RIHANNA TELLS BILLBOARD MAGAZINE ABOUT HER NEW STYLE & ALBUM!

RihRih is on the cover of the upcoming issue of Billboard magazine. Inside the feature story the magazine covers Rihanna’s recent change in style, the challenges she’s facing with her audience and some of her upcoming projects.

We’ve been trying to tell y’all that “Rated R” was not that hot, but the Billboard story confirms that the project has sold 998,000 copies, according to SoundScan, her lowest amount since her 2005 debut, “Music of the Sun” (594,000).

For the folks screaming how she’s platinum, looks like that’s an official ALMOST. SMH.

RihRih addresses Rated R in the Billboard story saying:

” ‘Rated R’ showed that I wasn’t a shallow artist,” she says. “I have some depth. There was definitely some growth, going through that dark moment in my life.”

Rihanna never refers to her relationship with Brown in specifics and says she “definitely” prefers to let “Love the Way You Lie” speak for itself, which of course is made easier by the fact that it’s not on her own album. “It’s kind of like the closing to that chapter, and now we’re in a new stage,” she says.

On Her Evolving Style:

“A lot of people dress like Lady Gaga now. I’ve just stepped off into a whole new look and style,” Rihanna says calmly, phoning in just before a flight to London after a nonstop week of work and play in New York. “The whole shoulder pad thing, and the architectural look, is so sharp-edged and tough. I’m over that. I like floral prints now, which I never liked.

“Trends are boring,” she adds. “It’s boring to see everyone doing the same thing.”

On Crafting Loud:

“I wanted songs that only I can do, not generic songs that everyone else could sing,” Rihanna says. Her collaborations with Esther Dean went a long way in this regard, no doubt in part because both are young, successful female pop hitmakers of color in a heavily male-dominated field.

Dean, who specializes in rhythmic pop songs with a naughty streak (her most recent work includes Usher’s “Hot Toddy,” Katy Perry’s “Peacock” and “Firework,” and Aguilera’s “Not Myself Tonight”), co-wrote “S&M,” “Fading Away” and “What’s My Name,” which will be the second single off “Loud.” She says Rihanna’s biggest strength is that “she doesn’t try to sound like you; she sounds like herself. She’s not in there trying to figure out how she can beat you singing your song. She goes in there and says, ‘I’m going to sing this song because I f*cking love it.’ “

“She really captured me, everything I would say and how I would say it,” Rihanna says of Dean. “Some people get it halfway right. She just gets it and knows exactly what you want to hear.”

Rihanna may not do much of her own songwriting, but by all accounts she was more active than ever in guiding the creative choices for “Loud.” Writing camps took place several months ago in Los Angeles and Miami, where Rihanna, who nearly always uses “we” when discussing the making of her album, says about 100 writers and producers were invited to collaborate and craft songs for consideration. “We gave them guidelines and a bunch of topics,” she says. “We’d have 10 writers in one room and five writers in another room and put them with one producer, then split the group up and put them with another producer.”

On Collaborating with Drizzy:

For her recent collaboration with Drake, a remix of “What’s My Name” that will appear on “Loud” as a bonus track, Rihanna personally presented the track to the Canadian MC. “She played the record to Drake backstage somewhere to try to get him on a verse,” Stargate producer Tor Erik Hermansen says. “She’s calling me up saying, ‘Where are the files?’ That’s one thing you don’t hear often from artists on her level.”

“Drake is the hottest rapper out right now,” Rihanna says, “and we’ve always been trying to work together. He’s the only person I thought could really understand the melody of the song, and the minute he heard it he said, ‘I know exactly what I’m going to do. I love it.’ And he did it like three days later.”

“Work Together”? Is that what they call it these days???

On Filming Battleship:

“My favorite part has been shooting in the ocean,” Rihanna gushes, sounding her most excited. “We were going at top speed, and I had to shoot this really badass weapon off the front of the boat. There was gunpowder all in my mouth by the time it finished.”

Rihanna has a stuntwoman for her more daring scenes, but per usual, she’s more likely to take charge. “They always want me to sit down when the dangerous stuff happens, but I am a control freak,” Rihanna says. “So I said, ‘No.’ She doesn’t do it like I would do it.”

The article also touches on RihRih’s partnership with Doritos and the upcoming launch of her fragrance Reb’l Fleur, but what they didn’t mention was her participation in Kodak’s “So Kodak” campaign.

SOURCE:
http://bossip.com/293863/rihanna-covers-billboard-magazine-and-join...