Music

NEW YORK — R&B singer Casandra “Cassie” Ventura took the stand Tuesday as the prosecution’s star witness in Sean “Diddy” Combs’s federal sex trafficking trial, delivering explosive and emotional testimony with detailed allegations of physical, sexual and psychological abuse by the music mogul during their 10-year romantic relationship. Her appearance at the Daniel Patrick Moynihan U.S.

Kali Uchis is turning her dreams into reality. The singer has announced her first headlining arena tour, the Sincerely, tour in support of her fifth album of the same name. Uchis will kick things off in August at the Moda Center in Portland, Oregon, and wrap up in late September in Denver. The Sincerely tour marks Uchis’ biggest tour to date, traversing 24 cities and stopping at major venues like The Kia Forum in Inglewood, California, and Madison Square Garden in New York. The career-first for Uchis comes on the...

Australia’s Folk Bitch Trio have announced their debut album Now Would Be A Good Time, out July 25th via Jagjaguwar. To accompany the announcement, the group — Gracie Sinclair, Jeanie Pilkington, and Heide Peverelle — also dropped the new single “Cathode Ray.” A track about “bodily, deeply human anxieties,” the gem expertly showcases their heavenly harmonies, with a stripped-down melody that aches in vulnerability: “I walk a free man so it canʼt be love/But everybody needs somebody/To make their body/Come undone.” As Sinclair says of the track, “It expresses a...

For the first time, Magdalena Bay is traveling from show to show on a tour bus. The electro-pop band, made up of Mica Tenenbaum and Matthew Lewin, is caught up in the second tour for their sophomore album, “Imaginal Disk,” released Aug. 2024. They first toured last fall, and the 2025 leg includes dates across the country, including California’s Lightning in a Bottle and Wonderfront, plus shows in Europe. Additionally, they’re opening for Billie Eilish’s London shows in July. But, at the moment, they’re thinking about how much a “real-deal...

Kali Uchis has announced her first North American arena tour to support the release of her fifth studio album “Sincerely,.” The Grammy award-winning singer will begin her first jaunt as a headliner in arenas on Aug. 14 for an opening night in Portland, Ore. at the Moda Center. She will take her atmospheric sound to 24 cities including Los Angeles, New York, Miami, Toronto, and Chicago, before wrapping up on Sept. 25 at Ball Arena in Denver, Colo. Uchis announced the tour on social media with a vintage-inspired video trailer...

Lynne Jordan never planned to be a professional singer. The Ohio native realized her vocal ability early in life but kept her talents hidden until she attended Northwestern University. One night at a campus party, the bashful journalism major was persuaded by a friend to sing a song with the live band. She was so impressive that she landed another gig for $500 — a pretty penny for the early 1980s. “I thought, ‘Let me get over this shy, humility crap,’” Jordan said, laughing. “I could buy dinner. That’s some...

Farm Aid will celebrate its 40th anniversary on September 20 with a super-sized show at Huntington Bank Stadium in Minneapolis, Minnesota, featuring Farm Aid board members Willie Nelson, Neil Young, John Mellencamp, Dave Matthews, and Margo Price in addition to Billy Strings, Nathaniel Rateliff & the Night Sweats, Trampled by Turtles, Waxahatchee, Eric Burton of Black Pumas, Jesse Welles, Madeline Edwards, and others that have yet to be announced. Ticket sales begin May 16. “Family farmers are the heart of this country, and we depend on each other for good...

• SZA Tells Drew Barrymore 'You Gave Me Permission to Be Myself' "[Your laugh] reminds me of all the things about myself that make me nervous, but on you, it shines so brightly," the singer said • This Emo Country Singer Is Tapping into Your Pain Nolan Taylor addresses depression and insecurity in frank terms on his debut album: "The songs that are the heaviest, they just come right out" • Björk's Work-Life Balance Improved After She Swapped Touring for Mini-Residencies "You can have a personal life," the musician shared...

When Michelada Festival canceled its 2025 festival last week over the uncertainty around artist visas, it rang the alarm for several other Latin music festivals around the country. Michelada, a Chicago-based event, became the first of its kind to cancel over the “rapidly changing political climate.” The festival wrote on May 6: “We’re no longer able to guarantee the full experience we had dreamed up for you with all your favorite artists. Although we tried to push through, it became clear that we wouldn’t be able to deliver the full...

Sean “Diddy” Combs’ sex trafficking trial escalated on Monday afternoon as Daniel Phillip, a 41-year-old male escort, was called to the witness stand. In an extremely graphic testimony that lasted about an hour, Phillip was questioned by lead prosecutor Maurene Comey about his sexual encounters with Combs and his then-girlfriend Casandra “Cassie” Ventura from around 2012 to 2014. According to Phillip, he was paid between $700 and $6,000 on several occasions to have sex with Ventura, as Combs watched and masturbated. On more than one occasion, he witnessed Combs physically...