Rihanna has a large discography with tons of good songs, but the truth is that a lot of them (including her biggest hits) are also basic and generic.

-Diamonds is warmed-over pop/rnb written around a tired 'shining like diamonds' metaphor.

-Pour It Up, Birthday Cake sound like pretty much every other hip hop club single.

-Where Have You Been is typical electropop, so is You Da One.

-Take a Bow is just a rehash of many other pop songs calling out a partner's infidelity.

-Right Now, Jump, and We Found Love are all formulaic EDM pop songs.

These are just a few of many examples of generic songs in Rihanna's discography. And yet it's only artists like Kesha and Katy Perry, etc. who are labeled as 'basic'.

Why does it seem that ATRL deluded into thinking that all sweet, joyous pop is generic and that darker and urban-inflected pop music is original?

Because her music isn't generic.

She does get called out for it... just not in recent times because she hasn't had music. Diamonds got dragged by some people when it came out and The Monster definitely got called basic.

Because she does it better than anyone else.

Because she isn't

Acclaimed?

None of her albums make end of year lists and most of her albums are below 70 on metacritic.

She can have all the generic sounds she likes but her voice will always elevate them to non basic level

Edit: funny that only girl started playing on vh1 right when i opened this thread, prime example of a song that would be a basic mess if sung by anyone else

Diamonds did receive some criticism and so did Take a Bow and the others. Not so much criticism, but they were compared to other songs released during those times.

The reason Rihanna isn't "criticised" is because she's always one of the first ones to do something trendy. So it's still fresh and new when she does it. And honestly, her songs always have that Rihanna touch, because of her vocals.

But see, that's what happens when you release an album every year, you're always one step ahead, while your peers are still recording...

Domestic violence victim privilege/sympathy.

She does that's why her albums tend to not make years ends list and such.

She has the same metacritic average as the girl in your avi, who has never had a score as high as rated R.

Rihanna has generic songs but she isn't really generic. Katy Perry released made-for-radio safe microwavable singles and Ke$ha was just noise over Dr Luke beats, she could have been anybody.

Rihanna's music makes trends or is released very early in the trend, it's only considered generic when you're late to the train everyone else hopped on like right now which was a critically ignored flop.

what kinda non answer

RudeBoyy bringing up Beyoncé in response to criticism of Rihanna. I am shocked rn.

And btw, BEYONCE has an 85 on metacritic, 10 points higher than the highest rated Rihanna album. And Bey's career score is 70, 3 points higher than Rih's.

Because it's not generic compared to the other pop girls.

Diamonds not being EDM doesn't make it not generic.