Ok, this isn't flamebait and isn't destined only to Rihanna fans, but I noticed one common thing about discussions about features and non feature songs:
People keep saying that a certain song smashed because it has a certain person on it, or because it was released by a certain artist, as if the name of the artist alone was what made it a hit.
While I agree that the starpower of an artist is able to influence the chart points of a song - mostly on its first weeks- , people still buy and stream songs for what it sounds like. So it's a mistake saying The Monster and LTWYL smashed only because of Rihanna. They smashed because they were good songs. Of course, if they didn't have Rihanna on it but had another not as known artist, they wouldn't probably have found the exact same success, but they would still have smashed, because the reason people bought that song was because they connected with it and found it catchy and good.
If The Monster found more success than Bezerk, it's not only because Rihanna was on it. Bezerk is not even that catchy, and it's not very radio friendly. Even if it had Rihanna on it, it wouldn't have smashed as hard as The Monster, because like I said, the problem is with the song...
The artist may influence the first weeks of downloads and the first weeks of Streaming, but after that it's all about the GP, and the GP doesn't really care if the song had their favorite artists or not, they only care about enjoying it
