Rebecca Black said her relationship with her girlfriend helped her endure the demands of touring this summer with Katy Perry, telling PEOPLE that “it is the gay sex that I am so blessed to have that I can look forward to.” The comments were made before Black attended the MTV Video Music Awards at UBS Arena in Elmont, New York, on Sept. 7, 2025.
Black, 28, confirmed she is sexually active with her partner but declined to identify the person. She first publicly described herself as queer in April 2020, saying at the time that the label felt right because her attractions had varied.
Joining Perry on the Lifetimes Tour this summer marked a major step for Black, who said the biggest surprise was the scale and complexity of staging arena shows night after night. “It takes more than a village,” she said, noting the crews that move cities of equipment and set pieces and the trust required to execute aerial elements in Perry’s production. “I can’t believe she trusts these girls to put her in the sky. It’s a lot.”
Black said she had never performed to crowds of more than 10,000 people before the tour and described the first night as overwhelming. “I was so overstimulated the first night and so scared, and by the end it felt so like redeeming to be able to get on and be like, ‘This is just another show,’” she said. She added that by the end of the run it “was so much fun.”
The Lifetimes Tour came after the Irvine, California, native released her second studio album, Salvation, in February 2025. Since then, she has issued collaborations with hip-hop duo Joey Valence & Brae and with electronic artists Jax Jones and sooyeon, and she said more music is forthcoming. “I’m very close to being done, and I am really excited about the direction,” Black told PEOPLE. “It’s dark. It’s sexy – definitely, definitely sexy.”
Black first rose to widespread attention in 2011 with the viral single “Friday,” released when she was 13. She has since spoken about the abrupt changes fame brought as a teenager, telling The Post in 2021 that her world “changed in a lot of ways” and that she sometimes struggled to find control amid people trying to capitalize on her early success.
On the Lifetimes Tour and in recent recording sessions, Black has positioned herself away from the novelty that defined her initial breakthrough and toward a more intentional, adult pop sound. She said the recent run reinforced the amount of behind-the-scenes labor required to present large-scale pop spectacles and underscored the personal supports she leaned on while balancing a busy performance schedule and new releases.
Black attended the MTV VMAs on Sept. 7 among other artists and industry figures drawn to the annual awards show. She did not offer a timeline for the release of her next project but said she does not plan to slow down.