Apple Music and TikTok have announced an exclusive partnership to give TikTok users more music listening options on the short-form app than ever before.

This includes a feature called “Play Full Song” that allows TikTok users with Apple Music accounts to play entire songs on the social app — and the streams from those plays acts just like a regular stream on Apple Music would, including providing the same royalty payment. Users can also swipe through a vertical social feed solely designed for song discovery, and artists can host listening parties on TikTok, allowing them to promote new music and connect with fans where they are already scrolling.

Additionally, after one song ends, another will begin, designed to keep listeners hooked and help them discover new songs. Users can also save their songs directly to their Apple Music playlists and their TikTok “Your Music” folder.

These features will roll out worldwide over the weeks ahead and are already available in some markets.

This marks a major expansion of TikTok and Apple Music’s partnership. For years, TikTok has had an “Add to Music App” feature to help music fans convert their discovery on TikTok into their Apple Music account, but this is the first time full songs can be played on the social app.

“Tapping into the music you love should feel effortless,” says Apple Music’s Ole Obermann. “With Play Full Song, Apple Music subscribers can move easily from discovering a track on TikTok to listening to it in full instantly, without breaking the flow. This integration not only makes it easier for fans to discover, listen to, and engage with the artists they love, but also creates a powerful new pathway for artists – turning moments of discovery into deeper connection and sustained engagement in one simple, seamless experience.”

“TikTok is where music discovery and culture move at the speed of the community,” adds Tracy Gardner, global head of music business development at TikTok. “Thanks to Apple Music, Play Full Song gives fans a seamless way to go from discovery to full-length listening, and Listening Party provides a shared place to experience music together in real time. It’s all about bringing artists and fans closer, and turning shared moments into lasting connections.”

If you were wondering where Tom Misch had been for the past few years, “Flowers in Bloom,” the opening song from sophomore album Full Circle, might offer an answer. “Took some just to heal my mind,” he sings atop an acoustic strum, adding that he “went back to the beginning, just to find it deep within me.” He mentions hitting the “salty air” and appreciating the “ocean breeze.” It is a song that feels lived-in and authentic.

Full Circle (March 27) arrives as Misch’s first full solo studio album in eight years, arriving as a belated sequel to 2018’s Geography. That album came after two star-making mixtapes Beat Tape 1 (2014) and Beat Tape 2 (2015) that marked him out as one of British music’s bright young things, a guitarist and songwriter who could flit between jazz, pop, hip-hop and disco and could pull a feature or two (more on those later).

His star continued to grow during the pandemic due to his Quarantine Sessions which featured covers of Nirvana and Solange. 2020’s What Kinda Music, a joint album with jazz drummer Yussef Dayes, was released via Blue Note Records and nominated for a prestigious Ivor Novello award. 

Yet behind the scenes, Misch was struggling. The pressure of being a solo act – paired with ever-increasing opportunities being sent his way – was impacting his mental health. His anxiety grew to the point that a tour of Australia in 2022 was cancelled. In a recent statement explaining his choices, he said that the “project got bigger than I ever imagined” and that the “intensity of it all caught up with me.” He downed tools, hit the road and fully logged off.

“It came from necessity,” Misch tells Billboard U.K. of that period, speaking from Sri Lanka where he’s visiting on a surfing trip. “I needed something different. I wanted to leave London and be around people and have some kind of structure and routine.” That turned out to be a surfing school in Cornwall, England, where he could enter as a complete beginner and push his body in a way he hadn’t had the chance to.

“It can be really hard as a musician as you’re not part of an institution; there’s no safety net,” he explains. “You’re basically self-employed.”

Being a solo artist, too, instead of a band can lead to “lonely” and “confusing” experiences, especially for performers who don’t use a stage name or moniker; for Misch, his worth and stature as a musician was tied to his personal identity. Deciding to pull back from that and focus on himself was a risky decision, but one he knew he had to take. 

A period of travelling and part-time work in different jobs allowed him to reconnect with himself. He worked as a barista and a gardener (“the first time I properly had a boss”). He drove a campervan through Portugal on a solo venture and moved back to his family home in southeast London. Returning to the guitar – Misch’s primary songwriting tool – came tentatively and without expectations. Eliciting a strong feeling of enjoyment was more important than the end product.

“Following that time out and having that little meltdown, it made me realise I just want to enjoy life and want to feel good and be able to appreciate it,” he says. “There’s no point having a thriving career if you can’t enjoy it. Like, what’s the point?”

He’s not the first British artist in recent times to speak candidly about mental health and tell fans when they need time away. Sam Fender, Lola Young, Wet Leg, Arlo Parks and more have all stepped back from live performances in recent years when the burnout of touring took its toll. A 2023 census by charity Help Musicians said that 30% of U.K. musicians reported low mental wellbeing.

Misch says that starting his career on SoundCloud helped him set a solid base around him as an independent musician and hold autonomy over his career decisions: “I’m very fortunate to be a part of that golden era of SoundCloud. That was my springboard. Those days of being able to create every day and put it out and develop. It also took the pressure off things and helped me find a community.”

He remains an indie musician and retains the rights to his masters, a huge advantage in 2026. A number of his songs (“It Runs Through Me,” “Movie” and “Beautiful Escape”) have amassed hundreds of millions of streams on Spotify alone, and Geography hit No. 8 on the U.K.’s Albums Chart. “I’m fortunate that I don’t have to be thinking about [touring] right now,” he says. “I just want to see how it goes.”

In the intervening years, the 30-year-old released electronic and house-influenced music under the Supershy alias, but a return to music issued as Tom Misch came slowly. Making an album was not a priority, until he began working with a selection of trusted writers and producers to dip his toe in the water. Matt Maltese (Rosalía, Joy Crookes), Ian Fitchuk (Jelly Roll, Beyoncé) and Daniel Tashian (Kacey Musgraves) helped Misch shape the sound and feel of the folk-tinged songs on Full Circle.

A warm new sound emerged from Misch’s songwriting, with Neil Young, JJ Cale, Adrienne Lenker and James Taylor credited as inspirations. “Sisters With Me,” a paean to the support of his loving family, is sonically forthright, and built upon Misch’s combination of tender instrumentation and his soothing vocals. “When the tears are rolling down my face… When I’m lost and trying to find my way/ I know that I will be OK,” he sings of his bond with his two siblings.

“It can be a challenge making a song work with just a guitar, because you have to be saying something interesting and truthful,” he says of the approach on Full Circle. “I feel like the lyrics on this record have to be good, especially when it’s so stripped back. On Geography I could hide behind grooves a bit and production.”

Why was now the right time to let people into his life via his songwriting? “I don’t think I had that maturity before,” he says. “This record is a result of me going through a lot, maturing and just a very introspective process in my life and getting to know myself a bit more.”

Misch says that he craves real authentic interaction in songs, particularly in the industry’s current iteration. “I don’t think it’s deliberately linked to AI, but maybe there’s something subconscious happening there about wanting to make something very human and personal and leaning into that.”

Full Circle boasts just one feature — a switch-up from his previous record, which hosted guest appearances from rappers De La Soul, GoldLink and Loyle Carner. “[Full Circle] felt so personal as a record, I didn’t want to dilute that by chucking on a feature,” he says. “In the past I’ve done features where I’ve sent a rapper a beat and they’ll just send back a verse and that’s it. I haven’t even met half the people I’ve worked with. I didn’t want to do that; it didn’t feel right.”

The bug for creativity caught him, and following the release of Clairo’s 2024 LP Charm – a key influence on Full Circle – he hit up its producer Leon Michels about collaborating. Michels and Misch then connected with Brazilian legend Marcos Valle and headed to Rio de Janeiro to produce and play on the latter’s upcoming album.

Alongside growing his Wildflower community project, which supports emerging musicians, Misch will return to the stage for a two-night stand at London’s KOKO theatre, beginning April 1. He has some new players in his band and is not putting pressure on himself to commit to anything beyond that; if he enjoys the performances, he’ll get more dates booked in. It’s an appropriately wizened approach, following his thoughtful and understated comeback.

“The first thing with me now is, ‘does it feel good?’” he says. “And if it feels good, I’ll have longevity and have a long career, because I feel good.”

HUNTR/X singers EJAE, AUDREY NUNA and REI AMI, who are set to receive Billboard’s 2025 Woman of the Year award at the Hollywood Palladium in Los Angeles on April 29, join a very impressive roster of recipients. The 18 recipients to date have won a combined total of 115 Grammys, three Oscars and a Primetime Emmy.

Reba McEntire, who became the first recipient in 2007, went on to be inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame and receive the Kennedy Center Honors. Madonna, who was named Woman of the Year in 2016, is in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

Taylor Swift, the only two-time Woman of the Year recipient, went on to become the only four-time Grammy winner for album of the year. Beyoncé, Woman of the Year for 2009, went on to become the artist with the most Grammy Awards in history. Billie Eilish, Woman of the Year for 2019, went on to become the first artist in nearly four decades to sweep the Big Four categories at the Grammys in one night. This year, Eilish earned another laurel (alongside her brother, Finneas) as the first three-time song of the year recipients in Grammy history.

EJAE, AUDREY NUNA and REI AMI comprise the first group or duo to receive the honor. EJAE won a Grammy on Feb. 1 for co-writing “Golden,” which took best song written for visual media. She is also nominated for best original song at the Oscars on Sunday March 15 for co-writing the global smash. The trio will perform the song on the telecast.

The Woman of the Year award is an outgrowth of Billboard’s Women in Music list, which was launched in 2005 as a magazine-only feature. As noted, McEntire became the first Woman of the Year honoree in 2007, at an event, “Top 20 Women in Music,” held in conjunction with Lifetime. The first event branded Women in Music was held in 2008. The event has been held every year since, except 2021, when it transitioned from an early-winter to a late-winter gathering.

Check out the past years’ honorees in the gallery below.

Eight-time Grammy winner Kacey Musgraves will release her sixth studio album, Middle of Nowhere, on May 1.

The Lost Highway/Interscope set includes collaborations with Willie Nelson, Miranda Lambert, Billy Strings and Gregory Alan Isakov.

Musgraves has been teasing the 13-song collection on social media and through highway billboards, including posts where she and Lambert traded comments about previously trash-talking each other. The posts led to speculation that either the pair was feuding or had a duet coming. The latter was correct, with the country superstars coming together for a track called “Horses & Divorces.”

The album is prefaced with “Dry Spell,” a humorous, twangy track out today that addresses Musgraves’ 335-day period of abstinence in clever euphemisms: “I’m so lonely, lonely with a capital H if you know what I mean,” she sings, adding, “I’ve been sitting on a washing machine/ Ain’t nobody’s tool up in my shed.” Musgraves directed the video with Hannah Lux Davis.

The song is one of many that addresses a period where Musgraves was sometimes blissfully and sometimes woefully romantically unattached.

“The bulk of this record was made during the longest single period of my life,” said Musgraves in a statement, “And I found that for the first time, it actually felt incredible being alone, and existing in a space not defined by anyone else. I became fascinated with the concept of liminal space, both geographical and emotional. We don’t linger in these transitional, empty spaces long enough and rush to define where or whatever is next. I became so at ease with being in the ‘middle of nowhere’ in many senses, and sitting in the un-comfort of the undefined. I had a lot of time for creative ambling and leaning into myself in different ways; horses, humor, writing with my early collaborators again, and living out my very simple, inspired life between Texas, Tennessee, and Mexico.”

She produced the album, which takes its name from a sign in her small Texas hometown of Golden, with longtime collaborators Daniel Tashian and Ian Fitchuk.

The album is Musgraves’ first since 2024’s Deeper Well, which debuted at No. 1 on Billboard’s Top Country Albums chart. It included philosophical track “The Architect,” which won the Grammy for best country song in 2025.

Middle of Nowhere tracklist:

1. “Middle of Nowhere”
2. “Dry Spell”
3. “Back on the Wagon”
4. “I Believe in Ghosts”
5. “Abilene”
6. “Coyote” feat. Gregory Alan Isakov
7. “Loneliest Girl”
8. “Everybody Wants To Be a Cowboy” feat. Billy Strings
9. “Horses and Divorces” feat. Miranda Lambert
10. “Uncertain, Texas” feat. Willie Nelson
11. “Rhinestoned”
12. “Mexico Honey”
13. “Hell on Me”

Organizers of the annual invite-only Coachella afterparties Desert Nights have today (March 11) announced the lineups for next month’s events. Happening over both weekends of Coachella 2026, Desert Nights will host three nights worth of parties on April 10-12, then again on April 17-19.

The first weekend Desert Nights lineup features Pawsa, Rossi. b2b Carlita, Ayybo, Josh Baker and Deep Dish, David Guetta, Green Velvet b2b Afrojack, Kaz James playing an all vinyl set, Brunello, Adriatique, WhoMadeWho, Bedouin, Ben Sterling Omar and Le Yora.

Weekend two will again feature Sterling and Baker, along with Max Styler, Prospa, Arodes, Alisha, Hugel and friends, Murda Beatz, Sosa, Joshwa, Mochakk, Chloe Caillet, Yamagucci b2b Darco, Rossi. and Riordan. See the complete lineups below.

Desert Nights happens at Zenyara, a 70-acre private estate located 2.5 miles from the Coachella site that features a lake and private beach among other luxe amenities. The parties are hosted by creative agency Corso Millner Group and Framework (the Los Angeles-based dance event company also behind the Coachella 2026 afterparties Framework In the Desert) in partnership with Tao Group Hospitality.

“When we think about how to describe this event, we’re flooded with the feedback we receive each year” Corso Millner Group founder and CEO David Corso says in a statement. “From major music fans, the biggest celebrities and performing artists themselves, the feedback is always the same — ‘There’s nothing like it,’ ‘it’s mind blowing,’ ‘I’ve never seen an event like this in such a luxurious space.’

“For over eight years, that feedback has been the same,” Corso continues. “At CMG, we are fortunate to be able to produce a lot of one of a kind experiences that push the boundaries. Out of everything we do, the culture and experience that we’ve curated with Desert Nights is the coolest thing we do.” 

Check out the 2026 Desert Nights lineups below.