Janelle Monáe Gets Sensuous on Fourth Album ‘The Age of Pleasure’
New Janelle Monáe album The Age of Pleasure has released, the artist’s first LP in five years.
Janelle Monáe welcomes us to her age of radical self-love on new album The Age of Pleasure. The LP, which released on Friday (June 9), features an illustrious slate of guests including Seun Kuti and Egypt 80 (“Float”), Doechii (“Phenomenal”), Grace Jones (“Ooh La La”), Nia Long and Amaarae (“The Rush”), Sister Nancy (“The French 75”), along with Ckay (“Know Better”). The Age of Pleasure also marks Monáe’s return to music after five years, last releasing third studio album Dirty Computer in 2018.
Singles from the album were “Float” and “Lipstick Lover,” which was accompanied with an NSFW music video that expressed Monaé’s affections for women. The 37-year-old, who uses both she/her and they/them pronouns, recently spoke to Rolling Stone about being open with her sexuality while keeping her relationships under wraps.
"You have to understand that experiences will be had and people will change and evolve and not be the person you look up to," she said. "As much as you love and care about me, I'm on my own journey that has nothing to do with music, has nothing to do with art."
Since Dirty Computer, Monáe has acted in film (Antebellum, Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery) and television (Homecoming, Human Resources), and released the short fiction anthology The Memory Librarian: And Other Stories of Dirty Computer.
To promote The Age of Pleasure, Monáe will embark on a 26-date tour, beginning August 30 in Seattle before concluding October 18 in Inglewood.