Last night, on June 25, the eve of Ariana Grande’s 25th birthday, the singer teased fans with a short snippet of a song and video from her new album, “Sweetener,” on both Twitter and Instagram.
The a capella song, briefly featured in the 9 p.m. PST tweet, is believed to be called “Raindrops” and will most likely be the intro to the Grande album. Although the full album will not be officially released until Aug. 17, Grande has been open about sharing some details with fans.
https://twitter.com/ArianaGrande/status/1011459113232969734
Grande teased the album’s cover art on an anonymous Instagram profile through a series of individual posts, revealing the entire image on June 19. The teased music video matches the aesthetic of the album cover, which pictures Grande upside-down and is her first album cover to be displayed fully in color.
Just one day after the cover art was shared with fans, Grande’s album became available for pre-order on a variety of platforms, including iTunes and Amazon Music.
https://www.instagram.com/p/BkQXx27nIw0/?hl=en&taken-by=arianagrande
Then, on June 21, the singer released “the light is coming,” a new promo single for the album, featuring Nicki Minaj. Fans will have the opportunity to listen to the song on the 15-track album, as well as “no tears left to cry,” a single Grande released a few months earlier. Aside from Nicki Minaj, the album is expected to feature Pharrell Williams and Missy Elliot.
“Sweetener” is Grande’s first full album since “Dangerous Woman” in 2016. Her less recent albums include “My Everything” (2014) and “Yours Truly” (2013).
In her takeover of Jimmy Fallon’s “The Tonight Show,” Grande explained the meaning behind the title of the album. Grande said, “It’s kind of about bringing light to a situation or to someone’s life or somebody else brings life to your life. Sweetening the situation.”
Grande hopes to shed some light and positivity with the album as she takes on new adventures in her life. After being praised on Twitter for the “Sweetener” album cover’s design, she replied “issa new chapter for the first time my life is in color as well.”
https://twitter.com/ArianaGrande/status/1008517165832654848
The tweet comes shortly after the announcement of her engagement to actor and “Saturday Night Live” star Pete Davidson.
Fans were also curious about the inspiration for the upside-down album cover, which came from her friend Aaron. Grande tweeted “i showed aaron a photo and he was sitting opposite me and he said ‘i even love it upsidedown’ and that was kind of it for me at the time i had been feeling v ‘upsidedown’ for a while & the simplicity of that was like oh duh wow my bestie a genius.”
https://twitter.com/ArianaGrande/status/1008519030108540933
Grande’s mother Joan tweeted the names of songs from Grande’s account, two of which fans already know are on the album: “no tears left to cry” and “the light is coming.” Additional titles include “god is a woman,” “breathing” and “raindrops.” Fans can only guess the songs will appear on the upcoming album, but they might just have to wait until Aug. 17.