Yet again, Rihanna is teasing fans with a sliver of information about her long-awaited ninth album, shared while promoting her latest Savage x Fenty show. Specifically, she’s hinted that her next full-length musical offering is “going to be completely different” to what’s come before.
“You’re not going to expect what you hear,” the musician tells reporters with Associated Press (see below). “Whatever you know of Rihanna is not going to be what you hear.”
“I’m really experimenting,” she adds of the follow-up to 2016’s Anti, which she previously described as “reggae-inspired or reggae-infused”. “And music, it’s like fashion, you should be able to play. I should be able to wear whatever I want, and I treat music the same way.”
“I’m having fun,” she concludes. “And it’s going to be completely different. That’s it.”
Gradually opening up about the record over the last couple of years, Rihanna has assured fans that it’s going to be worth the wait, and that it will be “an outlet” in an overwhelming world (meaning that it can’t arrive soon enough, tbh).
In the meantime, however, she’s been busy becoming a billionaire, announcing a Caribbean cookbook, and spending some quality time with A$AP Rocky in New York City, where the pair have made a convincing case for their status as the world’s most stylish couple.
ICYMI, Rihanna was also announced as Dazed’s 30th anniversary cover star earlier this month (take a look here). Her latest Savage x Fenty show is set to hit Amazon Prime Video on September 24.