REVIEW: Beyoncé’s “Lemonade” carries raw emotion and soul

By Denna Changizi,
BlueDevilHUB.com Staff–

I’ve always been a big fan of Beyoncé and I was beyond ecstatic when I saw that her new album, “Lemonade,” was released–I wasn’t the only one. According to The Huffington Post, the album sold 828,773 copies worldwide in the first three days of release, and has been on the iTunes top charts ever since.

“Lemonade” isn’t like any other Beyoncé album; this is rawer than Queen B has ever been, as she seems to be singing about coping with the potential affair her husband had. The album shows how she deals with the situation throughout different stages from beginning to end.

At first, understanding the complete meaning of each song was a bit of a challenge, but thankfully the album came with “Lemonade the Film.” The lengthy movie was more than an hour and took every minute to carefully depict the different stages of grief that Beyoncé potentially went through. What I loved most was the presentation of the album: it told a complete story, and each song represented a chapter of it.

Though every song seemed to have its own powerful story to it, I chose my three favorite songs: “Pray You Catch Me,” “Don’t Hurt Yourself” and “6 Inch.”

1. Pray You Catch Me
This track starts off from the beginning of any rocky relationship in which a partner believes the other is cheating. I’ve listened to the song on repeat and I still get chills every time Beyoncé sings about the strong level of hurt she feels. The passion in the lyrics sung shows how left out Beyoncé feels in her husband’s life. The line “I’m prayin’ you catch me listening” allows one to fully understand the loneliness of this situation, and the desire to be caught shows the desperation of wanting to know what’s going on.

2. Don’t Hurt Yourself
After listening to this track, I realized I would never want to be on the receiving end of Queen B’s anger. This song was sung with pure rage, and gave me goosebumps listening to every lyric, knowing that every threat, every promise and every rhetorical question is cautionary. The chorus clarifies that Jay Z’s behavior, which hurt Beyonce, also caused damage to himself as well. She ends the song on a bitter note, urging her husband to be careful of his next move. She even throws in a couple words, threatening that she is more than willing to leave him: “This is your final warning/You know I give you life.”

3. 6 Inch
Knowing the workaholic Beyoncé is, this track featuring The Weeknd elaborates on how much time she’s spending on her work, and that she thoroughly enjoys pouring her heart into a project, because it eventually leads to power. I love how Beyoncé strongly sings about moving on and replacing the hurt she is feeling with hard work and dedication. It was definitely motivating.

This album was amazing like every other Beyoncé album, but it was more powerful and real than Beyoncé has ever sounded. I would highly recommend this album to anyone who wants to listen to emotional yet motivational music.