UP
Usher
Artist, Actor
Age 26
Three years ago, EW spoke to Usher about his grander ambitions. ''I'm
really interested in acting,'' he proclaimed. ''I would love to have an
opportunity to segue dance and acting, in the way Gene Kelly and Fred
Astaire did, but in a more modern setting.'' This didn't seem like a
terribly realistic goal at the time: For one thing, Usher already
appeared to be stuck at a midlevel star plateau. For another, the screen
breakthrough he was promoting at the time was a cameo on Sabrina, the
Teenage Witch. But in 2004, the phrase ''Usher movie'' trips off the
studio-exec tongue much more readily. His Confessions is far and away
2004's best-selling CD (5.7 million to date, more than 2 mil ahead of
nearest competitor Norah Jones). ''Yeah!'' remains its most ubiquitous
single. And during one week in June, Usher held down three of the top 10
spots on Billboard's Hot 100, a feat unmatched since the Bee Gees in
'78. Little surprise, then, that Dimension Films has signed Usher for
his first film lead, playing — surprise — a kid dreaming of immodest stardom.
UP
Prince
Artist, Producer
Age 46
He rewrote the rule book, getting an allowance for CDs given away at
concerts to be counted as Billboard/SoundScan sales. Mind you, that
power play bred so much resentment that the rule book was rewritten
again, so no other artist can pull that stunt in the future. Still,
Prince reaped the PR benefits of having a top 10 album for months — his
first such reign in over a decade — on top of one of the year's most
consistently sold-out (and entertaining) tours.
UP
Lil Jon
Artist, Producer
Age 32
Look up party in the dictionary — the Crunk & Wagnall's version, that
is — and you'll find a picture of this not-so-lil entrepreneur. Hip-hop
meets the Red Bull-fueled dance floor in his smash productions for
Ciara, Petey Pablo, and, of course, Usher (''Yeah!,'' the year's signature
dance hit). He's no slouch making his own music, either; his November
release on TVT could make him the next Kanye West-size double threat.
UP
Kanye West
Artist, Producer
Age 27
In West's world, ''Jesus Walks,'' but money definitely talks, too. The
dough he brought in as a wildly successful producer (Alicia Keys, Jay-Z,
Twista, Britney) serves as mere backstory to his '04 triumph as a solo
artist: College Dropout (2.3 million so far) is the year's
fifth-bestselling CD, and the biggest by a debuting artist. Hip-hop's
King Midas finally turned himself multiplatinum.
UP
OutKast
Artists
Ages 28
They've sold 5.4 million of their CD set of conjoined solo albums.
They're in preproduction on their Prohibition-set HBO musical. Andre
3000 is interviewing the Bush and Kerry daughters for a political
documentary, while Big Boi cameoed on Omarion's first single. They won a
Best Album Grammy, cleaned up at MTV's VMAs and the World Music Awards,
and should do the same at next month's AMAs. Imagine what these two guys
could accomplish if you got them in the same room.
