The two EPs SZA released on her own in the interim — “See.SZA.Run” (2012) and “S” (2013) — were early salvos in a revolution in R&B. They shared as much DNA with hip-hop, Björk and left-of-center electronic music of artists like Toro y Moi and Purity Ring, as they did with Brandy or Jill Scott, inspiring comparisons to contemporary iconoclasts like the Weeknd and Frank Ocean.

Her lyrics at the time were a world away from the open diary of “Ctrl.” Songs like “Time Travel Undone” and “Aftermath” were saturated in oblique imagery and abstract symbolism. And, as if to complete the obfuscation, her vocals were submerged in reverb and atmospherics, giving them a disembodied quality.

When critics accused her of mistaking style for substance, she took it to heart.

“People would say [expletive] like ‘I don’t know who she is, I don’t know what she’s talking about, this is boring,’ ” SZA said. “And I realized that I was bored with myself. I was just feeling and emoting with no structure and no intent.”

On “Ctrl,” her objectives were transparency and humanity. She wanted to exhibit a red-blooded mind and body at work, to give voice to everything that she had once concealed.

On “Supermodel,” the album’s opening track, she jabs an absent beau with spiteful taunts (“You was a temporary lover”) before turning the knife on herself (“Why am I so easy to forget?”). On the single “Drew Barrymore,” a confession of putative sins (“I’m sorry I’m not more ladylike, I’m sorry I don’t shave my legs at night”) becomes a defiant rallying cry.

The writer and producer Issa Rae, who used multiple songs from “Ctrl” in Season 2 of her HBO series “Insecure,” said it was SZA’s sharp turn toward candor that made her take notice.