Muni Long on Saving R&B With Her New Album 'Revenge'

Muni Long has declared her new project the R&B album of the year, and she may be right. The Grammy-award winner received Best R&B Performance for "Hrs and Hrs" last year and her single "Made for Me" quickly became a classic, being sung bar-for-bar at middle school proms and across TikTok between besties. With a pen trained for over 17 years, the singer-songwriter is true to this, not new to this.

Her return to the airwaves is through her new album Revenge, a 14-track project meant to be a diary entry she shares with the world, advising women to stay in touch with their higher selves despite all odds.

Below, we sit down with Muni Long to discuss developing her album while pregnant, navigating relationships and saving old-school R&B.

Tell us about this album being a diary for you.

This album is the first time that I actually put my real feelings and real experiences on wax. Before now, I would always imagine or put myself in other people's shoes or hear one of my friend's stories and write about it from there. But this is the first time I was like, "I'm going to use this as therapy and talk about what I'm actually going through."

Do you actually keep a diary?

I do. I have several journals actually, but I only ever use my diary to manifest things. So, even if I'm having a down moment, the entry will turn into me speaking positively about it to try to change it or have it exit my frequency. I might start out by saying "I'm really sad today," but then it'll just turn around.

How did this project come to fruition?

I was pregnant at the time. Once I hit seven months my stomach was so freaking big, I couldn't go anywhere because people were recognizing me. So, I had just been sitting in my room for months doing nothing but then I started getting the itch. We put a studio in the house so that I could write and make music. I made "30s" and then a couple days later I did "Made For Me," and "Reverse." I had them all by November 2023.

The album is called Revenge and initially you'd think this album is about getting your lick back, but you take a mature approach fueled by love and self-respect. Tell us about this approach of letting karma play out.

When you really get in touch with your higher self, it becomes more important to stay in contact with that version than cussing somebody out or fighting. We can disagree. We can have differences of opinion. We don't have to argue. If something didn't go your way, there are a million other amazing things out there that you can go get into. Just leave that alone. So, once I really understood that, it became easy to just say "I see what you just did but you know what? You have that. Congratulations. I'm out."