RIHANNA
Rihanna (born Robyn Rihanna Fenty; February 20, 1988) is a Barbadian singer and songwriter. She assumed creative control of her third studio album Good Girl Gone Bad (2007) and became a household name following the release of its internationally successful lead single “Umbrella”. She followed it with five Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) platinum-certified albums, including the Grammy Award winning Unapologetic (2012) and her second Billboard 200 number-one album Anti (2016). With sales exceeding 200 million records worldwide, Rihanna is one of the best-selling artists of all time. Rihanna is the youngest and fastest solo artist to earn fourteen number-one singles on the Billboard Hot 100, and was named the Digital Songs Artist of the 2000s decade and the top Hot 100 artist of the 2010s decade by Billboard. Forbes ranked Rihanna the fourth most powerful celebrity of 2012, and was named one of Time’s 100 Most Influential People in the World later that year. (More from Wikipedia)
Among individual female performers, Madonna is rightfully regarded as paving the way for a parade of brash young women, including a bumper crop in recent years: Britney Spears, Mylie Cyrus, Rihanna, Katy Perry, Lady Gaga, etc.
(October 2013)
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One of the hallmarks of the bandmembers in early punk rock bands is picking new names for themselves. Not everyone did that, and most musicians perform under their own names. For the record, as best I can tell, Frank Zappa, Fats Domino, Major Lance, Kris Kristofferson, and Stonewall Jackson are using their real names (with Fats being a nickname, though Major and Stonewall are not). Grace Slick is her married name; she was born Grace Wing. Most though not all of the one-name performers are also using one of their real names, with slight spelling changes and anglicizing here and there: Madonna, Prince, Jewel, Cher, Björk, Enya, Beck, Donovan, Morrissey, Liberace, Sade, Seal, Shakira, Rihanna, Adele, Dido, Melanie, Beyoncé, etc.
(March 2017)
