Aaliyah is the third and final studio album by the American singerAaliyah. It was released on July 7, 2001, byBlackground Records andVirgin Records.[nb 1] Because of its packaging design, it is also known as "The Red Album". Aaliyah started to work on the album in 1998, but rescheduled its recording around her developing film career. She resumed recording in 2000 at Sing Sing Studios in Australia, where she shot her role for the 2002 filmQueen of the Damned during the day and recorded songs at night. Additional recording took place atManhattan Center andSony Music Studios in New York andWestlake Recording Studios in Los Angeles, among other locations. Through her recording contract with Blackground, the singer worked primarily with the record label's in-house crew of writers and producers, includingBud'da, J. Dub,Rapture, andEric Seats, as well as longtime collaboratorTimbaland.
Aaliyah is described in critical commentaries as an album ofR&B,neo soul, anddance-pop, while drawing on an array of other genres such asfunk,hip-hop,alternative rock,electronica, andLatin music. The album's producers incorporated synthesizer melodies, fragmented beats, distorted guitar, and eccentrically manipulated vocals andsong structures, while much of the lyrics were written by singer-songwriterStatic Major, who shared a close friendship and strong rapport with Aaliyah. The resulting songs deal with the complexities of romantic love and different stages in a relationship. Aaliyah viewed the album as a reflection of herself as both a young adult and a matured vocalist.
Aaliyah was critically and commercially well-received upon release, charting at number two on the USBillboard 200. However, it sold diminishingly afterwards. After the album's first single "We Need a Resolution" performed moderately, Blackground and Virgin wanted a high-charting follow-up to increase the album's sales. The labels chose "Rock the Boat" after it began receiving airplay as an album cut. Aaliyah shot a music video for the song in the Bahamas, butdied in a plane crash during a return flight to the US on August 25. After her death, sales of the album greatly increased and led it to the top of theBillboard 200, eventually reaching more than 13 million copies sold worldwide. Released during a period of peak activity in R&B, critics have since ranked the album as one of the genre's best and most influential records from this era, impacting artists such asBeyoncé,Rihanna, andthe Weeknd. After years of internal and legal conflicts between Blackground, the singer's estate, and the album's creators,Aaliyah was released to music streaming services for the first time in 2021.
Background
Aaliyah in 2000
Aaliyah recorded her second albumOne in a Million with producer-songwritersTimbaland andMissy Elliott, releasing it in 1996 to commercial success, and graduated from high school the following year.[2] She gained achieved further success with songs from film soundtracks, including her 1998 single "Are You That Somebody?"[3] Recording again with Timbaland for the song, Aaliyah experimented with moreavant-garde sounds in herR&B andpop music, while singing in alow-register and minimalist style distinct from her vocally-virtuosic female contemporaries.[4] After it became the biggest success of her career at that point, the singer wanted to keep a lower profile and avoid overexposure.[5]
A third album was planned for February 1999, but Aaliyah postponed its recording to develop an acting career, which led to a starring role in the 2000 filmRomeo Must Die.[6] The film heightened her profile significantly, while the soundtrack's single "Try Again" became her first number-one song on the USBillboard Hot 100.[7] Her labelBlackground Records used the film and its soundtrack to set up a distribution deal withVirgin Records America, which would distribute Blackground's subsequent releases globally.[8]
Recording and production
Aaliyah began recording the album in 1998.[9] She recorded a few songs, including two with Timbaland, before working onRomeo Must Die.[10] In 1999, while working on the record in New York City, Aaliyah called and askedTrent Reznor, one of her musical idols, to produce a song, but they could not coordinate their schedules.[11] She intended to finish the album by the end of 2000 and resumed its recording while filming in Australia forQueen of the Damned (2002), as she shot her part for the film during the day and recorded songs at night.[12] She said in an interview forBillboard, "there were nights when I didn't go into the studio—I was too tired. On the weekends, I always made it."[13] Jomo Hankerson, Blackground president and Aaliyah's cousin, said that he had to "bribe the producers", who did not want to "go halfway around the world!" He added that they ultimately had "a beautiful time ... making hot music".[14]
Most of the album's songs were recorded at eitherSony Studios in New York City or Sing Sing Studios in Melbourne, including "Loose Rap", which was done at both studios. Aaliyah recorded "More Than a Woman" atManhattan Center Studios, "U Got Nerve" at Soundtracks Studios in New York City, "We Need a Resolution" atWestlake Studios, and "I Care 4 U" at Magic Mix Studios and Music Grinder Studios in Los Angeles.[15] She had first recorded "I Care 4 U", written by Elliott, in 1996 forOne in a Million, but scrapped it after that album's completion.[16] Aaliyah worked with Blackground Records' in-house crew of musicians, songwriters, and producers, including novice producersBud'da, J. Dub, Rapture, and Eric Seats.[17] Music managerJimmy Henchman, a friend of Aaliyah's managerBarry Hankerson, helped coordinate the record's production and arranged for the producers and writers to work with the singer.[18]
Most of the album's lyrics were written byStatic, from the R&B bandPlaya.[19] While the band was growing apart, he was invited by Blackground to be a lead writer for the album after writing "Are You That Somebody?" and "Try Again". Static was a part of Aaliyah's close group of friends, which included Missy Elliott and Timbaland, and shared an infatuation with her.[20] He found Aaliyah to be ideal for his songwriting style, while she believed that he could accurately portray her feelings.[21] A subtly sexual lyricist, he wrote "Rock the Boat" for her in 1999, but Blackground felt she was not ready for the song. Barry Hankerson said of his songwriting, "We always were protective over every lyric ... But he did things where you never felt offended. You just felt like you overheard someone thinking ... he was clever ... Aaliyah depended on him [and] he depended on her." Elliott said that he was "a part of that bridge of Aaliyah growing up lyrically".[20] While she discussed the lyrics with Static, the singer consulted Bud'da about the sound and musical direction of the album.[22] She was interested in learning about theUK garage scene at the time.[23]
In March 2001, Aaliyah finished recording the album after having filmed her part inQueen of the Damned for four months, which ultimately delayed the album's release.[24]MTV News'sGideon Yago reported that she completed its last song on March 9, and the album as a whole wasmastered byBernie Grundman at his studio in Los Angeles.[25]
While in Australia, Aaliyah also did a photo shoot for the album with photographersJeff Dunas,Jonathan Mannion,David LaChapelle, andAlbert Watson.[26] The singer handled fivepythons at the shoot and developed an affinity for snakes, finding them "dangerous, but quite beautiful" and representative of her on the album. She revisited the snake theme in her music video for "We Need a Resolution" in April 2001 and toldMTV, "They live in solitude, [and] there are times in my life [when] I just want to be by myself. There are times I can't even figure myself out. I feel they are very complex creatures, [but] at the same time, they're sexy, too. That's why they representAaliyah pretty well."[27] Ultimately, Watson's photo of Aaliyah posing directly at the camera was chosen by artwork designerWarren Fu to be the front cover, with Watson later explaining that it especially demonstrated "a symmetrical composition ... with a look of confidence and maturity."[nb 2] Of the album itself, Aaliyah called it "a good reflection of [myself] and the person [I am] today", saying in an interview forJet magazine, "I am a young adult now, and I think this album shows my growth vocally."[29]
Music
Pop songs are struggles, conscious or not, between the artist's urge to do her own thing and the audience's desire for familiar satisfactions. How many stylistic tics before the big chorus? How much individual versus how much mass appeal? It's magnetic when you can hear the struggle—the drama of seduction, of whether you give yourself to the listener, and what happens then. That's the drama Aaliyah plays nonstop on her third album.
An R&B,neo soul, anddance-pop album,Aaliyah features midtempofunk songs,hip-hop-textured uptempo tracks, andslow jams that draw on oldersoul influences.[31] Along with contemporaryurban sounds, the music incorporatesMiddle-Eastern influences, mutedalternative rock, and—particularly on Timbaland's songs for the album—Latintimbres.[32] "Never No More" mixes both older soul and modern hip hop sounds withstring arrangements by producer Bud'da, while "Read Between the Lines" is a rhythmic, digitalsamba with Latin percussion.[33]Aaliyah's production features synthesizer melodies, vintagesyndrums, distorted guitar,staccato arrangements, andlayered, eccentrically manipulated vocals.[34] John Mulvey ofNME finds its sound subtle and lacking "bombast and histrionics", while the magazine's Alex Needham likens its "otherworldly",high frequency production todub reggae and the dark, spaciousdance music ofDr. Dre andMassive Attack.[35] InStephen Thomas Erlewine's opinion, the album is distinct from the older soul leanings ofMacy Gray andJill Scott, as its music sounds unconventional yet modern, "turning out a pan-cultural array of sounds, styles, and emotions".[36]
Aaliyah's beats are produced in a manner that makes them sound fragmented, exhibitingtechno andelectro textures. Tracks such as "Loose Rap", "Extra Smooth", and "What If" feature unconventionalsong structures experimenting withresolution.[37] "I Can Be" and "What If" incorporate2-step androck elements, although the latter song draws particularly fromDetroit techno andindustrial rock.[38] On the club-influenced "More Than a Woman", Aaliyah'svocal harmonies interplay againstminor key string and guitar sounds, while "Loose Rap" features underwater noises, low-keyelectronica in the style ofthe Neptunes, and harmonically soft vocals declaring "it ain't just rhythm and blues".[39] Ernest Hardy ofRolling Stone compares the album's experimentation to the sounds onOutkast'sStankonia (2000),Sade'sLovers Rock (2000), and Missy Elliott'sMiss E... So Addictive (2001).[40] According toSlant Magazine's Sal Cinquemani, "like Elliott's genre-bendingSo Addictive,Aaliyah provides a missing link between hip-hop and electronica."[41]
Lyrics
Thematically,Aaliyah explore the intricacies of romantic love and phases in a relationship, such as frivolous infatuation, issues near the end of a relationship, and heartache.[42] Subtle, lighthearted humor and witty sound effects, such as comical vocal manipulation, intersperse the themes of heartbreak and eroticism.[40] According toCitysearch's Justin Hartung, the record "transforms the confusion of young adulthood into exhilarating freedom", whileBillboard's Rashaun Hall says that each song possess a unique emotional identity that accompanies the music's sonic variety.[43]
Among the female empowerment-themed songs, Bob Waliszewski ofPlugged In observes a "healthy self-respect" in Aaliyah, who "doesn't put up with unfaithful cads ('U Got Nerve'), mind games ('I Refuse'), self-impressed hunks ('Extra Smooth'), gossip and envy ('Loose Rap'), or physical abuse ('Never No More')".[44] Thekey-shifting,drum and bass-influenced "Extra Smooth" addresses an enthusiastic courtship and is inspired by a conversation between Aaliyah and Static about how men try to act suave, while "Loose Rap" is titled after the slang phrase of the same name and dismisses romantic admirers who use tritepick-up lines.[45] "Those Were the Days" dispassionately dismisses a male lover, while "What If" angrily threatens an unfaithful lover and by extension similar men.[46] On "I Care 4 U", the narrator tries to console a friend who is heartbroken, but finds herself distressed byunrequited feelings she has for him.[47]
Aaliyah's vocals are sung in a restrainedsoprano style throughout the album.[49]Vibe magazine's Hyun Kim argues that its songs draw focus to her singing more than her previous records, "bringing it to the forefront as opposed to hiding it behind the layered production".[5] BiographerChristopher John Farley says that she "emotionally detail[s] a song" unlike on her previous albums and that "her gentle voice now seem[s] like something elemental, a kindly wind blowing through the branches of a big tree."[50] According to Joshua Clover, Aaliyah pushesmusical notes "into strange corners ofsyncopation's shifty architecture" on the more "shape-defying" tracks. Overall, "she makes the sonics tell the story, creating meaning outside the lyrics, pleasure beyond thehooks."[30]
"Rock the Boat" is sung with breathless vocals by Aaliyah, who instructs her lover on how to please her sexually and equates her erotic high to a drug high.[51] Ballads such as "I Care 4 U", "Never No More", and "I Refuse" are sung more emotively, expressing melancholy qualities and hurt.[40] On "I Can Be", Aaliyah sings from the perspective of an adulterous man's mistress who wants to be his foremost girlfriend.[52] Alex Macpherson fromThe Guardian writes that "Aaliyah's blank, numbed delivery" on the song "makes being the other woman seem like an emotionally masochistic form of self-medication".[53]
The red logo fromAaliyah's 2001 marketing campaign
Aaliyah was originally issued by Blackground and Virgin in Japan on July 7, 2001, before its release in the United Kingdom on July 16 and in the United States on July 17.[1] In the US, it debuted at number two on theBillboard 200 albums chart behindSongs in A Minor byAlicia Keys, selling 187,000 copies in the week of August 4.[54] Although it was the highest sales week of Aaliyah's career, the album sold diminishingly over the next two months.[55] The singer planned to embark on the largest concert tour of her career to support the album, while Blackground and Virgin—heavily invested in the record's success—wanted a single with a high chart placement to help increase sales.[56] "We Need a Resolution" had been released as thelead single on April 13, but did not receive significant radio airplay and only reached number fifty-nine on theBillboard Hot 100.[57]
Aaliyah and Background were at odds as to what the second single from the album should be. She was pushing for "Rock the Boat" whereas the label was pushing for a Timbaland-produced track.[58] In early August 2001, Aaliyah filmed a music video for the Timbaland-produced "More Than a Woman" in Los Angeles.[59] The label opted for "Rock the Boat" as the album's second single after the track began receiving airplay as an album cut, and released the song as a single on August 21, 2001.[60] On August 22, 2001, Aaliyah traveled to the Bahamas to shoot a video for "Rock the Boat".[59] After its completion, she and several crew members who were returning to the USdied in a plane crash on August 25.[61] Blackground executives were uncertain when they would release the album's next single and video.[62]Aaliyah had sold more than 447,000 copies by this point.[63]
The album's sales increased rapidly after Aaliyah died.[64] News of her death was reported on the last day ofNielsen SoundScan's sales tracking week, during whichAaliyah sold 62,000 copies, a 41.5% increase from its past week's sales.[65] The following week, it sold 305,500 copies and ascended from number 19 to number one on theBillboard 200, making it the record's highest sales week.[66] It was Aaliyah's only album to top any ofBillboard's charts and marked the first time a recording artist climbed to number one posthumously sinceJohn Lennon in 1980 with his albumDouble Fantasy.[67] On September 19,Aaliyah reached more than one million copies sold.[68] In November, "Rock the Boat" was released as a single and reached number two on the R&B/Hip-Hop chart that same month.[69] In the US,Aaliyah spent 69 weeks on theBillboard 200, reaching 2.06 million copies sold by February 25, 2002, and 2.6 million sold by December 2009.[70]
Blackground, which had ended its joint deal with Virgin in November 2001, wanted to send the video for "More Than a Woman" (released on September 4) to domestic outlets, but it required both labels to work together.[71] Blackground subsequently moved toUniversal Records, and the video was first aired in Europe.[72] In the UK, "More Than a Woman" was released as a single on January 7, 2002, and entered thesingles chart at number one, whileAaliyah re-entered thealbums chart at number 65; it had originally entered the chart at number 25 on July 28, 2001.[73] Two weeks after "More Than a Woman" reached number one, the album jumped 17 spots to number five on January 27, 2002.[74]Aaliyah went on to spend 36 weeks on the British charts.[75] According to theOfficial Charts Company, the album sold a total of 303,000 copies in the UK.[76] It also reached number nine on the record charts in France, Germany, and the Netherlands, where it charted for 33, 41, and 46 weeks, respectively.[77] According to theInternational Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI), the record was the 34th best-selling album in the world during 2001.[78] In August 2012,NME writer Tom Goodwyn reported that it had sold more than 13 million copies worldwide.[79]
Aaliyah was met with highly positive reviews from most critics.[87] AtMetacritic, which assigns anormalized rating out of 100 to reviews from professional publications, the album received anaverage score of 76, based on 14 reviews.[80] According toPitchfork's Rawija Kameir, reviewers praised the singer for deviating from the "candy-coated" quality of contemporary pop music in favor of an approach that perfectly balanced pop, R&B, and hip hop.[88] Rashaun Hall fromBillboard felt that Aaliyah was taking a different approach in comparison to her pop/R&B peers, who "crank out happy-go-lucky albums year after year". He deemed the album as a "sonically diverse set in which each number has an emotion all its own".[89]
Reviewing forThe Guardian in July 2001, Michael Odell calledAaliyah a flawless blend of pop and R&B, "as much a brochure for the current state of R&B production facilities" as it is a showcase for its namesake's singing. He found the music's textures "scintillating" and believed its distinguishing characteristic to be "a playful and confident reworking of the [R&B] canon".[82] In theChicago Tribune, Brad Cawn wrote that Aaliyah demonstratesSade's grace and Missy Elliott's daring with fashionable neo soul that is "equal parts attitude and harmony, and all urban music perfection", while Russell Baillie fromThe New Zealand Herald deemed the music innovativedance-pop on what he called "a cohesive, detailed and disarmingly enticing album".[90]Simon Price, writing forThe Independent, wrote the record was "further evidence thatblack pop is the avant garde".[91] In a review forThe A.V. Club,Nathan Rabin argued that the album establishes Aaliyah as a significant artist unobscured by her collaborators, while Hardy fromRolling Stone called it "a near-flawless declaration of strength and independence" in which Aaliyah explores her "fantasies and strengths".[92] Writing forSpin, Clover viewed the record as her most profound work and said she had made "art" out of Timbaland and Static's "formal finesse" by "investing sound schemes with urgency and emotional intricacy".[30]
Some reviewers were more qualified in their praise. Mulvey deemedAaliyah "graceful" and "satisfying rather than extraordinary" in his review forNME. Although he said it is redeemed by Static's consistent songwriting, Timbaland should have contributed more songs, in his opinion.[85] Like Mulvey,Q remarked that its music is decent rather than innovative, with somefiller.[86] InEntertainment Weekly,Craig Seymour wrote that there are a few songs that stray from her musical strengths, but elsewhere she "skillfully portrays love as part woozy thrill, part pulse-racing terror".[81]Robert Christgau inThe Village Voice named "We Need a Resolution" and "U Got Nerve" as highlights and called Aaliyah "a slave to her beats, but a proud slave".[93] Connie Johnson from theLos Angeles Times was more critical, finding the production unadventurous and the lyrics lacking the depth and "personal revelation that gives music some immediacy".[83]E! Online felt that although the album is "not as immediate as some of her past mainstream work", she "pushes the boundaries of her voice and her age".[94] Ultimately the publication praised Aaliyah for "slowly working her way through R&B, hip-hop and even slightly techno beats".[94] Although Luke McManus from the Irish publicationRTÉ felt the album was too long, he praised it saying it was "the smoothest and most seductive R'n'B album of the year, with lyrics that are appealingly upfront and assertive".[95]
Aaliyah was named the best album of 2001 bySlant Magazine and one of the ten best records of the year byThe Atlanta Journal-Constitution andTime magazine.[96]NME ranked it at number 39 on their year-end list.[97] The album finished 73rd in thePazz & Jop, an annual poll of American critics published byThe Village Voice. Christgau, who created and supervised the poll, said in his accompanying essay that Aaliyah had finally "developed material nobody can deny" on "a good album".[98] The record also finished 37th in the annual poll run by German music magazineSpex.[99] For the album, Aaliyah was posthumously awarded anNAACP Image Award forOutstanding Female Artist.[100] At the2002 American Music Awards, it won in the category of Favorite R&B/Soul Album.[101] In 2002,Aaliyah received aGrammy Award nomination forBest R&B Album. "Rock the Boat" was nominated forBest Female R&B Vocal Performance.[102] "More Than a Woman" was nominated in the same category in 2003.[103]
Along with Aaliyah's burgeoning film career, the album was a part of her rising mainstream success in 2001.[108] In a retrospective review, Steve Huey fromAllMusic called it her most consummate record and said it "completed the singer's image overhaul into a sensual yet sensitive adult".[61] Erlewine, the website's senior editor, regarded the album as "a statement of maturity and a stunning artistic leap forward", whileBBC Music's Daryl Easlea felt it made Aaliyah's two previous accomplished albums "look like exercises injuvenilia".[109] According toPopMatters journalist Quentin B. Huff, she had never used her singing to complement her music's innovative production before with as much variety, conviction, and success as onAaliyah, which he said was also known as "The Red Album" because of its red artwork. Huff believed the record showcased the growing rapport between the singer and her collaborators while disproving questions about how she would continue recording music while broadening her profile.[110] InThe New Rolling Stone Album Guide (2004), Keith Harris wrote that "Aaliyah had grown from studio puppet to a powerful R&B archetype—a more self-awareRonnie Spector for a time that requires more self-awareness of its young adults."[106]
Aaliyah's re-emergence with the album in mid-2001 coincided with a period of peak activity in contemporary R&B, as well as the popularity of neo soul.[111] According to Erlewine,Aaliyah was "one of the strongest urban soul records of its time", whileThe Guardian called it the peak of R&B's golden age at the "turn of the century".[112]Alexis Petridis, the newspaper's lead critic, believed Aaliyah had recorded her most engaging music in a year when R&B and hip hop demonstrated the most creativity in popular music.[113]Aaliyah is widely considered to be one of the greatest pop albums of the 2000s and has been included on several "best-of" lists.[114] In 2005, theAaliyah album ranked 66th onGQ's "100 Coolest Albums in the World", whileStylus Magazine placed it at number 47 in the "Top 50 Albums of 2000–2005"; the publication's David Drake ranked it eighth on his own list.[115] A few years later, it was named one ofVibe magazine's "150 Essential Albums of the Vibe Era", and at the end of the decade, it placed at number 72 onSlant Magazine's list of the best albums from the 2000s.[116] Writing forVibe's list, Jon Caramanica believedAaliyah "may be the best soul album of the young millennium" and yet "redefines the category" with music that is "daring in construction, gorgeous from conception ... damn near post-R&B".[117] The album was ranked number 77 onNPR's "The 150 Greatest Albums Made By Women" list and according to writer Stacia Irons, "Aaliyah became a catalyst and bridge that created a smooth transition from '90s style R&B into ModernPBR&B".[118]
Aaliyah helped establish the "beat"-based sound of R&B during the 2000s while impacting a new wave ofblack progressive musicians.[119] AsThe Independent's Micha Frazer-Carroll writes, acts such asDestiny's Child,Ashanti,Amerie, andCassie capitalized on the success of the album's "idiosyncratic sound", while Aaliyah's "pared-back vocal phrasing" established an archetype for a "more stoic R&B singer" that would influence vocalists likeCiara andRihanna.[4] Timbaland's commercial success with R&B-influenced singers such asJustin Timberlake andNelly Furtado during the decade was later attributed byThe Guardian's Rebecca Nicholson to his experience producingAaliyah, writing that he "hasn't come close to creating anything as sonically stunning since".[120]Q journalist Eve Barlow credited the album in 2011 for "creating a blueprint that can be heard across pop music today" with acts such as R&B singersBeyoncé andThe Weeknd, and the indie pop bandThe xx.[121] According to Kameir, Aaliyah's characteristic multi-part harmonies on the album foreshadowed those ofSolange Knowles.[88] The Official Charts Company described the album as "one of the most influential R&B albums of modern times", and that it has "provided inspiration for an entire generation of hip-hop superstars like Beyonce,Frank Ocean andJanelle Monáe".[76]
Timbaland (right center), one of the album's producers, in 2012
The recording sessions for theAaliyah album produced many leftover tracks that were posthumously archived by Blackground and mostly left unreleased because of internal conflicts and legal complications between the label, Aaliyah's family, and the producers. Six of these recordings were released in 2002 on the compilation albumI Care 4 U.[108] Blackground's subsequent decline and mismanagement of the singer's catalog resulted in theAaliyah album's unavailability on streaming services in the next decade, leading Kameir to say in 2019 that, "paradoxically to its significance, the legacy ofAaliyah is now diminished".[88] That year,The Guardian ranked it number 28 on a list of the 100 best albums from the 21st century, making it the list's only album absent from streaming services. The newspaper's music editor, Ben Beaumont-Thomas, wrote in an accompanying blurb: "This album is lauded for the three masterpieces Aaliyah made with Timbaland—Try Again, More Than a Woman and We Need a Resolution—that lend a serpentine malevolence to her voice, but there are also strong old-school jams and languorous ballads. Lesser R&B stars match their voice to the beat—Aaliyah's genius, tragically cut short when she was killed in a plane crash, was to slink through it with an almost Latin sense of rhythm."[122]
In August 2021, it was reported that the album and Aaliyah's other recorded work for Blackground (since rebranded as Blackground Records 2.0) would be rereleased on physical, digital, and streaming formats in a deal between the record label andEmpire Distribution.[123] However, Aaliyah's estate issued a statement in response to Blackground 2.0's announcement, denouncing the "unscrupulous endeavor to release Aaliyah's music without any transparency or full accounting to the estate".[124] On September 10,Aaliyah appeared on streaming andmusic download services through Blackground and Empire.[125] In the following weeks, it re-entered the USBillboard 200 at number 13 and at number seven on the Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums and UK Hip Hop and R&B Albums charts.[126]
^The album was first issued in Japan on July 7, 2001, before its release in the US on July 17.[1]
^Fu went on to explain in an interview forVibe: "Perhaps it was a reaction to her being mysterious and aloof behind her sunglasses in previous covers, but this particular photo seemed to say 'Here I am, this is me.' It just felt like her arrival from her adolescent years to womanhood ... I wasn't sure why I decided to tint the cover photo red at the time. But there is something so bold and celebratory about it, it just felt right."[28]
^Hampton and Banks were credited on the album's 2021 reissue.[127] According to92Q Jams journalist Keenan Higgins, their composition "(Too Little in Common to Be Lovers) Too Much Going to Say Goodbye" (recorded by the Newcomers in 1974) is sampled on the song.[128]
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