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    A Bizarre Love Triangle Playlist

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    Sabrina Carpenter, Loretta Lynn and SZA sing about all the points on a love triangle.Sabrina Carpenter’s “Taste” was the most successful of this year’s triangular tunes.Brendan Mcdermid/ReutersDear listeners,Today’s playlist is all about one of popular music’s favorite shapes: the love triangle.Full of drama, secrets and passion, songs about love triangles have never exactly gone out of style. But as I’ve been considering some of the patterns and trends in this past year of pop music, I’ve noticed that they’re more popular — and in some cases, subversive — than ever.This year has specifically been full of songs in which the singer is unusually fixated on “the other woman.” The most successful is “Taste,” a sassy, innuendo-stuffed pop-country smash by one of the year’s breakout stars, Sabrina Carpenter. “I’ve heard you’re back together,” she sings to her love interest’s former and current squeeze. “And if that’s true, you’ll just have to taste me when he’s kissing you.” That refrain has more than a hint of queer subtext, which Carpenter makes explicit in the campy, surprisingly gory music video, which ends with her kissing her female rival (played by Jenna Ortega) and the two accidentally killing their shared beau. In a twist, they’re not terribly bothered by it.But “Taste” wasn’t the only 2024 song with an eye on the other point of the triangle. Released in March, Olivia Rodrigo’s “Obsessed” — a track from the deluxe edition of “Guts” — finds the singer haunted by the imagined perfection of her current partner’s ex-girlfriend: “If I told you how much I think about her, you’d think I was in love,” she sings. Another prominent triangular tune, Billie Eilish’s “Wildflower,” from “Hit Me Hard and Soft,” has become such a beloved fan favorite that it has spent 26 weeks on the Billboard Hot 100. “I see her in the back of my mind, all the time,” Eilish sings of a partner’s ex — whom Eilish comforted when they first broke up, causing her to wonder, “Did I cross the line?”These songs all suggest some sort of transference and, at times, even a flirtation with both opposing points on the love triangle. Pop songs about same-sex desire are not nearly as taboo as they once were, and I suspect the surge in these sorts of songs reflect that shift.But in another sense, they’re telling a tale as old as time, a point I wanted to underscore by putting them in conversation with some older tracks. On today’s playlist, you’ll hear all the aforementioned songs, along with classics from the Cars, Loretta Lynn and Robyn, among other artists. It also features a certain global superstar’s 2024 remake of the ultimate “other woman” song, “Jolene.” No matter how you slice it, it seems, three’s a crowd.I know I’ve been known to share,LindsayWe are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Did Beyoncé’s Grammy Nominations Really Break Michael Jackson’s Record?

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      Not exactly. But in Grammyland, nothing is simple.On Friday, as the news emerged of Beyoncé’s 11 Grammy nominations for her country-Beyoncé-style album “Cowboy Carter,” some fan accounts on social media trumpeted that it had become “the most Grammy-nominated album of all time,” and claimed that Beyoncé had even topped a record set in 1984 by Michael Jackson’s “Thriller,” the mega-blockbuster against which all other hits have since been judged.Was that true? Not quite. But in some ways her accomplishment was equivalent to Jackson’s.In the sometimes confusing world of Grammy stats, nominations for an artist can be spread across multiple projects, and the performing artist on a song or an album is not necessarily an award’s nominee — prizes can (and often do) go to collaborators like songwriters, producers or engineers.And Beyoncé is not the only recent artist to receive 11 nominations in one year. Kendrick Lamar did so for the 2016 awards, as did Jon Batiste for 2022 — but in both cases, they were not all for work on a single album. (Lamar’s nods that year, for example, included his guest appearance on Taylor Swift’s song “Bad Blood.”)Officially, “Thriller” received a total of 13 nods when the 26th annual Grammy nominations were announced in early 1984. Jackson himself was cited in 11 of them. Of the two others, one was for Bruce Swedien, the album’s renowned engineer. The other cited Quincy Jones and James Ingram, the writers of the song “P.Y.T. (Pretty Young Thing),” which was up for best rhythm & blues song. In a sign of Jackson’s thorough dominance that year, two other “Thriller” songs were nominated in that same category: “Billie Jean” and “Wanna Be Startin’ Somethin’.” (“Billie Jean,” credited to Jackson as the sole songwriter, won.)Ultimately, Jackson collected seven awards for “Thriller,” including album of the year and record of the year (for “Beat It”). Swedien won best engineered recording, non-classical. That night was one of Jackson’s most iconic moments. He attended the show with Brooke Shields and Emmanuel Lewis as guests, and wore a sparkling blue-and-gold military-style jacket, with a crystal glove over his right hand.But that was not all. Jackson narrated a soundtrack album for the film “E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial,” with music by John Williams — which became a legal nightmare because MCA Records, which released the “E.T.” album, had not gotten the necessary clearance from Jackson’s label, Epic, for him to appear on it.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Grammys Snubs and Surprises: Charli XCX, André 3000, the Beatles and More

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      A look at the nominations’ unexpected and intriguing story lines, including the role of an absent Drake, the validation of André 3000’s flute music and overlooked gems.The names headlining this year’s Grammy Award nominations make a lot of sense: Beyoncé, Kendrick Lamar, Billie Eilish and Taylor Swift are perennial favorites with imperial reach. Sabrina Carpenter and Chappell Roan have stormed the mainstream. Shaboozey and Charli XCX made themselves inescapable.While there was once a time when it was easy to argue that the Grammys were out of touch, barely attempting to be an accurate representation of popular music in a given year, the major acts of 2024 are all accounted for. Shedding some of its fusty baggage under the Recording Academy chief executive Harvey Mason Jr. and a slate of new industry voters, the awards show has brought itself more or less in line with the Billboard charts, radio and streaming services, centering the celebrities of the moment.Still, it’s the Grammy Awards — not everyone can be happy. So after poring over the 94 categories that make up the 67th annual class of nominees, The New York Times’s pop music team — the reporter Joe Coscarelli, the chief pop music critic Jon Pareles, the pop music critics Jon Caramanica and Lindsay Zoladz and the Culture editor Elena Bergeron — were left with a few lingering questions: Is Beyoncé’s cross-genre domination really warranted? What are the Beatles doing here? And have the Grammys gotten too safe?We broke down the richest — and most baffling — story lines, snubs and surprises.Sabrina Carpenter’s success on the charts was mirrored in her Grammy nods: six of them.Emma Mcintyre/Getty Images for CoachellaA Mirror to the MainstreamJOE COSCARELLI I must admit, I’m almost sad at how predictable the Big Four categories — album, record and song of the year, plus best new artist — are these days, and this year in particular. Back in my day — not that long ago! — Beck was beating Beyoncé to close the night. And sure, you still have your occasional upsets by Jon Batiste (album of the year, 2022) or Bonnie Raitt (song of the year, 2023). But the odds of a truly destabilizing major win in February feel quite long now, likely by design.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Beyoncé and Young Women Pop Sensations Lead 2025 Grammy Nominations

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      Charli XCX, Billie Eilish, Chappell Roan and Sabrina Carpenter will compete in the biggest categories, along with Taylor Swift and Kendrick Lamar.Beyoncé and Taylor Swift will face off in all top categories at the 67th annual Grammy Awards, leading a pack of nominees that also features buzzy young female stars who have dominated the pop charts over the past year.With 11 nods, Beyoncé has more citations than any other artist this year, for “Cowboy Carter,” her gumbo of country, R&B and acoustic pop that spurred conversations about the Black roots of many American genres, including country.The other top nominees, with seven apiece, are Billie Eilish, a onetime teenage disrupter who is now a Grammy and Oscar darling; Kendrick Lamar, the rapper laureate, whose nominations stem from a no-holds-barred battle of words with Drake; Post Malone, a pop shape-shifter gone country (and who appeared on both Beyoncé and Swift’s latest albums); and Charli XCX, the British singer-songwriter and meme master whose digital-nostalgic iconography was borrowed by the Kamala Harris campaign.Swift has six nominations, as do Sabrina Carpenter and Chappell Roan — two of this year’s fresh pop sensations, each receiving their first Grammy nods.The awards ceremony is set for Feb. 2 in Los Angeles.The biggest contest this year, at least in terms of celebrity wattage, is Beyoncé vs. Swift. Both are juggernauts in the culture and at the Grammys. With 32 career trophies, Beyoncé, 43, has already won more awards than any other artist, and is now also the most-nominated person, with 99. Yet she has never taken album of the year, despite four previous nods.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Grammy Nominations 2025: See the Full List of Nominees

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      Artists, albums and songs competing for trophies at the 67th annual ceremony were announced on Friday. The show will take place on Feb. 2 at Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles.Beyoncé is the top nominee for the 67th annual Grammy Awards with 11 nods for her genre-crossing “Cowboy Carter.” The LP and its songs will vie for record, song and album of the year, as well as competitions in pop, rap, country and Americana categories.The superstar — who has already won more Grammys than any other artist — leads a pack of contenders that includes Charli XCX, Billie Eilish, Kendrick Lamar and Post Malone (all with seven nods apiece), followed by Sabrina Carpenter, Chappell Roan and Taylor Swift, who have six each.The ceremony, which is scheduled for Feb. 2, 2025 at the Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles, will recognize recordings released from Sept. 16, 2023 to Aug. 30, 2024.Here is a complete list of the nominations, which were announced on Friday by the Recording Academy.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      How Levi’s Turned a Beyoncé Song Into an Ad Campaign

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      The denim brand was looking for ways to sell more apparel to women, and the megastar gave them a natural spokeswoman thanks to a song on “Cowboy Carter.”Kenny Mitchell, the chief marketing officer at Levi Strauss & Co., knew his team needed to move fast after Beyoncé released the track list for her album “Cowboy Carter” in March. Out of the 27 songs listed, one provided the denim brand’s marketing department with a huge opportunity: “Levii’s Jeans.”While in Paris to celebrate his wife’s 50th birthday, Mr. Mitchell was communicating across time zones with his team back at the company’s San Francisco headquarters to figure out how they could capitalize on the moment. When the songs dropped that week, Levi’s had landed on adding an extra I to the brand’s Instagram name, as Beyoncé had with her song.Still, Mr. Mitchell thought the brand could go further.“Once that album came out, it was obviously a moment where we said, Hey, maybe we can start to have some conversations about whether a deeper partnership makes sense,” Mr. Mitchell said.Soon after, Levi’s reached out to Beyoncé and her team. The two camps had already worked together on various campaigns and creative projects over the years. She had worn their jeans when she was a member of Destiny’s Child in the early 2000s, making Levi’s one of the first brands to collaborate with the group, and she continued to incorporate the brand in her solo career..What soon became apparent for executives at Levi’s after the release of “Cowboy Carter” was that Beyoncé could be the key to achieving one of the company’s top strategies: convincing more women to shop the brand.A third of Levi’s shoppers are women. The plan, executives say, is to bump that to 50 percent.Levi’s has tried several strategies over the years to appeal to women, including a line called Lady Levi’s.Jim Wilson/The New York TimesWe are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      How Trump and Harris Are Courting Pop Stars (Very Differently)

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      Subscribe to Popcast!Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Amazon Music | YouTubeOn this week’s episode of Popcast, the pop music critic Jon Caramanica and the pop music reporter Joe Coscarelli discuss how musicians, both mainstream and more obscure, have figured into the current presidential campaign, including:An endorsement of Kamala Harris from Taylor Swift, plus the role of Beyoncé’s music in the Harris campaignDonald J. Trump’s recent embrace of rappers and reggaeton stars, in addition to his support in the country music worldHow Trump is finding new audiences via podcasters like Theo Von and the Nelk Boys, as well as via the stars of livestreaming services like Twitch and Kick, including Adin RossHarris’s full dive into the meme ecosystem following her inclusion in Charli XCX’s “brat summer”Connect With Popcast. Become a part of the Popcast community: Join the show’s Facebook group and Discord channel. We want to hear from you! Tune in, and tell us what you think at popcast@nytimes.com. Follow our host, Jon Caramanica, on Twitter: @joncaramanica. More

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      5 Essential Frankie Beverly and Maze Songs, Including ‘Before I Let Go’

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      The singer, who died on Tuesday at 77, had a smooth, sunny delivery that turned at least one track into a lasting anthem of Black celebrations.The song is a call to action from its opening notes. There’s only a brief stomping riff before Frankie Beverly, the lead singer and songwriter of the soul and funk band Maze, intones “woah-ohhh.” By the time he actually gets to the song’s opening lyrics, “You make me happy,” audiences at barbecues, family reunions, weddings, block parties and musical festivals know they should already be on the dance floor.“Before I Let Go” peaked at No. 13 on Billboard’s R&B chart after its release in 1981, on the band’s fifth album. But in the more than four decades since, the song became a signature for the group and for Beverly, whose warm but impassioned vocals ignite the track and elevate it to a communal release, particularly at Black gatherings.Questlove, during a sit-down in March with Beverly for his podcast, called the song “the national anthem of life,” in part for its ubiquity in Black celebrations. Invoking the nostalgia of home and togetherness through its ebullience and Beverly’s bellowing delivery, the song is often an end-of-the-night anthem: Beverly and Maze used it as a set-ender and the band for many years closed the annual Essence Festival with the jam.Clint Smith, the New York Times best-selling author, poet and journalist, described the energy Mr. Beverly is able to alchemize with his music in a poem from 2015 titled “When Maze and Frankie Beverly Come On in my House.”“A reminder of the playful manifestations of love, how the harmony of guitar & trumpet & bass & sweat & Frankie’s voice can create the sort of levity that ensures love lasts long after the song has stopped,” Mr. Smith wrote.Beyoncé’s cover of “Before I Let Go,” from her 2019 live album “Homecoming,” brought the song to new listeners, and her performance — adding calls to new dance moves for TikTok and Instagram audiences — reveled in its sheer delight.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Beyoncé’s ‘Cowboy Carter’ Country Album Snubbed by CMA Awards

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      The country-plus-everything-else album was given only limited promotion on country radio, with the success of the song “Texas Hold ’Em” driven by streaming and downloads.When the Country Music Association announced the nominations for its 58th CMA Awards on Monday, there were plenty of expected names.Morgan Wallen, the pop-country superstar who has been a streaming phenomenon, led the pack with seven nods, including for the top honor, entertainer of the year. Cody Johnson and Chris Stapleton, two Stetson-wearing stalwarts, had five nominations apiece, and Lainey Wilson, a rising star in song and style, and Post Malone, the rap-rock-folkie who made a pivot to country this year, each got four.But there was a conspicuous absence: Beyoncé, whose country-plus-everything-else album “Cowboy Carter” took the music world by storm this spring, with her song “Texas Hold ’Em” going to No. 1 on Billboard’s Hot Country Songs chart. The album — with a cover picturing Beyoncé as a red-white-and-blue rodeo queen, riding a horse sidesaddle and hoisting an American flag — was a cultural phenomenon, stirring debates and extensive news media coverage about the historical role of African Americans in country music and their continuing struggles to be accepted by the Nashville establishment.A Beyoncé fan account quickly protested on X: “The CMA’s have once again deferred to those in the industry who prefer to deny Black artists the recognition they deserve.”But the snub was not unexpected. Eight years ago, Beyoncé got a cool reception at the 2016 CMAs when she performed her song “Daddy Lessons” with the Chicks (then still known as the Dixie Chicks). That experience apparently played a role in Beyoncé’s decision to make a country album, with the star saying that “Cowboy Carter” was “born out of an experience that I had years ago where I did not feel welcomed … and it was very clear that I wasn’t. But, because of that experience, I did a deeper dive into the history of Country music and studied our rich musical archive.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More