Songs About Girls

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Songs About Girls
Studio album by Will.i.am
Released September 25, 2007
Recorded 2006–2007
Genre Hip hop, pop rap, electronic
Length 60:00
Label will.i.am music group, Interscope
Producer will.i.am, Polow da Don, Fernando Garibay, Paper-Boy
Will.i.am chronology
Must B 21
(2003)		 Songs About Girls
(2007)		 #willpower
(2012)
Singles from Songs About Girls
  1. "I Got It From My Mama"
    Released: September 24, 2007
  2. "Heartbreaker"
    Released: May 5, 2008
  3. "One More Chance"
    Released: August 18, 2008
Professional ratings
Review scores
Source Rating
Allmusic 4/5 stars[1]
BBC (unfavorable)[2]
Entertainment Weekly (C-)[3]
Rolling Stone 3.5/5 stars[4]
Slant 3/5 stars[5]
Sputnikmusic 1.5/5 stars[6]
Yahoo! Music UK 3.5/5 stars[7]

Songs About Girls is the third studio album by rapper will.i.am, known from his work with The Black Eyed Peas. The original title of the album was "Keep the Beeper". The album was released on September 25, 2007.[8] The first single released from the album was a club track titled "I Got It from My Mama" which debuted on the Billboard Hot 100 at #93 on the 17th of August 2007.[9] The album was recorded by Pardraic Kerin and will.i.am, and mixed by Dylan "3-D" Dresdow.

Contents

[edit] Background

The album has been described by will.i.am as semi-autobiographical conceptual album "where all the songs could tell a story of falling in love, falling out of love, trying to get back in love, destructing love and destroying love and then starting a new situation. That journey is what makes this unique."[8] The album is partially based on a seven year relationship that will.i.am experienced and the infidelities and the break-up of that relationship.[10] According to will.i.am's video on MySpace TV, he considers Songs About Girls to be his debut album, with his first two being production compilations.

[edit] Collaborations

will.i.am revealed on the Canadian MTV e2 show that the album would feature collaborations with: Slick Rick, Ice Cube, Q-Tip, Common, Snoop Dogg, Too Short, Busta Rhymes and Ludacris.[11] Unfortunately, the only collaboration that made the final cut is the Snoop Dogg collaboration. An anonymous female singer appears in some of the songs. Cheryl Cole also sang backing vocals for the single version of "Heartbreaker". will.i.am also recorded a song with American R&B singer Justin Timberlake on a song called: "Going Crazy" - though never made the final album cut.[12] Also, "Fly Girl" was originally a collaboration with Michael Jackson, but the version featuring Jackson did not make the final album cut.

[edit] Album release

In September 2006, will.i.am became the head of marketing of the online music distribution company Musicane.[13] Musicane allows artists to directly sell their songs to the public without a record company overseeing the distribution of the album.[14] will.i.am has stated that he intends for Songs About Girls to be an infinitely expandable collection of songs that are distributed through Musicane and other online music services.[10] According to will.i.am; "If I have an album filled with songs about girls, what happens if tomorrow I write another song about a girl?", he explains. "So something that started off just with 15 songs, in the next ten years could have 100 songs. Having 12 songs on a record? That day is done".[10] Despite Will's success with The Black Eyed Peas and as a producer for numerous other artists, the album flopped. It debuted at a disappointing #38 on the Billboard 200 with sales of just 21,000 copies according to Nielsen SoundScan.[15] This was significantly less than The Black Eyed Peas' "Elephunk" (#14) and Monkey Business (#2) and also Fergie's solo effort The Dutchess (#2). The album leaked to the Internet on September 19, 2007. The album debuted on the Australian ARIA Albums Chart on October 1, 2007 at number 58 with sales of 870 copies. The album was released on Argentina on October 5, 2007. The album went Gold in Poland three days before its release. "Dynamite Interlude" has no writing or production credits.

[edit] Track listing

No. Title Writer(s) Producers Length
1. "Over"   William Adams, Jeffrey Lynne will.i.am 4:00
2. "Heartbreaker"   Adams will.i.am 5:27
3. "I Got It From My Mama" (featuring Kat Graham) Adams, Jean-Luc Drion, Dominique Régiacorte will.i.am 4:01
4. "She's A Star"   Adams, Jamal Jones Polow da Don 3:47
5. "Get Your Money"   Adams, Patrick Bodmer, Walter Merziger, Arno Kammermeier, Phillipmjung will.i.am 5:24
6. "The Donque Song" (featuring Snoop Dogg) Adams, Fernando Garibay, Calvin Broadus Fernando Garibay 4:29
7. "Impatient" (featuring Dante Santiago) Adams, Josh Lopez, Caleb Speir will.i.am 4:17
8. "One More Chance"   Adams, Garibay Fernando Garibay 4:24
9. "Invisible"   Adams, George Pajon Jr., Mike McHenry, Jean Baptiste, Joshua Singleton for The Bullets Production Team, Speir will.iam, Paper Boy 3:56
10. "Fantastic"   Adams, Gordy, Alphonso Mizell, Fredrick Perren, Deke Richards will.i.am 3:25
11. "Fly Girl"   Adams, Keith Harris, Pajon Jr. will.i.am 4:46
12. "Dynamite" (Interlude) Adams will.i.am 1:19
13. "Ain't It Pretty"   Adams, Jones Polow da Don 4:35
14. "Make It Funky"   Adams will.i.am 3:59
15. "S.O.S (Mother Nature)"   Adams will.i.am 4:17
16. "Spending Money"   Adams will.i.am 3:08
17. "Mamma Mia"   Adams will.i.am 2:53
Samples credits

[edit] Charts and certifications

Chart (2007) Peak
position
Australian ARIA Albums Chart[16] 58
France Albums Chart[17] 89
Switzerland Albums Chart[17] 27
Russian Chart[17] 7
UK Albums Chart 68
U.S. Billboard 200[17] 38

[edit] Certifications

Region Certification Sales/shipments
Poland (ZPAV)[18] Gold 10,000*

xunspecified figures based on certification alone

[edit] References

  1. ^ Allmusic review
  2. ^ BBC review
  3. ^ Entertainment Weekly review
  4. ^ Rolling Stone review
  5. ^ Slant review
  6. ^ Sputnikmusic review
  7. ^ Yahoo! Music UK review
  8. ^ a b "will.i.am Has Love On The Brain For Solo Debut". Billboard.com. http://www.billboard.com/bbcom/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003617523. Retrieved 2007-08-19. 
  9. ^ "I Got It from My Mama". Billboard.com. Archived from the original on 2007-09-29. http://web.archive.org/web/20070929150022/http://www.billboard.com/bbcom/esearch/chart_display.jsp?cfi=379&cfgn=Singles&cfn=The+Billboard+Hot+100&ci=3085774&cdi=9357067&cid=08/25/2007. Retrieved 2007-08-19. 
  10. ^ a b c Batey, Angus (August 10, 2007). "Peas in our time". Times Online (London). http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/music/article2229512.ece. Retrieved 2007-08-19. 
  11. ^ "MTV e2: will.i.am". MTV.ca. http://www.mtv.ca/tvshows/show.jhtml?id=1340. Retrieved 2007-08-19. 
  12. ^ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pk5QQuMH9Cs
  13. ^ "WILL.I.AM JOINS MUSICANE AS HEAD OF MARKETING". Remix Mag. http://remixmag.com/beat_science/will-i-am-musicane-092606/. Retrieved 2007-02-24. 
  14. ^ "Musicane Announces Launch of the DRM-free will.i.am On-Line Music Store". top40-charts.com. http://top40-charts.com/news.php?nid=34752. Retrieved 2007-08-19. 
  15. ^ Katie Hasty, "Rascal Flatts Races To No. 1 In Debut-Heavy Week", Billboard.com, October 3, 2007
  16. ^ Paul Cashmere "Foo Fighters Slaughter Competition For Number 1 Spot". undercover. Retrieved November 16, 2007.
  17. ^ a b c d "will.i.am - Songs About Girls chart peaks". Music Square. Retrieved November 16, 2007.
  18. ^ "Polish album certifications – will.i.am – Songs About Girls" (in Polish). Polish Producers of Audio and Video (ZPAV). http://www.zpav.pl/rankingi/wyroznienia/zlote/index.php. 

[edit] External links

will.i.am
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