makes it Miller’s second-highest peak on the chart among his 23 entries, trailing only the No. 10 best for “Good News” in 2020.

Notable among the other tracks, “5 Dollar Pony Rides” bolts 32-19 in its second week on Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs and wins the weekly Streaming Gainer and Sales Gainer honors. “DJ’s Chord Organ,” featuring SZA, begins at No. 23 and opens at No. 7 on the Hot R&B Songs chart.

Over On the Billboard Hot 100: On the all-genre, multi-metric Hot 100, four of the album’s songs debut: “Funny Papers” (No. 77), “5 Dollar Pony Rides” (No. 85), “DJ’s Chord Organ” (No. 95) and “Stoned” (No. 97).

Miller Hits a New Peak on the Billboard Artist 100 Chart: Activity surrounding Ballonerism drives Miller 66-2 on the Billboard Artist 100, a new peak for the rapper at his 83rd nonconsecutive week on the chart. The Billboard Artist 100 measures artist activity across key metrics of music consumption – album and track sales, radio airplay and streaming – to provide a weekly multi-dimensional ranking of the most popular artists in the U.S.