Is Rihanna in her wedding singer era, or does she have something bigger planned?
On Friday, March 1, videos began to pop up online of Rihanna performing a small concert in Junagadh, India as part of a three-day pre-wedding celebration for Anant Ambani, the son of billionaire businessman Mukesh Ambani. Anant will tie the knot with Radhika Merchant in July.
Rihanna sported a sparkling green long-sleeved dress with thigh-high pink boots as she performed her set for a crowd of 1,200 guests, which included the likes of Bill Gates, Ivanka Trump and Mark Zuckerberg. She performed a medley of hit songs, including “Work,” “B—h Better Have My Money” and “All of the Lights,” among others.
Aside from her 2023 Super Bowl halftime show, the wedding celebration marks her first performance since 2016, and some fans have speculated this outing could mean even more performances to come from the “Love on the Brain” singer, specifically at Glastonbury Music Festival.
“While she was reportedly paid between $6 and $9 million for the 19 song set, I was still confused as to her motivations,” Blakely Neiman Thornton, a self-described pop culture anthropologist, said via Instagram Reels on Friday. Thornton noted that, because Rihanna is a billionaire herself, “there are a plethora of things she could do to make $9 million without going to India: a new Fenty lip liner, two Insta posts for a car company, etc.”
However, Thornton pointed out that, according to NME, Rihanna is one of several acts rumored to be performing at Glastonbury this year, which will take place from June 26 to June 30.
“As Kelly Rowland would say, we have our motivations,” Thornton said. “This crossing continents for $9 million is below her pay grade. But getting paid $9 million to practice? Seven figures for something you were gonna do anyway? Now that makes sense.”
Rihanna released her last album, Anti, in 2016 and a follow-up has reportedly been in the works ever since. In 2019, multiple sources exclusively disclosed to Us Weekly that the Grammy winner had finished recording her ninth album. According to one source, the vocals were complete but “mastering and more behind-the-scenes stuff” were still in the works. Rihanna herself claimed via Instagram that she would drop the record in 2019.
However, the album never came. In February this year, her partner A$AP Rocky confirmed that Rihanna was “working on it” when asked for an update on the project. Rihanna has previously stated that when she does finally release new music, there will likely be a tour to go along with it.
“Well, we’re always gonna go back on tour when, I feel like, I wanna do a tour when there’s new music,” she told Entertainment Tonight in December 2023. “We already know what that’s gonna be with the songs that I perform my last tour. That was a long time ago. I feel like it’s only fair that my fans get what they’ve been waiting on, which is new music. And after that, let’s just blow everything up.”
