For years, the Cascio family was one of Michael Jackson’s fiercest defenders against ugly pedophilia claims. The five siblings from New Jersey, whom Jackson considered a “second family” and who spent much of their childhoods with the King of Pop, publicly denied that he was ever inappropriate with them.

That all changed in 2019, when the HBO documentary Leaving Neverland amplified child sex abuse claims against Jackson from two men in disturbing detail. As the Cascio siblings tell it, the film led them to reflect and reveal to each other for the first time that they had all been abused by Jackson as children across “hundreds of instances.” The estate of Jackson, who died in 2009, says the Cascios fabricated these claims and were seeking to cash in on the cultural moment.

Whether the Cascios’ allegations were true or not, one thing is for sure: The siblings signed a multimillion-dollar settlement, including a strict nondisclosure agreement, with the Jackson estate in late 2019. Now, the validity of this settlement is the subject of a bitter legal battle in court.

The Jackson estate alleged in a court petition this summer that the Cascios violated the settlement with an “extortionate” threat that they would go public with the claims unless they were paid an additional $213 million. Last month, the Cascio siblings responded by asking a judge to declare the settlement void.

The Cascios — Frank, Aldo, Marie-Nicole, Edward and Dominic — said the estate “exploited their confusion and vulnerability” upon coming to terms with the alleged abuse by pressuring them to quickly sign a deal they didn’t understand.

According to the Cascios’ Oct. 6 court filing, the siblings didn’t have their own lawyer and were told by the Jackson estate that the deal “would not get done” if they hired counsel and took time to review the papers. They also said the estate misrepresented the nature of the settlement, telling them it was a “life rights” agreement.

“Exploiting the same patterns of trust, fear and conditioned loyalty that Michael Jackson had cultivated for decades, the estate manipulated respondents’ emotional state to extract their silence through coercive and deceptive means,” wrote the Cascios’ attorney Mark Geragos. “The rushed process was intended to, and did, in fact, take advantage of the Cascio siblings’ shock and trauma upon realizing this had happened to all of them.”

The estate, meanwhile, says the Cascios were not pressured to sign anything. To the contrary, the estate claims in court filings that the Cascio siblings were the ones who demanded a settlement for their “specious allegations” — and that the estate reluctantly paid to avoid public pain and harm to Jackson’s children.

“Frank inaccurately depicts the negotiations leading up to the execution of the Agreement as one-sided strong-arming,” wrote the estate’s attorney, Jonathan Steinsapir, on Oct. 30, referring to Frank Cascio.

The truth, argues the estate, is that the settlement was “extensively negotiated” and “voluntarily executed” by the Cascio siblings. It is now urging a judge to enforce all provisions of the agreement, including a mandatory arbitration clause.

A court hearing on the dispute is scheduled for Dec. 3 in Los Angeles County. Geragos and a rep for the Jackson estate both declined to comment on the matter on Friday (Nov. 7).

Jackson was never convicted or held legally liable for any accusation of child sex abuse during his lifetime; he settled a civil claim in 1994 without admitting any wrongdoing, and he was acquitted at a criminal trial in 2005. But such allegations have continued to dog his legacy, most notably when Leaving Neverland hit screens in 2019.

The Jackson estate called Leaving Neverland a “one-sided hit job” and sued HBO, leading the documentary to be removed from the streaming platform. Yet the subjects of Leaving Neverland, Wade Robson and James Safechuck, are continuing to pursue civil sexual assault claims against the estate.

Meanwhile, the Jackson estate has been extraordinarily successful at monetizing the singer’s legacy. Jackson died with $500 million in debt, but the estate has since generated more than $3 billion with catalog deals and new live shows exploiting the King of Pop’s intellectual property.

The estate’s latest endeavor is Michael, a long-developed biopic tracing Jackson’s rise to stardom. After years of setbacks and delays, Michael finally has a release date of April 24, 2026.

The movie’s first teaser trailer dropped on Thursday (Nov. 6) with scenes of Jackson’s real-life nephew, Jaafar Jackson, recording and performing Michael’s record-smashing 1982 album Thriller. The teaser does not allude to any of the abuse claims against Jackson.

She did it! After generating Grammy buzz for months with smash hit single “APT.” featuring Bruno Mars, ROSÉ has now secured nods for both song and record of the year, as well as best pop duo/group performance.

In a video posted by one of the BLACKPINK star’s friends, which ROSÉ reposted on her Instagram Story, we get to see how she reacted to the news — as well as the tense few moments that led up to it. In the clip, she and her pals watch the Friday (Nov. 7) nominations ceremony while on a group FaceTime call. As the names are listed off for record of the year recognition, ROSÉ says nervously, “Are we not going to get it?”

“Aw, maybe we’re not going to get it,” she adds, hiding behind her fists clenched with anticipation.

When ROSÉ and Mars’ names come on screen, the K-pop star and her friends absolutely lose it. Letting out loud, wordless cheers, she says in disbelief, “Oh my god!”

The reaction clip comes shortly after the full list of 2026 Grammy nominations was unveiled Friday morning, revealing Kendrick Lamar as the frontrunner with nine nods and Lady Gaga, Jack Antonoff and Cirkut as having the second-most with seven apiece. ROSÉ’s song and record of the year honors are particularly special, however, as they mean she’s made history as the first K-pop musician to ever score one, much less two, Big Four nominations as a lead artist.

“It’s still a dream for me,” the New Zealand native recently told The Hollywood Reporter of winning a Grammy someday. “It’s still a fantasy — a moment that proves to myself so many things.”

Grammy-wise, this year was huge for K-pop in general. In addition to ROSÉ’s triumphs, KPop Demon Hunters earned nominations for song of the year, best song written for visual media and best pop group performance for Billboard Hot 100 topper “Golden,” as well as best compilation soundtrack for visual media.

It’s a dog-eat-dog world, and Leon Thomas leads the pack.

On Friday, the singer woke up to a whopping six 2026 Grammy nominations, including album of the year, for his breakthrough sophomore album Mutt.

“Thank you God, my team, every collaborator, every producer, family, friends and most especially my fans, I couldn’t have done it without you,” he wrote in an Instagram caption for a graphic listing his nominations. “I got a show tonight and I’m gonna continue working harder on this next album.”

In addition to album of the year, Thomas — who won his first Grammy in 2023 thanks to his production contributions to SZA’s “Snooze” — also earned a nomination for best new artist. Poetically, his two general field nominations come 15 years after Victorious, the television series that established him as a Gen Z child star, premiered on Nickelodeon. Thomas earned his first Grammy nod back in 2020 in the best rap song category for his work on Rick Ross and Drake’s “Gold Roses.”

Mutt also earned a nomination for best R&B album, while several tracks were individually recognized, including “Yes It Is” (best R&B song), “Vibes Don’t Lie” (best traditional R&B performance), and the NPR Tiny Desk live version of “Mutt” (best R&B performance).

Six Grammy nominations cap a whirlwind breakthrough year for Thomas. Outside of earning his first Hot 100 top 10 hit as a performer with “Mutt” (No. 10), the multi-hyphenate also won best new artist at the BET Awards, made his late night TV debut on The Late Show With Stephen Colbert, and shared a new funk-forward EP titled PHOLKS. Last week, he played Austin City Limits and kicked off his headlining Mutts Don’t Heel Tour at Dallas’ House of Blues. The R&B star’s new trek will visit venues across the U.S., Europe and Australia, before concluding on April 19 at Perth’s Metro City.

In Thomas’ Billboard cover story, his manager, Jonathan Azu, remarked, “I hope he’s the guy with the Lauryn Hill photo [holding multiple trophies]. Every year, there’s somebody and I hope it’s him. He is a man of his peers, and I think over the past year he has proven to them that he’s here to stay.”

Looks like Leon Thomas is one step closer to re-creating that iconic photograph. Check out the “Mutt” singer’s reaction to his 2026 Grammy nominations below.

AI was an omnipresent topic at the Music Tectonics conference in Santa Monica, Calif., earlier this week, creeping into seemingly every panel discussion and casual poolside conversation. Everybody can see that AI will transform the music business. That’s a 30,000-foot view. Zoom in, however, and there’s far less certainty about how, exactly, AI will disrupt the status quo. 

“Not everybody wants to be a creator” was a frequently heard sentiment. Lucas Cantor Santiago of Mindset Ventures has a particular point of view as a composer. The setup he currently uses to write music would have cost $200,000 15 years ago. Now, somebody can get “basically the same tools” from a trip to the Apple Store. But Cantor Santiago doesn’t believe access to tools has led to more creators. “It’s just caused people like me to start writing music faster, and maybe people who didn’t have classical training to be able to start writing music,” he said on a panel.

AI’s ability to help human creators, not replace them, was a common theme at Music Tectonics. Granted, the conference was heavy on consumer technology brands such as Yamaha, Roland and Fender. Had AI anarchists been invited to speak, there would have been more diversity of thought. But the opinions of people who actually make music for a living carry a lot of weight, as they’re on the front lines of making music that eventually finds an audience. To this crowd, AI slop has little redeeming value and won’t find a meaningful audience. 

The historical record doesn’t fully support the idea that AI won’t increase the ranks of creators, though. Greater access to inexpensive production and distribution tools has already transformed the music business. Artists who were previously locked out of nationwide distribution — it was impossible for a DIY artist to get Tower Records to stock their CDs — now have access to tens of millions of consumers through digital distributors and digital service providers (DSPs) such as iTunes and Spotify. “When I owned a record label and house label in Chicago in the ‘80s, there were 100 new records a week,” said Matt Adell, co-founder and COO of Musical AI, on a panel. “When I left [EDM download store] Beatport, there were 27,000 new records a day. There are now over 150,000 new songs a day hitting the DSPs.”  

Given easier tools, people are already creating more music. Many of the 150,000 songs a day cited by Adell — or whatever the number is currently — were created by AI. French music streamer Deezer said in September that 28% of tracks uploaded are created wholly by generative AI, underscoring the fact that AI tools could lead to more music being created. Unpopular, long tail music may not attract much attention, but it creates markets where none previously existed. DIY distributors such as DistroKid, CD Baby and TuneCore can operate because production tools are inexpensive — sometimes free — and artists can afford the modest fees to distribute their songs globally.  

AI’s biggest impact could be to turn everybody into a small-scale creator. Kristen Bender, senior vp of digital innovation strategy and business development at Universal Music Group (UMG), noted during a panel that 30% to 40% of all music content on social media platforms has been manipulated by AI in some way, suggesting there are more creators than people might think. “We think that AI is going to enable so [much] hyper-personalization and interesting ways to interact with content,” she said. 

Along those lines, Liz Moody, a partner at law firm Granderson Des Rochers, described how AI tools will allow fans to interact with artists in new ways. Moody, who worked on Udio’s recent licensing deal with UMG, told the audience Udio could create “a fan-focused experience where fans can work with their favorite artists to make personalized music, maybe with the artist’s voice, or maybe create some mashups between two songs that they love.” 

When AI tools first appeared, the initial conversation focused on AI-generated music’s potential to supplant the popularity of human-created songs. But Bender and Moody — who have visibility into where these business models are headed — encouraged people to think smaller. It’s easy to imagine a licensed, industry-sanctioned generative AI platform partnering with well-known artists to create personalized renditions of “Happy Birthday” for their subscribers. But it’s a lot harder to imagine anyone other than the creator wanting to hear their personalized version. 

The 2026 Grammy nominations were announced Friday (Nov. 7), with Bad Bunny, Sabrina Carpenter, Kendrick Lamar and Lady Gaga highlighting some of the biggest categories. Within the traditional Big Four categories — record of the year, song of the year, album of the year and best new artist — Interscope led all record labels with eight nominees among the 32 slots, giving parent company Universal Music Group (UMG) a commanding 21 of those 32 nods. What’s more, Interscope’s leadership structure means its total is even higher: Interscope Capitol Labels Group (ICLG) includes Capitol (two nominations), Motown (two nominations) and the joint HYBE/Geffen partnership that signed KATSEYE (one nomination), meaning that ICLG led the way with 13 total nominations in those four categories. 

That marks the fifth time in the past eight years Interscope has led among labels. Interscope artists that received those nominations were Billie Eilish (record, song), Kendrick Lamar (record, song, album) and Lady Gaga (record, song, album). Capitol’s nominations were for Doechii (record, song), Motown’s came for Leon Thomas (album, best new artist) and KATSEYE’s nomination was for best new artist.

In second among labels with six nominations is Island Records, which achieved a few feats of its own. For the second year in a row, the label had two nominees for best new artist. This year, those two honorees are Olivia Dean and Lola Young, while last year, Carpenter and Chappell Roan were both nominated (Roan ultimately took home the award). Island — which led all labels last year, when Carpenter and Roan were both nominated in all of the Big Four categories — also saw additional nominations for Carpenter (record, song and album) and Roan (record), each of whom has received nominations in those categories for the second year in a row. Carpenter now joins Taylor Swift (who has done it twice) as the only artists to receive album of the year nominations in back-to-back years since the categories were expanded from five to eight nominees for the 2019 ceremony.

Island is also part of a larger structure in REPUBLIC, which encompasses Republic Records, Def Jam and more. REPUBLIC, overall, received eight nominations, as “Golden” from the Kpop Demon Hunters soundtrack was nominated for song of the year for Republic Records and Justin Bieber’s SWAG album, released by Def Jam, was recognized for album of the year.

In third among labels is Atlantic, which got song and record nominations for ROSÉ and Bruno Mars’ “APT.,” as well as best new artist nominations for Alex Warren and The Marías. In fourth is Rimas, home to Bad Bunny, who saw his DeBÍ TiRAR MáS FOToS album nominated for album of the year, while its title track “DtMF” got song and record nominations. Columbia also grabbed two nominations — album of the year for Tyler, The Creator’s CHROMAKOPIA and best new artist for Addison Rae — while Roc Nation Distribution got a nod for releasing Clipse’s album of the year-nominated Let God Sort Em Out and Warner Records kept its best new artist success alive with a nod for Sombr, marking the seventh best new artist nod the label has racked up in the past six years.

Among label groups, the aforementioned UMG dominated with 21 nominations, while Warner Music Group accounted for five, the indies collectively garnered four and Sony Music had two.