Songwriter Ingrid Burley talked with Genius Wednesday about the inspiration behind the hit single “Love Drought” — which she wrote after being disappointed with a music label — on Beyoncé’s latest album, Lemonade.
In the interview, Burley tells Genius that the song, which has been interpreted as a song about Beyoncé and Jay Z’s marriage, is really about Beyoncé’s label, Parkwood Entertainment.
“I was very frustrated with the label because two of the people who were running the label at the time lied to me and told me that Beyoncé wasn’t currently listening to any new music,” Burley tells Genius.
At the writing camp two years ago, an A&R person told her that the pop star actually was listening to new music. She said she went to a back room to smoke and write about her disappointing relationship with the label.
The line “10 times out of nine, I know you lying” came from this incident of misinformation, she said.
“Getting that feedback read back to me, I could’ve just reacted then and said, ‘Man, she just told me!’ you know? But it was, like, I had to internalize that and the only way I could really get over it was kinda, like, hehe, she’s gonna sing this song I wrote about her label one day!”
The songwriter also says that she and Beyoncé grew up together in Houston.
She tells Genius that not even Beyoncé knows “Love Drought” is about Burley’s relationship with music.
