SZA teased at May’s Met Gala that her sophomore album was “ready to go” and advised her fans to prepare for “a SZA summer,” inducing a painful wait that lasted through the summer and fall. Finally, we’re in for a SZA winter.
via: Vulture
She revealed on Saturday Night Live that S.O.S. is set to drop on December 9. Oh, and she casually debuted a new song, “Blind,” during her performance.
Per Billboard, the songs on S.O.S are “captivating,” drawing on surf rock and grunge in parts alongside “her beloved lo-fi beats.” SZA also told the magazine she was less “carefree” during S.O.S. than Ctrl. On November 30, the artist posted the album artwork for S.O.S. on Instagram, captioning it “The ocean of tears I’ve been holding onto since the last album… ?” Next, she’s set to promote new music with a Saturday Night Live performance on December 3.
SZA has previously criticized her label, Top Dawg Entertainment, for blocking her releases. In 2020, she called TDE “hostile”; earlier this year, she said the label and its president, Punch, delayed the album from a summer release. Punch told Billboard he and SZA are on good terms and chalked the delayed music up to many factors in SZA’s life and business that kept her out of the studio, comparing it to basketball. “You may run off 15 points in a row,” he said. “It has been a lot of starting and stopping and then we finally got into that rhythm.” For her part, SZA took issue with the business focus of an album rollout in the cover story. “I don’t know if chasing after superstardom or whatever I’m supposed to be doing right now is sustainable for me or for anybody,” she said. “I’mma take a good swing at it, and I’mma give ’em my absolute best.”
