#56 Lemonade by Beyoncé

The 100 Greatest Albums of All Time

2025 Album Rank

56

Total Points

1022

Year Released

2016

Billboard 200 Chart Peak

1

Weeks at #1

1

RIAA Sales Certification

4,000,000 (Multi Platinum)

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Lemonade Album Details

Lemonade is a groundbreaking concept album and visual project by Beyoncé, blending personal narrative, political commentary, and genre-defying music into a cultural landmark. Released without prior announcement, the album arrived as both a deeply confessional statement on betrayal, resilience, and forgiveness, largely interpreted as a response to infidelity in her marriage, and a powerful celebration of Black womanhood. The accompanying hour-long film, premiered on HBO, gave the album added visual and emotional depth, elevating it to a multimedia experience unlike anything else in mainstream pop at the time.

Musically, Lemonade is genre-fluid, weaving through R&B, trap, country, reggae, blues, and rock. Collaborators included Jack White, James Blake, The Weeknd, Kendrick Lamar, and producers like Mike Will Made-It, Diplo, and Just Blaze. Lyrically, the album unfolds as a journey through the emotional stages of grief; intuition, denial, anger, apathy, emptiness, accountability, reformation, forgiveness, resurrection, hope, and redemption. Rooted in deeply personal and generational trauma, especially that faced by Black women in America.

Interesting Facts About Lemonade

• The album title comes from a quote by Beyoncé's grandmother-in-law, Hattie White: "I had my ups and downs, but I always find the inner strength to pull myself up. I was served lemons, but I made lemonade."
• Daddy Lessons marked Beyoncé's first foray into country and was so authentic that it sparked debate in the country music community, eventually leading to a live performance at the 2016 CMA Awards with the Dixie Chicks.
• Jack White, featured on Don't Hurt Yourself, described Beyoncé as a "musical genius" and was amazed by her bold creative choices during their collaboration in New York.
• The song Formation, released the day before her Super Bowl 50 performance, became a lightning rod for political discourse with its celebration of Southern Black culture and critique of systemic racism and police brutality.
• Visual references in the Lemonade film draw heavily from the works of Black feminist writers, including Warsan Shire, whose poetry is featured in interludes throughout the project.
• Hold Up contains an interpolation of the Yeah Yeah Yeahs' Maps and was co-written in part by Ezra Koenig of Vampire Weekend and Father John Misty, making it one of the album's most eclectic collaborations.
• Sandcastles is one of the most stripped-down moments on the album, featuring just piano and raw vocals. It was written by Vincent Berry II and Malik Yusef, and was initially offered to Teyanan Taylor, who did not record the song.
• The entire album was initially created in a private house in L.A. dubbed "The Lemonade Factory," with most collaborators unaware of the full concept until late in the process. Beyoncé controlled every aspect of production, sequencing, and visual presentation.
• Lemonade became the first album to be certified platinum based solely on streaming and digital sales without a traditional retail release, and each of its 12 tracks charted on the Billboard Hot 100 simultaneously.

Lemonade Tracklist

1. Pray You Catch Me
2. Hold Up - Reached #13 on Billboard's Hot 100 chart
3. Don't Hurt Yourself
4. Sorry - Reached #11 on Billboard's Hot 100 chart
5. 6 Inch
6. Daddy Lessons
7. Love Drought
8. Sandcastles
9. Forward
10. Freedom - Reached #35 on Billboard's Hot 100 chart
11. All Night - Reached #38 on Billboard's Hot 100 chart
12. Formation - Reached #10 on Billboard's Hot 100 chart

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