18 minutes ago, nooniebao said:

Is the video not done or is it being reshot? Some people in the know claim she’s doing reshoots for the video with segments already filmed.

FTN said she shot a "concept video" in a rehearsal studio, which is apart of the planning process. 

I’m sorry, but if leaks like W4U are anything to go by. That scrapped album full of motivations would’ve likely been ass. She truly miss the mark with WS which had the bigger impact imo. Album should’ve came out last year like planned. 

And that “I dOn’t wAnT tO cOmPaRE” but I’m going to compare anyway thing is redundant. Literally every new Black girl in the industry is more consistent than Normani.
 

Edited June 27, 20224 yr by AFullMoonlight

4 hours ago, halfhabibi said:

Lol twitter insider (who gave us the new snippets) said she filmed a tease with Blaire for CP but they're still planning the video....I have to laugh

She moves at a snails pace. If this is true we are definitely not seeing or hearing a thing until August or September. For one song. 

6 hours ago, URBAN said:

I'm not talking about charts baby. I'm talking about career consistency.

I know Normani's chart history and last time I checked she only had 4 Hot 100 entries without Fifth Harmony. 

DWAS w/Sam Smith - #7
Love Lies w/Khalid - #9
Wild Side w/Cardi B - #14

Motivation - #3

Checklist - Didn't chart.

Waves w/6lack - Didn't chart.

Diamonds w/Meg - Didn't chart.

Fair - Didn't chart.

Now let's look at Ms. Bailey's.

Have Mercy - #28

You and Me w/Gunna - #72
Treat Me - #81

Surprise - TBD

They may not be as high as Normani's, but when you compare solo projects, Chloe has the upper hand.

I'm not bashing Normani because I've been a fan since her X-Factor days, but as a fan, I'm tired of the inconsistency. 

 

Motivation alone has more streams than her entire discography

 

Those bottom 3 charted for a combined total of 2 weeks

 

 

Just stop it. 

 

 

 

 Normani struggles with consistency but undermining her success isn’t the answer 

 

Spoiler

A quick visual representation:

 

Normani in blue vs the competitor this thread is obsessed with comparing her to.  

 

Edited June 27, 20224 yr by cliche_display

Many of y'all have let impatience turn into hate.

 

Unfortunately, I get it. To put it crudely, she has blue balled her fans for years by teasing that something is around the corner, always. And usually it’s not. Transparency could have spared her a lot of backlash. Assuming she knew the prep time she wanted after Motivation, she could have said that she flat out needed some time away to get her artistry together. Her fans would have respected that and she could have better managed expectations. Perhaps she did say it and no one listened when she began repeating it in interviews.

 

Her plans also probably changed over time in conjunction with the label so she didn't start with perfect information 

 

 However, the promise-and-disappear routine badly distorted her message of "I need time". It’s clear she never stopped recording. Yet she or her label have not wanted her music to evolve in public. Everything has to be released in its final form, perfect, “a masterpiece”, a “reset”.

  

I think that’s where that language comes from in her captions and tweets.  She’s trying to achieve this benchmark of perfection so that she can avoid all the UNWARRANTED pushback against her work. The paradox is that people would probably give her more grace, not if she were more perfect, but if she were more consistent.  Frankly, she’s been perfect and selective for over a decade and and she gets tons of pushback maybe for that very reason. 

 

  I can empathize with her dizzying approach a bit though.

 

You have to think about it like this. She hasn’t gotten a chance to develop absent the pressure of high expectations. Fair wasn’t allowed to be a videoless artistic expression about a breakup. It had to chart. Otherwise, like clockwork, here come the comparisons to Chloe’s one week above 100 because of a music video being viewed on Facebook or some other ridiculous flop bar. Normani wasn’t allowed an I Have Questions, or a Crying In The Club. Everything has to be Havana or it's a bust. There's no grace and no middle ground for her. Love Lies heightened expectations around Normani because then she had to immediately repeat its success or her contribution would constantly be in question. When she did repeat the success with Sam people still discredited her. Nothing is ever good enough for the peanut gallery and I think she’s internalized being devalued in that way. 

 

She’s been under hyper scrutiny since she was 15, so the quest for ready “perfection” makes sense. She’s faced a pressure that artists like Doja or Lizzo or even Summer Walker didn’t face. They were allowed to experiment and release EPs, mixtapes, and albums with no pressure before finding bigger hits years into their solo careers. Whereas Normani was expected to be a fully formed solo artist out of the gate like a Beyonce or a Camila...

 

Even when several of her first projects were commercially successful, it wasn't enough because people wanted to prove that she couldn't do it solo. After the collabs, when Motivation was moderately successful, it still wasn't enough. Now the bar is back to grazing the bottom of Billboard for a week? Lmao

 

Without question, Chloe's path to popularity has been eased by Normani's presence in the industry. Although Chloe has similar pressure to perform out of the gate, Normani is always used as a footstool in conversations to elevate Chloe's mediocre stats, despite Normani accomplishing so much more commercially.

 

The expectations for Normani to snap into a leading role after being backgrounded in a group for years are really unparalleled. Beyoncé and Camila were the face of their groups. Even Chloe has more autonomy as a duo with her sister. Meanwhile Normani has been tasked with transforming from the token black girl in a pop group to a commercial “juggernaut” overnight. Who else in music has been expected to do that, honestly? Some of the blame can be placed on her team for feeding into high expectations by not encouraging stable output from her. It's like they also just wanted to cash in on her potential without allowing for her development. Which explains all the PR, Ariana tour, Rolling Stone covers before she had much music. Even if she were more consistent, not everything smashes even from the biggest artists, so that bar is unrealistic for a developing soloist. She literally has a better hit-to-**** ratio than most popular artists did before they released a full body of work, and she still gets slandered as a commercial bomb. Literally 4 of her 6 videod singles are top 40s  (3 top 15s, 2 top 10s) and that's no mean feat when you literally have 13 songs, collabs withstanding.  Fair is not an outlier. Songs that aren't given full single treatment tend to underperform even from established artists, but she's not allowed to be like everyone else. You can hear the unrelentingly high commercial expectations echoed in this thread even in the way CP is talked about . It has to smash. It can’t just be good and that be enough.  Normani has to be the apex star or else she’s condemned to comparisons and undermining.  Even her successes are held against higher standards.

 

Most artists don’t have to develop under that kind of pressure. They have time, they have space. Normani has not. She's never had a period where she wasn't expected to produce. Maybe a slightly more grounded team could have gotten her that.

 

So while Fifth Harmony was a great launching pad, it also made her hyper visible as an artist before she was ready as a person. 

 

Grace

Edited June 27, 20224 yr by cliche_display

41 minutes ago, cliche_display said:

Many of y'all have let impatience turn into hate.

 

Unfortunately, I get it. To put it crudely, she has blue balled her fans for years by teasing that something is around the corner always. And usually it’s not. A better alternative might have been more transparency. Assuming she knew this after Motivation, she could have said that she flat out needed some time away to get her artistry together. Perhaps she did say it and no one listened when she started repeating it in interviews.

 

However, the promise-and-disappear routine badly distorted her message, to be fair. Because it’s clear she never stopped recording, but she or her label don’t want her music to evolve in public. Everything has to be released in its final form, perfect, “a masterpiece”, a “reset”.   

 

I think that’s where that language comes from in her captions and tweets.  She’s trying to achieve this benchmark of perfection so that she can avoid all the UNWARRANTED pushback against her work. The paradox is that people would probably give her more grace, not if she were more perfect, but if she were more consistent.  Frankly, she’s been perfect and curated for over a decade and and she gets tons of pushback maybe for that very reason. 

 

  I can empathize with her dizzying approach a bit though.

 

You have to think about it like this. She’s hasn’t gotten a chance to grow without expectation. Fair wasn’t allowed to be an artistic message. It had to chart. Otherwise like clockwork here come the comparisons to Chloe’s one week in the top 90. Normani  wasn’t allowed an I Have Questions, or a Crying In The Club. Everything had to be Havana or it was a bust. Love Lies heightened expectations around her because then she had to immediately repeat its success or her contribution would constantly be in question. When she did repeat the success with Sam people still undermined her. Nothing is ever good enough for some and I think she’s internalized being devalued in that way. 

 

She’s been under hyper scrutiny since she was 15, so the quest for immediate  “perfection” makes sense. She’s faced a pressure that artists like Doja or Lizzo or even Summer Walker didn’t face. They were allowed to experiment and grow and release art with no pressure, whereas she was expected to be a fully formed solo artist out of the gate like a Beyonce or a Camila...

 

The expectations for her to snap into a leading role after being backgrounded in a group for years are really unparalleled. Beyoncé and Camila were the face of their groups. Even Chloe had more autonomy in a duo with just her sister. Normani has been tasked with going from the token black girl in a group to becoming a commercial “juggernaut” overnight. Who else has experienced that? Everything needs to smash. She can’t release a song for fun so maybe that’s stifles her. You can even hear expectations echoed in this thread by the way CP is talked about . It has to smash. It can’t just be good and that be enough.  Normani has to be the apex star or else she’s condemned to comparisons and undermining.  Even her successes are held against higher standards.

 

Most artists don’t have to develop under that kind of pressure. They have time, they have space. She hasn’t had that.  

 

So while Fifth Harmony was a great launching pad, it also made her hyper visible as an artist before she was ready as a person. 

 

Grace

agree with all of this for the most part, although I do wanna emphasize the whole transparency thing cause she literally didn’t start doing that until years later. we wouldn’t be nearly as upset with her if she didn’t take almost half a year on something she claimed would be out within a month. also when it gets here I might add the content NEVER matches with the wait time. if we got several performances and a bunch of other fun things with the songs I wouldn’t even mind it, but she does the exact opposite, performs it once (maybe twice at best) stays on it for like two weeks, then dips again. it’s not like I don’t think she’s a hard worker, but you just have to question it sometimes because what are you even doing in between these time gaps that you can’t have videos filmed and other things ready to go before the song is out? it’s always last minute with them and it doesn’t help that they move slow as hell when they do it as well.

 

7 hours ago, Flare said:

Okay but why Twitter has all the tea and ATRL has nothing? What is going on? 

Bump. HELLO! 
 

We’re supposed to be the exclusive site. Meanwhile, half of twitter heard more candy paint and dui than us. 

1 hour ago, cliche_display said:

Many of y'all have let impatience turn into hate.

 

Unfortunately, I get it. To put it crudely, she has blue balled her fans for years by teasing that something is around the corner always. And usually it’s not. A better alternative might have been more transparency. Assuming she knew this after Motivation, she could have said that she flat out needed some time away to get her artistry together. Perhaps she did say it and no one listened when she started repeating it in interviews.

 

However, the promise-and-disappear routine badly distorted her message, to be fair. Because it’s clear she never stopped recording, but she or her label don’t want her music to evolve in public. Everything has to be released in its final form, perfect, “a masterpiece”, a “reset”.   

 

I think that’s where that language comes from in her captions and tweets.  She’s trying to achieve this benchmark of perfection so that she can avoid all the UNWARRANTED pushback against her work. The paradox is that people would probably give her more grace, not if she were more perfect, but if she were more consistent.  Frankly, she’s been perfect and curated for over a decade and and she gets tons of pushback maybe for that very reason. 

 

  I can empathize with her dizzying approach a bit though.

 

You have to think about it like this. She’s hasn’t gotten a chance to grow without expectation. Fair wasn’t allowed to be an artistic message. It had to chart. Otherwise like clockwork here come the comparisons to Chloe’s one week in the top 90. Normani  wasn’t allowed an I Have Questions, or a Crying In The Club. Everything had to be Havana or it was a bust. Love Lies heightened expectations around her because then she had to immediately repeat its success or her contribution would constantly be in question. When she did repeat the success with Sam people still undermined her. Nothing is ever good enough for some and I think she’s internalized being devalued in that way. 

 

She’s been under hyper scrutiny since she was 15, so the quest for immediate  “perfection” makes sense. She’s faced a pressure that artists like Doja or Lizzo or even Summer Walker didn’t face. They were allowed to experiment and grow and release art with no pressure, whereas she was expected to be a fully formed solo artist out of the gate like a Beyonce or a Camila...

 

The expectations for her to snap into a leading role after being backgrounded in a group for years are really unparalleled. Beyoncé and Camila were the face of their groups. Even Chloe had more autonomy in a duo with just her sister. Normani has been tasked with going from the token black girl in a group to becoming a commercial “juggernaut” overnight. Who else has experienced that? Everything needs to smash. She can’t release a song for fun so maybe that’s stifles her. You can even hear expectations echoed in this thread by the way CP is talked about . It has to smash. It can’t just be good and that be enough.  Normani has to be the apex star or else she’s condemned to comparisons and undermining.  Even her successes are held against higher standards.

 

Most artists don’t have to develop under that kind of pressure. They have time, they have space. She hasn’t had that.  

 

So while Fifth Harmony was a great launching pad, it also made her hyper visible as an artist before she was ready as a person. 

 

Grace

I totally get all of this but I think the reason we want candy paint to smash is truly because we want the album. Lol. It’s actually really hard to Stan her at this point. Putting yourself in her shoes absolutely helps yes but it’s all still frustrating when so many other artists even on RCA are having their albums green lit without smashes and we’re still waiting on Normani with all these pushbacks ? 

3 hours ago, cliche_display said:

Motivation alone has more streams than her entire discography

 

Those bottom 3 charted for a combined total of 2 weeks

 

 

Just stop it. 

 

 

 

Babe, I'm not undermining her success. I am 100% still behind her, I just can't believe her team is letting these new girls show her out like this.

Whether you like it or not, you can't deny Normani has been inconsistent. That's what my posts are about. 

3 hours ago, cliche_display said:

Many of y'all have let impatience turn into hate.

 

Unfortunately, I get it. To put it crudely, she has blue balled her fans for years by teasing that something is around the corner always. And usually it’s not. A better alternative might have been more transparency. Assuming she knew this after Motivation, she could have said that she flat out needed some time away to get her artistry together. Perhaps she did say it and no one listened when she started repeating it in interviews.

 

However, the promise-and-disappear routine badly distorted her message, to be fair. Because it’s clear she never stopped recording, but she or her label don’t want her music to evolve in public. Everything has to be released in its final form, perfect, “a masterpiece”, a “reset”.   

 

I think that’s where that language comes from in her captions and tweets.  She’s trying to achieve this benchmark of perfection so that she can avoid all the UNWARRANTED pushback against her work. The paradox is that people would probably give her more grace, not if she were more perfect, but if she were more consistent.  Frankly, she’s been perfect and curated for over a decade and and she gets tons of pushback maybe for that very reason. 

 

  I can empathize with her dizzying approach a bit though.

 

You have to think about it like this. She’s hasn’t gotten a chance to grow without expectation. Fair wasn’t allowed to be an artistic message. It had to chart. Otherwise like clockwork here come the comparisons to Chloe’s one week in the top 90. Normani  wasn’t allowed an I Have Questions, or a Crying In The Club. Everything had to be Havana or it was a bust. Love Lies heightened expectations around her because then she had to immediately repeat its success or her contribution would constantly be in question. When she did repeat the success with Sam people still undermined her. Nothing is ever good enough for some and I think she’s internalized being devalued in that way. 

 

She’s been under hyper scrutiny since she was 15, so the quest for immediate  “perfection” makes sense. She’s faced a pressure that artists like Doja or Lizzo or even Summer Walker didn’t face. They were allowed to experiment and grow and release art with no pressure, whereas she was expected to be a fully formed solo artist out of the gate like a Beyonce or a Camila...

 

The expectations for her to snap into a leading role after being backgrounded in a group for years are really unparalleled. Beyoncé and Camila were the face of their groups. Even Chloe had more autonomy in a duo with just her sister. Normani has been tasked with going from the token black girl in a group to becoming a commercial “juggernaut” overnight. Who else has experienced that? Everything needs to smash. She can’t release a song for fun so maybe that’s stifles her. You can even hear expectations echoed in this thread by the way CP is talked about . It has to smash. It can’t just be good and that be enough.  Normani has to be the apex star or else she’s condemned to comparisons and undermining.  Even her successes are held against higher standards.

 

Most artists don’t have to develop under that kind of pressure. They have time, they have space. She hasn’t had that.  

 

So while Fifth Harmony was a great launching pad, it also made her hyper visible as an artist before she was ready as a person. 

 

Grace

I agree with this but she and her team have handled everything from the output to communication with the fans way too poorly and for much too long for this to be an excuse any longer. After 4 years it’s time to find some footing and competence. And none of us would care about Fair flopping if she would dream to actually give us the video, promote a little and continue to serve music. What I dislike the most is she clearly has some type of limited slots available to her for release and after “relaunching” last year with something great (Wild Side) thry undermined it by once again having no follow through with solid promotion, waited 8 months to give another single and yes it was very much so the wrong choice also crippled by no video or promo. So now we have to wait for this album even longer as she stages her umpteenth relaunch 

My main gripe with her right now is if you were so passionate about Fair, where is the damn music video?! You filmed it, paid everyone, so why haven’t you released it? Don’t say the song was just for the arts and then abandon your plans for the song bc it flopped.

If she doesnt release the album this year would yall still stan?

38 minutes ago, Topaz said:

If she doesnt release the album this year would yall still stan?

Trying my hard not to think much about her - if I succeed at that, I might forget I was once really interested in her   If FTN is right and there's no video shot yet, she can keep that song. Time is ticking. BET would've been a great platform yet nothing. Sometimes I think the industry is closed for her unless she actually smashes. And I lost all hope for an album this year (which is horrible). 

48 minutes ago, Topaz said:

If she doesnt release the album this year would yall still stan?

Nope. Been waiting since i was 20 years old  and i’m gonna be 25 in August. The stan ship has sailed and i’m sure a lot her fans feel the same.

Edited June 27, 20224 yr by dominickmcintee

 

Spoiler

It’s a good thing she’s pretty

 

Edited June 27, 20224 yr by orange22

1 hour ago, Topaz said:

If she doesnt release the album this year would yall still stan?

she stopped being my #1 fave already so i’ll probably be a casual fan who checks up on her from time to time  which is sad considering i’ve been stanning her since i was in middle school and now i’m in uni 

Edited June 27, 20224 yr by hallucinate

If she hasn't filed an MV....girl what have you been doing?

 

One thing about Brandon....he will get his girls modelling gigs

 

I wonder why he doesnt have such connections inside the music industry

Edited June 27, 20224 yr by NormaniReign

14 hours ago, Camilitau.u said:

Chile Chloe got the Tina Knowles machine pushing her so much by having her perform everywhere but still no hits. Normani REMAINS the standard anytime she performs on a big stage she eats up the other girls and they get a lot inspiration as you saw with that lap dance that Normani did at VMAs and was replicated tonight by a certain “friend”.

 

Normani = 2 Top 10s 3 Top 20s 4 Top 40s

Chloe = Bailey

 

 

6 hours ago, cliche_display said:

Many of y'all have let impatience turn into hate.

 

Unfortunately, I get it. To put it crudely, she has blue balled her fans for years by teasing that something is around the corner, always. And usually it’s not. A more digestible approach might have been transparency. Assuming she knew the prep time she wanted after Motivation, she could have said that she flat out needed some time away to get her artistry together. That way she could have managed expectations. Perhaps she did say it and no one listened when she began repeating it in interviews.

 

Her plans also probably changed over time in conjunction with the label so she didn't have perfect information at the time.

 

 However, the promise-and-disappear routine badly distorted her message of "I need time". Because it’s clear she never stopped recording. Yet she or her label have not wanted her music to evolve in public. Everything has to be released in its final form, perfect, “a masterpiece”, a “reset”.   

I think that’s where that language comes from in her captions and tweets.  She’s trying to achieve this benchmark of perfection so that she can avoid all the UNWARRANTED pushback against her work. The paradox is that people would probably give her more grace, not if she were more perfect, but if she were more consistent.  Frankly, she’s been perfect and curated for over a decade and and she gets tons of pushback maybe for that very reason. 

 

  I can empathize with her dizzying approach a bit though.

 

You have to think about it like this. She’s hasn’t gotten a chance to develop absent the pressure of high expectations. Fair wasn’t allowed to be an artistic expression about a breakup. It had to chart. Otherwise, like clockwork, here come the comparisons to Chloe’s one week above 100 or some other ridiculous flop bar. Normani wasn’t allowed an I Have Questions, or a Crying In The Club. Everything has to be Havana or it's a bust. There's no grace and no middle ground for her. Love Lies heightened expectations around her because then she had to immediately repeat its success or her contribution would constantly in question. When she did repeat the success with Sam people still discredited her. Nothing is ever good enough for the peanut gallery and I think she’s internalized being devalued in that way. 

 

She’s been under hyper scrutiny since she was 15, so the quest for immediate  “perfection” makes sense. She’s faced a pressure that artists like Doja or Lizzo or even Summer Walker didn’t face. They were allowed to experiment and release EPs, mixtapes, and albums with no pressure before finding bigger hits years into their solo careers. Whereas Normani was expected to be a fully formed solo artist out of the gate like a Beyonce or a Camila...

 

Even when multiple of her first projects were commercially successful it wasn't enough because people wanted to prove that she couldn't do it solo.

 

The expectations for her to snap into a leading role after being backgrounded in a group for years are really unparalleled. Beyoncé and Camila were the face of their groups. Even Chloe has more autonomy as a duo with her sister. Meanwhile Normani has been tasked with transforming from the token black girl in a pop group to a commercial “juggernaut” overnight. Who else in music has been expected to do that, honestly? Some of it is has been her team feeding into high expectations by not encouraging stable output from her. It's like they also just wanted to cash in on her potential without allowing for her development. Which explains all the PR, Ariana tour, Rolling Stone covers before she had much music. Not everything smashes even from the biggest artists, so that bar is unrealistic for a developing soloist especially. She literally has a higher hit ratio than most popular artists did before they released a full body of work, and she still gets slandered as a commercial bomb. Literally 4 of her 6 videod singles are top 40 hits and that's no mean feat, collabs withstanding.  Fair is not an outlier. Most songs that aren't given full single treatment flop even from more established artists, but she's not allowed to be like everyone else. You can even hear the unrelentingly high commercial expectations echoed in this thread in the way CP is talked about . It has to smash. It can’t just be good and that be enough.  Normani has to be the apex star or else she’s condemned to comparisons and undermining.  Even her successes are held against higher standards.

 

Most artists don’t have to develop under that kind of pressure. They have time, they have space. Normani hasn't. She didn't have that period where she wasn't expected to produce.

 

So while Fifth Harmony was a great launching pad, it also made her hyper visible as an artist before she was ready as a person. 

 

Grace

I couldn’t imagine the pressure put on her. I am frustrated with delays and pushbacks of course and it has made me want to take a step back but I will say I’m mad at the situation more than her as an individual. I just want the music no shade

17 hours ago, Khamis said:

Her mom thinks she’s Beyoncé or Rihanna and clearly gets some sort of weird high on having access to something that literally only a handful of people actually want. Imagine getting a thrill at pissing on your daughters 12 remaining stans? Best to ignore her. 

This post is sending me into orbit  

 

 Almost 9 years since this song. It was playing at the car dealership when I was there. I was shook af. Came right after No Scrubs. 

58 minutes ago, Kool_Aid_King said:

This post is sending me into orbit  

Whatever she does, she's Normani. A girl that the internet will not let go no matter how much she retreats. Her mother is right about that.

 

She has cosigns from Nicki and Cardi

Rihanna and Chris Brown

Brandy and Monica

 

 

I mean yall always act like she's some industry Z lister but every opp and his opp stamps her so 

1 hour ago, Getlikemike said:

 

I couldn’t imagine the pressure put on her. I am frustrated with delays and pushbacks of course and it has made me want to take a step back but I will say I’m mad at the situation more than her as an individual. I just want the music no shade

I know. I have hated her choices about releasing but I think there's something deeply problematic about the double standards

 

So others are considered successful just for showing up to every event, but when she was on tour, on covers, in collabs, it was why isn't she charting higher she's been shoved everywhere?

 

When the public barely streams the other girls, it's fine but when she gets 100s of millions of streams it's not impressive. She cannot win and that's where I have an issue. It's with the disparity in treatment because I think it reinforces her lack of engagement and anxiety about releasing.