Beyoncé On Her New Album: [Quotes Not Found]
In a new British Vogue story, the singer says... nothing at all
A new Beyoncé album means a new press cycle where she says absolutely nothing at all, and we all just pretend it’s an oasis in the middle of the desert. In conjunction with announcing her seventh album, Renaissance, Bey is on the cover of British Vogue and the accompanying “profile” is basically just a diary entry.
British Vogue editor-in-chief Edward Enniful wrote the cover story, in which he recounts what it was like texting Beyoncé and going to her house one time. After eating a meal of “ribs, cream corn, peas, and mashed potatoes” (you can take the girl out of Texas…) Enniful got to hear some of the new album, and describes it as such:
Instantly, a wall of sound hits me. Soaring vocals and fierce beats combine and in a split second I’m transported back to the clubs of my youth. I want to get up and start throwing moves. It’s music I love to my core. Music that makes you rise, that turns your mind to cultures and subcultures, to our people past and present, music that will unite so many on the dance floor, music that touches your soul.
Ok… Does she have anything to say about it?
“The creation has been a long process, she explains, with the pandemic giving her far longer to spend thinking and rethinking every decision,” Enniful wrote. Would have loved to read an on the record quote, but paraphrasing will have to do.
In fact, the only quotes in this piece come when Enniful runs into Beyoncé at a party and asks her when they might work together again (“I think we could do something for July”) and then later when she refers to her close circle as “My earth, my heart, my soil and my sanity.” Awesome.
At least the photos are good. They’re inspired by what Enniful calls “the tropes of club life during the last century’s final quarter,” which is an infuriating way to say Studio 54.
This is how Beyoncé does it. She never has to speak, she just has to make music and look good in the pictures. Besides, who needs thoughtful quotes about process and her life when you’re going to listen to the music whether she talks about it or not? Celebrity journalism is dying, Beyoncé is thriving, and Edward Enniful has a good dinner party story for the rest of his life.
