Rihanna Teases Creative Visions for New Music, Songwriting Ongoing

Rihanna's highly anticipated album, dubbed R9 by fans, has been a prolonged wait for both her supporters and the artist herself. In an interview for Interview Magazine's spring 2024 edition, Rihanna, 36, discussed her return to the music scene after dedicating time to her Fenty beauty and fashion ventures and motherhood.

While she hasn't abandoned music entirely, Rihanna disclosed that she's currently focusing on conceptualizing the visual elements for her upcoming album, indicating that the songs are still a work in progress.

“I have a lot of visual ideas,” the singer told the outlet. “It’s weird. My brain is working backward right now. I usually have the music first, and the music leads me into all of these visual opportunities, and now I’m having all of these visuals.”

Rihanna stepped away from music in 2017 to launch Fenty Beauty and in 2018, she launched Savage X Fenty, her lingerie brand. She has since come into her own as a businesswoman, and a side effect of her busy schedule on that front, plus having two kids, is that there hasn’t been a new Rihanna album in nearly a decade.