Actress Rihanna poses for photographers upon arrival at the premiere of the film ‘Ocean’s 8’ in London
Britain Ocean’s 8 Premiere, London, United Kingdom – 13 Jun 2018
The album of unreleased music from “Rihanna” joins recent unauthorized records from “Beyoncé” and “SZA”.
Rihanna is releasing new music this year — but the album that popped up on iTunes and Apple Music over the weekend is not it. Still, Angel, an unauthorized record full of unreleased tracks uploaded by “Fenty Fantasia” and quickly disseminated across social media, was so popular among listeners that it debuted at Number 67 on iTunes’ worldwide albums chart. Was it a real album? Yes, but no. While Rihanna was indeed the singer on the record, Angel seemed to comprise demos and some unreleased songs that have, according to Rihanna fans, been floating around the Internet in some fashion since 2009. Within hours, the album disappeared from iTunes and Apple Music as quietly as it had appeared, and Apple has not commented on the matter.
Rihanna’s team did not immediately respond to request for comment. While the singer said last year that she had a record in the works for a 2019 release, the exact date has not been announced.
