BLACK SOCIAL HISTORY Robyn Rihanna Fenty born February 20, 1988, known by her stage name Rihanna, from the Welsh name Rhiannon, is a Barbadian recording artist, actress, and fashion designer. Born in Saint Michael, Barbados, she began her career when she met record producer Evan Rogers through mutual friends in late 2003. She spent the next year traveling to the United States recording demo tapes under Rogers' guidance. Her demo tape was eventually shopped to several record labels and subsequently signed a contract with Def Jam Recordings after auditioning for its president, rapper Jay-Z.
Rihanna's debut album, Music of the Sun (2005), featuring the Billboard Hot 100 top three hit single "Pon de Replay", peaked at number ten on the Billboard 200 chart. Her second album, A Girl Like Me (2006), peaked at number five in the US and generated the worldwide hits "SOS" and "Unfaithful". Her third album, Good Girl Gone Bad (2007), spawned the international hits "Umbrella", "Don't Stop the Music", "Take a Bow", and "Disturbia". The album was nominated for nine Grammy Awards, winning Best Rap/Sung Collaboration for "Umbrella". Her fourth album, Rated R(2009), produced the top ten singles "Russian Roulette" and "Hard", plus the number one hit "Rude Boy". Her fifth, Loud (2010), spawned the number one hits "Only Girl (In the World)", "What's My Name?", and "S&M". Her sixth album, Talk That Talk (2011), included the worldwide chart topper "We Found Love" and the top five single "Where Have You Been". Rihanna's seventh album, Unapologetic (2012), became her first number one album on the Billboard 200 and generated her twelfth Hot 100 number one single "Diamonds" and the top three hit "Stay". In addition to her solo work, Rihanna has collaborated with numerous other artists, including being featured on the worldwide hits "Live Your Life" (with T.I.) and "Love the Way You Lie" (with Eminem).
Rihanna's work has earned her numerous awards and accolades, including six Grammy Awards, five American Music Awards, 22 Billboard Music Awards, and two BRIT Awards. She has sold more than 100 million records worldwide, which makes her one of the best-selling artists of all time. She has achieved twelve number one singles on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, the youngest solo artist to achieve the feat. Billboard named her the Digital Songs Artist of the 2000s decade, ranking her seventeenth overall. In 2012, Forbes named her as the fourth most powerful celebrity of 2012, with earnings of $53 million between May 2011 and May 2012. The same year, TIME named Rihanna one of the 100 Most Influential People in the World.
Career
1988–04: Early life and career beginnings
Rihanna's career began through her association with American record producers Carl Sturken and Evan Rogers; she met Rogers through mutual friends in Barbados in December 2003. She caught the attention of Rogers, who asked Rihanna to come to his hotel room, where she performed renditions of the songs "Emotion" and "Hero". This impressed Rogers, who then took Rihanna and her mother to New York to record some demo tapes. Rihanna was signed to Rogers' and Sturken's production company, Syndicated Rhythm Productions, which assigned her a lawyer and manager. In late 2004, her demo tape was distributed to record labels around the world, where it captured the attention of Jay Brown, an A&R executive at Def Jam, and played it for president and CEO of Def Jam Recordings Jay-Z. In February 2005, Rihanna flew up to New York to audition for Jay-Z and industry executive L.A. Reid, performing Whitney Houston's version of "For the Love of You" and the original songs "Pon de Replay" and "The Last Time". That same day, Rihanna signed a six-album record deal with Def Jam Recordings, and she later moved to New York to live with Rogers and his wife. Robyn Rihanna Fenty was born on February 20, 1988, in Saint Michael, Barbados. Her mother is Monica Braithwaite, a retired Afro-Guyanese accountant, and her father is Ronald Fenty, a warehouse supervisor of Barbadian and Irish descent. Rihanna has two brothers, Rorrey and Rajad Fenty, and two half-sisters and a half-brother from her father's side, each born to different mothers from his previous relationships. She grew up in a three-bedroom bungalow in Bridgetown and sold clothes with her father in a stall on the street. Rihanna's childhood was deeply affected by her father's addiction to crack cocaine, alcohol, and marijuana, and her parents' turbulent marriage ended when she was 14. Rihanna grew up listening to reggae music and began singing at around the age of seven. She attended Charles F. Broome Memorial Primary School and Combermere High School, where she formed a musical trio with two of her classmates. Rihanna was an army cadet in a sub-military programme; the singer-songwriter Shontelle was her drill sergeant. Although she initially wanted to graduate from high school, she chose to pursue a musical career instead.
2005–06: Music of the Sun and A Girl Like Me
Rihanna spent the next three months collaborating with rapper Memphis Bleek on his fourth studio album 534 and recording her debut album. Her album featured production from Rogers, Sturken, Stargate, and Poke & Tone. Her debut single, "Pon de Replay", was released in August 2005. It charted successfully worldwide, peaking in the top five in fifteen countries, including at number two on both the US Billboard Hot 100 and UK Singles Chart. Her debut album, Music of the Sun, was released later that month. It peaked at number ten on the US Billboard 200 and received a Gold certification from the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), denoting shipments of over 500,000 units. The album sold over two million copies worldwide. It received mixed reviews; Rolling Stone gave it two and a half out of five stars and described as lacking replay value, ingenuity, and rhythm. Sal Cinquemani of Slant Magazine described the album as a "glut of teen R&B chanteuses" and described her lead single as "a dancehall-pop mixture that owes plenty of its sweat and shimmy to Beyoncé's "Baby Boy". A second single, "If It's Lovin' that You Want", was not as successful as its predecessor, but reached the top ten in Australia, Ireland, and New Zealand.
A month after the release of her debut album, Rihanna began working on her second studio album. Rogers, Sturken, Stargate, J. R. Rotem and label-mate singer-songwriter Ne-Yo worked on the production of the album. A Girl Like Me was released in April 2006. Critical response to the album was mixed;Rolling Stone commented, "Like her filler-packed debut album, this similar but superior follow-up doesn't deliver anything else as ingenious as its lead single."The album was a commercial success, charting in the top ten in thirteen countries. The album reached number one in Canada and number five in the UK and US, where it sold 115,000 copies its first week. Its lead single, "SOS", was an international success, charting in the top five in eleven countries, including Canada, Germany, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom. The song reached number one on the US Billboard Hot 100 and in Australia, her first to reach this chart position. "Unfaithful", the album's second single, reached the top ten in eighteen countries, including number one in Canada and Switzerland. "We Ride" and "Break It Off", the latter featuring Sean Paul, were also released as singles. Following the release of the album, Rihanna embarked on her first headlining tour, the Rihanna: Live in Concert Tour, also performing alongside Jay-Z and Ne-Yo on the Rock Tha Block Tour. In addition, she joined The Pussycat Dolls on their PCD World Tour.
2007–10: Good Girl Gone Bad and Rated R
For her third studio album, Good Girl Gone Bad, Rihanna embraced a new musical direction through uptempo dance tracks produced by Timbaland, will.i.am and Sean Garrett. Released in May 2007, the album charted at number two in Australia and the US and topped the charts in multiple countries, including Brazil, Canada, Ireland, Japan, Russia and the UK. The album received the most positive critical reviews of her first three albums. The lead single, "Umbrella", topped the charts in thirteen countries and remained number one in the UK for ten consecutive weeks, the longest-running number one single since Wet Wet Wet's single "Love Is All Around" spent fifteen weeks at the top in 1994. It was Rihanna's first single to be named one of the best-selling singles worldwide, with sales of over 6.6 million copies. The songs "Shut Up and Drive", "Hate That I Love You" featuring Ne-Yo, and "Don't Stop The Music" were also released as singles. In support of the album, she began the Good Girl Gone Bad Tour in September 2007, with 80 shows across the US, Canada, and Europe. Rihanna was nominated for several 2008 Grammy Awards, winning Best Rap/Sung Collaboration for "Umbrella" alongside Jay-Z.
Throughout 2008, Rihanna performed on the Glow in the Dark Tour alongside Kanye West, Lupe Fiasco, and N.E.R.D. Her third album's reissue, Good Girl Gone Bad: Reloaded, was released in June 2008 with three new songs: "Disturbia", "Take a Bow", and the Maroon 5 duet "If I Never See Your Face Again". All three were released as singles and charted highly, reaching peak positions worldwide. In August 2008, Rihanna and a host of other female singers, including Beyoncé Knowles, Mary J. Blige, and Mariah Carey, recorded the charity single "Just Stand Up!", the theme song to the anti-cancer campaign Stand Up to Cancer. "Live Your Life", a duet between T.I. and Rihanna, released that November, peaked in the top ten in thirteen countries worldwide, topping the Billboard Hot 100.
A remix album, Good Girl Gone Bad: The Remixes, was released in January 2009. Good Girl Gone Bad has sold over 2.8 million units in the United States alone, receiving a two-times-platinum certification from the RIAA. It is Rihanna's best-selling album in the country to date. The album has sold over seven million copies worldwide.
In July 2009, Rihanna collaborated with Jay-Z and Kanye West on "Run This Town", which peaked at number two on the Billboard Hot 100, number one in the UK, and reached the top ten in ten other countries. Her fourth studio album, Rated R, was released in November 2009. Critical response was favorable;Rolling Stone stated that Rihanna "transformed her sound and made one of the best pop records of the year". The album's lead single, "Russian Roulette", was a commercial success, reaching number one in Norway and Switzerland and making the top ten in sixteen other countries. This was followed by the release of "Hard" with Young Jeezy and "Rude Boy". The latter was the biggest worldwide success from the album, topping the US Billboard Hot 100 for six weeks and reaching top ten positions in twenty-two other countries. Two other singles were released from the album: "Rockstar 101" with Slash and "Te Amo". Rated R: Remixed was released in the spring of 2010 and featured ten tracks remixed by Chew Fu. To promote the album, Rihanna embarked on her second worldwide tour, the Last Girl on Earth Tour. At the 52nd Grammy Awards, "Run This Town" won Best Rap Song and Best Rap/Sung Collaboration.
2010–11: Loud and Talk That Talk
In summer 2010, Rihanna collaborated with rapper Eminem on "Love the Way You Lie", which was a major worldwide success, reaching number one in over twenty countries. The song was Rihanna's seventh US number one of her career, making her the female artist with the fifth-most number ones in the chart's history. Reaching number two, the song became the biggest-selling song of 2010 in the UK, and the first of Rihanna's singles to sell over one million copies in the country. She also lent her vocals to "All of the Lights", a single from Kanye West's album, My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy, alongside John Legend, The-Dream, Elly Jackson, Alicia Keys, Fergie, Kid Cudi, and Elton John. In October 2010, Rihanna switched managers, joining Jay-Z's Roc Nation Management.
Loud, Rihanna's fifth studio album, was released the following month. Its lead single, "Only Girl (In the World)", reached number one in fifteen countries, including Australia, Canada, the UK, and the US. The album's second single, "What's My Name?", featuring Drake, also reached number one in the US and UK, making Rihanna the first female solo artist to have five number one singles in the United Kingdom in consecutive years. The song reached number one on the US Billboard Hot 100 before "Only Girl (In the World)", the first time in the chart's history that an album's lead single reached number one after the second. The third single, "S&M", reached number one in the US following the release of its official remix featuring Britney Spears. It was Rihanna's tenth US number one single on the chart, tying her with Janet Jackson in fourth place for female soloists who have topped the chart. With only four years, eleven months, and two weeks between her first and tenth number one on the chart, Rihanna set a record as the solo artist with the fastest accumulation of ten chart toppers. "Man Down" and "California King Bed" were released as singles in May 2011 with moderate success. "Cheers (Drink to That)" was released as the sixth and final single from the album, reaching the top twenty in the UK and the top ten in the US.
In February 2011, "Only Girl (In the World)" won the award for Best Dance Recording at the 53rd Grammy Awards. In June 2011, Rihanna embarked on the Loud Tour, which sold out ten nights at the The O2 Arena in London, the most sold out shows for a female artist in the venue's history. The tour was the seventh highest grossing tour worldwide of 2011. The final three shows in London in December 2011 were filmed for Rihanna's second live video album, titled Loud Tour Live at the O2, which was released on December 18, 2012. In October 2011, Nicki Minaj released the collaboration "Fly", featuring Rihanna. The song peaked within the top twenty in the US and UK.
Rihanna's sixth album, Talk That Talk, was released in November 2011. The album debuted at number three on the Billboard 200 with sales of 198,000 copies and number one in the UK, selling 163,000. The lead single, "We Found Love", topped charts in twenty-seven countries worldwide, peaking in the top ten in thirty countries and breaking many records worldwide. It topped the Billboard Hot 100 for ten non-consecutive weeks, becoming Rihanna's longest-running number one single and the longest-running number one of 2011. The song was later named the 24th biggest hit of all time on the Billboard Hot 100. "You Da One" and the titular track featuring Jay-Z were released as the second and third singles from the album to moderate success, the former reaching the top twenty in the UK and US. "Where Have You Been", the fifth single, successfully charted worldwide, reaching number five in the US and six in the UK. "Cockiness (Love It)" was released as the album's sixth and final single in a remixed form featuring rapper ASAP Rocky.
2012–present: Rihanna's seventh studio album, Unapologetic, was released in November 2012. In the United States, the album debuted at number one on the Billboard 200/with sales of 238,000, marking Rihanna's first number one album in the country. In addition, it was the best-selling debut week of her career, besting her fifth studio album Loud (2010).
The album was Rihanna's third consecutive number one album in the United Kingdom and fifth in Switzerland. The lead single from the album, "Diamonds", reached number one in more than twenty countries worldwide, including on the US Billboard Hot 100, her twelfth number one on the chart which tied her with Madonna and The Supremes as the artists' with the fourth most number ones on the chart's history. The album's second single, "Stay", featuring Mikky Ekko, reached the top five in over twenty countries, including number three on the Billboard Hot 100. "Pour It Up" was released as the second US single and third overall, reaching number 19 on the Hot 100. An official remix featuring American rappers Young Jeezy, Rick Ross,Juicy J
, and T.I. was later distributed. "Right Now" featuring David Guetta serves as the fourth single from the album and currently has reached the top fifty on the Hot 100. As promotion prior to the album's release, Rihanna embarked on the 777 Tour, a mini tour of seven shows in seven countries in seven days. A documentary DVD of the tour was later released.In early 2012, two collaborations featuring Rihanna were released: Coldplay's "Princess of China" from the album Mylo Xyloto and Drake's "Take Care" from hisalbum of the same name. In February 2012, Rihanna won her third Grammy Award for Best Rap/Sung Collaboration at the 2012 Grammy Awards, and was voted the Best International Female Solo Artist at the 2012 BRIT Awards for the second consecutive year. March 2012 saw the simultaneous release of collaborations between Rihanna and Chris Brown: remixes of her song "Birthday Cake" and his "Turn Up the Music". The recordings received mainly negative responses due to the pair's history of domestic violence. In September 2012, "We Found Love" won the MTV Video Music Award for Video of the Year, making Rihanna the first woman to receive the accolade more than once.
In February 2013 at the 55th Grammy Awards, Rihanna won her sixth Grammy Award, in the category Best Short Form Music Video for "We Found Love" (2011). Also that month, the Official Charts Company announced that Rihanna had sold 3,868,000 records in the past year in the UK alone, ranking at number one in the list of 2013 BRIT Awards artist nominees. Rihanna's fifth headlining concert tour, the "Diamonds World Tour", began in March 2013 in support of Unapologetic. In May 2013, it was reported Rihanna was working on her eighth studio album. On June 3, 2013, American hip hop artist Wale released a remixed version of his single "Bad" featuring Rihanna. On August 2, 2013, Billboard announced that Rihanna is the 15th biggest US Billboard Hot 100 artist of all time, and is the highest ranking newcomer on the list since the last time Billboard compiled all time artists in 2008.
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