Following an incredibly tough year, Ariana Grande [1] has made a triumphant return to the spotlight [2]. In addition to releasing her fifth studio album [3], Thank U, Next, the 26-year-old is currently on her Sweetener world tour [4], and she's the latest star to grace the cover of Vogue's August 2019 issue [5] (which hits newsstands in NYC/LA on July 16 and nationwide on July 23). In the accompanying interview, Ariana opens up about everything like her tour, the Manchester benefit concert [6], and her "all-consuming" grief over ex-boyfriend Mac Miller [7].
Ariana and Mac dated for nearly two years [8] before they split in May 2018. Mac died at age 26 [9] from an accidental overdose of fentanyl, cocaine, and alcohol in September 2018. Since his death, Ariana has kept his memory alive with heartfelt tributes [10] on social media and at her concerts.
- On touring and her music: "Of course because I'm an extremist, I'm like, 'OK, I'll go on tour!' But it's hard to sing songs that are about wounds that are so fresh. It's fun, it's pop music, and I'm not trying to make it sound like anything that it's not, but these songs to me really do represent some heavy sh*t."
- On figuring out who she is: "I'm a person who's been through a lot and doesn't know what to say about any of it to myself, let alone the world. I see myself onstage as this perfectly polished, great-at-my-job entertainer, and then in situations like this I'm just this little basket-case puddle of figuring it out."
- On organising the Manchester benefit concert: "It's not my trauma, it's those families'. It's their losses, and so it's hard to just let it all out without thinking about them reading this and reopening the memory for them. I'm proud that we were able to raise a lot of money with the intention of giving people a feeling of love or unity, but at the end of the day, it didn't bring anyone back. Everyone was like, 'Wow, look at this amazing thing', and I was like, 'What the f*ck are you guys talking about? We did the best we could, but on a totally real level we did nothing.'"
- On grieving over Mac Miller's death: "It's pretty all-consuming. By no means was what we had perfect, but, like, f*ck. He was the best person ever, and he didn't deserve the demons he had. I was the glue for such a long time, and I found myself becoming . . . less and less sticky. The pieces just started to float away."
- On using her music to cope: "But if I'm completely honest, I don't remember those months of my life because I was (a) so drunk and (b) so sad. I don't really remember how it started or how it finished, or how all of a sudden there were 10 songs on the board. I think that this is the first album and also the first year of my life where I'm realising that I can no longer put off spending time with myself, just as me. I've been boo'd up my entire adult life. I've always had someone to say goodnight to. So Thank U, Next was this moment of self-realisation. It was this scary moment of 'Wow, you have to face all this stuff now. No more distractions. You have to heal all this sh*t.'"