New Life

New Life
Studio album by Monica
Released	April 6, 2012 (2012-04-06)
Recorded	2010–12
Genre	R&B, soul
Label	RCA
Producer	Monica Brown (also exec.), Bryan-Michael Cox, Jermaine Dupri, Earl & E, Missy Elliott, Lamb, Rico Love, Pierre Medor, Mr. Morris, Polow da Don (also exec.), Salaam Remi, D. Smith
Monica chronology
Still Standing (2010) New Life (2012)
Alternative cover
Deluxe edition cover
Singles from New Life
"Anything (To Find You)" Released: August 2, 2011 "Until It's Gone" Released: September 27, 2011 "It All Belongs to Me" Released: February 14, 2012 "Without You" Released: May 8, 2012

New Life is the seventh studio album by American R&B recording artist Monica released on April 6, 2012, as the singer's debut release with RCA, following the disbandment of her former label, J Records in October 2011. Production on the album was handeled by Bryan-Michael Cox, Jermaine Dupri, Missy Elliott, Lamb, Rico Love, Polow da Don, and Salaam Remi, among others.

Preceded by the Missy Elliott-crafted buzz singles "Anything (To Find You)" and "Until It's Gone", released on August 2 and September 27, 2011 as digital downloads respectively, the album's first single "It All Belongs to Me", a duet with singer Brandy, was released on February 6, 2012.

Background and developement

In September 2010, Monica said that she had started work with producer Polow da Don on her upcoming seventh studio album.^[2] Initially expected to be released as her fifth album on mentor Clive Davis' J Records following the March 2010 release of her commercially successful sixth album Still Standing, much of it would eventually be recorded under RCA Records after the restructuring of the RCA Music Group in October 2011 which shuttered J along with sister labels Jive and Arista.^[3]

In December 2010, the singer spoke about the development of the album to Rap-Up magazine. Together she and Polow were confirmed to have worked on the bulk of the album though Monica expressed her interest in tyring “to get with one or two producers and pretty much create the meat, and then you pretty much get the rest of it done around the center of the album.”^[4] Though still untitled, she hoped that as with Still Standing, determining an album title would help finding a direction on the project.^[4] On December 16, 2010, New Life, the title of the album, was finally confirmed by Monica on her Twitter account.^[1]

Other producers on the album include Rico Love,^[5] Oak,^[6] and Missy Elliott.^[7][8]

Singles

The album's lead single, "It All Belongs to Me", is a duet with recording artist Brandy. It leaked on the Internet on February 6, 2012, and was released to the iTunes store February 14, 2012. It officially impact Rhythmic and Urban radio on February 21, 2012.^[9] The song has recently climbed to number 23 on the Hot R&B/Hip Hop Songs chart. "Without You" will serve as the official second single, impacting U.S. Urban AC radio on May 8, 2012.^[10]

Other Songs

"Anything (To Find You)", featuring Rick Ross, was released for digital download on August 2, 2011 as the first promotional single. However, it was not included on the album's official tracklisting. The song originally also featured Lil' Kim. The song initially debuted on the Hot R&B/Hip Hop Songs chart at seventy-one, and continued growing for several weeks, eventually peaking at number twenty-five. "Until It's Gone" was released for digital download on September 27, 2011 as the album's second promotional single. The song impacted Urban Mainstream, and Adult radio on October 3 and October 4, 2011. The song peaked at number twenty-two on the Hot R&B/Hip Hop Songs chart. The song served fourteen weeks on that chart. Although "Until It's Gone" was lined up to become official first single together with "Anything (To Find You)", the merge of RCA Records from J Records delayed much of the album release.

Reception

Critical response

Professional ratings
Review scores
Source	Rating
Allmusic	[11]
The A.V. Club	C+[12]
The Boston Globe	mixed[13]
Entertainment Weekly	C+[14]
Los Angeles Times	[15]
NME	4/10[16]
Slant Magazine	[17]

New Life received generally mixed reviews from music critics. At Metacritic, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, the album received an average score of 58, based on seven reviews, which indicates "mixed or average reviews".^[18] Adam Markovitz of Entertainment Weekly criticized its "cheesy choruses and outdated tun", and called the album "a thoroughly last-millennium set of self-help ballads about starting over ('Take a Chance') and finding strength in tears ('Cry'), set to the kind of cheesy slow-jam beats that were hot back during Monica's previous life as a '90s teen phenom."^[14] Los Angeles Times writer Ernest Hardy criticized the songwriting and called the album "a slickly produced collection of largely generic, meandering songs about self-affirmation in the wake of heartache and romantic disillusionment."^[15] Tuyet Nguyen of The A.V. Club commented that it "engages [Monica's] vocal strengths without ever really challenging them" and stated, "New Life isn’t about broadening horizons so much as it is about realizing a comfortable niche."^[12]

Although he found it "beautifully sung and slickly produced", Ken Capobianco of The Boston Globe also called the album "numbingly predictable" and commented that Monica "deserves better material than the generic songs she works with here."^[13] Ben Cardew of NME noted "limpness" in its songs and wrote that "there are far too many limp ballads to really excite."^[16] Slant Magazine's Jonathan Keefe found the album "scattered and uneven", and accused Monica's collaboraters of disserving her, writing that New Life "squanders Monica's on-point vocal turns on some cliché-addled songs and embarrassingly cheap-sounding production."^[17] However, Allmusic editor Matt Collar found Monica's voice to be "in top form" and complimented her "saucy, spirited, and soulful vibe", writing that it "makes New Life such a refreshing and focused female soul album."^[11]

Commercial performance

One week after its release, New Life debuted at number four on the US Billboard 200, and at number two on the official Billboard's Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums, with moderately successful first week sales of 69,000 copies^[19] — less than half as much as her previous effort, number-two album Standing with first week sales of 184,000 copies. ^[20] However, this marked Monica's fifth top ten album in this country on both the US Billboard 200 and Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums charts. In it's second week, the album slid with a 70% decrease to number 15 with 22,000 units sold. ^[21]

Track listing

Sample credits^[22]

• "Until It's Gone" contains a sample from "I Don't Want to Lose You" written by Thomas Bell and Linda Epstein, as performed by The Spinners; and "9mm Goes Bang" written by Scott Sterling and Lawrence Parker, as performed by Boogie Down Productions.
• "Cry" contains a sample from "Igloo Love" written and performed by Salaam Remi.
• "Catch Me" contains a sample from "Isn't It a Shame" as performed by Labelle, written by Randy Edelman.
• "Anything (To Find You)" contains a portion of the composition "Who Shot Ya?", written by Christopher Wallace, Sean Combs, Nashiem Sa-Allah Myrick, Herbert Magidson and Allie Wrubel; contains a portion of the composition "You're All I Need to Get By", written by Nickolas Ashford and Valerie Simpson; contains a sample from "I'm Afraid the Masquerade Is Over", as performed by David Porter.

Charts

Chart positions

Release history

References

External links

• Monica.com — official site