Earlier this year, Diane Warren became the first songwriter in Oscar history to be nominated for best original song nine years in a row. Can she possibly extend that streak to 10 consecutive nominations?
We won’t know for sure until the nominations are announced on Jan. 21, but as of today (Aug. 21), you can hear the song that she hopes will make it happen: “By Any Means,” which she wrote for a feature film of the same name starring Mark Wahlberg. The soulful, midtempo ballad is performed by David Kushner, whose “Daylight” reached No. 33 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 2023, in tandem with the legendary The Isley Brothers, who have had 40 Hot 100 hits, including three that made the top 10: “It’s Your Thing,” “That Lady (Part 1)” and “Fight the Power Part 1.”
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Here’s a link to the soundtrack version of the song, which is available on all streaming platforms. The music video will be released on Aug. 28. Here’s a link to the slightly longer film version.
Warren has amassed 17 Oscar nominations for best original song, more than any other woman. One more nod and she will tie the legendary Johnny Mercer for second place on the all-time leaderboard. Another all-time great, Sammy Cahn, has long led the list with 26 nods.
Warren has yet to win a competitive Oscar, but in 2022 she received an honorary award which was inscribed: “To Diane Warren, for her genius, generosity and passionate commitment to the power of song in film.”
By Any Means is directed by Elegance Bratton with a script written by Sascha Penn. Inspired by a true story and set in the 1960s, a young Black FBI agent (Yahya Abdul-Mateen II) is sent to Mississippi to investigate a wave of brutal killings targeting civil rights leaders. He is forced to work alongside notorious hitman Greg Scarpa (Wahlberg).
Two of Warren’s recent Oscar nominations are for songs from period films that dealt with the civil rights struggle. She and co-writer Common were nominated in 2018 for “Stand Up for Something” from the film Marshall, which starred the late Chadwick Boseman as Thurgood Marshall, the first Black Supreme Court Justice. She was nominated in 2025 for “The Journey” from The Six Triple Eight, which told the story of the 6888th Central Postal Directory Battalion, an all-Black, all-female battalion in World War II.
In a statement, Warren explained her inspiration in writing the song, “I wanted to write a song that captured the spirit of the film which is about those who go beyond the rules to do what is necessary. My idea was to take an iconic artist who came from that era and pair them with an artist from this current era. Having the legendary Isley Brothers come on board was a dream come true. They are as amazing today as they were when they were performing during the time of these events, they are so authentic to this story. David Kushner is a great young singer who sounds like he could have come from that era too. He is a young guy with an old-soul voice. The combination of him and the Isleys is pure magic, and together they have created a song that could live in many eras to come. I’m proud to be a part of it.”
Ronald Isley explained his connection to the story. “Having lived through the Civil Rights era, this story is personal. We saw firsthand the courage, sacrifice and struggle it took for change to come. Music has always had the power to speak to what people are going through, and Diane Warren has written a song that carries that kind of meaning. It was an honor for Ernie and me to be a part of it and to lend our voices to a film that remembers this history while reminding a new generation why it still matters.”
Ernie Isley further explained, “I believe the film and the song will have a major impact. Ronald and I are happy to be involved with this project.”
Kushner, 25, added: “It’s an honor to be a part of the music that soundtracks a powerful film like By Any Means. I’m a huge fan of Mark Wahlberg and being part of this song alongside Diane Warren, a songwriter I’ve looked up to since I fell in love with music and began writing songs, as well as musical legends like The Isley Brothers, is beyond surreal and has been an incredible experience.”
By Any Means, The Album soundtrack is being released by AB Records/The Orchard on Sept. 18 and features two versions of the original song. The single version is produced by Jacob Olofsson, with Ron Isley’s vocals produced by PooBear. Veteran music supervisor Bonnie Greenberg served as executive music producer for the song. By Any Means is distributed domestically by Paramount Pictures and is scheduled for theatrical release on Sept. 4.
Weezer’s Blue, Green, Red, White, Teal, and Black eras are in the rearview. We’ve now reached Gold.
At midnight, Rivers Cuomo and Co. turned over a new leaf — gold leaf — with the release of their 20th studio album. The process behind the new, self-titled collection, the so-called Gold Album, was a blast from the past, an LP made the old fashion way.
Following a well-received 30th anniversary tour, the four band members got down to business in a rehearsal space in Orange County, Calif. Those sessions marked the first time Cuomo and Weezer’s drummer Pat Wilson had fleshed out the framework of a song since their first album, released back in 1994.
Klas Ahlund and Kenneth Blume (FKA Kenny Beats) came on board to produce the new body of work. Ahlund contributed a “more mathematical, stringent approach,” reps say, while Blume set about to make the “most violent Weezer album ever.”
The fruits of their OC labor, 10-tracks including the lead singles “Shine Again” and “We Might As Well Be Strangers” featuring Wednesday, the latter track performed live Wednesday night (Aug. 19) when the rockers stopped by NBC’s The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon.
“We hung out in a living room, actually, for months. All four of us. And just threw ideas out. It was really fun,” Wilson told Fallon of the new project.
“What you hear on the record is something that could only be created by humans coming together and being vulnerable and creating something together,” Cuomo added. “It just can’t be created by AI or a somebody on their own working on a computer or something.”
The band will support the new Gold Album with Weezer: The Gathering tour, getting underway in September with multiple stops across North America.
“The gathering has something to do with summoning sorcerers from all corners of the world to come into this,” Cuomo explained to Fallon. “And I think this tour is something like that. We’re summoning all the different kinds of Weezer fans from around the world to come rock out with us.”
Stream The Gold Album below.
Billboard’s Friday Music Guide serves as a handy guide to New Music Friday’s most essential releases each week — the key music that everyone will be talking about today, and that will be dominating playlists this weekend and beyond.
Last week, we featured Phoebe Bridgers, Katseye, Ayra Starr, Troye Sivan and more.
This week, Sam Smith shares their new album, Hazel Eyes; Stella Lefty releases her highly-anticipated debut set; and Weezer drops its 20th (!) full-length… plus much more. Check out all of this week’s picks below:
Sam Smith, Hazel Eyes
On “Constant Companion” — one of 12 tracks on Smith’s fifth album — the English singer-songwriter chooses to spotlight their impressive range, singing in their deeper, lower register to start and slowly softening into a more familiar tone that allows their voice to soar. Accompanied by gentle percussion and choral harmonies throughout, delicate keys and an acoustic guitar kick in later and help carry the song. But it’s in the last minute, after the addition of winding strings, that it reaches its peak as Smith bellows with renewed intention: “’cause you, you are my constant companion.” — LYNDSEY HAVENS
Stella Lefty, Long Way Home
After breaking out this year with her debut chart hit “Boston” (which interpolates Noah Kahan’s “Stick Season”), fast-rising country-pop artist Stella Lefty shares her first full-length, Long Way Home. Lefty, 24, co-wrote all 14 tracks on the album, which follows her May EP and is produced by Joe Reeves. As Melinda Newman writes in the album’s Tracks Ranked, “Reeves’ low-key production perfectly complements Lefty’s sweet, unadorned vocals, creating what feels like an uncomplicated, authentic effort and a solid introduction to a formidable, developing talent.” — L.H.
Weezer, Weezer (Gold Album)
What else could Weezer possibly name its 20th album except for Weezer? So they did just that — then added (Gold Album) for good measure. It’s a bold title for a fittingly bold album, full of power-pop-rock anthems led by Rivers Cuomo’s distinguishable vocals. Co-produced by Klas Ahlund and Kenneth Blume (formerly known as Kenny Beats), the latter set out to make “the most violent Weezer album ever,” according to a release. Turns out, they did just that. — LYNDSEY HAVENS
Jorja Smith, What Are The Odds
The third album from British singer-songwriter Jorja Smith is injected with energy and beats primed for the dance floor, as previewed by previously-released singles “What’s Done Is Done” and “I Lied, You Lied.” Meanwhile, single “Alive” with Wizkid showed that Smith can still it slow it down when she wants. And while the album mostly leans into those more booming tracks — some of which feel a world away from the more intimate R&B of her 2018 debut Lost & Found — songs like “Pretend” and album closer “When It Gets Like That” let Smith’s stellar vocals take the lead. — L.H.
Brandon Flowers, Thrasher
For his first solo effort in 11 years, The Killers frontman Brandon Flowers turned to his dad’s record collection for inspiration — and found himself creating an album full of country-western-inspired tunes. Across Thrasher, which is Flowers’ third solo project, he turns inward not only for the sonics but for the song’s lyrical content as well — and perhaps that’s where the album’s title and boxer-inspired artwork come from. Think less of a production punch, and more of a mental one — which can sometimes hit even harder. — L.H.
Brennan Wedl, Brennan Wedl
With signees including Waxahatchee and MJ Lenderman, ANTI- Records has emerged as the marquee destination for alt-country artists — and that roster now includes Brennan Wedl, who supported Waxahatchee and MJ Lenderman’s joint spring tour and captures rootsy magic on her self-titled label debut. With a voice that immediately conjures Lucinda Williams, Wedl lyrically channels both Lenderman’s hyperspecificity (“Let’s get on the Jumbotron at MSG / And shake it like an Etch A Sketch,” on “Let’s Be Models”) and Waxahatchee’s poetic concision (“I can be your low-grade fever / Keep you hot and bothered,” on “I Wanna Be Your TV”) across the set’s 13 gems, which blend punk, garage-rock and country for what Wedl calls “grungetry.” Produced by Waxahatchee’s Katie Crutchfield and her longtime producer Brad Cook, Brennan Wedl is another essential entry in the subgenre that has become indie-rock’s dominant style this decade. — ERIC RENNER BROWN
Garth Brooks opened his Blame It All On My Roots tour in Indianapolis’s Gainbridge Fieldhouse on Thursday (Aug. 20) night, taking fans back to his ‘90s heyday.
Announced in July, the trek is a recreation of Brooks’ 1996-1998 massive world tour, down to the set design, lighting rig and famous spinning drum pod. On opening night, he even kept to a retro setlist, playing no songs that came out after 1997.
Brooks took the stage slightly before 8 p.m. A grand piano came up through the floor with pianist Dave Gant playing the opening strains of, appropriately enough, “The Old Stuff,” as Brooks then rose up through the grand piano, singing the first lines from the 1995’s Fresh Horses cut: “Whoa, I said a little prayer tonight/’fore I came on stage/as I came walking past the drivers and the locals on the union wage.”
In addition to Gant, Brooks’ band includes many players who have been playing with him since at least the ‘90s, including drummer Mike Palmer, fiddle player Jimmy Mattingly, pedal steel guitarist Bruce Bouton bassist Mark Greenwood. The only facet not replicated from the ‘90s tours was the colorful Mo Betta western wear shirts Brooks sported each night: for opening night, he wore a simple black shirt with his blue Wranglers.
Brooks took to social media to thank the audience shortly after the show’s end, posting on Instagram and X, “THIS is how you start a tour!!! INDY… night one of four, and you absolutely blew the roof off this place! If this is the beginning, we’re in for one hell of a ride!!!!!!! love, g”
Brooks, who is recording each night’s performance for later release, has three more shows in Indianapolis before heading to Denver’s Ball Arenas (Sept. 4-6), Rosemont, Illinois’s Allstate Arena (Sept. 10-13) and Washington, D.C.’s Capital One Arena (Sept. 18-19). As he has throughout his career, Brooks is announcing one tour stop at a time. All tickets are priced at $154.
Below is the set list from the opening night.
Bliss out, ENHYPEN is back with six fresh tunes.
At the stroke of midnight, the K-pop heavyweights dropped THE SIN : BLISS, the group’s eighth mini album and the second installment in the ongoing THE SIN series.
THE SIN : BLISS is ENHYPEN’s first release since HEESEUNG announced that he would go his own way and pursue a solo career. Now a six-piece of Jake, Jay, Sunghoon, Sunoo, Jungwon and Ni-ki, the band recently completed the Latin American and United States legs of their BLOOD SAGA trek, their largest world tour to date.
ENHYPEN’s busy year has taken the group to Brazil, where they performed on late-night television program The Noite com Danilo Gentili; and Mexico City for a 2026 FIFA World Cup celebration event at Campo Marte. Along the way, the group took part in San Diego Comic-Con 2026, where they introduced global audiences to “DARK MOON,” HYBE’s original story inspired by ENHYPEN’s narrative universe. The lads also gave blood — and their profiles — to the World Health Organization (WHO) campaign in celebration of World Blood Donor Day on June 14.
Up next, BLOOD SAGA tour dates in the United Kingdom and Europe from February through March 2027, including stops in Italy, France, The Netherlands and Germany.
Prior to the release of THE SIN : BLISS, the group landed nine titles on the Billboard 200, including six top 10 appearances — MANIFESTO : DAY 1 (No. 6 in 2022), DARK BLOOD (No. 4, 2023), ORANGE BLOOD (No. 4, 2023), ROMANCE : UNTOLD (No. 2, 2024), DESIRE : UNLEASH (No. 3, 2025), and THE SIN : VANISH (No. 2, 2026).
Stream THE SIN : BLISS and check out the BLOOD SAGA 2027 world tour dates and venues below.
Feb. 24 — Milan, IT – Unipol Dome
Feb. 27 — Paris, FR – La Défense Arena
March 2 — Amsterdam, NL – Ziggo Dome
March 5 — Berlin, DE – Uber Arena
March 9 — London, UK – The O2
Stella Lefty emerged seemingly out of nowhere this year with the track “Boston,” a toe-tapping, romantic country-pop smash that interpolates Noah Kahan’s “Stick Season.” The tune, one of the summer’s biggest hits, reached No. 3 on both Billboard’s Hot 100 and Country Songs charts following “Thinking ‘Bout You,” her only other previous charting song, which peaked at 50 on Country Songs.
Bolstered by the success of “Boston,” Lefty’s EP, Is This Heaven, debuted at No. 9 on the Top Country Albums in late May, making her the first woman to land in the top 10 with her initial release this year. All six songs from that effort are on Long Way Home, her first full-length album out Friday (Aug. 21) via Atlantic Outpost.
The album, helmed by British producer Joe Reeves (Lil Durk, Morgan Wallen, Jelly Roll), is extremely likeable. Reeves’ low-key production perfectly complements Lefty’s sweet, unadorned vocals, creating what feels like an uncomplicated, authentic effort and a solid introduction to a formidable, developing talent. Her voice is wrapped around primarily acoustic instrumentation, especially banjo and mandolin, that adds to the album’s overall pleasing blend of country, folk and pop.
Lefty, 24, co-wrote the album’s 14 songs and the subject matter is solidly Gen Z. All but one of the tunes deals with romance and trying to figure out the complexities of what happens after boy meets girl. Many of the encounters start in a bar, because that’s where 20-somethings are hanging out. This leads to a similarity in theme that could wear thin when the album is listened to from start to finish — as does the mid-tempo pace of most of the songs — so the songs shine better when listened to individually.
Below Billboard ranks all 14 songs. (Just assume the tunes are mid-tempo unless described otherwise.)
With Hazel Eyes, Sam Smith charts a fresh, emboldened emotional hinterland. Across the London-born singer’s four previous albums, the question of who exists beyond that distinct, aching, soulful voice has loomed large.
Smith initially built a career, after all, on the strange alchemy of writing about heartbreak from largely hypothetical pain; they penned 2014 global smash In the Lonely Hour before ever experiencing a breakup. The albums that followed gradually filled in the blanks – desire, growth, personal identity, sex – though with the sense of an artist discovering themselves and testing out what they want to say to the world. In the process, they have scooped billions of streams, five Grammy Awards and seven Billboard Hot 100 top 10 hits — and with 2023 Kim Petras collab “Unholy,” became the first openly nonbinary artist to top the chart.
At times, Smith’s fifth full-length effort gets closer than ever to answering that question. The dual muses across Hazel Eyes become figures in a wider romantic mythology; even when their partner, the (hazel-eyed) fashion designer Christian Cowan, or their newly adopted home of New York City enters the frame, lyrically, the 34-year-old avoids rendering them literally to instead focus on capturing the feelings they inspire.
Until now, Smith “didn’t understand what my heart was for,” they tell us on the title track; “To Be Free,” the record’s searching and graceful closer, reckons with harbouring shame and maintaining a public persona, only to realise that patient, requited love can offer an escape from performing different versions of the self.
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The latter track lent its name to Smith’s U.S. concert hall residencies last year, which included 24 sold-out nights at Warsaw in Brooklyn and will head to Manchester’s Albert Hall (Sept. 3-4) and the London Coliseum (Sept. 8-19) for a further 10 shows next month. In the states, Smith was joined onstage by a plethora of pop luminaries, including Ed Sheeran, Hozier and Sienna Spiro. Yet for all its starry cameos, the run featured minimal stage production in order to zone in and illuminate the sheer force of Smith’s vocal, with little to distract from it after the pop-baiting campaigns of their past two records (2020’s fairly tepid Love Goes, and its expressive if uneven 2023 follow-up Gloria).
While it was enlivening to hear Smith stretch beyond the soft-focus piano pop balladry of their earlier work, particularly on the slinky, trop-pop-influenced chart hit “How Do You Sleep?” or the disco-fied “I’m Not Here to Make Friends,” Hazel Eyes finds them returning familiar textures with a newly exploratory ear. Its sound is pared back to the hallmarks of their earlier output but within that palette, Smith makes room for subtle surprises, weaving flourishes of country guitar into “When He’s Gone” and teaming up with seminal Canadian indie songwriter Feist on multiple tracks, whose influence feels particularly pertinent throughout the emphatic storytelling of “Moondance.”
As Hazel Eyes adds another layer to Smith’s story, its title itself an ode to Cowan and the pair’s recent engagement, here’s every track from the new record ranked.
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