a song born from buying seven engagement rings in one afternoon, built on a show tune from 1959, and the most argued-about record she has released.
the short answer
7 rings was released in january 2019 and debuted at number one. it interpolates my favorite things from the sound of music, which is why the rodgers and hammerstein estate holds the large majority of its publishing — an unusually expensive songwriting decision. the title comes from an afternoon on which she bought engagement rings for herself and six friends after her own engagement ended.
the tiffany's afternoon
the origin is well documented and better than most song origins: in the autumn of 2018, days after her engagement to pete davidson ended, she took six friends to tiffany's and bought all seven of them engagement rings. the song was written about that afternoon almost immediately afterwards.
that is the reading the record is built on — friendship and money as a response to a bad month — and it explains the tone, which is closer to a joke told loudly than to a boast.
the sound of music, and the publishing
the melody interpolates my favorite things, written by richard rodgers and oscar hammerstein ii for the 1959 stage musical the sound of music. an interpolation is a re-recording of an existing melody rather than a lift of an existing recording, and it is cleared through the publisher.
the rodgers and hammerstein estate holds the great majority of the song's publishing as a result — a share widely reported as around ninety per cent. for a song that spent eight weeks at number one, that is one of the most expensive melodic decisions in modern pop, and it was made knowingly.
the criticism
the record drew three distinct lines of criticism and they are worth separating, because they are usually run together.
- appropriation. the delivery, the ad-libs and the visual language of the video were widely argued to be borrowing from black and latina hip-hop aesthetics without acknowledgement. this was the largest and most sustained of the three.
- similarity claims. princess nokia and soulja boy both publicly argued that the flow resembled their own records. neither resulted in litigation, and neither claim was formally adjudicated.
- the flex itself. a song about buying things landing in january 2019 met a fairly predictable amount of eye-rolling, which is the least interesting of the three objections and the one that aged fastest.
none of that stopped it. it debuted at number one, held it for eight weeks, and was one of the three songs with which she occupied the entire top three of the hot 100 in february 2019 — the first act to do that since the beatles.
where it sits now
it is one of the two biggest songs of her career and, by the standards of the catalogue around it, not one of the best — a judgement this site is happy to make in public and does make, at nineteenth, in the ranked twenty. enormous and interesting are different properties.
questions people ask
what is 7 rings about?
an afternoon in late 2018 when ariana grande bought engagement rings for herself and six friends, days after her own engagement ended. the song is about friendship and spending money as a response to a bad month.
what does 7 rings sample?
it interpolates my favorite things from the sound of music, written by rodgers and hammerstein in 1959. it is an interpolation — a re-recorded melody — rather than a sample of the original recording.
who owns the rights to 7 rings?
because of the interpolation, the rodgers and hammerstein estate holds the large majority of the publishing, widely reported as around ninety per cent.
why was 7 rings controversial?
chiefly over accusations that it borrowed black and latina hip-hop aesthetics without acknowledgement. separately, princess nokia and soulja boy each argued publicly that the flow resembled their own records; neither claim went to court.
how long was 7 rings number one?
it debuted at number one on the billboard hot 100 and spent eight weeks there.