14 DAY TRIAL // Despite massive promotion and incredible hype, Rihanna’s “R Rated” album did not fare as anticipated, for reasons that are still rather foggy. Her next studio material, though, aside from bringing back the happy, colorful sound that made her such a hit with fans, will also aim to be as timeless as Michael Jackson’s “Thriller,” Def Jam Vice President Bu Thiam says in an interview with Vibe cited by AceShowbiz.
As Rihanna herself said a while back, her upcoming material will come back from the dark territory she went into with “R Rated” and a slew of huge names as collaborators will help ensure that. Among them, Thiam enlists Ester Dean, Mel & Mus and Rock City, The-Dream Ne-Yo and Stargate, who will make sure that she gets to see the vision she has translated into recorded track. Now is Rihanna’s time, the VP believes, and she will certainly be coming out with an album that will create quite an impact.
“I’m trying to push her to where every song will be a hit from 1 to 12. I’m talking about NO album fillers. Our bar for this album is Michael Jackson’s Thriller,” Thiam says. “She’s great to work with and very hands on with every song that’s being written and produced. She has visual concepts for just about every song. It’s already giving me the feel of a timeless album, and right now is her time,” the record label vice president goes on to say.
“With the bar set high, it is no wonder then if ‘there is a big writing camp with 50 other producers writing for Rihanna’s next album.’ Earlier this year, Taio Cruz revealed about what he knew concerning the Barbadian songstress’ record, adding ‘They have hired out 20 to 30 different studios and had everyone in there collaborating, switching people around. Each person did about six or seven songs. It doesn’t normally work like that but she’s a huge artist’,” AceShowbiz writes.
Another huge name at some point attached to that of Rihanna was David Guetta, who once said that he’d be very interested to work with her. Back then, the famous DJ said the only possible obstacle would be in conflicting schedules but he promised that, granted that was out of the way, the result would be positively amazing.