When Olivia Dean accepted the Grammy Award for best new artist at the 68th annual honors on Sunday night (Feb. 1), she wasn’t just cementing a huge moment in her own career. As an artist signed to Island Records in the U.S., she also helped her label make history: After Chappell Roan won best new artist at the 2025 ceremony, Island Records is now the first record label in at least 40 years to land back-to-back best new artist victories.

Island’s wins came as the label scored a pair of nominees in each of the past two years, with Sabrina Carpenter and Roan both nominated in 2025, and Lola Young joining Dean on the nominees list this year. Atlantic Records (Alex Warren, The Marías) also had two nominees this year, and Warner Records had two nominees in both 2025 (Benson Boone, Teddy Swims) and 2023 (Anitta, Omar Apollo), though none brought home the award. But Island’s feat extends back to the 1980s.

This being the music industry, none of this is exactly straightforward; labels and imprints are nearly always in flux, and corporate structures mean that some label collectives and groups could claim back-to-back winners in various years. (Island itself is part of the REPUBLIC Collective, which includes Republic Records, Mercury Records, Def Jam and others.) One recent example: Olivia Rodrigo, signed to Geffen, won best new artist in 2022, while Samara Joy, signed to Verve, won in 2023. Both are part of the Interscope Geffen A&M umbrella (which itself is now even broader, encompassing Capitol Music Group as well), though they are separate labels.

The last label to have done it, then, was Epic Records back in the mid-1980s — technically, the label did it three years in a row — and even that comes with a bit of an explanation. In 1984, Culture Club won best new artist, having put out their debut album Kissing to Be Clever on Virgin in the U.K. and Epic in the U.S. The following year, Cyndi Lauper took home the honor, having released She’s So Unusual on Portrait Records — a subsidiary of Epic, which at various points was folded into and a standalone under the Epic banner. In 1986, Sade won best new artist following the release of Diamond Life — an album that came out under the Portrait banner in the U.S. and Epic in the U.K. While slightly convoluted, Epic (and Portrait) were variously involved in each release over that three-year period.

Prior to Epic, it hadn’t been long since another label did it: Warner Bros. Records, which saw its artists Rickie Lee Jones and Christopher Cross win in 1980 and 1981, respectively, for their self-titled debut albums. Warner appears to have been the first to achieve the feat, meaning only three labels have accomplished it since the award was inaugurated in 1960.

Lorde is giving back to one of the communities she stopped through on her Ultrasound World Tour as it navigates a period of political turmoil: Minneapolis, the site of a weeks-long ICE operation that led to the deaths of two civilians in January.

In a post on her Instagram Story on Tuesday (Feb. 3), the New Zealand native announced that she’s contributing the money she made from merch sales in the Minnesota city, about three months after she played two Ultrasound shows there in October at the Minneapolis Armory. She wrote, “I’m donating our merch take in Minneapolis ($204k) to Minnesota Immigration Rights Action Committee + Immigrant Defense Network.”

Lorde also shared a photo of herself with her face cropped out, the phrase “ICE Out” written in black marker on the back of one of her hands.

The Minnesota Immigration Rights Action Committee is a grassroots organization that organizes protests and gathers resources for families affected by ICE raids, detainments and deportations. The Immigrant Defense Network is made up of more than 90 immigrant, labor, legal, faith and community organizations “dedicated to protecting and advancing the constitutional rights of immigrant communities across Minnesota” through “referrals to legal support and coordinated educational activities,” according to its website.

The singer-songwriter’s contribution comes as many immigrant families are struggling in Minneapolis, where ICE has been deployed for the past month or so. National outrage over the agency’s actions in the city reached a fever pitch in January when Renee Good was shot and killed by an ICE officer named Jonathan Ross, and fully boiled over when Alex Pretti was shot and killed by a different officer just a couple of weeks later.

The Donald Trump administration has insisted that both deaths were the result of officers acting in self-defense, but many Americans disagree, with video footage captured by eyewitnesses seeming to suggest that neither officer was ever in danger. Lorde’s “ICE Out” message on Instagram echoes the one displayed on buttons worn by numerous stars at the 2026 Grammys on Sunday (Feb. 1), including Billie Eilish, Kehlani and Justin and Hailey Bieber.

Lorde is far from the only star who’s rallied support for Minneapolis. Lizzo recently shared a video of ways her followers could help, and Tom Morello held a “Concert of Resistance & Solidarity” event in the city on Jan. 30 with Bruce Springsteen — whose protest song “Streets of Minneapolis” dropped shortly prior — in attendance and performing, too.

Supporting her Billboard 200 No. 2 album Virgin, Lorde’s Ultrasound trek kicked off in September 2025 and saw the performer play shows across North America and Europe through mid-December. Later in February, she’ll embark on a run of shows in Australia and New Zealand.

E-40 and Too Short are ready to bring their Bay Area flair to the 2026 NFL Honors. 40 Water and Short are slated to perform at the ceremony honoring the league’s biggest stars on Thursday (Feb. 5) at the Palace of Fine Arts in San Francisco.

The event kicks off at 9 p.m. ET and will be broadcast on both NBC and NFL Network, also streaming on Peacock and NFL+. Jon Hamm is set to host the NFL Honors while Druski, WWE superstar Seth Rollins, Tiffany Haddish, Tracy Morgan and actress Madelyn Cline are involved as presenters.

The NFL Honors will unveil the Pro Football Hall of Fame Class of 2026 and will announce awards such as mvp, coach of the year, offensive player of the year, defensive player of the year and comeback player of the year.

The ceremony kicks off Super Bowl weekend in San Francisco with the Seattle Seahawks set to battle the New England Patriots in Super Bowl LX at Levi’s Stadium in Santa Clara, Calif., on Sunday (Feb. 8).

Bad Bunny will headline the Super Bowl Halftime Show, and fans should expect to see Cardi B cheering on the Pats and her NFL boo, Stefon Diggs, on the NBC broadcast. It’s safe to say that E-40 will be rooting for the Patriots as well, since the Seahawks took out his beloved San Francisco 49ers on the road to the SB.

On the music side, Too Short released his Sir Too $hort, Vol. 1 (Freaky Tales) in April. Short wants to keep rapping into his sixties and he hopes to inspire his peers as well as the next generation to not put an age cap on hip-hop.

“When it’s all said and done I would love for a younger rapper, just one, to say, ‘Man, I wanna stick around like E-40 and Too $hort,’” he told Billboard in 2025. “Motivation!”

The Brooklyn Mirage saga has taken another twist with the announcement that the beleaguered nightclub has been acquired by Dubai-based hospitality and retail group FIVE Holdings. The news follows a laundry list of issues at the space related to permitting, bankruptcy and eventual plans for demolition that endured through much of 2025.

Under this new ownership, the Brooklyn Mirage will become the newest location of Pacha, the clubbing institution with a longstanding flagship location in Ibiza. Pacha New York City will be the second time the Pacha brand has franchised to New York, with the first Pacha New York location open from 2005 to 2015 under different ownership.

On Tuesday (Feb. 3), FIVE Holdings announced that it has entered into a long-term agreement assuming full operational management of the Brooklyn Mirage and The Great Hall complex, two of three spaces in the Avant Gardner complex. FIVE Holdings acquired The Pacha Group itself in 2023 in a deal valued at $330 million. (Pacha clubs in Barcelona and Munich are franchised venues and were not involved in the sale.)

The Brooklyn Mirage is now set to open in June and host a 2026 season ending in October, with the new operators promising “the world’s most sought-after electronic artists, Grammy-winning performers, and large-scale shows rarely seen in New York City, delivered with the production depth and ambition the culture deserves.” Meanwhile, the Great Hall complex will continue to operate year-round as a multi-genre venue.

The news marks a dramatic turn for the Brooklyn Mirage, which was, as of last October, set for demolition after the owners filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in August, according to public records. The club had been scheduled to reopen in May after a comprehensive remodel, but it never opened its doors due to ongoing permitting issues.

As Billboard reported last June, Andrew Axelrod’s Axar Capital had been a secured creditor of Avant Gardner — the Brooklyn nightclub company that booked and managed the Brooklyn Mirage, Kings Hall and the Great Hall — since late 2023 and had been leading unsuccessful efforts to reopen the venue.

In a statement, Axelrod said: “After supporting Avant Gardner through a challenging period in 2025, we are pleased to have achieved an agreement in principle with the Committee of Unsecured Creditors resolving all material matters related to the Chapter 11 plan and sale transaction, as reflected in yesterday’s filings in the U.S. Bankruptcy Court With these matters now resolved, the transition to FIVE and Pacha can move forward in earnest.”

Pacha New York City will be the first U.S. project from FIVE Holdings, which, in addition to Pacha Ibiza and a nearby Ibiza hotel, also encompasses a namesake hotel brand with three locations in Dubai and a property in Zurich, Switzerland.

“New York — the financial and cultural capital of the world — represents more than a market expansion for FIVE and Pacha; it marks a defining moment in our global journey,” added FIVE Holdings chairman and chief executive Kabir Mulchandani. “This move reflects the strength of our vision, the resilience of our platform, and our ambition to help shape the future of entertainment on a global stage. We are entering a city that influences how the world thinks, creates, and connects — and we do so with bold imagination, long-term commitment, and the confidence to build destinations that resonate far beyond their physical walls. For us, New York is not simply a new chapter — it is a statement of intent about the scale of our aspirations and the cultural impact we are here to create.”