We Speak R&B

‘Richest’ Is Muni Long’s Victory Lap: No. 2 at R&B Radio in a Year That Nearly Took Her Voice

Published

43 minutes ago

October 29, 2026

Some chart runs mean more than others. According to Rated R&B’s chart brief dated October 24, 2026, Muni Long’s “Richest” sits at No. 2 on Mediabase’s R&B Radio chart, holding at its peak behind only Tank’s “Yes.” For most artists that would be a strong week. For Long, a two-time Grammy winner releasing music months after a double lung transplant, it reads as something closer to a victory lap.

“Richest,” her Def Jam single, is a vulnerable ballad about daring to love again after heartbreak, executive produced by Tricky Stewart. What gives the song its weight is when it was made: it was the last record she completed before her surgery, and her first solo release of 2026. As Long shared on Good Morning America in a conversation with Robin Roberts, she caught severe pneumonia while opening for Brandy and Monica on The Boy Is Mine Tour, a crisis rooted in her long battle with lupus, diagnosed in 2014. Doctors told her she needed a double lung transplant and had roughly a week to live without one. She underwent the transplant in December 2025 and, six months post-operation, reported feeling like herself again, even as doctors cautioned that performing could be six months to a year away.

Radio is not the only place her voice is surfacing. On October 16, Long appeared on “Knockin,” a rock-soul standout from Lucky Daye’s new album ALOUD!, alongside the band The Paradox. The guest spot places her inside one of the fall’s most talked-about R&B releases, singing with the same command that carried her own hits “Hrs & Hrs” and “Made for Me,” both Grammy-winning performances.

That is the shape of this comeback: no sympathy campaign, no victory-lap interviews built around the hospital. Instead, Muni Long let a ballad she recorded before the operation climb to No. 2 at radio while she recovers, and lent her voice to a friend’s album for good measure. A third album is expected on Def Jam this fall. Whenever it arrives, “Richest” will stand as the moment she proved the voice the world nearly lost is still very much hers.

We Speak R&B

Fridayy Is Stealing Arena Nights on Rod Wave’s Don’t Look Down Tour, and Atlanta Gets Two in November

Published

21 minutes ago

October 29, 2026

We Speak Media

Fridayy is spending his fall the way rising stars are supposed to: in arenas, night after night, winning over crowds that did not buy a ticket for him. The three-time Grammy-nominated singer is out as a featured support act on Rod Wave’s Don’t Look Down Tour, and the run has already produced one of the season’s full-circle moments. At Brooklyn’s Barclays Center this week, where he played back-to-back nights on October 27 and 28, Fridayy brought out Meek Mill during his set, returning a favor years in the making for the rapper featured on his own “Proud Of Me.”

The tour now rolls into the Midwest, with two nights at Chicago’s United Center on October 31 and November 1, followed by Charlotte on November 3, Columbia, South Carolina on November 6, and a two-night Orlando stand on November 9 and 10. After a pair of Sunrise, Florida dates on November 14 and 15, the show reaches the city We Speak Media calls home, landing at State Farm Arena in Atlanta for two nights, November 18 and 19. Atlanta crowds pride themselves on knowing an R&B voice before the rest of the country does, and Fridayy’s church-rooted, melody-first sound is built for exactly that kind of room.

The voice is familiar even to casual listeners. Fridayy’s soaring hook work on DJ Khaled’s 2022 hit “God Did,” alongside Rick Ross, Lil Wayne, Jay-Z and John Legend, carried him into the Top 20 of the Billboard Hot 100 and earned three Grammy nominations, and his platinum-certified solo single “When It Comes To You” proved he could carry a record entirely on his own.

His catalog on Def Jam Recordings has kept deepening since, from his self-titled 2023 debut to the 21-track double album Some Days I’m Good, Some Days I’m Not, a project shaped in part by the loss of his father while he was out on a world tour, and his current album Tension. It is the kind of catalog that rewards a full arena set rather than a quick opening slot.

That is what makes this tour pairing work. Rod Wave’s audience shows up ready to feel something, and Fridayy, who learned music in church and behind a piano before he ever saw a stage this size, meets them there. By the time the Don’t Look Down Tour reaches Atlanta in November, expect the support act to be received like a headliner.