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Songs About Girls

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Untitled

Songs About Girls is the debut album by 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 the 25th of September 2007.[1] 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.[2]

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."[1] 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.[3] 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.

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.[4] However, the only collaboration that made it to the final cut is the Snoop Dogg collaboration. Cheryl Cole also sang backing vocals for the single version of "Heartbreaker".

Album release

In September of 2006, will.i.am became the head of marketing of the online music distribution company Musicane.[5] Musicane allows artists to directly sell their songs to the public without a record company overseeing the distribution of the album.[6] 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.[3] The album went Gold in Poland three days before its release.

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."[3]

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 fifty-eight with sales of 870 copies.

The song Impatient was later heavily sampled on Estelle's #1 hit American Boy, which was produced by Will.I.Am.

Track listing

All songs produced by will.i.am unless otherwise noted. "Dynamite Interlude" has no writing or production credits.

  1. "Over" - 4:01
  2. "Heartbreaker" - 5:28
  3. "I Got It from My Mama" - 4:02
  4. "She's a Star" (Produced by Polow da Don) - 3:48
  5. "Get Your Money" - 5:28
  6. "The Donque Song" (featuring Snoop Dogg) (Produced by Fernando Garibay) - 4:30
  7. "Impatient" (featuring Dante Santiago) - 4:17
  8. "One More Chance" (Produced by Fernando Garibay) - 4:24
  9. "Invisible" (Produced by will.i.am and Paper-Boy) - 3:57
  10. "Fantastic" - 3:26
  11. "Fly Girl" - 4:46
  12. "Dynamite Interlude" - 1:20
  13. "Ain't It Pretty" (Produced by Polow da Don) - 4:36
  14. "Make It Funky" - 4:00
  15. "S.O.S. (Mother Nature)" - 4:18

Bonus tracks

  1. "Spending Money" - 3:57 (México/Japan/Russia/Germany/Taiwan/Brazil/UK bonus track) (not listed as bonus track in the UK)
  2. "Mama Mia" - 3:39 (Japan/UK bonus track)
  3. "Damn Damn Damn" - 4:28
  4. "will.i.am vs. Superblack" (iTunes preorder only)

Singles

  1. "I Got It from My Mama"
  2. "Heartbreaker"
  3. "One More Chance"

Samples

  1. "I Got It from My Mama" samples "Don Quixiotte" by "Magazine 60"
  2. "Over" samples "It's Over" by Electric Light Orchestra A.K.A. ELO
  3. "Fantastic" samples "I Want You Back" by the Jackson 5
  4. "S.O.S. (Mother Nature)" samples "50 Ways to Leave Your Lover"by Paul Simon
  5. "Get Your Money" samples "Body Language" by M.A.N.D.Y. & Booka Shade
  6. "Mama Mia" samples "What'd I Say" by Ray Charles

Charts

Chart (2007) Peak
Position
Australian ARIA Albums Chart[7] 58
France Albums Chart[8] 89
Switzerland Albums Chart[8] 27
UK Albums Chart 68
U.S. Billboard 200[8] 38

References

  1. ^ a b "will.i.am Has Love On The Brain For Solo Debut". Billboard.com. Retrieved 2007-08-19.
  2. ^ "I Got It From My Mama". Billboard.com. Retrieved 2007-08-19.
  3. ^ a b c "Peas in our time". Times Online. Retrieved 2007-08-19.
  4. ^ "MTV e2: will.i.am". MTV.ca. Retrieved 2007-08-19.
  5. ^ "WILL.I.AM JOINS MUSICANE AS HEAD OF MARKETING". Remix Mag. Retrieved 2007-02-24.
  6. ^ "Musicane Announces Launch of the DRM-free will.i.am On-Line Music Store". top40-charts.com. Retrieved 2007-08-19.
  7. ^ Paul Cashmere "Foo Fighters Slaughter Competition For Number 1 Spot". undercover. Retrieved November 16 2007.
  8. ^ a b c "will.i.am - Songs About Girls chart peaks". Music Square. Retrieved November 16 2007.