Usher has been a staple of R&B and pop music for more than two decades. And while he became a Grammy-winner in the early aughts, he is even more excited about his new music in the 2020s.
The star capped off 2019 buy performing at “Dick Clark's New Year's Rockin' Eve with Ryan Seacrest.” On stage, he focused on classics like “Yeah!” and “OMG.” But what he didn’t perform was the collaborations he dropped this year: a duet with Atlanta’s own Summer Walker called “Come Thru,” which samples Usher’s 1997 hit “You Make Me Wanna...,” and the Ella Mai feature “Don't Waste My Time.”
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But that doesn’t mean the Atlanta crooner isn’t eager about his new tunes.
Recently, Usher spoke to Billboard magazine and teased his upcoming material, "there's more to come. If you like this, stay tuned."
Before expressing how thrilled he is to drop the follow up to 2016’s “Hard II Love,” the star was asked which tune from 2009 to 2019 was his favorite. While the decade included singles like, "DJ Got Us Fallin' in Love" and “Good Kisser,” Usher simply couldn’t choose.
“Aw man, wait till you hear this new album!” he said. “It [has] one of my new favorites. Of course, I love all of the songs that I’ve created and things that I’ve made, videos I’ve made. Having a favorite song is like picking a favorite child. Every one of them represents something special that happened in my life. I don’t know if I have one that’s special from the past more than the ones that are coming, but I can tell you this much: I’m really enjoying the new music that I’ve worked on, and really excited for you guys to hear it.”
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While the performer is looking ahead to his new music, he remains thankful for the groundwork laid by his previous hits, which include songs from albums such as “My Way,” “Confessions” and “Here I Stand.”
“This decade has represented growth for me,” he said. “For the most part, the design of [the past two] decades have continued to really work for me to expand my reach through music. Also, too, just as a human being that wants to make music that connects the world, and expand R&B, and all of the rhythm and blues that has come through my own personal experiences that I chose to write about. Or the places that I’ve gone that kind of introduced other genres -- and even though they were other genres of music, I still had the soul in it. Just really happy to continue to knock down these decades and start a new one.”
