Mary J. Blige has racked up several hits over her career, but there are a few songs she chose to pass on. During an appearance on the 7PM in Brooklyn podcast with Carmelo Anthony, she revealed that one of those tracks was “Umbrella.”
When asked to name the “one song or one beat” that got away and still crosses her mind, Mary mentioned the hit song. She noted it was originally pitched to her by producers The-Dream and Tricky Stewart.
“It’s not something that got away from me,” she said. “It’s just that I know what’s for me and what’s not for me.”
Mary was particularly not a fan of the refrain and didn’t think her fans would be either.
“All I heard was ‘aye, aye,’ and I was like, ‘Yo, my fans are going to bug out on me if they hear me talking about ‘aye, aye, aye,’” she said. “So I was like, ‘I’ve got a lot going on, so I’m going to pass.’”
When she later heard the finished version recorded by Rihanna, Mary felt like she had made the right call. “I was like, ‘See, it was for Rihanna. It wasn’t for me,’” she said. “I’m not afraid to pass on something that’s not for me. It got away, it got away, but it wasn’t for me in the first place.”
“Umbrella” appeared on Rihanna’s 2007 album, Good Girl Gone Bad, and featured a guest verse from Jay-Z. The song hit #1 on the Billboard Hot 100, where it held the top spot for seven weeks.
Copyright © 2026, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.
