Category: Viral

We still have a ways to go until we hear Ed Sheeran’s new album Play, as it’s set to drop in September. Thankfully, he’s been generous with sharing singles leading up to the release, and today (June 5), he’s back with another new one: “Sapphire,” which arrives alongside a video.

The video was shot in India (an appropriate choice given some of the song’s instrumentation), and it serves as a love letter to the country, similarly to how his “Azizam” video paid homage to Persian weddings.

He says of the song:

“Sapphire was the first song I finished for Play that made me know where the album was heading. It’s why I finished the recording process in Goa surrounded by some of the best musicians in India. It was an incredible creative process. I shot the music video with Liam and Nic across my India tour earlier this year, we wanted to showcase the beauty and breadth of the country and its culture. The final jigsaw piece for me was getting Arijit on the record. It was a journey to get there and such an amazing day of music and family. Me and him have done a full Punjabi version of the song that will come out in the next few weeks, which has a lot more of him on it. This is the album version of the song, and my favourite song on the album. Hope you guys love it. X.”

Sheeran also previously said of the album, “Play was an album that was made as a direct response to the darkest period of my life. Coming out of all of that I just wanted to create joy and technicolour, and explore cultures in the countries I was touring. I made this record all over the world, finished it in Goa, India, and had some of the most fun, explorative creative days of my life. It’s a real rollercoaster of emotions from start to finish, it encapsulates everything that I love about music, and the fun in it, but also where I am in life as a human, a partner, a father.”

Watch the “Sapphire” video above.

Play is out 9/12 via Gingerbread Man Records/Atlantic Records. Find more information here.

Uproxx cover stars aespa will be back soon: Today (June 5), they teased a new single called “Dirty Work,” set to arrive shortly. The 30-second teaser video, above, is an animation of jewelry being melted down and pouring to form the song’s title, which then snaps into a new diamond-encrusted piece.

Per a press release, the single, which is getting a physical release, is set to drop on June 27 at noon ET, and it’ll feature three tracks: The title track, an English version of it, and an instrumental version. The release is available for pre-order now, here.

The song will be the group’s first release of the year, and their first since unveiling the mini-album Whiplash in October 2024. They preceded that release with SYNK: Parallel Line – Special Digital Single, which included solo songs from the group’s members: Karina’s “Up,” Giselle’s “Dopamine,” Ningning’s “Bored!,” and Winter’s “Spark.”

This comes after a major 2024 for aespa, which saw the group release their debut album, Armageddon. Earlier this year, they also enjoyed a run of North American and European tour dates. In March, the group was also honored at Billboard Women In Music 2025 as the Group Of The Year, and they also performed “Whiplash” at the show.

There are a handful of couples in the pop sphere, and among them are Tate McRae and The Kid Laroi. Laroi seems to be especially appreciative of the life he and his superstar Canadian girlfriend are sharing.

In a new interview with Elle, when asked if there’s one female artist who has “imparted some wisdom” to him, he responded:

“Definitely my girlfriend. She’s the hardest working artist I’ve ever met in my entire life. And I don’t say that because she’s my girlfriend. Seeing how hard she works inspires and encourages me to follow along and do the same. There’s something really, really motivating about that — and really attractive as well.”

He also revealed what a weekend together usually looks like for them, saying, “We’re homebodies. Sometimes it’s nice to go out and do stuff like that, but most times, we’ll just be like, ‘Yo, should we go out for dinner? Let’s just order something. Let’s make something. Let’s watch something.’ The new Black Mirror just came out, so we’ve been watching that. The new Love On The Spectrum. That’s one of the best shows ever — Connor is, like, my favorite person of all time.”

Read the full interview here.

Benson Boone was all over The Tonight Show yesterday (June 4). He was there from the very start of the episode: In the cold open sketch, Fallon claims he can do a backflip like Boone, but when he tries, he ends up just crashing into a food-covered table.

During an interview with Fallon, he also discussed the origin of his “moonbeam ice cream” lyric from “Mystical Magical,” explaining:

“I write pretty much everything, me and this guy Jack [LaFrantz]. We are very unserious when we’re together. When we work, even the song I’m singing tonight, ‘Momma Song,’ it’s a very serious song, but that session the day we wrote that song, you would’ve thought we were trying to not write ‘Momma Song.’ We connect so well, and we were just kind of having a day. […] As we get on through the session, we kind of came to what’s called writer’s block, and it’s when you have a melody already, but, you cannot think of a lyric.

Jack’s sitting there, and we’re kind of goofing off, and he just goes, ‘You know, what if you just did this?’ And it looked like he was gonna say something really good, and we’ve been sitting there for an hour, I’m like, ‘This is it,’ and he goes, ‘Moonbeam ice cream / Taking off your blue jeans.’ […] It’s a placeholder, at least. […] It was a placeholder for the day, and then we went home and listened to it, and I was like, ‘You know what? Moonbeam ice cream.’”

At the end of the chat, he fulfilled Fallon’s to do a backflip off his desk.

Elsewhere during the show, he performed his touching recent single “Momma Song.”

Check out the clips above.

Lorde is all in on the Virgin era, with her new album set for release later this month. So, she’s ready to look back at Solar Power and admit that the persona she cultivated didn’t necessarily feel authentic to herself.

On a new episode of Therapuss, Lorde explained:

“It was also so crazy touring Melodrama. I found it very intense for that whole time to be in this hardcore music [atmosphere] every night. I don’t know, for some reason I found it pretty intense and I just wanted something that felt very light and easy after that. It was cool. I love ‘Solar Power’ so much, and I truly needed to make it. I wouldn’t be here with another album if I hadn’t made Solar Power.

But I think it showed me that you sort of have no choice but to be who you’re supposed to be. Me sort of disappearing and being all wafty and on the beach, I was just like, ‘Actually, I don’t think this is me.’ I think I just am this person whose meant to make these bangers that f*ck us all up, that just rip across a festival ground. I’m supposed to do that to our bodies. I don’t think I’m supposed to vibe out.”

Watch the full interview above.

Breakout R&B star Leon Thomas built on the momentum of his hit song “Mutt” with a deluxe reissue of the album of the same name, Heel, last Friday, adding nine new songs to the tracklist. They included a new version of the titular track, two collaborations with Big Sean, and the focus track, “Not Fair.”

To commemorate the deluxe album’s release, Thomas stopped by Jimmy Kimmel Live! to play “Not Fair” live, just four months removed from making his official television performance debut on The Late Show with “Mutt.” As with his previous performance, Thomas took the stage with his band, playing guitar and showing off his powerful vocals, this time amid a tangled coil of various audio cables (way more than could reasonably be expected for the current band set up). A background visualizer on the screen behind him played a distorted, closeup waveform, reminding me a little bit of those old Winamp visualizers. The performance offers an intriguing alternative listening experience for fans (similarly to The Weeknd’s “Open Hearts” video from January).

Watch Leon Thomas’ Jimmy Kimmel Live! performance of “Not Fair” above.

Mutt; Heel is out now via EZMNY Records and Motown Records. You can find more info here.

This week, West Coast living legend Too Short is the latest artist to stop by Uproxx Studios to try to psych out Sound Check host Jeremy Hecht. Jeremy pitted two remakes of his classic 2006 song “Blow The Whistle” against each other in his quest to glean Short Dawg’s taste, playing Saweetie’s “Tap In” alongside Drake’s “For Free.” Jeremy also had Short choose between “Still D.R.E.” and “The Message,” “The Ghetto” and “Atomic Dog,” and two songs that make great use of Too Short’s favorite word. Can he figure out Too Short’s life anthem?

Here’s how it works: Jeremy plays two songs for the guest artist, who has to choose one and explain their choice, giving Jeremy a chance to learn their musical taste. Jeremy then has to guess the artist’s life anthem, the song they’d take to a desert island, which the guest wrote down earlier on a piece of paper. Our production team has also given him a decoy song, and Jeremy has to guess which is correct based on what he’s learned in the previous rounds.

Watch Too Short take on the Sound Check challenge above. New episodes of Sound Check drop every Wednesday at noon ET / 9 PM PT on Uproxx’s YouTube.

Addison Rae is getting her shine as a pop star these days, but it was her time working with Charli XCX during the Brat era that felt like a formative moment for her.

Explaining during a new Apple Music interview with Zane Lowe that the session to write the “Von Dutch” remix was “a really big turning point” for her, Rae said that she was “still pretty insecure in my songwriting abilities.” Speaking about a note of lyrics she sent to Charli, she continued:

I sent her that, and she was like, ‘Yeah, we’re going to use all of this. We need to use all of this in the song.’ I was like, ‘Oh my God, are you sure you don’t want to like change it up or make this better? You’re amazing, and I trust you. This is your song and I just want to aid your artistry and your vision on this.’ […]

I felt very seen. Then I had hummed out that hook melody, ‘You just want to scream my name,’ that little melody that we do for the hook of the song. I hummed that out in my car and I sent it to her and she was like, ‘Great, this is the hook.’ I was like, ‘Oh my God, I had never felt so seen and understood, and also just trusted.’ I think she trusted me so strongly with what I thought was cool for that, which really gave me confidence in my taste.

Watch the full interview above.

Last month, while presenting the award for Favorite Country Duo or Group at this year’s American Music Awards, two burgeoning country stars — both playing homage to the storied genre, made headlines. As Megan Maroney, the blonde up-and-comer who often answers to “Emo Cowgirl” gave Shaboozey, fellow Country crooner known for his chart topping track “A Bar Song (Tipsy)” that mixes country and rap — a quick music history lesson, sharing a story of the how the Carter Family won Favorite Country Duo or Group in 1974. She ended her story by giving them credit, where it perhaps wasn’t due, saying they “basically invented country music.” He gave her a side eye so fierce for the comment that the internet noticed. Later, he explained, while defending Maroney, the reason for his reaction. “When you uncover the true history of country music, you find a story so powerful that it cannot be erased,” he shared via Twitter. It’s a sentiment many Black artists like Shaboozey have attempted to share as they navigate the world of American roots music, a sound made up of decades of blues, bluegrass, folk, gospel, and country.

Since the advent of radio, Black artists have been categorized by their race rather than their sound. In a segregated system that was more concerned by marketing to white people vs. Black people, and choosing which airwaves songs would play based more on physical characteristics than sound, it’s no surprise that it’s taken until 2025 for an artist like Beyoncé to become the first Black woman to win the Grammy for Best Country Album. But the truth is that people across races have been creating American roots music since the African rhythms, call-and-response vocals, and the banjo (which has African origins), blended together with the fiddles and ballads of Britain and Ireland, with Native American musicianship and storytelling. It’s a genre that is chiefly American, and although people may assume it was created by those who had the platforms to speak about it during their time (*cough* The Carter Family *cough), it would not have been and could not have been created anywhere other than the sonic melting pot of this country.

Still, even in 2025, though the face of these genres are changing, many Black singers and songwriters have yet to experience success, thanks in part to the subconscious and industry-created bias that they ‘don’t belong’ in certain genres. Because of this, we’re sharing the names and music of just a few of those artists you should watch, but more importantly, listen to. Here are Black roots artists that are breaking the rules of genre and reclaiming the sound that has always been theirs.

Annahstasia

When LA-based singer-songwriter Annahstasia first wrote songs that paid homage to the sounds she’d grown up with, a mix of folk with jazz training, she was immediately told to pivot to pop. Her deep, resonating voice and storytelling ability through song came naturally to the singer at a young age, but as she met with record executives, she found that her instincts and their intent for her didn’t match. “It was disheartening,” she told NME. “Imagine showing up to a space and being like, ‘This is me.’ And someone saying, ‘Ew.’ It doesn’t feel good.” Lucky for us, she persevered, bringing her songs on global tours opening for the likes of Lenny Kravitz and releasing a debut album filled with poetry, soul, and of course, folk instrumentation. Her latest album, Tether, promises more from the artist, as she pushes against capitalism, leans into self-revelations, and mingles romantic prose with sharp declarations in a move that not only reclaims the genre but allows her as an artist to reclaim herself.

Cleo Reed

New York City’s Cleo Reed has been making a name for herself, combining Black Southern folk and delicate guitar playing to create their own fresh version of roots music. Classically trained in guitar and songwriting at Harlem School of the Arts before joining a punk band (NYC’s Pretty Sick) to releasing their debut album Root Cause in 2023, they’ve relied very little on categorization of their sound and more so into what makes folk music what it is — a means for holding the powerful accountable and documenting lived realities. Her recent single “Always The Horse, Never The Jockey,” embodies the genre’s political core. “It is a harrowing realization to notice and understand that the systems seen in the United States are intentionally designed to fail us,” she said of its inspiration in a statement. “Each day, I’ve seen who chooses to ride right past the dysfunction in search of industry. I can’t help but admit that I feel more in relation to the horse itself than the jockey.” With a new album on the way and a penchant for timely tracks, Cleo Reed’s impact is promising.

Tanner Addel

Country has long been the home of bleached blondes with oversized hair and songs about heartbreak (thank you Dolly Parton!), but those designations have rarely been allocated to Black women in the genre, if they were in the genre at all. Enter, Tanner Addel, who has come into pop country embracing all aspects of herself and telling stories she could only tell. Earlier this year, she released “Going Blonde,” which tells her adoption story, and what drew her to embracing the same color of locks as her mom, whom she never met. She’s already played a sold-out headline tour, manifested a collaboration with Beyoncé on Cowboy Carter’s “BLACKBIRD,” and has continued to amass “buckle bunnies” who, like her, embrace the Country lifestyle they’ve grown up on. And although she’s said that Country has had a hard time evolving, her rise to fame is clearly pushing it in the right direction.

Mexico is a frequent travel destination in the summer, but a fall visit is worth considering, especially with the news of the Corona Capital 2025 lineup. This year’s festival is going down from November 14 to 16 at Mexico City’s Autódromo Hermanos Rodríguez and headlining are Foo Fighters, Chappell Roan, and Linkin Park.

Elsewhere on the lineup are Queens Of The Stone Age, Franz Ferdinand, Garbage, Lucy Dacus, Jelly Roll, Nilüfer Yanya, Waxahatchee, Vampire Weekend, Alabama Shakes, Grizzly Bear, Lola Young, Marina, Mogwai, Samia, Deftones, Weezer, Cut Copy, Men I Trust, PinkPantheress, and TV On The Radio. Notably, this will be Deftones’ first show in Mexico in nearly a decade.

A pre-sale for Banamex cardholders begins on June 6, then a general on-sale starts on June 7. More information is available on the festival website.

Memo Parra, director of international events at festival promoter OCESA, told Billboard, “Corona Capital is not just a festival — it’s a bridge between cultures, emotions, and generations. Since 2010, it has evolved into one of the most important festivals in the world, attracting thousands of fans from every corner of the globe to Mexico. […] What truly sets Corona Capital apart is its musical curation: a carefully crafted selection that has made music the backbone of the festival.”