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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

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      Beyoncé Rumors Briefly Took Center Stage. Kamala Harris Grabbed It Back.

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      Unsubstantiated rumors that the star would appear at the Democratic National Convention, perhaps alongside Taylor Swift, created a daylong frenzy. Then the headliner took control.The report was published around 7 p.m. on Thursday, in all caps. TMZ announced that Beyoncé would be “PERFORMING AT DNC’S FINAL NIGHT!!!” After days of increasingly frenzied rumors that she would make an appearance at the Democratic National Convention, this report set the United Center in Chicago abuzz. But TMZ was wrong. So was Mitt Romney. So were the betting markets. So was basically all of social media.Instead, Vice President Kamala Harris ended the convention by advising attendees to take seriously the task of preserving democracy and not to celebrate prematurely.It was a sobering end to a day of celebrity-centered anticipation. Since the Harris campaign chose Beyoncé’s “Freedom” as its campaign theme song, I had heard intense speculation that the singer would be a special guest on the night of Harris’s acceptance speech to become the party’s presidential nominee. On the convention’s first day, Harris released her new campaign ad, featuring “Freedom.” There was the precedent set by past conventions, with Stevie Wonder performing in 2008 for Barack Obama, and Katy Perry in 2016 for Hillary Clinton. There was the footage of a marching band rehearsing Beyoncé’s songs in the arena.As I entered the United Center, I heard the rumor that Beyoncé and Jay-Z had been in Chicago for several days. Before I settled in at the arena, she had been “sighted” at O’Hare airport. Similar stories were ricocheting across the arena.There was the national anthem sung by the Chicks, with whom Beyoncé performed at the Country Music Association Awards in 2016. Their presence seemed only to reinforce the inevitability of her grand entrance. By 9 p.m., things had reached a fever pitch: I was told by a friend of a friend I was sitting next to that Beyoncé and Taylor Swift were expected to appear onstage together in a mark of feminist solidarity, and stand with the thousands of delegates dressed in suffragist white clothing. The specificity of the rumor was astounding.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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      The Meaning Behind Beyoncé’s ‘Freedom,’ the Harris Campaign Anthem

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      Since Kamala’s Harris’s first appearance at campaign headquarters a month ago, the rousing strains of Beyoncé’s “Freedom” have been the candidate’s spirited anthem, blaring under the campaign ads and ahead of Harris’s speeches. The song, from the 2016 visual album “Lemonade,” builds momentum with each verse and features a chorus that is a striking call: “I break chains all by myself/Won’t let my freedom rot in hell/Hey! I’ma keep running/’Cause a winner don’t quit on themselves.”It served as the driving force behind the latest campaign ad that debuted during Night 1 of the Democratic National Convention, which has itself been buoyed by energetic music throughout. It has also provided a sonic shift in messaging, offering Democrats a muscular keyword with widespread appeal to voters across partisan lines.But the song’s origins and supporting videos, and Beyoncé’s live performances of it, offer a deeper meaning for a candidate hoping to make history as the first Black and South Asian woman president.At the time of its initial release in spring 2016, “Freedom” appeared on what was, to that point, Beyoncé’s most politically explicit record to date. Its video paid clear tribute to Sybrina Fulton, Gwen Carr, Lezley McSpadden and Wanda Johnson, Black women whose sons — Trayvon Martin, Eric Garner, Michael Brown and Oscar Grant III — had been recently killed in racially charged incidents. In the video, the women sit next to each other as Beyoncé, dressed in a tiered white dress, belts the song in a visual performance that heightened the intensity and cathartic potential of the music. It features a verse from Kendrick Lamar, who raps, “But mama don’t cry for me, ride for me/Try for me, live for me.”Along with Lamar’s 2015 single, “Alright,” the two artists released arguably the most enduring protest anthems of the Black Lives Matter movement within a span of months.The song’s success is already resonating with the many and riling up others. Just yesterday, Beyoncé sent a cease-and-desist to Donald Trump’s campaign for its use of the song without permission on a social music video. More

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      Who’s Afraid of Being Black? Not Kamala, Beyoncé or Kendrick.

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      With her response to Donald Trump’s comments about her background, Kamala Harris showed that Blackness doesn’t need to be explained or defended — an idea underscored by her campaign theme song.Vice President Kamala Harris didn’t take the race bait.A few hours after Donald J. Trump falsely claimed that she suddenly decided to become “a Black person,” Ms. Harris reminded the crowd at a Black sorority convention in Houston that Mr. Trump was resorting to a familiar script. It was the “same old show,” she said, of “divisiveness and disrespect.”She chose not to deflect attention away from her multicultural heritage or to double down on it. That tactic nullified an implication that being Black is something that needs to be authenticated, explained, disavowed or defended. It underscored that Blackness isn’t something that can be turned on or off.Like Ms. Harris, my father is the child of an Indian mother and a Black father. Both he and his parents were born in and emigrated from Trinidad and Tobago. Because of him, I saw up close what Ms. Harris is conveying: that it’s possible to refuse to pit one heritage against the other even as you embrace Blackness as your primary political identity.“My mother understood very well that she was raising two black daughters,” Ms. Harris wrote in “The Truths We Hold: An American Journey,” her 2019 memoir. “She knew her adopted homeland would see Maya and me as black girls, and she was determined to make sure we would grow into confident, proud black women.”Ms. Harris, like my dad, considers her Blackness something to be celebrated and, at times, protected.Beyoncé and Kendrick Lamar perform her song “Freedom,” now used by the Kamala Harris campaign, at the BET Awards in 2016.Matt Sayles/Invision, via Associated PressWe 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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      The 15 Songs That Hit No. 1 This Year (So Far)

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      Hear tracks by Shaboozey, Sabrina Carpenter, Kendrick Lamar and more.Shaboozey reached No. 1 on the Hot 100 this week for the first time with “A Bar Song (Tipsy).”Daniel PrakopcykDear listeners,It’s Caryn the editor here again, seizing control of the playlist one more time (don’t worry, you’ll have Lindsay back next week).On Monday, Shaboozey reached the top of Billboard’s Hot 100 with “A Bar Song (Tipsy),” making him the second Black artist to hit No. 1 on both the all-genre singles chart and Hot Country Songs. Somehow both milestones came this year: Beyoncé did it first with “Texas Hold ’Em.”The news got me scrolling through what’s topped the Hot 100 so far in 2024 — over the last 27 weeks, 15 songs have done it. And we’re going to listen to all of them in The Amplifier today.It’s always interesting to see how the official chart stacks up against cultural vibes. It may feel like the summer of “Espresso,” but Sabrina Carpenter’s Certified Bop hasn’t hit No. 1 in the United States (yet). It doesn’t just seem like Taylor Swift’s “The Tortured Poets Department” is dominating 2024: It is, with 11 straight weeks at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 album chart. But only one of its songs — its opener, “Fortnight,” featuring Post Malone — has spent any time atop the Hot 100. Ariana Grande’s “Eternal Sunshine” has had two songs summit the singles chart; Beyoncé’s “Cowboy Carter” had the one. Billie Eilish and Chappell Roan haven’t hit No. 1 yet this year, but I wouldn’t count them out.The longest run belongs to “I Had Some Help,” by Post Malone featuring Morgan Wallen (six weeks, five of them consecutive). Two songs from the Kendrick Lamar vs. Drake beef hit No. 1; perhaps unsurprisingly considering the outcome, they were both Lamar’s.So let’s take a trip through the recent past together — and for fun (or counterprogramming), see how the biggest songs of the year (so far) compare to our critics’ best songs of the year (so far).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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      Girl Groupers Gone (Successfully!) Solo

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      With two new albums from members of Fifth Harmony out now, a look back at other pop singers who took off on their own.Diana RossJoe Castro/European Pressphoto AgencyDear listeners,This is not exactly a boom time for American girl groups*. The last high-profile one to have any chart success was Fifth Harmony, who formed on the 2012 season of “The X Factor” and went on an indefinite hiatus in 2018. I bring this up because, strikingly, two former members of Fifth Harmony have released solo albums in the past two weeks: The R&B chanteuse Normani put out her long-gestating “Dopamine” on June 14, and today the Cuban-born pop star Camila Cabello is unleashing her bold, outré fourth solo album, “C, XOXO.”In honor of this rare phenomenon in the pop cosmos, I thought it would be fun to put together a playlist of songs by former members of all-female vocal groups — past and present — who flew the coop and went solo. Yes, this mix features Beyoncé. And Kelly Rowland too! It also includes tracks from the Supreme Ms. Diana Ross, the multitalented Dawn Richard and the eternally cool Ronnie Spector, among others.Also, a programming note: I will be on vacation for the next two weeks, but as always I’ll be leaving you in good hands. Expect a fresh Amplifier written by a very special guest to arrive in your inbox each Tuesday while I’m gone, and get ready for an especially eclectic record haul playlist when I return from my travels. Til then!Respectfully I say to thee,Lindsay*The girl group is, of course, still alive and well in the K-pop world. If I had to guess, I’d predict that the next major, global, post-girl-group superstar will come from South Korea.Listen along while you read.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