Tamela Mann has topped Billboard’s Gospel Airplay chart for two weeks running (March 28 and April 4) with “Live Breathe Fight.” The coronation gave Mann her 13th leader, the most among women in the chart’s history, and tied her with Kirk Franklin for the most overall. It marks her seventh consecutive No. 1.

“Thirteen No. 1s on Billboard’s Gospel Airplay chart — this is amazing,” Mann tells Billboard. “And to be tied with my brother Kirk Franklin, both of us from Fort Worth, Texas, it’s just incredible. I’m just as grateful now as I was for my first No. 1. I’m honestly in amazement.”

Mann first reached the lead with “Take Me to the King” for 25 weeks in 2012. She has remained a consistent presence on the chart since, with No. 1s including 2017’s “Change Me” (14 weeks), 2016’s “God Provides” and her 2013 cover of MercyMe’s “I Can Only Imagine” (13 each).

Mann and Franklin, who most recently reigned with “Do It Again” in November, preside over James Fortune & FIYA and Tasha Cobbs Leonard, each with 10 Gospel Airplay No. 1s, Jekalyn Carr (nine) and Zacardi Cortez (eight).

Mann credits her latest leader’s connection with listeners for its chart success. “What makes a gospel song work on radio today is the message,” she says. “Speaking to what people are going through and encouraging them … I really believe it’s the words that connect and help songs become No. 1s.”

As she reflects on the milestone, Mann points to the gospel voices who helped shape her path. “I think about the people who came before me — the Hawkins family, Andraé Crouch, Vanessa Bell Armstrong, the Clark Sisters. Those are the voices I grew up listening to and learning from.”

Director Chris Miller is sipping an Aperol Spritz during a well-earned family vacation to the Dolomites, marveling at the success of his and co-director Phil Lord’s film Project Hail Mary.

Starring Ryan Gosling, the movie about a hapless schoolteacher who is blasted off into space to save civilization has also done something otherworldly: become a box office hit. To date, it has grossed $300 million globally, a miraculous feat for a movie in the modern era that isn’t a sequel or based on existing IP. (Industry observers point to 2023’s Oppenheimer as the last example of a similar hit). One could even say that its rare success at the box office mimics the improbable story told in the film. 

“When you’re doing something that’s a big risk at a time when things are not looking great and it works, it’s very gratifying,” Miller told Billboard via Zoom in between orange-hued sips, of both the film itself and its box office. “In a way, it was its own Hail Mary.”

Aside from an emotional and inspiring story (which was adapted from a 2021 novel by Andy Weir) coupled with eye-popping visual effects, the film is fueled by an eclectic soundtrack utilizing both head-turning needle drops and an innovative score which is equally atmospheric and soaring. 

“We initially had a few ideas we were circling when it came to the music,” Miller told Billboard. “One of them was to have music from all over the world because we wanted it to feel like a global mission with everyone rooting Ryan’s character on.” That includes anything-but-mainstream placements like “Gracias a la Vida” from the Argentine singer Mercedes Sosa and “Po Atarau” courtesy the Turakina Māori Girls’ Choir out of New Zealand, spearheaded by music supervisor Kier Lehman. “We tried using more modern tracks in it, but it didn’t ever want to stick,” said Miller.

There was one outlier. The movie’s most memorable musical moment comes from a haunting performance by the no-nonsense character charged with heading the international task force to save Earth, played stoically by Sandra Hüller. During a key moment in the film, the team gathers to blow off steam and sing karaoke, with Hüller belting out Harry Styles’ Billboard Hot 100 top 5 hit “Sign of the Times,” a setup that was inspired by a location scout the directorial duo embarked on. 

“We went onto the USS Abraham Lincoln in San Diego and noticed that the most interesting parts of the ship were the social spaces,” Lord recalls. “Some of them have all sorts of quirky things, like 15 versions of Monopoly and a karaoke machine. We were thinking, this is also a movie about social anxiety and the way our connections with each other become so valuable.”

Inspired to include a karaoke scene in the script for dramatic effect, initially Hüller’s character wasn’t even slated to take the mic. But in a story Gosling later relayed on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon, days before they shot the scene, the star randomly heard Hüller from her dressing room. “I heard the voice of an angel and I was like, ‘What is that?’ I went down the hallway and said, ‘You can sing? Please sing in the movie.’ And she was like, ‘I’ll think about it.’”

Eventually, Lord said that Hüller agreed with one caveat: “She said, ‘I’ll do it, but only if I get to pick the song.’” The team girded themselves, but her choice was “Sign of the Times,” as she and her daughter would both sing along to the Styles track. But the clock was ticking: the production only had 36 hours left on the ship where they were filming in London; barely enough time to practice, let alone clear the megahit considering the time difference. Gosling told Fallon of the reaction: “Can you choose an easier song to clear?”

“We spent over a month getting ready to film that scene, pre-recording everybody and overpreparing with options,” Lehman said, until the musical wrench was thrown into his plans. “I knew it wasn’t going to be easy, so we immediately jumped into it.” Their first call was to Universal Music Publishing who represents Styles. Eventually, the film’s powerhouse producer Amy Pascal got involved, as well as Jody Gerson, chairman/CEO of Universal Music Publishing Group. “She got in touch with Harry and told him what a special movie it was going to be.”

In the 11th hour, they narrowly cleared the song. “Just in time for her to sing, but just barely,” said Lehman. “There was no prep for her.” According to Lord, she only crooned it on camera twice. “We also didn’t tell anybody there what she was going to do, so those reactions are genuine reactions from the cast who didn’t even expect her to show up.” 

As Gosling told Fallon, “It became the anthem of the film,” with the actor even singing it to Harry Styles during a recent hosting gig on Saturday Night Live. Adding to the kismet, Styles is back in the spotlight promoting his Billboard 200-topping album Kiss All The Time. Disco, Occasionally in tandem with the movie’s release. “It’sone of those incredible moments,” said Lehman, noting even specific lyrics like “We gotta get away from here” match the scene perfectly in the lead-up to Gosling launching into space. “I think it comes from leading with the creative first and not being afraid to take a chance on the right song, even though the backend part of the process wasn’t the ideal situation for my position as a supervisor,” Lehman admits.

In addition to clearing Styles on a time crunch, Lehman also had a Beatles song to contend with. The source material novel is rife with Beatles references, which carry over on screen. Even the capsules Gosling eventually sends back to Earth are named for the respective members of the Fab Four. With that in mind, the goal was to include at least one Beatles tune: no small feat for the famously clearance-averse and typically prohibitively expensive act. 

“There were some interesting covers that we had tried from early on because we assumed we never would be able to actually get one in,” said Miller. They included David Bowie’s spin on “Across the Universe” as well as “Here Comes the Sun” courtesy Cat Stevens. Eventually, they narrowed in on two songs: “Don’t Let Me Down” for the end credits, and “Two of Us” during a pivotal scene before the film ends. According to Lehman, the process was layered: “The first I was told was that it’d be very expensive, and they’d need a lot of information in order to make a final decision.”

With that, the filmmakers handed over scripts, a rough cut, and then, unusually, the final cut of the scene late in the process, so the powers that be had full understanding of the song’s inclusion which later got the greenlight. “Our producing partner Aditya Sood pitched ‘Two of Us,’ and when we included it, it fit it so perfectly,” said Miller, alluding to the fact that while the song on its face is about John and Paul’s friendship, it has double meaning given it’s also a nod to Ryan Gosling’s character and the alien he (spoiler alert) becomes close with.”

With the placements in place, the rest of the universe of music is populated by a score from Daniel Pemberton, who previously teamed up with Lord and Miller on Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse. “I wanted to make something that felt magical and strange, that captured both the awe and wonder of the universe as well as what it would be like to communicate with an alien being who turned out to be kinda fun,” Pemberton told Billboard. According to Miller, they wanted to make sure Gosling’s character “never felt alone in the scenes. That’s why there were a lot of choral elements in the score; like children stomping and clapping.”

In fact, Pemberton used an array of novel ways to record the score, including recruiting actual schoolchildren to record in none other than Abbey Road, in a nod to Gosling’s teacher character. “We had (the kids) playing a lot of the percussion parts using their bodies, stomping on the floor, clapping and slapping,” said Pemberton, who also used a 1950s-era Cristal Baschet, made of glass and metal and played with water. “There are so many unique sounds.”

“A lot of a movie’s success depends on people feeling engaged and holding their attention for the length of a concert,” said Lord. “A big part of that is having beautiful music in it. Over time, I think we managed to find the right rhythm to keep everyone locked in and that’s why you’re finding people leave the theater, telling their friends and wanting to see it again.”

The temperature was in the 70s, and Taylor Austin Dye’s head was in the ‘90s.

On June 12 last year – the Thursday after Nashville’s CMA Fest – Dye had a job to do. She was set for an 11:00 a.m. writing appointment at the Brentwood home studio of songwriter Dan Agee. She’d just bought a used convertible, and she decided to put the CD player to work.

“I was listening to a Shania Twain album on the way to the write, you know – top down, it was a great day,” Dye recalls. “I went in there, and they said, ‘What are you feeling today? What’s going on?’ I was like, ‘Man, I’ve been listening to this Shania Twain record on repeat, and I would love to write something like that.’”

Well, not exactly like that. Dye wanted to inject a little Nickelback influence – “heavy drums, heavy guitar licks,” she explains – and as soon as she spoke those two references, Agee laid into a bristling, ascendant guitar riff. Songwriter Nick Wayne, the day’s third contributor, put in his own two cents when Dye mentioned a pro-female relationship story.

“Nick was like, ‘Well, what if you don’t need a man for that?’,” she recalls. “I was like, ‘That’s perfect. Let’s do that.’ And then we wrote it in about an hour.”

A feisty, powerful singer from Hazard, Ky., Dye is the first female signed to the country division of Jay DeMarcus’ Red Street label. “Don’t Need a Man for That” – eventually released as “Man for That” – would emerge as her first radio single for the company, showcasing her grit as well as her vocal power.

“Taylor’s a rough broad, you know what I mean?” says Lex Music Group founder Lex Lipsitz, her manager-producer. “She’ll throw down with you, but she’s also a woman, and she’s very girly, too. She loves makeup and loves getting dressed up and fashion and things like that. But she’ll also knock your front tooth out – you know what I mean? – if you piss her off.”

“Man for That” captured that determination and self-sufficiency, and unfolded much like the breezy convertible ride that got her to the appointment: top down. They knew what the hook would be at the finish. line and started from the opening note.

“The way I look at top-down writing, it’s so much easier for me to just get that [natural growth] of the song,.. almost like we’re live performing it for the first time,” Wayne says. “We actually don’t even know what’s about to happen.”

Here’s what did happen: Agee quickly pulled a track together around a stomping, four-on-the-floor bass, while Dye and Wayne developed a first-verse series of short “You don’t need to…” phrases – don’t need to “bait my hook,” “mow my grass,” “open my door.” The conclusion to the verse, “I don’t need a man for that,” set up the chorus, though that was challenging for a second. They wanted the melody to soar, and to change up from the shorter phrases in the opening frame.

“I remember Nick saying, ‘Taylor, just sing. Let’s not worry about lyric right now – just start singing, let’s see what happens,’” Agee recalls. “So, a lot of those long phrases are just what she’s saying in the moment. And Nick had his phone on record going, ‘Yes, that one.’ ‘Yes, that one.’ ‘Maybe not that one.’”

In the process, they pulled off a subtle, classic Twain move, modulating from a C blues scale to the key of E-flat. “The chorus, it modulates throughout the whole thing, which is such a ‘90s thing to do,” Dye notes. “I’m all for. it.”

That modulated chorus provided a temporary challenge in their top-down adventure. “I remember going around in circles about how we were going to get back, because it’s kind of in a differe.nt key from the first [verse], hence the Shania thing,” Agee says. “We really had to [change] the way th.ose last couple of lines landed to make it get back to the original riff and not feel out of left field.”

Lyrically, those phrases included a setup line that created a mild Nashville twist, capturing both Dye’s vulnerability and her swagger: “If you break my heart I’ll get you back/Baby, I don’t need a man for that.”

The second verse reversed the opening stanza’s point of view. Instead of “You don’t need to…” phrases, it rolled through “I can…” positives. The singer can “light my own smoke,” “make my own cash” and “take out my own trash.”

“Is the second verse going to kill a song or not?” Wayne asks rhetorically. “That’s a great topic that songwriters talk about, and it can be overthought. And so, it’s nice to just do the same thing but have the perspective change. We literally did the exact same thing. It’s just the person changed.”

After the second chorus, they modulated once more, shifting from E-flat to C major, slightly brightening the sound for a guitar solo.

“We played around for quite a while with it having another key change at the end, almost like Whitney Houston’s “I Will Always Love You,’ with a bigger lift at the end for another chorus,” Agee says. “After quite a bit of that, we started to go, ‘Okay, we pushed it too far.’”

Agee’s wife was out of town, so with the house to himself, he stayed up through most of the night building out a full-production demo. Lipsitz and Red Street were ecstatic about “Don’t Need a Man for That” (as the demo was labeled), and they held the instrumental tracking session on Oct. 16 at Southern Comfort, the basement studio at Lipsitz’s Brentwood home, formerly owned by Waylon Jennings and Jessi Colter. Lipsitz played frequently in that studio with Shooter Jennings in the ‘90s as members of the hard rock band Stargunn.

“We always joke that the ghost of Waylon is watching us,” Dye quips.

They followed the demo’s outline, but amped up the sound, particularly in the opening verse, where Agee’s production was percussion-less. After some experimenting, drummer Miles McPherson ended up playing sticks on the rim, reminiscent of ZZ Top’s “La Grange,” in that section. “Miles is so great,” Dye says. “I would put him in my pocket and take him everywhere with me if I could.”

Dye encouraged guitarist Nathan Keeterle to find a tone that was “a little dirtier, a little grungier,” and he ended up stacking a biting, white Gibson SG with a thick ES-335. Lipsitz also boosted the sound a decibel or two on the chorus – not enough to notice, but enough to make it feel brighter.

When Dye recorded her final vocals, she knocked out a glass of bourbon, then powered her way through it. Lipsitz coaxed her to re-sing a few sections to make her Hazard-bred enunciations discernible. “I’m not trying to tame her accent, but otherwise you don’t know what she’s saying,” he observes. “That’s how country she is.”

Dye installed “Man for That” as her show opener, and Red Street released it to country radio via PlayMPE on March 2, setting March 30 as the official add date. It introduces her as an empowered voice with serious bravado.

“That song is a good pointer to who I am as an artist,” she says. “It’s very fun, it’s energetic, it’s rocking. I think that encapsulates who I am.”

Ore Dake Level Up na Ken (Solo Leveling) Vol. 24 by DUBU, Chugong and h-goon debuts at No. 1 on the Billboard Japan Book Hot 100 list released April 2.

The title is the Japanese manga adaptation of a popular South Korean web novel by Chugong. The volume scores across three metrics this week to claim the top spot: No. 1 in brick-and-mortar, No. 2 in e-books and No. 20 in e-commerce (EC). The anime’s second season began airing in Japan in January 2025, and its theme song, LiSA’s “ReawakeR (feat. Felix of Stray Kids),” stayed at No. 1 for eight weeks on the Global Japan Songs Excl. Japan chart, which ranks music from Japan consumed in other countries and regions.

Tsujitomo and Masaya Tsunamoto’s GIANT KILLING Vol. 69 — the soccer manga serialized in Morning magazine since 2007 — enters the chart at No. 2, hitting No. 4 in both brick-and-mortar and e-books, and No. 11 in e-commerce. Hirohiko Araki’s The JOJOLands Vol. 8 climbs a notch to land in the top 3. Bin Kusamizu and Saburo Megumi’s Fragile Vol. 31, which leads the e-book metric, debuts at No. 6.

Ryo Asai’s In the Megachurch, which continues to rule the social media metric, remains within the top 20 this week (No. 16). The title is nominated for the 2026 Hon’ya Taisho (Japan Booksellers’ Award), with the winner set to be announced April 9. On the social media front, both volumes of the Japanese edition of Andy Weir’s Project Hail Mary translated by Kazuko Onoda — the feature film opened in Japanese theaters Mar. 20 — rank at No. 2 and No. 3 on the metric. On the overall chart, Vol. 1 climbs from No. 16 to No. 12, while Vol. 2 rises from No. 21 to No. 14.

The Billboard Japan Book Hot 100 is a comprehensive chart combining physical sales, e-books, library loans, subscription data and social media activity. See the top 10 titles on this week’s list below, tracking the period from Mar. 23 to Mar. 29.

(Numbers in parentheses indicate the title’s metric placements for brick-and-mortar, EC, e-books, subscriptions, and social media, top 20 only. English title given if translations or adaptations exist.)

1. Ore Dake Level Up na Ken (Solo Leveling) Vol. 24, DUBU, Chugong, h-goon (1/20/2/–/–)

2. GIANT KILLING Vol. 69, Tsujitomo, Masaya Tsunamoto (4/11/4/–/–)

3. The JOJOLands Vol. 8, Hirohiko Araki (5/16/12/–/–)

4. ONE PIECE Vol. 114, Eiichiro Oda (2/14/–/–/–)

5. Oni no Hanayome (The Ogre’s Bride) Vol. 9, Jun Togashi, Kureha (3/–/–/–/–)


6. Fragile Vol. 31, Bin Kusamizu, Saburo Megumi (–/–/1/–/–)

7. Bungo Stray Dogs Vol. 28, Kafka Asagiri, Sango Harukawa (7/7/–/–/–)

8. Shuumatsu no Warukyure (Record of Ragnarok) Vol. 27, Azychika, Shinya Umemura, Takumi Fukui (6/–/–/–/–)

9. Orukusen Okoku-shi (History of the Kingdom of the Orcsen) Vol. 6, Kyoichiro Tarumi, Takeshi Nogami (–/–/3/–/–)

10. Kimi to Bara-iro no Hibi Vol. 3, Chihiro Hiro (12/–/10/–/–)





Pooh Shiesty has been arrested on robbery and kidnapping charges tied to a violent dispute over the Memphis rapper’s recording contract that included Gucci Mane as one of three victims.

The Department of Justice announced on Thursday (April 2) that Pooh Shiesty (Lontrell Williams Jr.), his father, Lontrell Williams Sr. and Big30 (Rodney Lamont Wright Jr.) were among eight individuals arrested on Wednesday (April 1) over the alleged incident, which is said to have taken place on Jan. 10 in Dallas.

During a press conference on Thursday hosted by Ryan Raybould, U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Texas, it was alleged that on Jan. 10, three music professionals traveled to a Dallas recording studio for a meeting arranged by Pooh Shiesty to discuss the rapper’s record deal. According to CBS News, the DOJ identified Gucci Mane as one of the individuals at the meeting.

Once the meeting began inside the Dallas recording studio, the complaint alleges that an “armed takeover” ensued.

“Williams Jr. produced an AK-style pistol and forced one of the victims to sign a release from the recording contract at gunpoint,” Raybould said. “The remaining conspirators displayed firearms and robbed the other victims of Rolex watches, jewelry, cash and other high-value items. One of the victims was actually choked by one of the victims to near-unconsciousness.”

The complaint accuses one of Pooh Shiesty’s co-conspirators of barricading the studio door so that the victims could not leave. Defendants also flaunted some of the stolen prized items on social media, as shown in a press release from the U.S. Attorney’s Office, Northern District of Texas.

Pooh Shiesty was on home confinement at the time of the January altercation after being released from prison in October. He served more than three years of a five-year sentence on firearm conspiracy charges.

Shiesty is signed to Gucci Mane’s 1017 Records company in partnership with Atlantic Records. Upon his release from prison, the Memphis rapper earned a top 10 hit with “FDO” on the Billboard Hot 100.

Eight of the nine suspects were arrested on April 1 by the FBI, while one remains at large. The same day, the FBI also raided Shiesty’s family home, located in Cordova, Tenn.

Outside of Shiesty, his father and Big30, the U.S. Attorney’s Office listed Kedarius Waters, Terrance Rodgers, Damarian Gipson, Demarcus Glover, Kordae Johnson and Darrion McDaniel as defendants in the case. Each faces up to life in prison if convicted.

Representatives for Shiesty declined to comment for this story. Billboard has reached out to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for North Texas for comment.