Take A Bow

In this song, Rihanna cuts loose her no-good, cheating, cad of a boyfriend through theater analogies, telling him to take a bow for his brilliant performance of lies so she can applaud. The lyric is by Rihanna's Def Jam labelmate Ne-Yo, who wrote a similar song for Beyoncé: "Irreplaceable." In that one, Bey gives the guy the boot by packing up his things (they're to the left) and calling him a cab.

Riri was on a roll with "Take A Bow," her third #1 hit, following "SOS" and "Umbrella." She released her third album, Good Girl Gone Bad, in 2007. Instead of going to work on her next album, Def Jam had her record two new singles, "Take A Bow," and "Disturbia," and put them on a re-released version of the album called Good Girl Gone Bad: Reloaded in 2008. Both songs went to #1, as did her T.I. collaboration "Live Your Life." Between the three songs, she spent nine weeks at #1 in 2008 when she was just 20 years old. Rihanna's next album, Rated R, was released in 2009 and included another #1, "Rude Boy."

This wasn't the first song to mock a lying lover with the title phrase. Madonna's "Take A Bow" was released in 1994 and was a #1 hit for seven weeks. She co-wrote it with Babyface.