Karol G achieves her 21st No. 1 on Billboard’s Latin Airplay chart as “Coleccionando Heridas,” with Marco Antonio Solís, rises from No. 3 to secure the top spot on the chart dated Jan. 31. Solís returns to No. 1 after more than a decade, with the victory giving him a 12th leader.

“Coleccionando Heridas” is the fourth single from Karol G’s Top Latin Albums No. 1 Tropicoqueta to land at the summit on the overall Latin Airplay chart. Cowritten by Karol G, Keytin, CASTA and Edgar Barrera, the song takes the lead in its 13th week, marking the longest climb to the top among the album’s four chart-topping singles: “Si Antes Te Hubiera Conocido” took four weeks to hit No. 1, “Latina Foreva” achieved the feat in seven weeks and “Verano Rosa” succeeded in 11 weeks.

“Coleccionando Heridas” reaches the summit following a 16% increase in audience impressions, to 8.83 million, accrued during the Jan. 16-22 tracking week, according to Luminate.

With the new achievement, Karol collects her 21st No. 1 on Latin Airplay, the second-most champs among women since the chart’s inception in 1994. She trails only Shakira, who continues to lead with 24.

For Marco Antonio Solís, the success marks his return to the top of the Latin Airplay chart after more than a decade, his last No. 1 being his featured turn on Enrique Iglesias’ 2014 No. 1 “El Perdedor.” In between, El Buki secured a top 10 through “Se Veía Venir” (No. 5 high in 2021).

Beyond its Latin Airplay coronation, “Coleccionando Heridas” fortifies its stronghold on Latin Pop Airplay, reigning for a fifth consecutive week at No. 1.

Grupo Frontera’s 16th Hit

Elsewhere on the Latin charts, Grupo Frontera achieves its 16th No. 1 on Regional Mexican Airplay through “Monterrey” as the song jumps 2-1 with 7.8 million audience impressions, up 17%, during the tracking week.

Among its 16th champs, “Monterrey” gives Grupo Frontera its second ruler unaccompanied by any other act, following “Hecho Pa’ Mí” in 2024.

“Monterrey” is one of 13 songs on the album Lo Que Me Falta Por Llorar, which debuted and peaked at No. 11 on the Regional Mexican Albums chart in November.


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Super Bowl LX is almost here. The storied game — this year on Feb. 8 — always features so much more than just football. From coveted commercial spots to performances — including the famous halftime show — there’s a lot to take in over the weekend of the Big Game.

Bad Bunny marks his second time appearing on the field, but this time as the headliner for Apple Music Super Bowl LX Halftime Show. (He appeared as a guest during Shakira and Jennifer Lopez’s set in 2020.) And a teaser trailer for his upcoming stint promises that “the world will dance.”

Charlie Puth, Brandi Carlile and Coco Jones are among the performers for the pre-game show, but there’s many more musicians who will make their mark on the festivities, too.

In 2026, the league is also celebrating the contest’s 60th year, with a special opening ceremony to commemorate the anniversary. Green Day – who hails from the Bay Area where the game will take place — will perform.

Then, of course, there are the commercials. So far, high-profile ads starring Sabrina Carpenter and EJAE (the voice of HUNTR/X’s Rumi in KPop Demon Hunters) have been announced. Expect more to come in the following days.

And we can’t forget about the parties, where stars such as Post Malone, The Chainsmokers, Ludacris, Loud Luxury and others are set to appear.


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Keep reading for everything you need to know about the 2026 Super Bowl. For more, relive the best Super Bowl commercials from 2025, the 14 best halftime shows ever and a timeline of every halftime show since 1991 to the present day.

When Ozzy Osbourne died in July, the world remembered how the Black Sabbath legend had shaped both modern rock and many aspects of today’s music business — showing artists how they could build massive merchandising empires and turn reality TV stardom into a new revenue stream, while also pioneering the concept of a genre-focused touring festival.

But while Ozzy was the face of those innovations, the creative force behind the blueprints was his wife of 43 years, Sharon Osbourne — a supremely talented music executive in her own right who’s not yet done changing the industry.

“All of the creative direction for visuals at Ozzfest was mine. I can’t sing a note — I’m tone-deaf — but I can be creative, and I like to create things,” Osbourne, 73, reminisced in December from a hotel room on New York’s Upper East Side, perfectly coiffed and sipping tea after a late night out at a star-studded private rock show at the Capitol Theatre in Port Chester, N.Y., that featured Slash, Eddie Vedder, Anthony Kiedis, Yungblud and Bruno Mars, among others.

“I’ve been talking to Live Nation about bringing [Ozzfest] back recently,” she continues. “It was something Ozzy was very passionate about: giving young talent a stage in front of a lot of people. We really started metal festivals in this country. It was [replicated but] never done with the spirit of what ours was, because ours was a place for new talent. It was like summer camp for kids.”

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First, Osbourne says, she’s working with Live Nation to launch a classical tour of Black Sabbath’s catalog, performed by local orchestras and set to state-of-the-art visuals, as well as a scripted feature film about a portion of Ozzy’s life. (Just weeks before Ozzy’s death last summer, Osbourne organized Back to the Beginning, a farewell concert for Black Sabbath stacked with metal legends in the band’s native Birmingham, England, that raised around $10 million for charity.)

Osbourne, the daughter of music impresario Don Arden, was born in London and cut her teeth working at her father’s record label, Jet Records, before taking what she calls the biggest risk of her career: leaving that label to manage Ozzy, whom she’d married after he was fired from Black Sabbath in 1979.

“Everybody thought Ozzy’s career was never going to happen as a solo artist — in those days, there weren’t that many people that had left bands and actually gone on and done really well,” she recalls. “They thought Ozzy and I would just end up in the toilet. It was really about getting up every day and showing everyone: F–k you, this is what we’re going to do. I never took no for an answer.”

She went on to manage acts including The Smashing Pumpkins and Motörhead. And while she wouldn’t go back into management now (“management is all or nothing — you can’t just be a little bit in”), she’s still obsessed with discovering new talent, seeing as much live music as she can and scouring the internet for gems. “I’ll troll all night,” she says, “and I’ll reach out to people I think are talented.

“I’m not interested in little girls in leotards throwing themselves around and humping the floor — some of them are really talented, but it’s not original,” Osbourne continues. “You have to have that sense of individuality, because otherwise you’re just a clone. Are you going to be an icon? Are you going to last the test of time? If you want to be a serious artist, who are you? It’s so easy to market yourself these days. Come out with a great little video — do it yourself at home, but be different. Don’t follow. You’ve got to be a leader. You’ve got to have your own look, your own sound. Your voice has to be instantly recognizable.”

Osbourne finds the business “very nerdy” now, remarking that “everybody is so polite,” and she hates streaming and AI-generated music: “I don’t like anything by machines — it’s got no soul.”

She still looks up to great executives, though, particularly Irving Azoff (“Love him, hate him, whatever — he’s a f–king icon,” she says). And while she says “grief is a new part of my life that I have to get used to” and admits she gets little sleep (“I’m up 24 hours a day. I only catnap now”), she’s heartened by the prospect of showcasing a new crop of rising stars at the next iteration of Ozzfest, which she says could launch as soon as 2027.

The festival would tour everywhere, just like it used to, she says, but of course, she has a new vision for it: “I’d like to mix up the genres.”

This story appears in the Jan. 24, 2026, issue of Billboard.

Ashley Tisdale ignited a fire with her essay from The Cut entitled “Breaking Up With My Toxic Mom Group” released on New Year’s Day. In the short tome, the High School Musical Star attempted to anonymously chronicle the drama between her and her then-unknown group of mothers she used to call friends.

“I felt lucky when my friend brought together a group of new moms that she knew. My friend’s friends were in the same situation as I was. Most of us had been pregnant through the early pandemic, so we missed out on the activities where you meet other expectant mothers,” she wrote. “We hadn’t had baby showers or prenatal yoga, and hardly anyone had held our newborns. But finally, we were able to be together, and our kids were able to be together, and it all felt right.”

But then, things took a turn for the worse, according to Tisdale, who used her married name, Ashley French, as the byline. “I remember being left out of a couple of group hangs, and I knew about them because Instagram made sure it fed me every single photo and Instagram Story,” she continued.

Recounting more unease, she ultimately decided to pull the trigger on the friendships and exit what she thought was a close-knit found-family through text message. “Here’s the hard-earned lesson I hope you’ll take to heart: It’s not the right group for you. Even if it looks like they’re having the best time on Instagram,” she finished the essay.

Of course, it didn’t end there. Internet-sleuthing quickly followed, with many theorizing – through those pesky Instagram posts – who Tisdale may have been writing about, including Hilary Duff, Mandy Moore and Meghan Trainor (although Tisdale’s rep denied it was them). So how did we get here? And what happened next? Keep reading to find out.


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These memories still follow us around. The video for Taylor Swift’s “Wildest Dreams” — off of her fifth full-length, 1989 — has has passed one billion views on YouTube, her sixth to accomplish that feat. (The others? “Blank Space,” “Shake It Off,” “You Belong With Me,” “Bad Blood” and “Look What You Made Me Do.”)

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Directed by Joseph Kahn — who also helmed the superstar’s visuals for “Blank Space,” “Bad Blood,” “Look What You Made Me Do,” “… Ready for It?” “End Game” and “Delicate” — dropped in August of 2015 in support of 1989’s fifth single.

The video stars Swift and Scott Eastwood as old-school Hollywood actors on the set of a 1950s movie in Africa, and whose short-lived love affair wreaks havoc during filming and at the film’s premiere. During the end credits of the gorgeously shot romantic tale, the title cards revealed that “all of Taylor’s proceeds from this video will be donated to wild animal conservation efforts through the African Parks Foundation of America.”

Eastwood recently admitted he was unaware of Swift when he got the call for the role. “I’d never met Taylor Swift before,” he said during the press tour for his 2025 movie Regretting You. “She called me out of the blue. She said, ‘Hey this is Taylor.’ I’m, like, ‘Taylor who?’”

In a 2016 interview, the actor revealed he also almost didn’t end up in the video. “None of my agents wanted me to do it, actually,” Eastwood said. “They said, ‘Oh, we don’t want you to do that! Why would you be Taylor Swift’s boy toy?’ and I said, ‘Why the hell not?’”

Watch the video for “Wildest Dreams” below:


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As part of the questionnaire for this year’s Power 100 list, honorees were prompted to give their thoughts on four separate questions: the state of the industry, what they foresee for the future of the business, the charities they support and what they would do if they didn’t work in music. Over the next several days, we’ll run a roundup of responses to each of those questions — our way of offering a snapshot of what the biggest players in the industry are thinking as we head into the new year.

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This first installment focuses on the following question: “What are your frustrations with the industry right now?” In the answers, executives hit on a few common themes. On the A&R front, one frequently-voiced frustration was an over-reliance on data and too little commitment to traditional methods of artist development, while others seemed concerned about the lack of a united front in the business — or, as one executive put it, “When it’s everyone against the world, it’s a bit easier.”

But more striking was the wide range of responses, from frustration around low streaming payouts, to the loss of jobs at record labels, to AI companies training their models on music without consent or payment to rightsholders, to one age-old complaint: so-called “bad actors” who prey on vulnerable artists.

Check out all the responses below, from executives including Mitch Glazier (RIAA), Larry Jackson (gamma.), Sherrese Clarke (Harbourview Equity Partners) and Elizabeth Matthews (ASCAP). And stay tuned for more roundups in the coming days.

Her lips may be sealed, but Haylie Duff’s Instagram stories speak volumes. The elder sister of Hilary Duff shared a snap of a playdate between her and Ashley Tisdale‘s kids, which the actress then shared to her own account.

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“Under table shenanigans,” Duff wrote of the children playing together.

Tisdale, of course, recently sparked controversy when she penned an essay for The Cut, in which she called out a “toxic” mom group that fans theorized involves Hilary, Mandy Moore and Meghan Trainor among others, though she didn’t name names. “I thought I found my village. Instead I was back in high school,” Tisdale wrote. “Even though it had been decades since 10th grade, the experience of being left out felt so similar.”

“Here’s the hard-earned lesson I hope you’ll take to heart: It’s not the right group for you. Even if it looks like they’re having the best time on Instagram,” she added of eventually leaving the cadre of mothers. Tisdale would later deny she was writing about the specific group of Duff, Moore and Trainor.

At the time, Haylie — who is rumored to be estranged from her sister — liked the Instagram that Tisdale posted to her account of the article.

Hilary’s husband, Matthew Koma, then took to his own Instagram to mock Tisdale’s magazine cover. “When You’re The Most Self Obsessed Tone Deaf Person On Earth, Other Moms Tend To Shift Focus To Their Actual Toddlers,” Koma’s fake headline read.

For her part, Hilary remained silent, only promoting her upcoming album Luck… or Something, out this February. Trainor also weighed in on TikTok with “me finding out about the apparent mom group drama” in text over a video of her sitting at her computer with her song “Still Don’t Care” playing in the background.


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Bruce Springsteen released one of the most politically charged tracks of his career on Wednesday (Jan. 28) with the surprise drop of the smoldering protest song “Streets of Minneapolis.” In a statement, the Rock and Roll Hall of Famer said the song was written on Saturday (Jan. 24) and recorded on Tuesday (Jan. 27) in response to “the state terror being visited on the city of Minneapolis.”

In the tradition of one of his icons, folk legend Woody Guthrie, the song’s lyrics plainly and powerfully tell the story of the pitched battles being fought on the streets of the city as citizens stand up and push back on the sometimes violent immigration raids being carried out by the Trump administration. Specifically, he pays tribute to the violent actions by border and ICE agents that so far this month have resulted in the killings of two American citizens: 37-year-old mother of three Renée Good and 37-year-old intensive care nurse Alex Pretti.

Springsteen dedicated the song to the people of Minneapolis, as well as “our innocent immigrant neighbors,” and to the memories of Good and Pretti.

The Nebraska-like urgent rocker opens with just Springsteen and spare instrumentation as he seethes, “Through the winter’s ice and cold/ Down Nicollet Avenue/ A city aflame fought fire and ice/ ‘Neath an occupier’s boots/ King Trump’s private army from the DHS/ Guns belted to their coats/ Came to Minneapolis to enforce the law/ Or so their story goes.”

The song, which is a callback to Springsteen’s Oscar and Grammy-winning 1994 soundtrack anthem “Streets of Philadelphia” from director Ted Demme’s 1993 AIDS drama Philadelphia, bursts into a full band roar by the second verse. Springsteen praises the brave push-back from residents of Minneapolis against the masked ICE and other border patrol enlistees who have descended on the city by the thousands this month to carry out Trump’s immigration agenda.

“Against smoke and rubber bullets/ By the dawn’s early light/ Citizens stood for justice/ Their voices ringing through the night,” he sings over chiming guitars and a steady drum beat. “And there were bloody footprints/ Where mercy should have stood/ And two dead left to die on snow-filled streets/ Alex Pretti and Renee Good.”

Springsteen joins a rising chorus of American citizens, a handful of Republican legislators and fellow artists including Billie Eilish and Finneas, Dave Matthews, Moby, Olivia Rodrigo, the Chicks as well as a raft of Hollywood stars decrying the aggressive tactics employed by Trump’s immigration enforcers. They’ve spoken out after the Jan. 7 killing of Good, who was shot to death by ICE agent Jonathan Ross amid Trump administration claims that she “weaponized” her car against Ross, despite video of the incident that appears to show her turning her car away from him and attempting to leave the scene of an ICE enforcement action.

Similarly, after Trump and several members of his administration rushed to label Pretti a “domestic terrorist” and “assassin” in the hours after his killing by an unidentified U.S. Border Patrol agent on Friday (Jan. 24), multiple video angles of his slaying appear to show him attempting to help a woman who had been thrown violently to the ground by agents amid a protest against their actions. Pretti, a licensed gun owner who video appeared to show had his holstered gun taken away from him just seconds into the confrontation, was shot 10 times while laying prone and pinned to the ground by half a dozen masked officers.

Springsteen’s plainspoken lyrics call out the people of Minneapolis, whose voices he says he hears “through the bloody mist,” vowing to take a stand “for this land/ And the stranger in our midst” and remember the names of those who died on their city’s streets.

The song is also a call-back to one of the Boss’ most intense protest anthems, 2001’s “American Skin (41 Shots),” his passionate response to the 1999 NYPD killing of unarmed Amadou Diallo. Along with the serially misunderstood anti-Vietnam War anthem”Born in the U.S.A.” and his John Steinbeck-inspired paean to the disenfranchised and trampled upon, “The Ghost of Tom Joad,” Springsteen’s latest is in keeping with his tradition of powerfully responding to the tenor of the times. And in keeping with his disdain for former reality TV star Trump, during the first Trump administration, he released “That’s What Makes Us Great,” a gritty song that spun the president’s “Make America Great Again” slogan in defense of immigrants who come to America in search of a dream and freedom.

“Trump’s federal thugs beat up on/ His face and his chest/ Then we heard the gunshots/ And Alex Pretti lay in the snow, dead,” Springsteen sings on the new song of Pretti, who was a nurse on an intensive care unit at the Department of Veterans Affairs.

“Their claim was self defense, sir/ Just don’t believe your eyes,” he continues. “It’s our blood and bones/ And these whistles and phones/ Against Miller and Noem’s dirty lies,” the latter a call out to White House deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller — who was the one who referred to Pretti as an “assassin” — and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, who also issued what appear to be misleading and inflammatory statements in the moments after the killing claiming that Pretti intended to “massacre” agents.

The song ends with Springsteen lamenting the trampling of rights by officers eager to question or deport anyone with Black or brown skin, while amplifying the frequently shouted cries of “ICE out now” heard at protests around the nation over the past few months.

“Here in our home they killed and roamed/ In the winter of ’26/ We’ll take our stand for this land/ And the stranger in our midst/ We’ll remember the names of those who died/ On the streets of Minneapolis,” he sings in the final, urgent refrain.

Listen to “Streets of Minneapolis” below.


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ROSÉ just spilled a bunch of tea about BLACKPINK, from details about the band’s upcoming mini-album to what the members would do if one of them didn’t want to be in the group anymore.

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Appearing on the episode of Call Her Daddy posted Wednesday (Jan. 28), the Grammy nominee shed some light on Deadline, BLACKPINK’s first collection of songs as a group since 2022’s Born Pink album. It will arrive after the foursome — which is also comprised of JISOO, JENNIE and LISA — reunited for their world tour last summer.

“It’s an album that we’ve all kind of obviously come back from after that year of exploring and all being our individual selves,” ROSÉ said, referencing BLACKPINK’s hiatus in 2024 as the women pursued solo projects. “And so I think it was really interesting to come back and see what was created after that. I really like all the songs there.”

Specifically shouting out “Jump,” the mini-album’s lead single released in July, the New Zealand native also teased, “We have a fun collaboration that’s coming up. And I played it for a bunch of my team and my friends, and they all were like, ‘It feels like “Jump,” but it’s, like, so different’ … It’s a big funky mixture of like all these things, but for some reason it works, and I’m really excited for the fans to see that.”

It’s been years since BLACKPINK properly released music as a group. After debuting in 2016 under YG Entertainment and working nonstop for years afterward, the quartet spent some time apart before re-signing their contracts ahead of their reunion last year.

But what happens if one of the ladies decides she doesn’t want to be in the band anymore? I think if one of us feels like at that time, that’s not the right thing, then we’re all in,” ROSÉ told host Alex Cooper. “We will understand, and — like any relationship — if one person is not ready for something, then it should just be respected, and I think we will always be ready to do that, because BLACKPINK is only four members. We will not be able to neglect anyone’s decision at any time in their life, and we trust that every decision made is the right decision for each person.”

Elsewhere in the podcast, ROSÉ rehashed the time Taylor Swift gave her advice at a party — “She pulled me aside, and she’s like, ‘Ask me anything’” — and recalled her initial reaction to her label choosing her stage name pre-debut. “It was the day before they released my picture … and, like, the name got announced,” she said. “I freaked out. I think it was like eight hours before it came out.”

“I love [ROSÉ] now,” she added. “But at the time, I was like, ‘What is it, ROSÉ?’ I was like, I sound like a grandma … Then they typed it on the computer, and they’re like, ‘Look, it’s going to look so cool.’ And then I saw it on screen, and that’s when I was like, ‘OK, it looks nice.’”

Watch ROSÉ’s full interview on Call Her Daddy above. 


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At weekend one of Coachella 2024, during her main stage sunset slot, Sabrina Carpenter gave her then-new single, “Espresso,” its live debut — and by the festival’s second weekend, “we knew things had shifted,” recalls her manager, Janelle Lopez Genzink.

“It was obviously really exciting,” the Volara Management founder ­continues, “but it was also slightly nerve-wracking, because we knew we were stepping into a meaningful cultural moment that was going to ­continue to grow.”

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“Espresso” went on to become Billboard’s No. 1 global song of the ­summer for 2024 and introduced Carpenter’s Grammy-winning, chart-­topping sixth album, Short n’ Sweet, released that August; two subsequent singles from the set, “Please Please Please” and “Taste,” hit Nos. 1 and 2 on the Billboard Hot 100, respectively. Meanwhile, behind the scenes, Volara was ­growing, too. By mid-2024, Lopez Genzink signed pop singer MARINA — who says Lopez Genzink “is one of the few who puts human beings first and commerce second” — and hired a new day-to-day manager, Bianca Nour, to join Volara’s tight team, which then consisted of early hires Amy Davidson and Merce Jessor.

By the start of 2025, Volara added another act to its roster: HAIM. “They’re my favorite rock band out there,” says Lopez Genzink, who was introduced to the trio through its attorney.

“Working with Janelle has been the greatest partnership,” the band’s Alana Haim says. “From the very beginning, her focus was always on supporting our vision and bringing our dreams to life. No idea is too crazy or too big — she makes you feel like anything is possible, and with her, it truly is.”

In 2025, Volara’s entire roster was on-cycle. “You should have seen our shared Google calendar,” Lopez Genzink says with a laugh. “There were a lot of colors.” In early June, MARINA released her sixth album, Princess of Power, and she embarked on a world tour in September that included her first Australian dates in 15 years. In late June, HAIM released its fourth album, I Quit, and it headed out on a tour of arenas and amphitheaters in September and October; by November, I Quit had scored the band its first best rock album Grammy nomination, making HAIM the first all-woman act to receive a nod in the category. (June was a particularly “crazy month,” with Lopez Genzink flying from New York for MARINA’s album promotion, then to Barcelona for Primavera Sound with HAIM and Carpenter, then to Los Angeles for her daughter’s tap recital — then back to London later that day. “I don’t ever want to do that again,” she says with an exasperated laugh.)

As for Carpenter, she followed Short n’ Sweet with yet another Grammy-nominated, chart-topping album, Man’s Best Friend, released in August. She added its songs — including Hot 100 No. 1 hit “Manchild” — to her hugely successful arena tour that wrapped in November and grossed $126.6 million over 72 shows, according to Billboard Boxscore (the trek ran from Sept. 23, 2024, to Nov. 23, 2025). Along the way, Carpenter became a bona fide festival headliner, topping the bills of Lollapalooza Chicago, Austin City Limits and Primavera. And come April, she’ll return to the desert to headline Coachella 2026. (At Coachella 2024, her weekend two outro predicted her quick return to the fest: “Coachella, see you back here when I headline.”)

Janelle Lopez Genzink photographed on Dec. 16, 2025 in Los Angeles.

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For Lopez Genzink, her rosterwide success is proof of concept — and why she sees results no matter how long she has had to build with an artist (a decade with Carpenter, dating back to her time at Faculty Management, compared with just one year with MARINA and six months with HAIM before each released their 2025 albums). “I work best with artists who have a really clear vision and a really, really strong work ethic,” she says. “I don’t think that anybody in music from the artist side or the executive side succeeds at a really high level unless you’re able to have the stamina to carry you when things are maybe not quite working yet. And then when things are working… when the largest opportunities are presented to you at one time, to have the energy to keep going.”

And yet, she says it’s equally important to know how — and when — to recover. She likens her team, and what she looks for in new hires, to athletes: “Someone who will work and work and work, but at the same time know how to take care of themselves so that we can always be like the best versions of ourselves for the artists, too.”

That mindset drove Lopez Genzink to found Volara in the first place. By 2021, she had 17 years of experience in artist management, including early roles with The Firm, Azoff Music Management and Faculty Management. (While interning at a major label, she recalls asking her boss, “What’s the job where you could be close to the artist all the time?”) She says her first management job at The Firm affirmed her path: “I don’t feel like I spent too many years trying to figure out what I wanted to do,” she says. “Obviously, the job of an artist manager isn’t super straightforward, but I had such a passion for it.”

Her main client across both Azoff and Faculty was a childhood favorite: New Kids on the Block. She spent over 15 years working as the band’s day-to-day manager, an opportunity that allowed her to travel the world on the group’s tours and even take part in the full arc of an album cycle, from A&R to rollout campaigns. “It really gave me the chance to grow as a manager,” she says, “and speaks to what I’m able to do now.”

Janelle Lopez Genzink photographed on Dec. 16, 2025 in Los Angeles.

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Soon after Faculty launched in 2015, Lopez Genzink met the firm’s next star client at a charity event. The then-15-year-old Sabrina Carpenter was acting on Disney’s Girl Meets World at the time and looking for artist management; Lopez Genzink was integral in signing her to Faculty. “From the moment that I met her, she had a very clear vision about how she was going to release her music and portray herself, even at that age.” (By 2018, Lopez Genzink rose to GM at Faculty.)

At the same time, Lopez Genzink’s own vision was crystalizing. “I was happy where I was, but I also had so much more in me,” she says. “When I started in management, I was a single female in [L.A.]. Then I got married and my life changed. And then I had one kid and my life changed again. And then I had two kids. I honestly wasn’t sure how I was going to be successful at the level that I wanted to be within the confines of a more traditional management company. I knew that I could build something that allowed me to succeed at a high level without giving up my desire to also have a partner, have kids and be present in their lives. And because management is such a lifestyle job, that’s just hard to do. So I wanted to build a company where that could be possible.”

Lopez Genzink launched Volara in August 2021, taking Carpenter with her seven months after the singer signed with Island Records, marking her departure from Hollywood Records. Carpenter’s Island debut, 2022’s Emails I Can’t Send, peaked at No. 23 on the Billboard 200 and included early breakout hit “Nonsense,” which became infamous for its cheeky outro that Carpenter tailors to each city she performs in.

“Nonsense” was an effective fire-starter — especially on the heels of key opening slots on Taylor Swift’s The Eras Tour — but Carpenter’s one-two punch of 2024’s Short n’ Sweet and 2025’s Man’s Best Friend set her career ablaze. The two albums delivered five top five Hot 100 hits (“Manchild,” “Please Please Please,” “Taste,” “Tears” and “Espresso”) and made Carpenter one of seven artists since 1980 to receive consecutive album of the year Grammy nominations.

As Lopez Genzink puts it, any lasting artist partnership boils down to one key component: trust. “So that before things are crazy, you’ve built a cadence for how you do things that when things shift — and you want them to shift, for any client, whatever success looks like for them — that baseline is already there,” she says. “And that way when you do have days that feel overwhelming, the artist can fall back on you and trust that you have the clarity of mind to support them.”

This story appears in the Jan. 24, 2026, issue of Billboard.