Due to her talent, style and vocal performance, she is showing signs of becoming the next big thing. She has even collaborated with bigger artists who also see that. Her first album, “Por Vida” which came out in 2015, had contributions from Tyler, The Creator, Kaytranada, and BADBADNOTGOOD. It is certainly is a great album that is needed in R&B today.
She has also been featured on the extremely popular English Virtual band, Gorillaz’s song, “She’s my Collar.”
Tyler the Creator also seems to like her style, as she was featured in his song, “PERFECT.”
About a week ago she released another collaboration with Tyler entitled, “After The Storm” which almost has a million views already.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RosviOqt77c
In addition to these collborations, she has also worked with Snoop Dog, she told Billboard her about her experience:
“Snoop saw “What They Say,” I think. Someone put him on to it — it was all word of mouth shit. He loved that I sampled Brenton Wood and loved the aesthetic and the low-rider culture behind it, so he was like, “I have to work with her.” He gave me a song on his mixtape.”
With so many big artists collaborating with her and seeing the potential she has, there is no doubt that she will shortly be blown up into superstardom. Check her out, she is truly an artist to look out for.
Every album Rihanna puts out breaks the barriers of what we thought we could expect from her. Not only has she completely redefine herself she has the music to back it up.
But Rihanna and N.E.R.D’s new track “Lemon” goes even further than that. At first listen, I didn’t even know it was Rihanna since she has never done rap before. It is a pleasant surprise that actually works. She is now going outside her genre of pop to show us even more of talent she possesses. Being able to do other genres, and have it work is the sign of a true icon.
An artist that evolves, is an artist that stays. “Lemon” officially landed Rihanna’s 50th Top 40 single. The only female artist that is ahead of her is Taylor Swift who has 55 Top 40 singles. Rihanna is currently tied with The Beatles and has surpassed Madonna who has 40. Who knows how long Rihanna’s rain will continue? Based on the last 13 years I would predict it not only is here to stay but to thrive. Anti truly marked her as an icon, and “Lemon” is shoving it in everyone’s faces.
The Migos, the hottest thing to happen in 2017, have just released their new single from their new record “Culture 2.” The Migos formed in 2009 and the group is composed of the rappers Quavo, Offset and Takeoff. Although they were formed in 2009, they really had their big break when they released their second album, “Culture” in January 2017. It received a lot of praise and debuted on top the Billboard 200 chart. After this point, one could not turn on the radio without listening to “Bad and Boujee”, which stayed for 36 weeks on the chart. Following this success, they almost defined and created a new style of rap, which includes mumbling and a sauvé style, comparable to Yung Thug. Now that they are so big, the expectations are high. So what can we expect from this new single entitled, “Supastars?”
At first listen, it doesn’t seem very original and it is definitely not as good as “Bad and Boujee.” The main problem with this song is that it doesn’t have a strong chorus that draws the listener in. The chorus also has three lines of just saying, “yeah”, which can get boring. It also doesn’t have a significant beat change in the chorus, which makes it hard to figure out where the chorus actually is. It is more of a freestyle that lasts five minutes with no central theme, which is a tad too long. Quavo also appears to have the most lines in the song, which is starting to become a trend. I would love to see Offset and Takeoff have more of a contribution on this album.
The background vocals of “yea”, “got it, got it”, “real”, “style” along with other call-outs, only detracts from the song since it is used too frequently, even for the Migos. It is almost like these background expressions are trying to make the lyrics more strong when it just doesn’t have a well-crafted component.
They are sticking to what they know, but the problem with that is that it doesn’t have the quality of being a stand out track. They have influenced the rap game, but this certainly isn’t as revolutionary.
This song is a lot better than a lot of what other artists are doing in the game right now, but I expected more from them. The song doesn’t have that star quality to send it to the top of the Billboard charts. Some would say I am being too critical but they have set this high of a bar for themselves, and only on their second album. Overall, the song doesn’t live up to my expectations and I hope that they have more variety on the full album.
It’s truly powerful to see the effect that Logic has done for his fans. He is showing that everyone struggles with depression, even when they are famous, they can still feel down. It is hard to tell what someone is going through since we all have our own personal battles but the most important thing to remember is that we are all human.
Now with the success of this song, he has a bigger and wider audience. In my opionion this wasn’t the rapper’s best song, due to the repetitive chorus but it did send him to instant stardom. I love seeing celebrities that use their platform for good, and also to put out quality content along with the message. The ripple of this song has caused quite the storm of people being more open about their mental health, and not being afraid to get help when they need it. We are one step closer to bringing the rate of suicide down. We truly only have this one life to live- might as well live it, even through the bad.
Punk Goes Pop series created by Fearless Records. It contains a collection of songs by various artists performing covers of pop songs. It was released on April 2, 2002 and is still thriving. Its success caused Fearless Records to release more pop cover albums. The basic formula is having punk bands do creative covers of pop songs, putting a new spin on traditional songs that have been heard over the radio. It gives the song a new direction and meaning, which highlights the power of music. Not only has the original song connected with listeners, just by changing the style can give it a whole new take which is very refreshing to hear.
You can listen to some of the most popular covers here:
Mayday Parade is a proud artist on these albums and they even have a cover that has 16 million views featuring Vic Fuentes:
Since Rap is becoming more and more popular and taking over the radio, it would great to make covers to capitalize on the buzz. Punk and rap have a lot of the same qualities, which gives it the perfect mix. Punk is an aggressive form of rock music while rap is more lyrical and fast-paced. Overall they are both subcultures that give voice to outsiders, and that mix is even stronger combined. These artists are people who don’t fit the norm and find connectivity in music.
One of the most impressive covers is Fame on Fire’s cover of “XO TOUR Llif3” by Lil Uzi Vert.
You can view the original song here & the cover:
On the topic of punk covers, everyone remembers Framing Hanley’s cover of “Lollipop” by Lil Wayne.
You can view the original song here & the cover:
One can even argue that these covers are better than the original, depending on your taste. Overall, I love seeing the merge of these two genres and I hope that more bands will be open to covering these songs. It is also a great way to get traffic to a band’s Youtube page by covering popular songs and doing it well. Hopefully, there can be a Rap Goes Punk in the next year to open up people’s tastes.
