Top 10 Rihanna Music Videos

If there’s one thing Rihanna excels at, it’s pushing boundaries. The video is a play on Rihanna’s relationship to her critics, a relationship that brings both pain and pleasure. The video features various images of sadomasochism and bondage, including Rihanna treating Perez Hilton like a dog. The brightly colored latex and leather makes this video feel tongue in cheek rather than serious. The video proved a little too explicit for some and was immediately banned in eleven countries. It also got RiRi into hot water with photographer David LaChapelle, who sued for similarities to several of his photos. But just like the song’s subject and Rihanna herself, this video begs for a little controversy.

This video makes use of the playful back and forth between Rihanna and Drake, confusing us further as to whether or not they’re a couple. The concept of the vid is simple enough with the duo meeting in a convenience store and heading back to Rihanna’s for a potential afternoon hook-up. But that doesn’t do justice to how charming and fun the video feels. The chemistry between the duo is off-the-charts and feels like a R&B flavored version of a meet cute. Filmed on New York City’s Lower East Side, it captures the relaxed vibe of the neighborhood as Rihanna struts her stuff on the streets leading to an epic drumming and dance circle in the park.

Rihanna’s never been someone who’s afraid to go after what she wants, and that’s just the case in this video. In it, Rihanna’s on the search for a man who can fufill her and she treks through various locales searching for that special guy. Unlike the majority of her videos, this one spotlights Rihanna as a dancer with its extended choreographed group numbers. She’s sultry and perfectly in sync with the song’s pulsating beat. In addition to her dancing, there’s some great imagery as she seems to invoke the Hindu god Shiva and grows multiple arms during her movements.

The perfect combination of her Barbados roots and pop art, the music video is pure eye-candy. Inspired by artists including Andy Warhol, M.I.A., and Jean-Michel Basquiat, the visuals are colorful and aggressive to match the loud, full sound of the music. Rihanna shimmies and shakes in Jamaican inspired outfits as she does popular dancehall moves. We get multiple black and white variations of Rihanna as she determines which rude boy is up to the task of handling her for the night. The video is carefree and celebratory of Rihanna’s free spirit, a welcome contrast from some of her darker videos.

The first music video can make or break an artist, and luckily for Rihanna, it launched her career. Only seventeen when it was released, Rihanna slid onto the scene with a single and a video recalling her island and dancehall roots. It’s one of her simpler videos with Rihanna getting the party started at a local club. Her attitude is infectious and pretty soon she has the dance floor filled with people trying to showcase their moves. It’s a perfect example of Rihanna’s captivating persona and the contagious rhythm of her music. And she’s been on replay ever since.

Creepy and sexy aren’t two words that often go hand-in-hand, but somehow Rihanna blends the two perfectly. Rihanna seems to be trapped in some sort of prison with guards watching her every move. The camera cuts back in forth between various images of Rihanna being watched and powerless and then flashes to other instances where she seems completely in control as she sings on her throne. The video features a dance sequence with stilted, zombie-like moves that call back to Michael Jackson’s famous “Thriller” dance. The video is dark without losing its playfulness, and shows that she’s never afraid to try something different.

Filmed in locations just two hours outside of Los Angeles, this video makes it feel like Rihanna’s on a planet of her own. She acts out the song’s lyrics that she is in fact the only girl in the world, and in this case the only person, as she sings to an unseen lover. The video’s cinematography is stunning, with Rihanna dancing and posing in front of different landscapes including a lake, a mountain cliff, and a wall of lush flowers. It’s coupled with bright pops of color from her fire engine red hair to the highly saturated balloons that appear in the sky behind her. The surreal video has the affect of forcing your attention solely on Rihanna and her captivating beauty.

As the first pairing between Rihanna and the super DJ, Calvin Harris, it’s a damn good one. The video features a doomed romance between Rihanna and a Chris Brown look-a-like. We get the story of a couple whose love for pills and partying draw them to one another, no matter if it’s good for them or not. It gets darker with Rihanna puking streamers and a suggestion of domestic violence between the two lovers, all of which sparked some controversy among critics. But naysayers aside, it’s a strong story of the downfalls of excess and shows viewers that it’s possible to leave a bad situation, and for that RiRi won a Grammy for the Best Short Form Music Video.

No one gets between Rihanna and her money! It’s the video that launched a thousand think pieces, and is definitely one of her most shocking and thought-provoking. Co-directed by Rihanna and Megaforce, the video tells the story ofRihanna getting revenge on her unfaithful accountant, who’s portrayed by Mads Mikkelsen. Rihanna and her posse kidnap his wife, and proceed to torture both the wife and accountant. The short film is provocative and feels much more cinematic than her earlier videos. And just when viewers think the story is over, we get the unforgettable image of Rihanna covered in blood as she struts towards the camera with a determined look in her green eyes. Better have her money, indeed.

Before we unveil our number one pick, here are a few honorable mentions:
“Pour It Up”
Unapologetic (2012)

“Shut Up and Drive”
Good Girl Gone Bad (2007)

“Diamonds”
Unapologetic (2012)

“American Oxygen”
American Oxygen (2015)

“SOS”
A Girl Like Me (2006)

This is the video that took Rihanna to another level. Her early stuff showed that RiRi was good, but this demonstrated her excellence. With a fresh new haircut and the first glimmer of her good girl gone bad persona, the video focused on a newer, edgier and sexier Rihanna. The video features stunning visual effects with Rihanna dancing on ballet pointe shoes, and in rippling water underneath a shower of sparks. And she bared it all for the first time as she struck striking poses while covered from head to toe in silver body paint. This video was huge when it premiered, earning her the coveted 2007 Video of the Year Award.


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