Rihanna - Anti -deluxe- -2016-album- [2021] Page

In 2016, ANTI was viewed as a commercial risk. Today, it is recognized as a blueprint.

: Critics eventually lauded it as Rihanna's "magnum opus" and one of the best pop albums of the decade. AI responses may include mistakes. Learn more Anti (album) - Wikipedia

Before SZA became a global superstar with Ctrl , she was the secret weapon on this opening track. The song sets the tone: "I got to do things my own way, darling." It’s a mission statement about artistic freedom. The distorted bass and Rihanna’s snarled vocals tell us immediately: this is not the "Umbrella" girl anymore.

: In 2025, ANTI became the first album by a Black female artist to spend 500 weeks on the Billboard 200. Rihanna - ANTI -Deluxe- -2016-Album-

Rihanna herself has acknowledged its brilliance. In a 2023 interview, she declared,

The Deluxe Edition’s bonus tracks also found their audience, particularly the playful and explicit “Sex With Me,” which gained a cult following and was later certified quadruple Platinum.

Lyrically, ANTI lives up to its title by running counter to pop expectations. It is a deeply internal album obsessed with the friction between public success and private vulnerability. Songs like "Consideration" (featuring SZA) act as a declaration of independence from industry expectations, with Rihanna singing, "I got to do things my own way, darling." In 2016, ANTI was viewed as a commercial risk

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The promotional campaign for Anti from summer 2014 comprised prolonged release delays and a $25 million deal with Samsung. Rihanna... Anti (album) - Wikipedia

Rihanna’s ANTI (Deluxe Edition, 2016) is more than an album. It is a landmark, a turning point, and a testament to the power of artistic courage. From its chaotic, freewheeling release to its remarkably resilient chart run, from its Braille-covered, meaning-rich cover art to its deep, moody, and genre-defying tracks, ANTI stands as a singular achievement in 21st-century pop music. It is the sound of the world’s biggest pop star tearing up the rulebook and daring to listen to her own voice instead. A decade on, it remains not just her last album, but her best—a timeless masterpiece that continues to challenge, comfort, and captivate, with no expiration date in sight. AI responses may include mistakes

Other reviews were more immediately effusive. Stephen Thomas Erlewine of AllMusic awarded the album four out of five stars, noting that it was "the first of Rihanna's records to feel constructed as a front-to-back album" where "mood matters more than either hooks or rhythm". Rolling Stone also gave it four stars, with Brittany Spanos writing that the album "forces us to question the boxes we’ve placed Rihanna in all along". Pitchfork, however, was less impressed, calling it a "scattershot album, not the product of a committed artistic vision".

She wanted to make music that felt authentic to her adult self. She sought songs that could transcend era-specific radio trends.