So with the new announcement of Rihanna releasing American Oxygen on TIDAL AND its music video.
Also, her new single BBHMM is doing nothing on radio and has fallen out of the Top 10 on iTunes.
FFS is looking to fall out of the Hot 100 Top 10 in its 9th week (Applause spent 14 weeks)

So which era has been messier?

ARTPOP actually had lots of promo, straightforward song releases and album imagery behind it so R8.

both are a mess, i can't decide

ARTPOP will always be the bigger mess. Unreleased video for the second single, last minute single changes, the public backlash, and all the drama going on upfront and in the background of her career. Not to mention Gaga kinda left the era for dead when she took two and a half months off from promoting the album during the middle of DWUW's single run. The only real successes of that era were Applause and the tour.

R8 may be a mess so far, but it still has a chance to pull itself together into a successful era

So far #R8 has had 3 buzz singles with no release date so i'll say that.

R8 so far

FFS is already looking to not outsell Applause. At this point in time, ARTPOP was bigger than R8

ARTPOP by far!!

ARTPOP actually had good music, amazing performances and the imagery of the era was on point. She actually bothered to give her best.

Meanwhile R8 has been nothing but a mess so far so that of course. She hasn't even announced the album release date yet - let alone the title of the album

BBHMM doing nothing on radio?

You clearly don't know ****.


FFS is looking to fall out of the Hot 100 Top 10 in its 9th week

LIES

R8.

ARTPOP had a clear lead single (although rushed) and the album release was always pretty clear from the get go. It had the similar "R8!!" lead up a year before since we already knew the title but it only really fell apart when she had a meltdown and the change of singles/video cancellation. Despite that, DWUW did decent and G.U.Y. only failed due to a gap of nothing which was dangerous when she was already fading.

R8 had the HOME interruption in between and now TIDAL being this massive barrier. We have no idea what's going on with this album. It could be tomorrow or 31st December 2015

Nothing can beat ARTPOP

In terms of management l, ARTPOP by far. Like, the Venus-DWUW mess, the Applause vs. roar mess, all the negative press, she lost her manager a week before the album was released and took a three month blackout in the middle of the era then try to revive it in the spring, only to basically shoot herself in the foot with G.U.Y.

I love ARTPOP so much but it was a mess from the ground up. It deserved so much better I dont really see what's so messy about the R8 era. I mean it's not as successful cause it's not your typical Rihanna sound but that's clearly just the direction she's going in

It completely fell out of the Top 50 on Pop radio

How is that a lie? FFS fell 3 spots last week to #8. I

ARTPOP seems like the bigger mess because it was a colossal downfall for Gaga.

But R8 is not far behind, I think that TIDAL and Jay Z might destroy the entire era.

True, but R8's era still has a way to go and FFS is still not done selling yet despite the outlook. The ARTPOP era is done and closed, so unless Rih's era flops from now on, she still has a chance to outperform Applause/ARTPOP

ARTPOP was such a messy era and it's saddening because the album deserved more.