TIME has unveiled its 2025 list of the world’s biggest rising stars, and among them were several major pop, Latin, country and hip-hop musicians.

On Tuesday (Sept. 30), the publication revealed that Tate McRae, Gracie Abrams, GloRilla and more have all been named on this year’s “TIME100 Next” ranking. Becky G, Rema, Fuerza Regida, Teyana Taylor and Lainey Wilson also made the list, which serves “to provide a snapshot of the moment and to recognize those who we feel are truly changing the world this year,” according to TIME.

The honorees each received blurbs that close friends or collaborators wrote for them. Billboard‘s September Chartbreaker Audrey Hobert penned the entry for her lifelong bestie and co-songwriter Abrams — “She is protective, and beautifully sensitive,” Hobert praised the pop star — while Selena Gomez shared why she loves Becky G.

“Becky G has never let the world define her,” the Rare Beauty founder wrote of the Latin music star. “She has always defined herself with her powerful presence. Through the years, I have watched her excel not only as an artist but also as a woman, an advocate, and a voice for our community.”

McRae, who graces the cover of one of the three “TIME100 Next” issues published this week, got praise from Materialists star Dakota Johnson. “Tate is magnetic,” the actress wrote for the publication. “I can’t wait to watch her artistry unfold and evolve while she sinks further into the DNA of pop music.”

One of the other cover stars, Jonathan Bailey, was honored by his Wicked costar Ariana Grande. “I’m so thankful that I get to spend so much time with this incredibly gifted, playful, and caring human being who is so endlessly curious about art and life and the many which ways they intertwine,” the pop star gushed. “I’ll forever be along for the ride.”

In addition to musicians, the “TIME100 Next” ranking also features actors, producers, political figures, activists, entrepreneurs and innovators. Last year, Sabrina Carpenter was featured on the ranking, while SZA and Dua Lipa have been in honored in years past.

Of the annual project, TIME‘s editor-in-chief, Sam Jacobs, wrote, “While we’ve made it our mission to cover people who have reached the pinnacle of their fields, the ‘TIME100 Next’ is an opportunity to recognize those still on the rise.

“We’ve known that true influence knows no age and that it can arrive early in a career,” Jacobs added. “This year’s class is no exception to that tradition.”

See McRae on the cover of TIME100’s “Next” issue below.

Actress Indya Moore, like many trans people in the U.S., is calling on people in power to stand up for her community’s rights. One of the powerful people she’s calling out by name is none other than her former boss, Ryan Murphy.

In an emotional video posted to her Instagram on Sunday (Sept. 28), Moore — who gained international acclaim for her portrayal of Angel Evangelista in FX’s Pose — criticized Murphy for failing to stand up for the trans community in the years since the Emmy Award-winning series ended in 2021.

The actress offered her thanks to Murphy and others who “have ever given us jobs” and “allowed us to be able to speak out,” before slamming Murphy for not using his platform to speak up about the ongoing attacks against the trans community by the U.S. government. “The fact that Ryan Murphy has been this silent … like, we really pissed you off that much, Ryan? Who upset you that much, Janet [Mock, writer, director and producer on Pose] really pissed you off that much?”

Moore continued, saying that she has been “reprimanded” before for speaking up about “mistreatment” she dealt with on the set of Pose, including her claim that producer Tanase Popa threw potato chips at her on set. She then turned her attention back to Murphy, asking how the influential showrunner could “do something like Pose during Donald Trump’s [2016-2020] administration, and then it’s like poof, you’re gone.”

“It’s garbage. It’s, like, an embarrassment,” she said. “Ryan Murphy, we need you to do more. You need to address the racism, the violence, and the targeting of people on your productions … you do need to make sure trans people are paid equally.”

Billboard has reached out to Murphy’s representatives for comment.

Moore’s statements about Murphy came amid a 30-minute video, in which the actress emotionally reacted to the Trump administration’s targeting of the trans community since the president took office again in January. In the nine months of the twice-impeached president’s second term thus far, Trump has taken multiple opportunities to discriminate against trans people, including limiting resources for transgender healthcare, eliminating federal recognition of transgender identities, banning trans people from serving in the military and ceasing funding for the national suicide hotline dedicated to helping queer and trans people.

In her tearful video, Moore questioned the competing narratives being used by the president and his supporters. “How do you go from ‘trans people are mentally ill, they need help’ to ‘trans people are terrorists?’ Y’all can’t make up your mind about how you want to view us, as weak and a target to bully, or as strong and a threat,” she said.

Moore thanked those who have stood up for trans people’s rights and safety, and urged those watching to keep doing so in the caption of her video, where she also tagged Murphy. “Trans People Need you. We have been copping [sic] for too long,” she wrote. “Lift us up along side everyone else.”

When Combustion Music celebrates its 25th anniversary in January, owner Chris Farren expects the Nashville-based publishing company will be firing on all cylinders.

And maybe operating with an empty tank.

Like firms in nearly every sector of the economy, Combustion has been forced to retool its business model as the digital era has matured during the 21th century, and Farren has developed an unusual plan in which he typically sells off the firm’s entire catalog about every five years, then begins rebuilding for the next sale when the projections make sense.

While the company’s inventory isn’t currently on the market, Farren believes a sale “will be imminent.”

Neither Farren nor a pair of Nashville publishing insiders could name a similar firm that operates with the same game plan — if there is one, said one of those executives, it’s “not common.” 

Farren started his music career as a songwriter, generating such ’90s hits as Deana Carter‘s “How Do I Get There,” Boy Howdy‘s “She’d Give Anything,” Kevin Sharp‘s “If You Love Somebody” and Collin Raye‘s “If I Were You.” He produced Carter, Boy Howdy and Sharp during their commercial peaks and, more recently, guided hits for  Corey Kent and Jameson Rodgers. Farren also signed Jeffrey Steele (“Big Deal,” “My Town”) to his first songwriting contract, a move that started Farren’s publishing journey.

“As a songwriter, I had sold some catalogs along the way, and I realized I wasn’t scared of that,” Farren notes. “I found that the right deal could be really smart because it gives you money now and gives you money to invest for later, as opposed to just waiting for the money to come in.”

Cash flow historically posed a major hurdle for indie publishers. When Farren and then-partner Ken Levitan, of Vector Management, founded Combustion in 2001, it typically took three to five years for a publisher to begin seeing income. The first revenue comes a little faster now from streaming companies, though the most substantial income is still performance royalties from radio broadcasts, and since most country hits take three to four times longer to reach their chart peaks than they did 25 years ago, the biggest income streams arrive about three months slower.

At its start, Combustion was designed as a publisher and label, with much of its focus on developing soundtrack albums. Although once profitable, sales of movie-music collections plummeted as consumers shifted to streaming individual songs. That’s part of what spurred a change in the business plan.

Fortunately for Combustion, Farren is good at identifying young songwriting talent. During the Nashville Songwriter Awards on Sept. 23, contemporary Christian music’s Matthew West, a former Combustion writer, claimed his second songwriter-artist trophy, while Ashley Gorley (“You’re Gonna Miss This,” “All-American Girl”), also a former Combustion affiliate, took home his ninth. In fact, Gorley, Gordie Sampson (“Jesus, Take the Wheel,” “Just a Dream”) and rock band Kings of Leon were among the earliest signees for the company, which also counts Zach Crowell (“Body Like a Back Road”), Blair Daly (“Smile,” “Beer Money”), Matt Jenkins (“Cop Car,” “Song for Another Time”) and the late Brett James (“Something in the Water,” “I Hold On”) among its former writers. The current iteration includes Kent, Brett Tyler (“Man Made a Bar,” “Wild As Her”) and Thomas Archer (“Wind Up Missin’ You,” “Truth About You”). Two Combustion creatives, Archer and Blake Bollinger, were among the writers on Kent’s recent Country Airplay No. 1, “This Heart,” while Combustion composers Nick Sainato, Chris McKenna and Jessica Farren are part of the team behind Josh Ross‘ current single, “Hate How You Look.”

The writers are key to Farren’s catalog sales strategy. Publishers and composers split the rights to any title in their agreements. A Combustion sale transfers the publishing piece to the buyer, though the writers retain their own share. Meanwhile, the writers’ contracts remain with Combustion, so even as Farren sells off the copyrights, he keeps the talent that begins developing new titles for the next version of the catalog.

“We’re not starting with zero writers,” Farren notes. “We’re starting with zero songs.”

Once Combustion zeroes out the library, it also restarts with an established staff that’s incentivized to rebuild toward the next catalog sale. Farren offers employees a percentage of the revenue from those deals in exchange for a smaller weekly paycheck. All six current staff members have accepted that offer.

“It’s worked out well in every case,” Farren says. “It kept my overhead down. It kept me hungry. It kept us motivated. It kept us kind of aligned as a team — we’re all in it together and we all win it together.”

To collect their share, employees have to remain on the team through the sale’s consummation, an agreement that encourages continuity. VP Chris “Falcon” Van Belkom has been with Combustion 21 years; director operations Kelly Lyons has been in place for nine years.

Frank Liddell, who founded indie Carnival Music in the late 1990s, has routinely turned down offers to sell his catalog. But he noted that as publishing has grown more difficult in the streaming era, every business model that improves the outlook for independent companies is worth pursuing.

“Anybody can walk around and say, ‘We care about the music and that’s all we care about,’” Liddell suggested. “None of us would be in business anymore. So it’s a very delicate balance, and when somebody finds …  an engine or a vehicle to stay independent, to have another voice other than being a major, [that’s] necessary for our business to continue to flourish.”

Farren is optimistic that Combustion will be firing on all cylinders — creatively and economically — as the calendar rolls over in a few months to 2026, bringing a 25th anniversary with maybe two reasons to party.

“A payday as well as a celebration would be my goal,” Farren says. “That would be even sweeter to say: 25 years and everybody’s in a really good place. And they’re going to get a nice bonus.”

The chairs were a ‘turning on the latest round of blind auditions on The Voice, with two stand-out singers in particular getting recognition across the board from the judges on Monday night (Sept. 29).

Both 19-year-old Sadie Dahl and 20-year-old Kayleigh Clark got four chair turns with their auditions, causing judges Michael Bublé, Niall Horan, Reba McEntire and Snoop Dogg to have to fight over them — not that Bublé even had the chance to try and convince the first young lady to join his team. That’s because a certain former One Direction star had blocked him after Dahl nailed a jazzy, run-filled cover of Black Pumas’ “Colors,” leading the crooner to grumble to himself, “I knew it.”

With all four judges turned around, but just three left in the race for Dahl, Bublé tried to convince her to go to Snoop’s team rather than Horan’s — and it worked. “Sadie was a great win,” the rapper said after the young singer chose him to be her coach. “I love her style, her voice, her uniqueness. I feel like she could win the show.”

Snoop wasn’t as lucky when it came to Clark, whose buttery rendition of Sugarland’s “Stay” got standing ovations from the hip-hop star, Horan and Bublé. Despite McEntire trying to win Clark over with her experience as a fellow female country singer, the hopeful ended up choosing the Irish pop star.

“Miss Reba, I love you so much, I have looked up to you my entire life,” Clark told McEntire. “But I think I’m going to go with Niall.”

“I just had to turn based off the goosebumps,” Horan said of Clark. “You had one of those really unique voices, kind of like in a Carrie Underwood kind of style, and it really pierced through.”

Dahl and Clark were just two of several aspiring stars who made it through the first round of season 28 of The Voice. Team Reba also gained 28-year-old Cori Kennedy and 35-year-old Daron Lameek; Team Niall welcomed aboard 31-year-old Revel Day; Team Snoop locked in 24-year-old Natalia Albertini; and Team Michael won over 36-year-old Marty O’Reilly, 38-year-old Aarik Duncan and 34-year-old Rob Cole.

The next round of blind auditions will air at 8 p.m. ET on NBC on Tuesday (Sept. 30). See Dahl’s audition above and check out Clark’s performance below.

Cassie Ventura has filed a letter in federal court days before a judge is set to sentence on Sean “Diddy” Combs, warning that the mogul subjected her to “horrific” abuse and that she fears “swift retribution” when he’s released.

Ventura – Diddy’s longtime girlfriend whose allegations of sexual abuse formed the core of the criminal case against him – filed the statement to support arguments filed by prosecutors on Monday that Combs deserves 11 years in prison when he’s sentenced later this week.

Following a blockbuster trial this spring featuring days of vivid testimony from Ventura, a jury issued a split verdict that acquitted Combs of the most serious sex trafficking and racketeering charges, but still convicted him on lesser counts of interstate prostitution. As a result of that verdict, his lawyers want him released almost immediately.

In her letter to Judge Arun Subramanian, Ventura pleaded with the judge for “justice and accountability” – and said that she hopes “your decision considers the truths at hand that the jury failed to see.”

“For over a decade, Sean Combs made me feel powerless and unimportant, but my experience was real, horrific, and deserves to be considered,” Ventura wrote in the letter. “While the jury did not seem to understand or believe that I engaged in freak offs because of the force and coercion the defendant used against me, I know that is the truth, and his sentence should reflect the reality of the evidence and my lived experience as a victim.”

Read Cassie’s entire letter to the judge below:

Dear Judge Subramanian,

I have been in a cycle of thought and then over thought writing this letter to you. If there is one thing I have learned from this experience, it is that victims and survivors will never be safe. Although I can hope for justice and accountability, I have come to not trust anything. I hope that your decision considers the truths at hand that the jury failed to see.

For four days in May, while nine months pregnant with my son, I testified in front of a packed courtroom about the most traumatic and horrifying chapter in my life. I testified that from age nineteen, Sean Combs used violence, threats, substances, and control over my career to trap me in over a decade of abuse. He groomed me into performing repeated sex acts with hired male sex workers during multi-day “freak offs,” which occurred nearly weekly. I was forced into lingerie and heels, told exactly how to look, and plied with drugs and alcohol so he could control me like a puppet. These events were degrading and disgusting, leaving me with infections, illnesses, and days of physical and emotional exhaustion before he demanded it all again. Sex acts became my full-time job, used as the only way to stay in his good graces.

I testified that I learned to read Sean Combs’s signals, knowing that when he spoke of “freak- offs,” he was demanding them, and that refusing meant punishment—losing my car, my phone, or worse. He controlled every part of my livelihood and threatened to destroy my reputation by leaking sex tapes, a threat he repeated often. His power over me eroded my independence and sense of self until I felt I had no choice but to submit. When he believed I had wronged him or was not sufficiently responsive, he also threatened people around me and those close to me, including my family. I regularly worried that displeasing him meant putting my family and friends’ safety at risk.

I testified how beyond these threats, Sean Combs frequently used violence to get his way. Over the nearly eleven years we were together, Sean Combs would hit me, punch me, stomp on my face, pull my hair, and throw my body to the ground and against the wall. The jury saw pictures of bruises on my back from Combs kicking me and saw the deep gash over my eye he caused when he slammed me into a bed frame. The entire courtroom watched actual footage of Combs kicking and beating me as I tried to run away from a freak off in 2016. People watched this footage dozens of times, seeing my body thrown to the ground, my hands over my head, curled into a fetal position to shield me from the worst blows. This physical violence caused bruises that makeup artists (paid for by Sean Combs) would cover up, as well as permanent scars all over my body.

During my time with Combs, I was in a constant state of hypervigilance, as I was always anticipating demands for sex acts or otherwise fearing retribution for any perceived slight. My descent into substance abuse was directly correlated with his increased control over my body, my money, my freedom, and my free will. I used those drugs to push through the horrifying sex acts he demanded and to numb myself to the physical pain and emotional turmoil I was constantly in. While the defense attorneys at trial suggested that my time with Combs was akin to a “great modern love story,” nothing could be further from the truth. Nothing about this story is great, modern, or loving—this was a horrific decade of my life stained by abuse, violence, forced sex, and degradation.

I spent the last seven years of my life slowly rebuilding myself—physically getting clean from the drug abuse Sean Combs forced and encouraged, and mentally understanding how to live with a seemingly insurmountable level of trauma. The horrors I endured drove me to have thoughts of suicide—ones I almost followed through on, if not for my family’s intervention and urging that I seek professional care. I have been to rehab and have taken part in dozens of types of therapy modalities to confront, compartmentalize, and cope with the horrific memories of sexual and emotional abuse I endured for nearly ten years. While what he did to me is always present, I am slowly learning how to live my life free of the fear and horrors I endured, and in doing so am fully devoted to my husband and my children.

I still have nightmares and flashbacks on a regular, everyday basis, and continue to require psychological care to cope with my past. My worries that Sean Combs or his associates will come after me and my family is my reality. I have in fact moved my family out of the New York area and am keeping as private and quiet as I possibly can because I am so scared that if he walks free, his first actions will be swift retribution towards me and others who spoke up about his abuse at trial. As much progress as I have made in recovering from his abuse, I remain very much afraid of what he is capable of and the malice he undoubtedly harbors towards me for having the bravery to tell the truth.

His defense attorneys claim he is a changed man, and he wants to mentor abusers. I know firsthand what real mentorship means, and this disgusts me; he is not being truthful. I know that who he was to me—the manipulator, the aggressor, the abuser, the trafficker—is who he is as a human. He has no interest in changing or becoming better. He will always be the same cruel, power-hungry, manipulative man that he is. When I came out with my allegations in my civil case, he flatly denied them again and again. It was only after actual video footage corroborated the exact words in my civil complaint that he issued an insincere apology on the internet. Thanks to the footage and my testimony, this is also something he will forever be associated with.

For over a decade, Sean Combs made me feel powerless and unimportant, but my experience was real, horrific, and deserves to be considered. While the jury did not seem to understand or believe that I engaged in freak offs because of the force and coercion the defendant used against me, I know that is the truth, and his sentence should reflect the reality of the evidence and my lived experience as a victim. Reliving in detail the events and truths described throughout the trial and this letter causes me tremendous emotional pain. I am trying with all that I am, to move on. I hope that your sentencing decision reflects the strength it took for victims of Sean Combs to come forward. I hope that your decision considers the many lives that Sean Combs has upended with his abuse and control.

I thank you for your time and attention.

Casandra Ventura Fine