Beyonce Releases New Album ‘Lemonade’ on Tidal

UPDATE: Following Tidal’s exclusive stream of Lemonade, the service is now offering downloads of Beyoncé’s new album for $17.99 at their site. According to the New York Times, Apple’s iTunes Music Store will also begin carrying Lemonade for purchase starting Sunday at midnight EST. Tidal will remain the venue to stream the album and its visual accompaniment. 

Beyoncé has released her long-anticipated sixth album, Lemonade, exclusively on Tidal. The 12-song album, the singer’s sixth, arrived with a short film and is a “conceptual project based on every woman’s journey of self-knowledge and healing,” Tidal said in a statement.

The album includes guest appearances by Kendrick Lamar, Jack White, James Blake and the Weeknd and features an eclectic roster of samples, including Led Zeppelin (“Don’t Hurt Yourself”), Yeah Yeah Yeahs (“Hold Up”), Father John Misty (“Hold Up”) and Animal Collective (“6 Inch”). Just Blaze, Diplo, Mike Will Made It and Vampire Weekend’s Ezra Koenig are among the album’s co-producers.

Prior to the album’s release, Beyoncé teased the mysterious, hour-long HBO special Lemonade with brief, thriller-like clips. In the special, Beyoncé invokes her ancestral roots, dealing with emotionally hefty issues of race, misogyny, black womanhood and marital infidelity. Serena Williams and Jay-Z make guest appearances in the film, though do not appear on the album.

Over the last few years, Beyoncé has teamed up with the network for her other specials, including the documentary Life Is But a Dream and a concert film about her 2014 co-headlining tour with husband Jay Z, the On the Run Tour.

Lemonade follows the singer’s self-titled, surprise-released 2013 LP. On December 13th of that year, the singer dropped a full album with videos for each song with no previous indication or promotion. Along with the nature of its release, the themes Beyoncé explored on the album were a significant shift from her previous material: she began to dive into body image, feminism, marital issues and the miscarriage she experienced before giving birth to daughter Blue Ivy Carter. 

Beyoncé followed the album with the More Only EP as the tour wrapped that summer. Beyoncé took home three Grammy Awards in 2015, including Best Surround Sound Album and two R&B category wins for single “Drunk in Love.”

Last year, Beyoncé became a co-owner of Tidal alongside her husband and peers like Kanye West, Rihanna, Madonna, Nicki Minaj and more. On the streaming service, she had teased exclusive content like the piano ballad titled “Die With You” and later the single “Formation” which was released the day prior to her return to the Super Bowl halftime show alongside Coldplay and Bruno Mars and was exclusively streamed on the service.

Prior to “Formation,” Beyoncé made a few guest appearances on other artists’ tracks following the release of More Only. She reunited with her Destiny’s Child groupmates for Michelle Williams’ “Say Yes,” sang alongside Nicki Minaj on the tough and sexy “Feeling Myself,” belted and harmonized with newcomer Arrow Benjamin on Naughty Boy’s “Runnin’ (Lose It All)” and joined Coldplay on the hypnotic “Hymn for the Weekend.”

In late April, she’ll head out on her Formation World Tour, which will run through this summer. She announced her plans for the trek in a commercial immediately following her appearance at Super Bowl 50 in February.

Lemonade Track List

1. “Pray You Catch Me”
2. “Hold Up”
3. “Don’t Hurt Yourself”
4. “Sorry”
5. “6 Inch”
6. “Daddy Lessons”
7. “Love Drought”
8. “Sandcastles”
9. “Forward”
10. “Freedom”
11. “All Night”
12. “Formation”