The gloves are off…

Tough girl Rihanna goes R Rated

Review by: Emily Crane

International superstar and style icon Rihanna is not taking any prisoners with her fourth album, Rated R. Featuring a darker, more sultry tone than what we are used to from the Barbados beauty, this album is not for the faint hearted. You have been warned.

As the title suggests, Rated R has certainly got the raunch factor. And it’s not just the music either, Rihanna has well and truly shaken off her previous girl next-door image in favour of couture and cutting edge, a look that has earned her recognition as an influential fashionista.

When Rihanna isn’t working the red carpet, she’s busy making music and her provocative lead single from the album certainly made a big entrance. Russian Roulette reached its peak in the UK singles chart at # 2 giving Rihanna her 11th top 5 hit in the country. The single has sold over 3 million copies worldwide but received a mixed reaction from critics. The padded cell, violence and Rihanna’s mysterious bleeding chest in the music video revealed a darker side to the artist, one that is both disturbing and thrilling at the same time.

Rated R has a vengeful, almost foreboding tone that sees Rihanna pushing the boundaries way beyond what she has done before.

With Rihanna’s third UK release we see a much lighter, playful theme in Rude Boy which is her best selling and highest-charting single from Rated R to date. Rudy Boy went top 3 in the UK single chart and hit the # 1 spot in the US and Australia. The bright colours, big lips and comic book look of the video harks back to 60s pop art giving it a kind of vintage feel.

But Rude Boy is not typical of the rest of the tracks on the album. Setting the mood well is Mad House which begins like a dubstep track before a male voice cuts through: “Ladies and gentlemen – to those among you who are easily frightened we suggest you turn away now. To those of you who think they can take it, we say welcome.”

If the warning in Mad House hasn’t left you reaching for the stop button, Rated R continues in a vengeful, almost foreboding tone that sees Rihanna pushing the boundaries way beyond what she has done before. She seems to be going in a harder, even rockier direction. Whilst Rated R is still essentially a dance-pop or hip hop album, there are guitar add-ons that may surprise you. Guns and Roses’ lead guitarist Slash makes an appearance on Rockstar 101 and Fire Bomb opens like an Aerosmith record.

Listening to hard-hitting tracks like Russian Roulette, it’s hard to imagine that just four years ago, Rihanna was a young girl living in the beautiful Barbados parish of Saint Michael. Staying true to her Carribbean routes, Rihanna’s debut album Music of the Sun featured the dancehall hit Pon de Replay, a tune that is probably the most remembered from the album. A year later the platinum selling album A Girl Like Me came next with # 1 singles SOS and Unfaithful.

But it was with her third album Good Girl Gone Bad that Rihanna firmly established herself as a potential megastar. The album bore what became the undisputed 2007 song of the summer, Umbrella. This Grammy award-winning global hit dominated the singles charts for weeks on end. In fact in the UK, Umbrella remains the longest-running number one single since Wet Wet Wet's Love Is All Around in 1994.

In the wake of such an iconic song you could be forgiven for thinking that anything Rihanna released since would fall short of the mark. But Good Girl Gone Bad continued to knock out some big hits including Shut Up and Drive, Hate That I Love You and Don’t Stop the Music. The album’s spin off, Reloaded, produced US number one singles Take A Bow and Disturbia.

Featuring production work from Timbaland and Tricky Stewart and the songwriting prowess of Justin Timberlake and Ne-Yo, Good Girl Gone Bad solidified Rihanna's position amongst the industry elite. The album went 5 times platinum in the UK and earned cumulative sales of more than 36-times platinum in at least 20 territories around the world. 

If you consider Rihanna’s impressive discography and a growing collection of music awards, it’s no surprise she’s released an album that takes things up a notch. Rated R might disappoint fans who are looking for pop ballads like Hate That I Love You but there are some new fans to be made with the more rockier tracks. Either way, Rated R sees a Rihanna who is all grown up and isn’t afraid to get what she wants.   

 

Tour

Fri 16 Apr 10 Belgium Antwerp

Sat 17 Apr 10 Holland Arnhem

Mon 19 Apr 10 Switzerland Zurich

Tues 20 Apr 10 France Lyon

Wed 21 Apr 10 France Marseille

Fri 23 Apr 10 Germany Frankfurt

Sun 25 Apr 10 Germany Oberhausen

Tues 27 Apr 10 Switzerland Geneva

Wed 28 Apr 10 France Paris

Fri 7 May 10 UK Birmingham

Sat 8 May 10 UK Liverpool

Mon 10 May 10 UK London

Tues 11 May 10 UK London

Thur 13 May 10 UK Sheffield

Fri 14 May 10 UK Nottingham

Sun 16 May 10 UK Manchester

Mon 17 May 10 UK Newcastle

Wed 19 May 10 UK Scotland

Thur 20 May 10 UK Scotland

Sat 22 May 10 Ireland Dublin

Sun 23 May 10 One Big Weekend

Mon 24 May 10 Ireland Belfast

US Tour – July & August

Do you want to win Rated R?

For a chance to win simply answer this question:
What was the first song released of the album in the UK?
To answer, email: competition@xcel.uk.net