Beyoncé has dropped new song “Break My Soul.” The track was first announced on Monday and arrived at midnight the same day. Check it out below.
The upbeat dance track features co-writing credits for Allen George and Fred McFarlane and Big Freedia due to samples of both "Show Me Love" by Robin S by the former and 2014 bounce track "Explode" from the latter. The Big Freedia sample acts as a mission statement for the song, with Freedia saying: "Release ya anger/Release ya mind/Release ya job/Release the time/Release ya trade/Release ya stress/Release the love/Forget the rest." Producers on the track are Beyoncé, The-Dream, Tricky Stewart, BlaqNmilD, and Jay-Z.
"Break My Soul" is the first single from Bey's forthcoming album Renaissance, due July 29. The album is her seventh solo effort and her first since 2016's Lemonade. In 2018 she teamed up with husband Jay-Z on the joint record Everything Is Love and then in 2019 she curated The Lion King: The Gift. A musical film and visual album based on the music of The Gift was debuted in 2020 on Disney+. Most recently Beyoncé released the Oscar-nominated "Be Alive," as heard in the Will Smith movie King Richard.
Little is known about Renaissance at the current moment. Bey is the cover star of July's British Vogue with editor-in-chief Edward Enninful noting in a letter that he has heard the album and that it "might be her most ambitious musical project to date." Speaking about the song of the record, he wrote: "Soaring vocals and fierce beats combine and in a split second I’m transported back to the clubs of my youth. I want to get up and start throwing moves. It’s music I love to my core. Music that makes you rise, that turns your mind to cultures and subcultures, to our people past and present, music that will unite so many on the dance floor, music that touches your soul."
