Rihanna's New Single Is Just More Of The Same

Well, those who were wondering if Rihanna's single with Kanye West and Paul McCartney, "FourFiveSeconds," which marked a departure from the pop star's usual pop-gangster sound, was going to be the type of music we could expect from Rihanna from now on... think again. With the release of Rihanna's "B**** Better Have My Money on Thursday, she has thoroughly proven that her pop-gangster sound is here to stay. And, to be perfectly honest, it's more than a little disappointing. "FourFiveSeconds" was so interesting and different that it was outright fascinating to see Rihanna's name on the track; by contrast, #BBHMM, as it has been dubbed my fans, is a casual return to more of the same that is hardly inspirational.

That's not to say the song isn't very good. It comes with fun lyrics like, "Y'all should know me well enough. Please don't call me on my bluff. Ballin' bigger than LeBron. Who y'all think y'all frontin' on?" and, even better, "Your wife in the backseat of my brand new foreign car. Don't act like you forgot I call the shots. Like brap brap brap." My mind is already putting together a music video to go with this that is along the lines of "Hard" or "S&M," because Rihanna certainly goes hard on this track. It's just, as I said, nothing new or interesting from the singer, making "FourFiveSeconds" seem like a random experiment in sounds that Rihanna decided wasn't worth pursuing further.

Of course, making a rush judgment of her upcoming album based on nothing but two songs would be a bit premature. However, I can't help but wish we'd gotten a little more experimental sound from Rihanna on this track than something that wouldn't have been out of place on, well, any album that she's done since Rated R.

The song is available for download on Dubsmash (or, you could do like me and wait until it comes up on iTunes), but eager fans can listen to it right now over at Cosmopolitan.