"We had Ariana Grande looking at us like yo, bro, I need a big record like right now."
If you are an Ari fan as much as I am then you have probably listened to "7 Rings" about a thousand times by this point. The song is all about celebrating female friendship and empowerment and the title 7 rings obviously refers to Ariana's lyric, "Wearing a ring, but ain't gon' be no "Mrs." Bought matching diamonds for six of my bitches".
The smash hit broke several pop records including making it to Billboard's Hot 100 top 3 for 7 weeks. The song is so popular because the message of girl power resonates with so many fans. At this year's ASCAP I Create Music Expo the team behind Ariana's majorly successful album Sweetner and the 3 record breaking singles she released in 2018 including Thank U Next, 7 Rings, and Break Up With Your Boyfriend I'm Bored attended the Pop Panel to discuss the process of creating these amazing songs with the artist. I got the inside scoop on the inspiration and song writing process behind all of these songs from Victoria Monet who is a long time friend and co-worker of Ariana. She explained what it was like creating these anthems and how they worked to express the message that Ariana wanted to convey of celebrating female success unapologetically.
She said, "It's about being observant and empathetic enough to recognize the feelings of an artist that the world needs to hear."
Victoria told the story of how the song title came about as they were working in the New York studio one day and once you hear this crazy tale it will only make the song that much better!
She said, "It's about being observant and empathetic enough to recognize the feelings of an artist that the world needs to hear."
Victoria told the story of how the song title came about as they were working in the New York studio one day and once you hear this crazy tale it will only make the song that much better!
According to producer Tommy who was also on the panel, Ariana had wanted to use the theme of her favorite song from the Sound of Music movie "Some of my favorite things" to create a song about her favorite things to do with her girlfriends. She wanted to have a retro vibe in the intro of the song and had told them, "Lets do something like the sound of music, but not."
So they were already working with that theme when Ariana showed up at the studio with Tiffany bags and started handing them out to her girlfriends. According to Victoria Grande had been out shopping that morning and had seen some rings in the Tiffany store that she liked. She apparently misjudged the price tag after not seeing a comma on it since she was "a little tipsy" according to the team and asked to get 7 rings for herself and her best friends. She wanted to show appreciation for her girlfriends after going through the hard times she had during her break up with her boyfriend the previous year. Once she got to the register and found out how much they really were she decided to buy them anyways and came straight to the studio where Victoria helped her create the "7 rings" song that day.
So they were already working with that theme when Ariana showed up at the studio with Tiffany bags and started handing them out to her girlfriends. According to Victoria Grande had been out shopping that morning and had seen some rings in the Tiffany store that she liked. She apparently misjudged the price tag after not seeing a comma on it since she was "a little tipsy" according to the team and asked to get 7 rings for herself and her best friends. She wanted to show appreciation for her girlfriends after going through the hard times she had during her break up with her boyfriend the previous year. Once she got to the register and found out how much they really were she decided to buy them anyways and came straight to the studio where Victoria helped her create the "7 rings" song that day.
So the song is truly based on a real life experience and I still can't get over it!
Monet also went on to share the process behind Thank U Next, the other record breaking hit that Ariana released in 2018. According to Victoria, Ariana came to her saying she wanted to write a song about her exes and they started working to create the single.
"It came together in about two weeks." said Monet.
Once it was written Ariana didn't release it right away becasue she was hesitant about naming her exes by name in the song but she ultimately decided to do it and called Victoria and the team up one morning aroudn 8 o'clock saying. today is the day! This was surprising because in pop there's usually a roll out and some marketing with a song but Victoria said that Ariana, "dropped it like a rapper" and even though people were skeptical of the song being successful it ended up breaking records.
When asked what made the song so successful Victoria said, "We were writing about what was actually going on, we were literally just narrating what was really going on to a beautiful melody with a fire beat."
When asked what it felt like to affect pop culture she said,"I think it's incredible. It was really cool to be in a session where we could talk about some real things that people wanted to hear that only we could say."
She continued saying, "The whole process was just us with our friends stripping down our feelings."
Victoria compared working with Ariana to a box of crayons saying, "When you go to a restaurant and they give you 3 crayons to color with, Ariana is like having a a whole coloring box. She's just so talented...she makes it very easy she writes and produces."
The panel ended with some amazing advice from the team telling future creators to never give up on their passion and it was definitely an inspiring session. I loved hearing the process behind creating these hits that truly have affected pop culture in such a big way. I can't wait to see what's next from this group!
"It came together in about two weeks." said Monet.
Once it was written Ariana didn't release it right away becasue she was hesitant about naming her exes by name in the song but she ultimately decided to do it and called Victoria and the team up one morning aroudn 8 o'clock saying. today is the day! This was surprising because in pop there's usually a roll out and some marketing with a song but Victoria said that Ariana, "dropped it like a rapper" and even though people were skeptical of the song being successful it ended up breaking records.
When asked what made the song so successful Victoria said, "We were writing about what was actually going on, we were literally just narrating what was really going on to a beautiful melody with a fire beat."
When asked what it felt like to affect pop culture she said,"I think it's incredible. It was really cool to be in a session where we could talk about some real things that people wanted to hear that only we could say."
She continued saying, "The whole process was just us with our friends stripping down our feelings."
Victoria compared working with Ariana to a box of crayons saying, "When you go to a restaurant and they give you 3 crayons to color with, Ariana is like having a a whole coloring box. She's just so talented...she makes it very easy she writes and produces."
The panel ended with some amazing advice from the team telling future creators to never give up on their passion and it was definitely an inspiring session. I loved hearing the process behind creating these hits that truly have affected pop culture in such a big way. I can't wait to see what's next from this group!
