YoungBoy Never Broke Again threatened to beat a fan after he kept getting pelted with objects during a tour stop in Columbus, South Carolina.

During YoungBoy’s latest performance on Thursday, the rapper paused his rowdy setlist to address a rambunctious fan in the crowd who kept throwing items onstage.

“I had to calm myself down,” YoungBoy said in part. “Throw one more thing up here, I’mma whoop your a–, boy. Throw one more.”

He went on to reiterate he would beat him down if he threw one more item. “You can play with me tonight if you want to,” YoungBoy continued. “This a YoungBoy show. I know you ain’t spend your money to come through this muthaf—in’ door to let no n—a do no p—y a– sh– here tonight.”

This isn’t the first time something contentious happened during YoungBoy’s MASA Tour. Without explanation, Chicago’s United Center canceled YoungBoy’s show slated for Sept. 23. The venue was criticized by YoungBoy’s manager over the act.

“@UnitedCenter bi—ed out. Shoutout to Joe Myhra @UnitedCenter. He didn’t want us to have fun. Scary,” Alex Junnier wrote, attacking Myhra, who appears to be the SVP of operations at Chicago’s United Center. “It’s ok, everyone; Joe just sits behind a desk and got nervous.”

Footage also recently emerged of a fan involved in a fight with an elderly security guard at YoungBoy’s Kansas City show. Per KCTV 5, a 14-year-old was detained for allegedly assaulting the T-Mobile Center employee.

Regardless, the Baton Rouge rapper heads to Florida to continue his lengthy trek this weekend.

Check out the video below.

A federal judge says Nelly should be reimbursed for hefty legal bills he spent defeating a “baseless” and “frivolous” lawsuit filed by one of his former St. Lunatics bandmates.

The case claimed that Nelly owed ex-bandmate Ali a cut of royalties from the rapper’s debut album Country Grammar. But the action was dropped earlier this year after Nelly’s attorneys argued it was obviously filed years after the statute of limitations had expired.

On Friday (Oct. 10), U.S. Magistrate Judge Robert W. Lehrburger wrote that the lawyers who filed the case should be punished for doing so, saying they had pursued the case against Nelly long after it was clear that they had no grounds to sue.

“It should have been patently obvious to [Ali]’s attorneys that his copyright ownership claim was time-barred,” the judge wrote. “After being placed on notice that the [case] stood no chance of success, [Ali] did not withdraw his complaint. Instead, his attorneys doubled down.”

Nelly (Cornell Haynes) rose to fame in the 1990s as a member of St. Lunatics, a hip-hop group also composed of St. Louis high school friends Ali (Ali Jones), Murphy Lee (Tohri Harper), Kyjuan (Robert Kyjuan) and City Spud (Lavell Webb). With the June 2000 release of Country Grammar — which spent five weeks atop the Billboard 200 — Nelly broke away from the group and started a solo career that later reached superstar heights with his 2002 chart-topping singles “Hot in Herre” and “Dilemma.”

Filed last year, the lawsuit alleged that Nelly had cut his former crew members out of the credits and royalty payments for the hit album. It claimed the star had repeatedly “manipulated” them into falsely thinking they’d be paid for their work.

But three of the St. Lunatics quickly dropped out, saying they had never actually wanted to sue Nelly and had never given legal authorization to the lawyers who filed the case. Though Ali initially moved ahead alone, he dropped the case entirely in April without explanation.

Though the case was over, Nelly’s attorneys refused to let Ali off that easy. They asked for sanctions — meaning legal penalties — against Ali and his attorneys over a “vexatious” lawsuit that “should never have been brought.”

“Plaintiff’s counsel succeeded in its frivolous campaign aimed at forcing Haynes to spend money defending Plaintiff’s ridiculous time-barred claims,” the star’s lawyer, Ken Freundlich, wrote at the time.

In the American legal system, each side usually pays its own legal bills, even including defendants who win a lawsuit that they feel they shouldn’t have faced. Only in rare cases, including as punishment for misconduct, do judges order the loser to repay the winner’s fees.

On Friday, Judge Lehrburger said Ali’s attorneys should face that kind of sanction, saying it should have been clear to Ali’s lawyers from the outset that the case was not viable: “Jones’s copyright ownership claim was groundless on its face from the time it was first asserted,” the judge wrote.

The judge heaped most of the blame on Precious Felder Gates, Ali’s lead counsel, who he said “was the driving force behind the action” and had caused Nelly to needlessly incur expenses to defend it.”

Judge Lehrburger pointed out that after it was made clear to Gates that her case was doomed, she filed an updated version that tried to hide that fact. The judge said Gates had “manipulated the pleadings” by removing key details about when Nelly had rejected Ali’s claim — the key facts that would indicate the case was too old.

Felder, the judge said, should face punishment for “vexatiously protracting the proceedings in bad faith by her attempt to obfuscate the facts she knew barred Jones’s claims and her subsequent refusal to withdraw the amended complaint in the face of overwhelming arguments that the claims could not possibly succeed.”

The actual sum that Felder will pay is unclear. The judge did not set an exact figure and said she only had to cover Nelly’s legal bills from after she re-filed her updated case. The sanctions must also be endorsed by a district judge, who could modify Judge Lehrburger’s findings. But with elite Los Angeles defense attorneys repping the star, the bill could easily be tens of thousands of dollars.

Neither side immediately returned requests for comment on Friday.

New music is dropping like autumn leaves this week, with releases from JISOO of BLACKPINK and Zayn Malik, Khalid and more artists hitting streaming services Friday (Oct. 10).

Starting with “Eyes Closed,” one of the world’s biggest former boy band stars teamed up with one-fourth of the hottest K-pop girl group on the planet. The lush ballad finds JISOO and Malik blending their distinct voices while delivering emotional lyrics about letting the past go for the sake of new love.

HAIM and Bon Iver also showed up with a perfectly matched collaboration, combining their respective powers to cook up the ultimate indie-rock creation. “Tie You Down,” however, is thematically opposed to JISOO and Malik’s duet, with the Haim sisters and Justin Vernon instead singing about letting go of a current relationship even though they’re still in love.

Other all-star collaborations this week include Gorillaz tapping Trueno and Proof for new single “The Manifesto,” as well as Alemeda and Doechii teaming up for fiery track “Beat a B!tch Up.” A Boogie Wit da Hoodie dropped a new song as well, interpolating Mariah Carey’s iconic hit “We Belong Together” in his post-breakup anthem “Part of Me.”

As far as new albums go, Khalid leads the charge with After the Sun Goes Down. The project comes just a little over a year after the R&B star released Sincerely, before which he took five years to follow up 2019’s Free Spirit.

With October fully underway, Billboard wants to know which piece of new music is your favorite this week. Tell us by voting for your No. 1 release below.

All products and services featured are independently chosen by editors. However, Billboard may receive a commission on orders placed through its retail links, and the retailer may receive certain auditable data for accounting purposes.

Looking to make a few upgrades? The new year is a great time to enhance your sound system. Whether you’re a music lover, a dedicated audiophile, gamer, movie buff, TV binger or a combination of all five, the speaker options are plentiful.

And with retailers such as Amazon, Best Buy, Target and Walmart offering major markdowns for the winter, you’re sure to find great deals on speakers and other electronics.

That said, having too many options can be overwhelming. When shopping for a speaker, it’s good to narrow down the style, size and price that best suits your needs. To make the search a little easier, we gathered up nine of the best speakers for music lovers to play all their favorite tunes, podcasts and more. The list is comprised of picks that we’ve tested out personally and other fan favorites.

From portable Bluetooth speakers to wired and freestanding speakers, see below for our picks for the best options to enhance your sound system. For more recommendations, read our roundups of the best record players, best over-ear headphones, best wired headphones and best Bluetooth earbuds. 

Sony ULT FIELD 1 Bluetooth Wireless Portable Speaker

$99.99 $129.99 23% off

Buy Now at walmart

A bright orange bluetooth speaker.

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This Sony ULT FIELD 1 Bluetooth Wireless Portable Speaker is for our readers who love music but are always on the go. Retailing for $99.99, 23% off its original price, the speaker comes with all the bells and whistles you need to get your tunes going. The tech is equipped with a Sound Diffusion Processor that essentially expands sound in any space, giving you larger-than-life audio that fills even the biggest of spaces.

The ULT FIELD 1 is a Bluetooth model boasting 12 hours of battery life and comes without wires, which means no awkward tangles. It’s also easy to carry thanks to the addition of a heavy-duty carabiner, our favorite feature, which means you can clip it to your bag on camping trips or hikes. It’s also waterproof, dustproof, and shockproof so you won’t have to worry about it getting damaged while out and about.

Sonos Roam 2 Ultra Portable Smart Speaker

$179

Buy Now at sonos

A portable smart speaker.

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Another stand-out portable model, this time from Sonos. The Roam 2 Ultra currently retails for $179 and is durable, compact and lightweight, giving it that portable factor. Don’t let its compact size fool you. The base on this speaker is powerful and clear, making for a reliable audio output for whatever your adventures take you. This model not only sounds great, but it’s both waterproof and dustproof, great for listening to tunes by the pool or while on a hike. It can also withstand gnarly drops, perfect for our more accident-prone readers.

Ultimate Ears WONDERBOOM 4 Waterproof Bluetooth Outdoor Speakers

$84.00 $99.99 16% off

Buy Now On Amazon

Mini speaker in gray.

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We’ve got another portable model that gives you all the great audio output, with the durability you need to travel. The Ultimate Ears WONDERBOOM 4 Waterproof Bluetooth Outdoor Speaker is one of the more affordable models on our list, coming in at $84 on Amazon. Like the other models mentioned, it’s waterproof, dustproof and even floats. It is a stand-out in our book because of its size, or lack thereof. The petite speaker can be easily packed away but has a powerful output that fills any room with 360 sound. The speaker also boasts one of the longest battery lives we’ve seen at 14 hours.

Bose SoundLink Flex II Wireless Waterproof Portable Bluetooth Speaker

$159

Buy Now at walmart

A pill-shaped speaker.

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Starting with something basic but dependable, Bose Soundlink Flex is a good choice in portable speaker option, if you’re looking for a no frills, Bluetooth speaker that you can carry around. Bose has a nice selection of speakers in stock – the cheapest of which is the Bose Soundlink Micro ($119). The Bose Portable Smart Speaker is a bit pricier ($399), while the Soundlink Flex falls on the more affordable side of the price scale.

The Soundlink Flex is engineered with a custom transducer that’s designed to flood the room with powerful sound. Available in black, red, white or blue, the speaker’s rugged exterior makes it easy to take on the go, and with up to 12 hours of battery life, you can play tons of songs before it’s time to recharge. The accompanying utility loop is perfect for hanging the speaker on a clip or carrying it around (the Bluetooth range stretches up to 30 feet). The Soundlink Flex is also IP67 certified waterproof and dust-proof.

JBL Authentics 200 – Retro Style Smart Home Speaker

$249.95 $379.95 34% off

Buy Now On Amazon

A box-shaped speaker from JBL.

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JBL has a great selection of portable speakers including the JBL Flip 6, JBL Clip 4, JBL Go 3, Boombox 3 and the new JBL Authentics 200 Wireless Speaker. A modern speaker with a retro-inspired design, the JBL Authentics 200 delivers rich sound and deep bass with dual 25mm tweeters, 5-inch woofer, 6-inch passive radiator, Wifi, Bluetooth, Google Assistant and Voice Assistant. Measuring 6.59 inches x 10.48 inches x 6.76 inches, this portable speaker is equipped with a 200-watt sound output and weighs almost seven pounds. You can purchase the JBL speakers at Amazon, Walmart, Best Buy, Crutchfield and JBL.com.

Marshall Emberton II Portable Bluetooth Speaker, Black & Brass

$99.99 $179.99 44% off

Buy Now On Amazon

Marshall portable speaker.

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Marshall is a personal favorite among music artists and fans (including our editors). You can’t really go wrong with a Marshall speaker, but if you’re looking for something not quite as small as a handheld option but not as big as a floor-standing speaker, the Emberton II might be the perfect fit. It combines the brand’s iconic retro design with contemporary technology delivering mega-sound in a smaller package than some of the larger Marshall designs. Emberton II has two full-range drivers, two passive radiators, dual tweeters and Bluetooth 5.0. Connecting the speaker to the Marshall App turns your phone into a control panel to adjust things like volume and playlists. The Emberton II is available at major retailers such as Amazon, Best Buy and at Marshall.com.

Sonos Era 300 Premium Smart Speaker

$379 $479 21% off

Buy Now at sonos

A smart speaker from Sonos.

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The Sonos Era 300 is one of the newer speakers to make our list and one of the best in its class. Era 300 serves up superior sound quality that can drizzle or flood the room with sound, depending on what you’re in the mood for. Available in black or white, the speaker’s compact, curvy design makes it stand out wherever its placed. Another great feature: intuitive touch controls that make it easier to turn up the volume or skip to the next track.

On the technical side of things, Era 300 features four tweeters, dual woofers and six, class-D digital amplifiers. Made from 40% recycled materials, the energy-efficient speaker is equipped with Wifi, Bluetooth, TruePlay, Dolby Atmos, Apple Airplay 2 and voice assistant (this feature can also be disabled). Era 300 allows you to jam away to your favorite tunes, playlists, podcasts and more on Amazon Music, Tidal, Apple Music and more. Another thing to note, Era 300 is incredibly easy to set up (around 10-15 minutes) and it comes in recycled packaging.

Klipsch – Reference Series 5-1/4″ 340-Watt Passive 2-Way Bookshelf Speakers

Buy Now at best buy $299.99 $299.99

A pair of two bookshelf speakers.

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Klipsch is another star in the realm of premium-quality sound. For music lovers who have the square footage to build a robust sound system, Klipsch offers everything from floor standing speakers to bookshelf speakers, computer speakers, home theater speakers, sound bars and subwoofers. Not sure where to start? The R-51M Bookshelf Speakers are perfect for blasting your favorite tunes. This dynamic speaker duo offers powerful sound, booming bass and award-wining acoustics courtesy of Tractrix horn technology, which mimics the sound, precision and emotion of a live concert. These 13.3-inch speakers are equipped with one-inch titanium dome tweeters, 5.25-inch copper woofers and a removable magnetic grill.

Sony SRS-XP500 X-Series Wireless Portable Bluetooth Karaoke Party Speaker

$449.99

Buy Now On Amazon

A kareoke speaker.

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Sony’s SRS-XP500 Bluetooth speaker is a nice investment if you’re looking for a boombox-style design. An alternative to the JBL Boombox 2 ($329.95), the SRS-XP500 delivers amazingly crisp sound thanks to Sony’s uniquely designed X-Balance speakers that pump out thumping, room-shaking bass. The battery delivers up to 20 hours of play time to keep the party moving all night long (literally). The speaker weighs about 24 pounds, but there’s a built-in handle that makes it easy to carry around, and LED ring lighting for added flair. Sony’s SRS-XP500 speakers are IPX4-certified water-and dust-resistant.

Polk Audio – Signature Elite ES60 Hi-Res Tower Speaker – Stunning Black

$599

Buy Now at best buy

A high-res tower speaker.

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We love a tower speaker because it blends in, and stands out. Polk Audio’s Elite Signature ES360 provides an enveloping, true-to-life sound experience that’s especially useful for Apple Music, Tidal, Amazon Music, Spotify and other streaming platforms. The floor-standing loudspeaker provides crystal-clear, hi-resolution sound with bass so incredible you might be able to feel it.

Perfect for your man cave or billiards room, according to one customer, the speaker is powered by Polk’s Patented Power Port Bass Enhancing Technology, which expands the overall bass port to provide a larger surface area for distortion-free, louder bass impact. The sleek ES60 features 1-inch High-Resolution Terylene Tweeters, 2.5-way cascading crossovers and a trio of 6.5-inch Mica-Fortified Polypropylene Woofers. Speakers in Polk Audio’s Signature Elite Series are designed with quality, timbre-matched components that let you seamlessly mix and match models to build the sound system of your dreams. This speaker is on sale at Amazon, Crutchfield and Polk Audio.

In the last week, the general public was pulled into a thriving ecosystem of content created by hardcore Taylor Swift fans, from podcasts to short videos — which likely played a role in helping her The Life of a Showgirl album break the record set by Adele’s 25 for first-week U.S. sales. 

The release of The Life of a Showgirl has generated conversation that’s not simply confined to Swift’s most fervent fans, says Zachary Hourihane, a Singapore-based creator who co-hosts Evolution of a Snake, a podcast about Swift, and makes videos under the moniker Swiftologist. Hourihane points to a reaction video he posted on TikTok — featuring critical comments about the numerous phallic references in Swift’s new song “Wood” — which received 4.8 million views and 8,800 comments in six days. 

“The people that are interacting with this video are not fans, they’re casual listeners,” he says. 

The conversation around The Life of a Showgirl got a boost from YouTube, a hotspot for fan-generated content, when the platform dedicated a section of its homepage to the content and conversation around the album release. On the YouTube Apple TV app, a “YouTube Features” section described as “Your home for The Life of a Showgirl” offered a smorgasbord of Swift, though there were only two videos from Swift’s YouTube channel: the official music video for “The Fate of Ophelia” and the combined “visualizer” videos for the songs “CANCELLED!” and “Eldest Daughter.”  

The YouTube section also highlighted the vastness of Swift’s media presence during the album launch and her promotional tour. There was a video of her appearance on The Graham Norton Show, a British late-night program. One video clip showed actress Keri Russell talking about Swift on The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon. A few critical videos appeared, too, such as podcaster Misha Petrov picking apart Swift’s song lyrics and conservative commentator Ben Shapiro’s scathing Showgirl album review.  

More than anything, though, YouTube revealed the depth of the Swifties’ community. One Swift-focused podcast that was picked up by YouTube’s algorithm was Hits Differently. Hosted by Molly and Ryan (they do not reveal their last names for privacy purposes), Hits Differently is a two-year-old podcast with nearly 80 episodes and approximately 4.5 million YouTube views to date. To celebrate the arrival of The Life of a Showgirl, the duo hosted a 50-minute live stream when the album release countdown clock went live. That video was viewed over 100,000 times, roughly 10 times the views of a typical Hits Differently YouTube video.  

Hits Differently is “a space for Swifties to feel like they have other people to talk to about stuff,” says Molly. “If they don’t have friends or family that listen to Taylor’s music, when [The Life of a Showgirl] drops at midnight, they’ll come to our channel to talk to each other.” Molly and Ryan typically release one episode a week, but pushed out multiple YouTube videos around the album launch. The pair also posts the videos on their Patreon page, where supporters can get early access to ad-free videos and exclusive content.  

Another show, The 13 Podcast, also saw tremendous interest around Swift’s album release, says Ana Szabo, one of the show’s four co-hosts. During album release week, the podcast, which Szabo says has racked up more than 6 million audio downloads in its five-year history, released three episodes, including a live listening party that attracted 11,000 fans. “With the Swifty community being so global, we have a lot of listeners that tune into our podcast from all over the world,” she says. 

Major events — an album release, a tour, an engagement announcement — give Swift-focused podcasts an opportunity to break from their routine and attract new followers. For The 13 Podcast, a typical episode examines Swift’s lyrics with a detective’s eye. “We try to find any literary connections,” explains Szabo, “inspirations, connections to her other songs across her discography, her music videos, everything that she’s said about the song.” 

Close examination of Swift’s lyrics is typical for Swift podcasts, says Andrew Ledbetter, a professor of communications at Texas Christian University. A Swift fan himself, Ledbetter has studied the narratives in Swift’s songs and analyzed their lyrical content. He explains that Swift’s music is built on narratives — the villains and heroes, longing and regret, the virtuous hero, finding meaning in the ordinary, the empowered voice — that her fans connect with.   

“Every Taylor Swift podcast I’ve heard, the lyrics are front and center,” says Ledbetter. “Swifties understand what a red scarf means. They understand what a koi fish guitar means, or a friendship bracelet.” 

Swift podcasts have become so popular that some creators are hosting offline events, too. The 13 Podcast threw a party for The Eras Tour stop in Dallas that attracted 350 fans. When Swift released The Tortured Poets Department album the following year, the group attracted 600 fans to another event, Swities in the Park, that featured a vendor market filled with Swifties offering things like face painting, jewelry, knitted goods and watercolor portraits. Their next event, on Oct. 17, will be at the Omni Hotel in Dallas.  

Evolution of a Snake has also ventured into live events. Hourihane and his co-host, Madeline Rubicam, went on a 10-city tour of the U.S. this summer, appearing in 300- to 400-seat theaters such as The Great Star Theater in San Francisco and The Miracle Theatre in Washington, D.C. In September, they took Evolution of a Snake to the 350-capacity Sugar Club Dublin in Ireland and the 300-seat Unicorn Theatre in London. Each show was a “condensed” version of the podcast’s “detailed,” “day-by-day” recaps of her career, explains Hourihane.  

“I think people just want to find community, and we love hosting the events,” says The 13 Podcast’s Szabo. “It’s a lot of fun, and it’s really, really wonderful to meet our listeners.” 

It’s hard not to attribute some of Showgirl‘s explosive first-week sales to the avalanche of content. Swifties purchased 3.4 million copies of Showgirl in its first week of release, reveling in the 34 variants that included limited-edition CDs and both bonus tracks and voice memos from Swift. The more casual fans contributed to the more than 460 million on-demand streams in less than a week. When the final tally is announced this Sunday (Oct. 12), Swiftie podcasters and content creators who contributed, to whatever extent, to the album’s record-setting feat could rightly take a bow. Swift herself surely wouldn’t begrudge them that.