Rihanna
At the age of 16, pop diva Rihanna secured a record deal with Def Jam. In 2005, she released her first album, Music of the Sun, which went on to sell and over 2 million copies worldwide. She continued to put out albums and a number of popular singles, such as “We Found Love,” “Unfaithful,” “Umbrella,” “Disturbia,” “Take a Bow,” and “Diamonds.” Global pop icon Rihanna has an unflinchingly edgy image and has received numerous industry honors, including Grammy and MTV awards.
Early life
Musician Robyn In February 20, 1988, in St. Michael Parish on the Caribbean island of Barbados, Rihanna Fenty was conceived. She is the oldest of the 3 children born to Ronald Fenty, a warehouse manager, and accountant Monica Fenty. Her father’s battles with crack cocaine and alcohol addiction as well as her parent’s marital issues—they were separated when she was 14—tainted Rihanna’s youth.
For numerous years during her adolescence, Rihanna also suffered from debilitating headaches, which she tried to hide from her classmates and peers so they wouldn’t think she was strange. She recalled that I never voiced my emotions. I’ve never let it out. I would attend classes.
Rihanna started singing as a youngster to escape her domestic problems. She started a girl group with 2 of her friends, and when they were 15 years old, music producer Evan Rodgers, who was on the island with his Barbadian wife, invited them to an audition. Rogers was in awe of Rihanna’s ability and beauty at a young age, which was terrible for her two pals. He said that “the moment Rihanna walked into the room, it was if the other two girls didn’t exist.”
Rihanna left Barbados only about a year later, when she was just 16 years old, to live with Rogers and his wife in Connecticut and begin recording a demo album. I didn’t glance back when I left Barbados, Rihanna recounted.
Movies
Rihanna ventured into the world of film in 2012, co-starring in Battleship and then providing the voice of the main character in the illustrated hit Home (2015).
In 2017, Rihanna appeared frequently in Bates Motel’s fifth season and had a significant part in the science fiction film Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets. Along with Sandra Bullock, Cate Blanchett, and Anne Hathaway, the pop artist was first seen by fans in Ocean’s 8 trailers, a female-led sequel to the well-known Ocean’s Trilogy that debuted in theaters in June 2018.
The Amazon musical Guava Island included Rihanna and Donald Glover, a.k.a. Childish Gambino, as co-stars the following spring.
Songs
Rogers secured Rihanna an interview with Def Jam Records’ newly appointed president, the famed musician Jay-Z, in Jan 2005. She remembered, “I was just trembling in the lobby.” But as soon as Rihanna began to sing, she recovered her calm. While she was singing, she recalled, “I remember staring into everyone’s eyes in the room, at that point, I was fearless.” But as soon as I finished the song, I realized Jay-Z was seated just in front of me. The hip-hop legend immediately signed Rihanna to his record label after being as impressed by her powerful presence as Rogers had been 2 years previously.
8 months later, in August 2005, she dropped her debut single, “Pon de Replay,” a club song with reggae influences that peaked at No. 2 on the Billboard singles list and established Rihanna as the next big pop sensation in the making. Later same month, she released her debut album, Music of the Sun, which included the hit “If It’s Lovin’ That You Want” and peaked at No. 10 just on Billboard albums chart. The following year, Rihanna launched her second album, A Girl Like Me, which featured the two big successes “Unfaithful” and “SOS,” which became her first No. 1 single.
With the release of her third album, Good Girl Gone Bad, in 2007, Rihanna underwent a shift from a sweet teen pop princess to a superstar and sex icon. The album’s #1 lead song, “Umbrella,” starring Jay-Z, was the catalyst for this change. It displays how much she has improved as an artist “Jay-Z commented on the song. You can tell how deep and how far she’s come from that song’s lyrics.
The Billboard singles chart champion “Umbrella” brought Rihanna her first Grammy Award for Best Rap/Sung Collaboration. The songs “Shut Up and Drive” and “Don’t Stop the Music,” the latter of which incorporates a sample from Michael Jackson’s “Thriller,” were also included on the album, which peaked at No. 2 on the charts “I want to start something.
With the hits “Hard” and “Rude Boy,” Rihanna continued her string of successful albums in 2009 with the release of Rated R. Her 2010 album Loud, which featured the singles “What’s My Name,” “Only Girl (In the World),” and “S&M,” was a commercial hit as well.
Rihanna has a long history of successful songs of her own, but she also worked with many other artists on a number of well-known songs from this era, such as Jay-“Run Z’s this Town,” Eminem’s “Love the Way You Lie,” Maroon 5’s “If I Never See Your Face Again,” and Kanye West’s “All of the Lights.”
Talk That Talk, Rihanna’s sixth studio album, was released in 2011. The album featured the DJ Calvin Harris song “We Found Love,” which received the 2013 Grammy Award for best short-form music.
Rihanna released such hits as the No. 1 Sia Furler song “Diamonds” and “Stay,” featuring Mikky Ekko, on her Grammy-winning 2012 album Unapologetic. It’s interesting to note that Unapologetic was Rihanna’s first album to top the mainstream charts. Additionally, she collaborated with Coldplay on the song “Princess of China,” and the following year, she achieved another No. 1 with the Eminem-assisted song “The Monster.
Rihanna, who is well-known for her provocative sexual imagery and outrageous fashion, gained attention in June 2014 for the sheer dress she wore at the Council of Fashion Designers of America awards ceremony. According to an Associated Press story, she told the audience that fashion has always been her “defence mechanism” when accepting the CFDA’s Fashion Icon Award. Although Rihanna admitted that there are some laws in fashion, she said that “rules are intended to be broken.” The singer also made a risky career move at this time, moving from the Def Jam label to Jay-Roc Z’s Nation.
NBC revealed that Rihanna would serve as The Voice’s principal mentor in August 2015. She did contribute vocals to the song “FourFiveSeconds” that was a cooperation between Kanye West and the late Beatle Paul McCartney. That same year, she also released the song “B**** Better Have My Money,” which was reportedly motivated by legal disputes with her previous manager and showcased a highly contentious, violent music video. In 2015, Rihanna also made history by becoming the first artist to have 100 million singles viewed and downloaded.
Private Life and Charity
The Clara Lionel Foundation, founded by Rihanna in 2012 and dedicated after her grandmother, sponsors and finances early warning and learning initiatives all over the world. At the 2020 NAACP Image Awards, she received the President’s Award in recognition of her charitable work.
She has also garnered media attention for her private life, though frequently due to events over and above her control. She initially appeared in tabloid news stories in 2006 when reports surfaced that she was having an affair with Jay-Z, her mentor. However, she and Jay-Z quickly shot down these claims as absurd. Prior to their rumored breakup in early 2020, she was then romantically involved to wealthy Saudi businessman Hassan Jameel.
Rihanna started dating rapper A$AP Rocky in late 2020. It was made public that the couple is welcoming their first child in January 2022.
After a domestic violence case in which her then-boyfriend Chris Brown beat her up before an awards event in 2009, Rihanna became the focus of a media frenzy. Due to the incident, Rihanna received an enormous amount of public sympathy, and she later became an advocate against domestic violence. She admitted as much to Diane Sawyer in an interview. Anyone can experience it.
She admitted as much in a subsequent statement with Rolling Stone, “I put my guard up so fiercely.” “I didn’t want anyone to witness my tears. People shouldn’t feel sorry for me, I thought. I resisted letting that be the perception even though it was a really vulnerable point in my life. I wanted people to perceive me as being tough and in good shape. I held that up until it seemed genuine.”
Rihanna seemed to be getting back in touch with Brown in 2012. Just on song “Birthday Cake,” which was published that year, the two collaborated. In August of that year, Rihanna also opened out to Oprah Winfrey about her connection with Brown.