#WheresTheAlbum? Rihanna continued to troll fans by teasing her highly anticipated ninth studio album, this time dropping a major hint that it might be coming soon.
“Update: me listening to R9 by myself and refusing to release it,” the nine-time Grammy winner, 31, wrote via Instagram on Sunday, December 22, alongside a video of a dog rocking out to House of Pain’s 1992 hit “Jump Around.”
Naturally, Rihanna’s 77.7 million Instagram followers put on their detective caps and began speculating about the release date. Many suggested that the album must finally be finished if the “Work” singer is listening to it, while others came up with plausible theories that it could drop by the end of the year.
One fan pointed out that Rihanna teased in an Instagram comment on December 22, 2018, that the project would be out in “2019.” Then, on Sunday, she posted the trolling dog video exactly one year later.
Another member of the Rihanna Navy reminded fans that the Barbados native similarly teased via Twitter on January 25, 2016, that she was “listening to ANTI,” her eighth album, which dropped three days later.
listening to ANTI 🎈 pic.twitter.com/AgqlhU0GEz
— Rihanna (@rihanna) January 25, 2016
Even Rihanna’s inner circle is on high alert for R9. Her brother Rorrey Fenty commented on Sunday’s Instagram post, “Drop de ting nuh!” while choreographer Parris Goebel reposted the dog video on her Instagram Stories with the caption, “Me waiting to choreograph for my sis album.”
Multiple sources told Us Weekly exclusively in February that the Fenty Beauty founder had finished recording her ninth record, although one insider explained that “mastering and more behind-the-scenes stuff” were still in the works at the time.
“I like to look at it as a reggae-inspired or reggae-infused album,” Rihanna told Vogue in October. “It’s not gonna be typical of what you know as reggae. But you’re going to feel the elements in all of the tracks. … Reggae always feels right to me. It’s in my blood. It doesn’t matter how far or long removed I am from that culture, or my environment that I grew up in; it never leaves. It’s always the same high. Even though I’ve explored other genres of music, it was time to go back to something that I haven’t really homed in on completely for a body of work.”
