Rihanna has opened up about her highly anticipated new album, and said it’d be “ridiculous” if the new project “didn’t arrive this year.”
Her comments appeared in a massive interview with British Vogue, where the Fenty mogul also reflected on motherhood and the rollercoaster that has come with it.
“Oh my God, it’s legendary,” she said of her first nine months as a mother. “It’s everything. You really don’t remember life before, that’s the craziest thing ever.
“You literally try to remember it – and there are photos of my life before – but the feeling, the desires, the things that you enjoy, everything, you just don’t identify with it because you don’t even allow yourself mentally to get that far because … because it doesn’t matter.”
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Rihanna also told British Vogue that she hopes to make music more of a priority this year, but reportedly made the comments before learning she was pregnant again, which she revealed during her Super Bowl LVII Halftime Performance on Sunday (February 11).
“I want it to be this year,” she said of dropping her ninth album. “Like, honestly, it’d be ridiculous if it’s not this year. But I just want to have fun. I just want to make music and make videos.”
The comments come after Rihanna has relentlessly teased fans about new music over the past few years, and said prior to her Super Bowl Halftime performance that the new tunes she’s cooking up will sound unlike anything that’s come before.
“Musically, I’m feeling open,” Rihanna said during an Apple Music press conference before the Big Game. “I’m feeling open to exploring, discovering, creating, things that are new, things that are different, things that are off, weird, might not ever make sense to my fans, you know, the people that know the music that I put out. I just want to play. I want to have fun. I want to have fun with music.”
She added that she’s been recording new music but that after returning to them months later would realize it’s “almost like trying to dress like you used to dress. It’s like, ‘Ew, no. I would never wear those again.’ Your taste changes, your vibe changes.”
The new album would be her first since 2016’s ANTI, which according to Chart Data both returned to the Billboard 200 chart and cracked the Top 100 at the end of January in anticipation of her halftime performance. This means that ANTI has now appeared on the Billboard 200 for a total of 353 weeks, two of which it spent at the No. 1 position.
The Barbados-bred hitmaker told British Vogue that ANTI “really is my most brilliant album,” and said it “felt like the most cohesive album I’ve ever made.”
“When you break it down and you realize this album goes from ‘Work’ to ‘Kiss It Better’ to ‘Needed Me’ to ‘Love on the Brain’ to ‘Sex With Me’ to ‘Desperado’… And somehow it all fits and not for a second did you glitch?”
She continued by saying that new music wouldn’t arrive unless she felt it was better than ANTI.
Rihanna also recently celebrated her first Academy Awards nomination thanks to her song “Lift Me Up.” Taken from the Black Panther: Wakanda Forever soundtrack, it scored a slew of new Platinum certifications from the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA).
Two songs from ANTI — “Same Ol’ Mistakes” and “Higher” — were certified Platinum for the first time on January 28; while “Desperado,” “Kiss It Better,” “Needed Me,” and “Love On The Brain” all added to their multi-Platinum status. ANTI‘s Drake-assisted lead single “Work,” is now certified 9x Platinum.
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