Muni Long is ready to step back into the spotlight.
Six months after undergoing a life-saving double lung transplant, the two-time Grammy winner is returning with “Richest,” an intimate new single that marks her first solo release since recovering from a health crisis that nearly claimed her life.
Long, who was diagnosed with lupus in 2014, contracted pneumonia during the Northeast leg of Brandy and Monica’s The Boy Is Mine Tour, forcing her to withdraw from the final show dates.
After returning home, she awoke in a hospital bed to devastating news: doctors told her she had just a week to live unless she underwent the transplant.
“My jaw dropped. Literally. I was like, ‘That’s rude.’ But they were kind of like, ‘This is not a joke. You need to make a choice. You can either go to hospice or you can get these lungs.’” Long told Good Morning America co-anchor Robin Roberts earlier this week.
Six months removed from the procedure, Long tells The Hollywood Reporter she wanted to make sure she was fully prepared before jumping back into the demanding cycle of releasing music.
“I really want to make sure I am ready because this business is so demanding,” Long says, “You’ve got to be on go when you start dropping. It’s a constant call and response, and that sometimes can be very exhausting.”
Taking half a year away, Long did more than allow her body to heal. She found perspective on the kind of artist she wants to be in her next season.
“This season, I’m in my feels,” she says with a laugh. “Seriously, everything is about feelings. How do I want the audience to feel? How does the visual make me feel? How does my comment or my caption make the reader feel?”
Throughout her career, Long has built her music around connection, from “Hrs & Hrs” to “Made For Me” and “Time Machine.” But with “Richest,” she wanted to lean even further into themes of love, softness and vulnerability.
“I love love, and this song is really talking about that moment when you realize, I’m on the edge, about to fall for this person.” she says. “We’ve got enough nasty stuff going on in the world, it needs some balance. I just want to put love into it.”
This sentiment extends into the song’s newly released music video, which stars rapper Akeem Ali opposite Long. The visual follows the pair through a series of intimate moments, from cooking spaghetti together in a kitchen to competing at an arcade, a park date at sunset and a cozy living room.
“I definitely think the new music is more sensual, intimate and vulnerable,” she says. “This is my first time really being soft and embracing it. But there’s still power in that. I need to be loved and you need to love me properly.”
As a two-time Grammy winner returning after a brief hiatus, Long says she isn’t concerned by any outside expectations.
“This may be a really odd analogy. Do bubbles really concern themselves with the wind?” she says. “No, they just float.”
“My only job is to live life, and interpret what I see and feel into sound and into stories people can relate to. Of course I want everyone to love it, but my job is to just make it. I get my confirmation through the journey and executing our vision the way we wanted.”
With “Richest” now available, Long says she wants listeners to walk away with more than a favorite lyric or a catchy melody, adding that she hopes it inspires listeners in one way or another.
“Inspiration is how you change the world,” she says. “Whether it’s an artist creating, or a guy with a girl, I want them to feel motivated to action. Because that’s how you change the world, and it’s a ripple effect.”
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