If the title wasn’t clear enough, Megan Thee Stallion is opening about the heavy experience of writing her new Traumazine album. Released with just one day’s notice, Traumazine is Megan’s second solo studio album — the follow-up to 2020’s Good News.
In an interview with Apple Music 1’s Ebro Darden and Nadeska, Megan explained, “I don’t write songs about how I feel; I write songs about how I want to feel,” she said, citing “Body” and “Freak Nasty” as examples. “So I feel like, on this album, it’s probably the first time I figured out how to talk about what I want to say.”
Informed by a number of whirlwind years marked by the death of her mother, Megan used Traumazine to process her emotions. “I kind of wanted to talk about everything that’s been happening to me since 2019, like since my mom passed,” Megan told Sirius XM on Monday (Aug. 15). “I feel like I just kinda worked through it like I never really dealt with it… now I’m coming to a place where it’s all hitting me.”
The “Big Ole Freak” rapper also told Apple Music 1 that “Anxiety,” one of the new songs on Traumazine, “was supposed to be a journal entry.”
“I feel like this is finally an opportunity for me to put it in music,” she said.
Traumazine features three Billboard Hot 100-charting singles so far: “Plan B” (No. 29), the Future-featuring “Pressurelicious” (No. 55), and “Sweetest Pie,” a duet with Dua Lipa (No. 15).
Megan topped the Hot 100 twice in 2020 with triumphant anthems such as the Beyoncé-assisted “Savage” remix and “WAP” (with Cardi B). For her new record, the Grammy-winning Houston rapper opted for a more personal direction. “I was crying more so writing the songs than recording the songs,” Megan revealed. “It kind of felt like a weight off my chest… actually saying some of these things out loud.” Traumazine is the product of much self-reflection. Megan recalled her mother’s final instructions for her: “She said, ‘Don’t stop,’ so then I just took that literally. And we here today.”
Megan Thee Stallion has earned four top 10 titles on the Billboard 200 and three top 10 singles on the Hot 100 including a featured turn on Ariana Grande‘s “34+35,” which peaked at No. 2.
Watch Megan discuss Traumazine here:
