Talk That Talk

Rihanna's sixth studio album, Talk That Talk, arrived on November 18, 2011, after a whirlwind recording schedule squeezed between dates on her Loud Tour. Originally planned as a reissue of Loud, the project quickly grew into a full album as new material poured out. Rihanna took the executive producer chair, guiding a production team that included Calvin Harris, Stargate, No I.D., Chase & Status, and Alex da Kid. The result is a tightly packed 11-track set that swings from thumping club tracks to quiet, intimate moments, all wrapped in a sound that pulls from dance-pop, hip-hop, dubstep, and house.

Critics took note of the album's bold lyrical turn. Rolling Stone called it her "smuttiest record by far," while The Guardian said she took the sex-talk blueprint of "S&M" and made it "even more raunchy." But there's more than shock value here. "You Da One" rides a reggae-tinged groove, "Drunk on Love" samples indie rock, and "Farewell" closes the album with a stripped-down ballad. The set debuted at number three on the US Billboard 200 with 198,000 copies sold in its first week, and went on to move over 1.15 million copies in the US alone. Globally, it topped charts in Austria, New Zealand, Norway, Switzerland, and the UK, where it entered at number one with 163,000 first-week sales. By 2013, it had surpassed 5.5 million copies worldwide.

The album's lead single, "We Found Love," became a defining hit of 2011. Featuring and produced by Calvin Harris, the track topped the Billboard Hot 100 for 10 weeks, making it Rihanna's longest-running number one at the time, and reached the summit in 27 countries. The song later won the Grammy for Best Short Form Music Video. Other singles included "You Da One," the title track with Jay-Z, "Where Have You Been," and remixes of "Birthday Cake" with Chris Brown and "Cockiness (Love It)" with ASAP Rocky. Talk That Talk marked a pivotal moment in Rihanna's career, bridging her dance-pop past with the edgier, more electronic sound she would explore on Unapologetic. [edit]