Month: November 2022

Lizzo has added a second North American leg to her successful 2022 Special tour. The second legdubbed The Special 2our — kicks off Friday, April 21st in Knoxville, TN at Thompson-Boling Arena.  The 17-date second leg of the tour continues through St. Louis, Montreal, Chicago and more before wrapping up on Friday, June 2, 2023, at Acrisure Arena in Palm Desert, CA.

Lizzo’s LP Special dropped in July 2022 and went on to debut at No. 2 with 69,000 equivalent album units sold in its first week, giving Lizzo her highest-charting album to date and the highest-charting album by a female artist in 2022 at the time.

Public on sale for the second leg The Special 2our will begin Friday, November 18th at 10 am local time via Ticketmaster.

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Ticketmaster announced that the public ticket sale for Taylor Swift’s “The Eras Tour” on Fri, November 18th has been canceled. Ticketmaster tweeted on Thursday: “Due to extraordinarily high demands on ticketing systems and insufficient remaining ticket inventory to meet that demand, tomorrow’s public on-sale for Taylor Swift | The Eras Tour has been cancelled.” 

Ticket pre-sales began on Nov. 15, with the high demand causing Ticketmaster’s website to crash. The company previously had fans pre-register as Verified Fans before the sale, and over 3.5 million fans pre-registered for Swift’s program — the largest registration in Ticketmaster’s history.   After Ticketmaster’s announcement, Swift fans expressed their disappointment, and even created a website to attempt to take action against Ticketmaster “through collective action.”

Ticketmaster previously issued an explanation in response to the chaos surrounding buying tickets for Swift’s tour: “The Eras on sale made one thing clear: Taylor Swift is an unstoppable force and continues to set records. We strive to make ticket buying as easy as possible for fans, but that hasn’t been the case for many people trying to buy tickets for the Eras Tour. We want to share some information to help explain what happened …Even when a high demand on sale goes flawlessly from a tech perspective, many fans are left empty-handed. For example: based on the volume of traffic to our site, Taylor would need to perform over 900 stadium shows (almost 20x the number of shows she is doing)… that’s a stadium show every single night for the next 2.5 years.”

As of press time, there was no word on whether the general sale will be postponed, or how many tickets still remain after the pre-sale.

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Sam Smith shared the full tracklist for their highly-anticipated new album Gloria. Smith revealed the titles of the 13 tracks that will be included on their upcoming fourth studio album, and in addition to his collab with Kim Petras on their smash hit “Unholy,” Smith also teams up with Ed Sheeran, Jessie Reyez, and Koffee.

Smith shared his thoughts on Gloria:  “I’m feeling overwhelmed and emotional as I start to let go of Gloria and hand this work over to you. It has been magical in every way to make this piece of music and by giving this record to you I am giving you part of my heart and soul.”

Gloria drops on January 27th, 2023. Check out the full tracklist – here.

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ABC has revealed an updated lineup of performers set to take the stage at the 2020 American Music Awards, airing live this Sunday, Nov. 20 at 8 p.m. EST from the Microsoft Theater in Los Angeles. Hosted by Wayne Brady, the show will also be available for streaming on Hulu the following day.

The newly-announced artists set to perform at the AMAs include Stevie Wonder, Anitta, Bebe Rexha, David Guetta, Charlie Puth, Dove Cameron, Lil Baby, Ari Lennox, and GloRilla. They join previously announced artists Carrie Underwood, Imagine Dragons, JID, Yola, and DJ D-Nice.

In addiiton, P!NK will sing a tribute to the late Olivia Newton-John. and the show will honor 17-time AMA winner Lionel Richie with the prestigious Icon Award. As a part of the celebration, two-time AMA winner Stevie Wonder and two-time AMA nominee Charlie Puth will take the stage to perform a medley of Richie’s hit songs. They will be joined by Ari Lennox for the special tribute performance as well.

This year’s nominees include Adele, Bad Bunny, Beyoncé, Drake, Taylor Swift, The Weeknd, and many more. Bad Bunny is the most nominated artist with eight total nods  Voting for all categories is open on VoteAMAs.com.

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RM of BTS has announced the release of his debut solo album Indigo, set to drop next month. RM took to HYBE’s social networking platform Weverse to share a statement detailing the album: “Hello. Finally. Because of you, my first album is coming out. I prepared hard for four years. It’s very different from my previous work and there are a lot of fun friends included. Please support us until December 2.”  RM previously released his self-titled debut mixtape in 2015, and his follow-up mixtape, Mono, was released in 2018 which included the single “Forever Rain.”

BTS’ label BIGHIT MUSIC also released their own statement about RM’s solo debut: “RM has already given fans an honest look into his world through two mixtapes. Through ‘Indigo’, RM delivers his candid thoughts and feelings and showcases wide-ranging music through collaborations with various artists.”

RM is the third member of BTS to release solo music this year, following J-Hope and Jin (who just released his song “The Astronaut” last month). The band members are focusing on individual projects after they announced over the summer that they would be taking a break as a group to pursue solo endeavors.

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The Recording Academy has revealed the nominations for the 2023 Grammy Awards. The nominees were announced by Recording Academy president Harvey Mason Jr., John Legend, Machine Gun Kelly, Olivia Rodrigo, and other musical artists during a livestream event held on Tuesday.

Beyoncé leads the nominees with nine nominations, including Album of the Year and Best Dance/Electronic Album for Renaissance. The 2023 nominations bring Beyoncé’s lifetime total to 88 nominations, tying with her husband, rapper Jay-Z, for the most nominations in Grammy history.

Kendrick Lamar follows with eight nominations, including Album of the Year for Mr. Morale & the Big Steppers, his first album in five years. Adele and Brandi Carlile both have seven nominations, and artists including Taylor Swift, Harry Styles, Lizzo, Mary J. Blige, Doja Cat, Bad Bunny and BTS each earned multiple nominations.

The 65th Annual Grammy Award ceremony will take place Feb. 5 at Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles and air on CBS. The event will also be available to stream live and on demand on Paramount+.  For the complete list of 2023 nominees, head here.

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