I'm aware of what's happened this year.

At this point I don't think she cares about first week sales. And It's not unusual to release the first single before the album is completed. In fact, TTT and Unapologetic weren't finished until weeks before they were released. We have no idea of the timeline, or when they intended on releasing this album. So who knows, if Kanye hadn't stepped aside the album could be completed by now.

She clearly likes Kanye and wants to work with him. And why shouldn't she? Because fans don't want to wait any longer? Bye.

Rihanna does what she wants, and the fans will still be here when she eventually does release the album.

I don't think we're exaggerating, at least 80%of the navy is fed up with waiting.

First she takes a break, which is something we all wanted.
Then in January she releases 45S. It's a good song, but is it living up to the hype after a 2 year long break between albums? No. But the hype sustains.
Then she releases BBHMM, which puts off a lot of her popfans and kills momentum.
Then the TIDAL exclusive American Oxygen happens, which puts off even more people and when it eventually gets released it flops and is a major hype-killer

Next up is a wait. A very long one, in which we see Rih designing shoes, socks and getting drunk on holiday. Oh and sometimes she records as well.
Then news pours out that the album isn't even finished as she's waiting for Kanye. Why is he executive producer when the era has been a disaster so far?
Why can't she do it herself like she did with her previous albums? Why does she HAVE to wait? Kanye is putting her career and era on hold for what?
An album full of timeless hits like American Oxygen and FourFiveSeconds?

Now it's been nearly 3 years since Unapologetic and we're as close to getting and album as we were 2 years ago.
Why did she rlease FourFiveSeconds when she was never close to finishing it? Who releases 3 songs from a non-existing album? She must be recording for a year now.
She got our hopes up and saw all the thirst for Rihanna music be destroyed by releasing these 3 songs.
She had the perfect oppurtunity to come back with a massive bang and set the music scene afire and maybe finally have first week sales over 250k like her peers do.
For comparison:
Una was recorded in 6 months or less
TTT was recorded in less than 9 months, mostly when she was TOURING
Loud was recorded in 7 months, while she was TOURING and FILMING Battleship
Rated R was recorded in 7 months and she was WRITING for that album
#R8 must be taking over a year or so now, it's still not finished and what is she doing besides it? Designing socks and shoes, while going on holiday?

That's all your opinion.

And yes, her fans will stick around even during "underwhelming" times. That's what fans do.

If you're so underwhelmed by her material... why do you stan her?

Am I the only one who's picked up on this being called Anti? Surprised nobody's mentioned it

But yeah... album title and covers are out there, so this is happening ~

ANTI better have some amazing, poppy singles as I am a fairweather Rihanna fan. Don't need no flop queen.

COVERING THE SATS.

Me too.

Renaming it from R8 as that stinks of flop.

She's calling it 'anti' for when it flops, she can say it was a one-off, rebellion album.

Tragic cover and title indeed ://