CeCe Winans

CeCe Winans

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CeCe Winans, 'Let Them Fall In Love': For The Record

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Winans' GRAMMY win for her 2017 gospel album arrived 30 years after her win for the 1987 hit "For Always" that she sang with her brother, BeBe Winans
Philip Merrill
GRAMMYs
Feb 22, 2018 - 4:34 pm

After close to a decade concentrating on ministry at Nashville Life Church with husband Alvin Love, the 2017 album Let Them Fall In Love restated the strength of CeCe Winans' musical and devotional message. It won Best Gospel Album at the 60th GRAMMY Awards and its track "Never Have To Be Alone" won for Best Gospel Performance/Song.

For The Record: CeCe Winans, 'Let Them Fall … '

Winans' GRAMMY wins began with the 1987 hit "For Always" performed with her brother, BeBe Winans. Still going strong 30 years later, her total GRAMMY wins so far have risen to an even dozen. And fittingly, "For Always" describes the impact she has had on American gospel and R&B music and on listeners' hearts.

CeCe Winans' family of gospel-enthused recording artists and performers has a complex, marvelous history. Her 1984 album, Lord Lift Us Up, with BeBe drew a Best Soul Gospel Performance By A Duo Or Group nomination at the 27th GRAMMY Awards, their first. BeBe has six career GRAMMYs, as does brother Marvin. As a group, the Winans — Carvin, Michael, Marvin, and Ronald — have five GRAMMY wins.

Additional family members, including the parents and the siblings' children, account for many more GRAMMY nominations. That's some spirit, accompanied by a gospel legacy almost too awesome to absorb.

Taking a look at CeCe's half-dozen gospel album GRAMMY wins before Let Them Fall In Love, they are bookmarked by collaborations with BeBe — 1991's Different Lifestyles and 2009's Still. Between those years, four of her solo albums won — her first solo LP, 1995's Alone In His Presence, followed by CeCe Winans (2001), Purified (2005), and Thy Kingdom Come (2008).

We don't have to imagine the faith that produced this rich collection of excellence because we can listen to it. NPR described just one track of CeCe Winans' latest as "a mighty blast of joy," so step right up.

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Marvin Gaye

Marvin Gaye

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Marvin Gaye 'Let's Get It On' | For The Record

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Seductive, elegant and successful, this landmark album expanded the range of the soul-music genre and raised the singer, songwriter and composer to iconic status
Philip Merrill
GRAMMYs
Aug 30, 2018 - 4:27 pm

In 1973, the Marvin Gaye album Let's Get It On brought new dimensions to R&B/soul music, expanding the genre's boundaries musically as well as delivering a sexual-liberation message that gelled with the youth "love-in" philosophy in full force at the time.

Marvin Gaye's 'Let's Get It On' | For The Record

Many elements came together to build the album's creative success. U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War had ended earlier that year. Gaye's previous socially conscious album What's Going On had been followed by his soundtrack to the movie Trouble Man, and the intimate, slow seductiveness of Let's Get It On was embraced by America as a message that felt just right. As an artist, Gaye's previous sales earned him creative control he took full advantage of, blending previously recorded tracks with new ideas, layering passionate background vocals of his own including moaning vocals, which were daring for the time. This was a turning point for the Berry Gordy music empire as well. He had started the album's Tamla label even before Motown and was expanding to the West Coast.

Let's Get It On features the influential collective of studio musicians known as the Funk Brothers, who helped create a musical platform for Gaye. The album is among their earliest credits, and they went on to win GRAMMY Awards and receive the Recording Academy's Lifetime Achievement Award in 2004.

On a more personal side, Gaye's marriage to Gordy's sister Anna was heading toward divorce and some of the romantic impulses captured by the microphone were reportedly directed toward his future wife, Janis Hunter, who producer/co-writer Ed Townsend had brought to the recording studio.

The title track went to No. 1 on Billboard's Hot 100 and the LP reached No. 2 on the Billboard 200, the most successful soul album of the year. Gaye's performances on tour were electrifying and his subsequent live medley of "Trouble Man" and the LP's "Distant Lover" track helped prove Gaye's emerging iconic status. Although nominated for a GRAMMY for the album, it was later at the 25th GRAMMY Awards that Gaye enjoyed his first wins for "Sexual Healing." His own Lifetime Achievement Award came in 1996, and Let's Get It On was inducted into the GRAMMY Hall Of Fame in 2004, joining its natural complement What's Going On, which was inducted in 1998.

Looking back, critics credit the smash as opening up the future of funk, as well as the quiet-storm and slow-jam styles. It was noted at the time that the explicit sexuality of the lyrics had a metaphysical dimension as well — embodying a yearning that was physical and spiritual at the same time. In his liner notes, Gaye conveyed the message, "I hope the music that I present here makes you lucky."

Catching Up On Music News Powered By The Recording Academy Just Got Easier. Have A Google Home Device? "Talk To GRAMMYs"

 

Michael Jackson in 1979

Michael Jackson

Photo: Chris Walter/WireImage.com

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Michael Jackson's 'Off The Wall' | For The Record

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Go back to the disco era and relive the emergence of the classic album's fresh R&B fusion
Philip Merrill
GRAMMYs
Jul 12, 2018 - 3:08 pm

In 1979 the emerging disco genre produced amazing R&B crossover hybrids, many of them recognized at the 22nd GRAMMY Awards, the first and only year in which the Best Disco Recording category was awarded. Into this esteemed mix, after meeting on the set filming The Wiz, Michael Jackson and producer Quincy Jones dropped Off The Wall on Aug. 10.

Michael Jackson's 'Off The Wall' | For The Record

The challenge for Jackson and Jones was to make the right creative experiments, including Jackson writing songs and producing them and collaborations with Paul McCartney and Stevie Wonder. The band Heatwave had already been nominated for GRAMMYs for songs such as their funk-disco hit "Boogie Nights." Jones reached out to their keyboard player and songwriter Rod Temperton and he submitted three compositions that Jackson featured on the album — its title track, "Rock With You" and the album's closer, "Burn This Disco Down."

Musicians playing on the album included Patti Austin, George Duke and David Foster, who also co-wrote a track. Lead engineer was the legendary Bruce Swedien and Ed Cherney was one of his assistants. All of these musical geniuses went on to further greatness in the years that followed their participation in Jackson's fifth studio album. After working on Off The Wall, the five of them went on to win a combined 27 GRAMMYs.

The unprecedented splash when Off The Wall  hit shelves pushed two hits to No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 — "Don't Stop 'Til You Get Enough" and "Rock With You" — and another two at No. 10 — "Off The Wall" and "She's Out Of My Life." This was the first time an album by a solo artist had ever notched four hits in the Top 10.

Arguably the pinnacle track of the set was "Don't Stop 'Til You Get Enough." Jackson's composition of the song began in his Encino, Calif., kitchen as something he couldn't stop humming as he went through the day. He had to convince his mother the title was not just about sex, and luckily he did. The track earned Jackson his first career GRAMMY win for Best R&B Vocal Performance, Male at the 22nd GRAMMYs.

In addition to its GRAMMY win, in 2008 Off The Wall was inducted into the GRAMMY Hall Of Fame along with Jackson's follow-up album Thriller. He also earned the Recording Academy Lifetime Achievement Award for his transformative contributions to the music community in 2010, most of which started with this seminal record in 1979.

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Artwork for For The Record episode on Aaliyah's 'One In A Million'

Aaliyah

Photo: Steve Granitz/WireImage

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For The Record: How Aaliyah Redefined Her Sound And Herself On 'One In A Million'

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Released in 1996, Aaliyah's career-defining 'One in a Million' marked a fresh beginning for the GRAMMY-nominated singer and launched her into a new era that saw her expand as an artistic leader, creative visionary and fashion icon
Treye Green
GRAMMYs
Aug 27, 2021 - 2:13 pm

Illuminated by the pale white light of a New York City subway platform, Aaliyah stares into the frame on the cover of her album, One in a Million. Her eyes hidden behind a pair of silver-frame sunglasses. Her slim figure cloaked in a black jumpsuit. Her pout brushed in a shade of brick-red lipstick. Her countenance unfalteringly confident as she faced her new era.

In the two years between the release of her multiplatinum debut album Age Ain't Nothing But a Number in 1994 and her follow-up, One in a Million, on August 27, 1996, Aaliyah had established herself as a budding musical talent. But in the fallout of her marriage scandal with R. Kelly and subsequent professional split from the signer, who wrote and produced the majority of Age Ain't Nothing but a Number, Aaliyah and her team faced the taxing task of finding a new team of producers equipped to push her sound forward.

Aaliyah recorded One in a Million while finishing her studies at Detroit High School for the Fine and Performing Arts, from which she graduated in 1997. She had also ended her contract with Jive Records, and then signed a joint deal with Atlantic Records and her uncle Barry Hankerson's Blackground Records. She was 16 when she began recording the album, having turned 17 when it dropped, a pivotal time in her personal life journey. She perfectly captured the transition in her iconic One in a Million era.

How 'One in a Million' Redefined Aaliyah's Sound

"I faced the adversity, I could've broken down, I could've gone and hid in the closet and said, 'I'm not going to do this anymore.' But I love singing, and I wasn't going to let that mess stop me," Aaliyah said in a 1996 interview with  writer Michael Gonzalez, per a retrospective on her career for Wax Poetics. "I got a lot of support from my fans and that inspired me to put that behind me, be a stronger person, and put my all into making One in a Million."

THE SOUND

Many artists Aaliyah's age may have been the product of the creative strategizing of their label—with managers, A&R teams, and other members of their crew choosing their producers, lyrics and overall sound with little to no input from the artists.

But Aaliyah challenged this expectation and misconception by taking creative control of One in a Million, making the sound on the project all her own. She led each member of her production and writing team to craft a One in a Million era with a variety of production styles.

"She definitely had an executive producer's ear. She had a great sense of what was right for herself, and you have to give her a lot of credit for steering those sessions to a place that obviously created meaningful hit records," Craig Kallman, CEO of Atlantic Records, told Vibe.com.

"She obviously made One in a Million, an album that was very, very much ahead of the curve and didn't sound like anything that had come before it," he added.

To aid in uncovering Aaliyah's new, "ahead of the curve" sound, Craig King and Vincent Herbert became the earliest producers to lay the musical groundwork of One in a Million, which Aaliyah first started recording in 1995.

"We caught [Aaliyah] at her probably second-most vulnerable stage in her career. We caught her at her sophomore jinx and when people were like, 'This will never work without R. Kelly because he put this signature sound on you,'" King told GRAMMY.com about working on One in a Million. "She was really trying to redefine all of that narrative, and we weren't interested in replicating what he was doing. We wanted to bring our own sound into the game, too."

Recording out of the famed Vanguard Studios in Aaliyah's hometown of Detroit, Michigan, King and Herbert produced a total of eight tracks for the project over three months, though only four made the final cut for the album. The album's production team also included contributors Jermaine Dupri, Darryl Simmons, Missy Elliott, Timbaland, and others, as well as writers Diane Warren, Monica Bell, Japhe Tejeda, and more.

With a team of production and songwriting heavy hitters in Aaliyah's corner, One in a Million began to take shape. The album would become a whole embodiment of Aaliyah's sound, building the R&B-rooted stylings that made her debut album a success into genre-blending productions while also giving listeners a fuller look into sonic complexity of the singer as an artist.

The Timbaland-produced lead single "If Your Girl Only Knew" bumps along, with its beat pulling from pop and funk inspirations, as Aaliyah calls out a flirtatious guy who's in a relationship. "4 Page Letter" and the album's title track slink along with multilayered productions packed with hi-hats, clicks, triple-beats, strings, and stacked harmonies, all the while reimagining the essential production elements of a love ballad. "Got's to Give It Up" and "Choosey Lover" put a modern spin on '70s throwback jams, while "A Girl Like You" samples "Summer Madness" by Kool & the Gang.

"I love all kinds of music, and I want to be known as the kind of singer that can do all of that. So, that's why I wanted the different varieties on the album to showcase that—showcase each part of my personality," Aaliyah said in an interview with the Associated Press during her press run for the project. "Definitely I love the soul, the hip-hop, the R&B. I love it all. But I do want people to see me as the type of artist that can sing any kind of music."

Along with their lyrical content and innovative productions, the album's tracks, like the paired-down, Warren-written "The One I Gave My Heart To" and the Herber- and King-produced "Never Givin' Up," also highlighted Aaliyah's vocal abilities, expanding the strength of her falsetto and upper register while allowing her the full space to showcase other elements of her vocal range and stylings.

"I remember being in the studio when she was singing ['The One I Gave My Heart To'] and hitting those notes and it was just beautiful," Warren told Vibe.com. "It just showed another side to her. The octave goes up in the end and some of that was what I'd written into the song, but she took it somewhere else. She not only rose to it, she went beyond it. She nailed that song and it was amazing what she did. It's still one of my favorite records."

Speaking on "Never Givin' Up," King said he was completely enamored with her interpretation of the track when they recorded it.

"The vocal arrangement. Every single time we layered a vocal, she was just so on point," King said. "She just superseded all my expectations. I was very, very impressed with her style there."

"This album, it shows the growth of the past two years. I'm 17 now. So, I've grown in a lot of ways. And this album, I think it shows a lot of my vocal range," Aaliyah told the AP while speaking on developing her sound for the project.  "I took a lot of risks on this album. I tried different things. And that's the main change from the two albums."

Aaliyah's shift in her sound resulted in some standout commercial wins. There were a staggering six singles released from One in a Million: "If Your Girl Only Knew," "One in a Million," "Got to Give It Up," "4 Page Letter," "Hot Like Fire," and "The One I Gave My Heart To." The latter eventually peaked at No. 9 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, making it the highest-charting single from the album. The remaining tracks saw varying degrees of success in both the U.S. and internationally — with "If Your Girl Only Knew" topping the Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs and "One in a Million" topping the R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay.

THE LOOK

While her fashion remained a key piece of her overall creative narrative as an artist throughout her career, Aaliyah's style transcended in the One in a Million era. She elevated her aesthetic with the assistance of her stylist and costume designer Derek Lee. As his first project with her, Lee styled Aaliyah's "One In A Million" music video after the two had a chance encounter in Santa Monica, California, just days before shooting the video in Los Angeles.

"[Aaliyah's] look was already established in a certain sense, but I wanted to start a progression. Prior to One In A Million, [her look] was definitely younger, her look was her age. Now, when we get to One in a Million, it's still her age, but it shows a little bit more of a maturity as well," Lee told GRAMMY.com.

Much like her album cover shoot, which featured moody shades of black, concrete gray, merlot, and the grey-green paint of the subway platform, Aaliyah's One in a Million era was often framed around a dark styling narrative that reflected her favorite colors and fabrics, including her affection for leather pieces.

"It was easy to make black stuff look cool and hard and sexy at the same time. One of her favorite colors was black. She liked it. She felt comfortable in it. It was easy to feel,"  Lee said. "One thing with Aaliyah is that her biggest accessory was her swag. She sold confidence, and the color black just enhanced it."

Aaliyah opted for minimal outfit combos consisting of one to three pieces that were fuseless and easy and in no way distracted from her presence on stage or on camera: See her oversized leather-coat-and-pants combo she wore during an appearance on "Live With Regis and Kathie Lee," her looks on the her "One in a Million" and "4 Page Letter" music video, and the metallic boiler suit Lee hand-painted and airbrushed for her performance on "The Tonight Show with Jay Leno."

"She was so sweet and just regular, when you're sitting there with her and kicking it with her. But soon as she gets on stage, she's this persona, which is her, honestly. She turns up that swag so much that you don't really want anything to distract from it because it shined so bright," Lee said of Aaliyah's looks, which regularly played with proportions by pairing oversized pants with mid-drift-baring T-shirts, bra tops and crop tops. "That was always on purpose. Even though she was dressed cool, it wasn't so over­ the ­top where you weren't still paying attention to what she was doing."

Much like she held creative control over the album's sound, Aaliyah exercised full agency over her One in a Million style narrative. She refused to buckle to any perceived pressure regarding the sexed-up styling arcs often employed by labels, stylists and other industry entities looking to rebrand a late-teen music artist approaching young adulthood. She instead chose to let her style reflect her authentic self, offering an example for her younger listeners that even in their own lives, they didn't have to rush to meet any standard or expectation that misaligned with what they wanted to portray.

"When she was ready for something, she was ready for something and was sure. If she wasn't mentally ready for something, then we wouldn't do it. Because she never wanted to look like she was dressed by somebody. I never want anyone I dress to look like they're dressed by anybody," Lee said. "She trusted me when she saw that I understood that. It was almost an unspoken agreement between me, her and her mom.

"I was always protective of her and never wanted her to sexualize herself in a certain way and dress in a certain way until she was ready … She never did anything before the time. She never forced it."

THE LEGACY

For 17-year-old Aaliyah, One in a Million became a career-defining project that silenced any lingering questions regarding her industry viability and influence. It also allowed her to grow as an artistic leader as she voiced her expectations for the project to her roster of contributors, working with them to ideate and execute the album's musical and visual concepts.

"[Aaliyah] never really chased after anybody else's style or chased what was going on at the moment," Lee said. "She knew her lane, wanted people around her that understood that lane, and wanted those people to accentuate her in that lane and leave the rest up to her … Her leadership was consistent. She was someone that had conviction and had a vision. I thank God for that because it made my job a lot easier knowing someone's vision, instead of having to guess what their vision was."

"I hope [listeners] appreciate the songbird that she is, the writer that she is, the singer that she is, and the vocal choices that she's made in this project," album producer King added. "I hope people really embrace and lean into her vocal abilities on this record. It really has set a precedent for a lot of singers in the game."

Released in the U.S. 25 years ago to the day, One in a Million continues its legacy in 2021. This month (Aug. 20), the album was released on streaming services after being largely absent on the digital market for over a decade, allowing music fans worldwide easier access to the album that has served as an inspiration for countless artists in the decades since its release. The rerelease comes days before the 20th anniversary of Aaliyah's death and the 25th anniversary of One in a Million.

But beyond its commercial impact and influence on pop culture, One in a Million, and its true wonder, will forever rest in what the album represented for Aaliyah personally as she stepped into her late teens and flexed her creative voice with reposeful fervor and unwavering certainty.

One in a Million marked Aaliyah's new beginning. And 25 years later, the project remains a symbol of her self-awareness and artistic sureness as she plotted the next steps in her journey from breakout star to an established music industry force who's confident in her sound, her self-image, and the creative story she wanted to tell.

Dawn Richard On Alchemizing Grief Into Joy, Advocating For Black Creators & Her NOLA-Honoring New Album Second Line

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Artwork for For The Record episode on Beyoncé's '4'

Beyoncé

Photo: Kevin Winter/American Idol 2011/Getty Images

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For The Record: The Creative Rebirth Of Beyoncé On '4'

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For the 100th episode of our For The Record series, GRAMMY.com takes you inside Beyoncé's GRAMMY-winning, platinum-selling 2011 album, '4,' an ode to the classics that ignited a personal and creative rebirth for the singer and launched a new chapter
Bianca Gracie
GRAMMYs
Jun 27, 2021 - 4:27 pm

Just before the 2010s, streaming services like Spotify, Apple Music and Pandora picked up where Napster rose and fell in the late '90s, driving the music industry toward a singles-driven market. Beyoncé's 4 album showed she was clearly not having it. In her 2013 HBO documentary, Life Is But A Dream, she targeted the then-burgeoning trend.

"It's a tough time for the music industry. I'm an artist that tours, I'm an artist that makes albums," she explained in an exasperated tone. "People don't make albums anymore, they just try to sell a bunch of quick singles and they burn out and they put out a new one. People don't even listen to a body of work anymore."

Before hip-hop dominated streaming in 2017, EDM and pop wore listeners out on sticky dance floors. Everyone wanted a piece of the mainstream radio pie, with songs like Usher's "OMG," Lady Gaga's "Poker Face," Rihanna's "Only Girl (In The World)," Jay-Z's and Alicia Keys' "Empire State of Mind," and the Black Eyed Peas' "Boom Boom Pow" ruling Billboard's Top 40 chart before and during the new decade.

But rewind just a few years before the release of Beyoncé's 4, a time when she, too, was caught up in the same sonic whirlwind she seemingly resented. In 2008, Queen Bey was at the height of her career thanks to her mammoth third solo album I Am...Sasha Fierce.

The Creative Rebirth Of Beyoncé On '4'

She scored five GRAMMY wins at the 52nd GRAMMY Awards in 2010, including Song Of The Year for "Single Ladies (Put A Ring On It)"), becoming the first woman artist to win six GRAMMYs in one night. "Single Ladies (Put A Ring On It)," "Halo," "If I Were A Boy," and "Sweet Dreams" were inescapable Top 10 singles. Beyoncé later doubled down on her mainstream presence by collaborating twice with Lady Gaga: "Video Phone" off Sasha Fierce and "Telephone" off Gaga's The Fame Monster. Bey's growing trendiness led to I Am... World Tour, her biggest and highest-grossing international trek at the time.

"After the last tour I was a bit overwhelmed and overworked," she explained in her 2011 Year of 4 documentary. "My mother was the person that preached to me and almost harassed me every day after I was doing the last world tour: 'You really need to live your life and open your eyes. You don't want to wake up with no memories and never really being able to see the world.'"

After the tour, Beyoncé announced a year-long hiatus to catch up on sleep and rethink her life's purpose. Her worldwide exploration of places like the Great Wall of China, the Egyptian pyramids and the Red Sea gave her insight, grounded her as a human, and eventually inspired 4, whose special title signifies the date of her marriage to Jay-Z, both their birthdays and her mother's birthday.

Released in June 2011, 4 is a 12-track refocus of Beyoncé's artistry on which she disregarded making music solely for mainstream appeal. The album's heightened maturity is reflective of three life changes. Two months prior to the album's release, the artist mutually severed management ties with her father Mathew Knowles, who'd guided her career even before the birth of Destiny's Child in the '90s. Around that time, according to Jay-Z, she became pregnant with Blue Ivy Carter during a Paris trip for the album's cover shoot. And along with being a new mother, she would soon enter her 30s.

Needless to say, Beyoncé was already "Drunk In Love" before the ubiquitous 2013 hit won two GRAMMYs three years later. And what better way to celebrate romance than with R&B? But instead of modernizing the sound as she did on previous albums, the artist opted to highlight the genre's traditional roots.

4 is more stripped-down compared to the gloss of I Am...Sasha Fierce, the liveliness of B'Day, and the contemporary radio-friendliness of Dangerously in Love. Instead, 4 is an ode to the classics. "Love On Top" resurrects the vibrancy of '80s R&B, a time when all-stars like the Jackson 5 and Whitney Houston upheld the heart of Motown's past. The song's retro appeal continues in its music video, with Beyoncé going full New Edition via boy band choreography.

Read: Inside The Visual World Of Beyoncé And Black Is King, Her "Love Letter" To Black Men

Nostalgia proved to be a winning formula: "Love On Top" won the GRAMMY for Best Traditional R&B Performance at the 55th GRAMMY Awards in 2013. The album then heads to '60s Philadelphia soul on "Rather Die Young," where Beyoncé uses the melodrama she picked up from her film roles in Dreamgirls and Cadillac Records to fuel the impassioned vocals and lyrics: "You're my James Dean / You make me feel like I'm 17," she whispers in the first chorus.

"Run The World (Girls)," the lead single off 4, was a total red herring. The female empowerment anthem, which samples Major Lazer's "Pon De Floor," doesn't indicate the album's time travel. (Diplo later pops in to co-produce "End of Time," a wildly addictive tribute to Nigerian Afrobeat pioneer, Fela Kuti).

The unapologetic mushiness of 4 is balanced by uptempos that remind you just why Beyoncé is a superstar. "Best Thing I Never Had," an unofficial sequel to the singer's 2006 GRAMMY-nominated anthem "Irreplaceable," finds her classily kicking a no-good man to the curb while trading Ne-Yo's pen for Babyface. The effervescent "Countdown" is wholly dedicated to her longtime boo, Jay-Z. Sampling Boyz II Men's 1991 hit "Uhh Ahh," the brass-heavy single shows off her signature rap-singing style first debuted with Destiny's Child: "Still love the way he talk, still love the way I sing / Still love the way he rock them black diamonds in that chain."

The '90s pop up on "Party," the laid-back groove dripping in "swagu" thanks to Kanye West's co-writing and co-producing credits. The album's version features Outkast's too-smooth André 3000, while the video features a then-rising J. Cole. 4 then heads back to the '80s for the bonus track "Schoolin' Life." Here, Beyoncé channels Prince as her playful vocals weave between an irresistibly funkified melody.

What makes 4 special is Beyoncé's vocal growth. There's the grit of "I Care," whose rawness cuts deep—"You see these tears falling down to my ears / I swear, you like when I'm in pain"—as she scats alongside the electric guitar solo; the infectious opening run on "Countdown"; the tenderness of "I Miss You," influenced by co-writer Frank Ocean; the emotionally unguarded "1+1," which riffs off Sam Cooke's 1960 classic "Wonderful World"; and the jaw-dropping four-key change on "Love on Top."

"Strong enough to bear the children / Then get back to business," Beyoncé affirms on "Run The World (Girls)." It's the motto of the 4 era: The album is the artist's lowest-selling LP to date, but just as she reassures in Life Is But A Dream, that was never the point. She helped revitalize the album's art form while proving that women can balance their careers and motherhood, all while taking major risks. After parting ways with her father, Beyoncé founded Parkwood Entertainment, a Columbia Records imprint and management company, which helped bring 4 to life.

Of course, this is Beyoncé, so the accolades were still impressive: The platinum-selling 4 continued her hot streak of debuting atop the Billboard 200 chart. And along with "Love On Top" winning a GRAMMY, album single "Party" earned a GRAMMY nomination for Best Rap/Sung Collaboration at the 54th GRAMMY Awards in 2012.

The album's vulnerability led to the world-stopping, industry-shifting surprise drop of Beyoncé in 2013 and the gripping Lemonade in 2016, both revealing more layers of heartache, overt sexuality, postpartum depression, socio-political injustices, feminism, trauma, infidelity, and forgiveness.

That continued intimacy worked in her favor tenfold: At the 2021 GRAMMY Awards show, Beyoncé made GRAMMY history when she became the performing artist with the most career GRAMMY wins with a total of 28, as well as the most nominated woman artist, counting 79 GRAMMY nominations overall. It all goes back to taking a chance on herself with 4, which further shaped a legacy that now matches the same legends she honored on this very album.

"There is room on this Earth for many queens. I have an authentic, God-given talent, drive and longevity that will always separate me from everyone else," she told Complex in 2011. "I've been fortunate to accomplish things that the younger generation of queens dream of accomplishing. I have no desire for anyone else's throne. I am very comfortable in the throne I've been building for the past 15 years."

Black Sounds Beautiful: How Beyoncé Has Empowered The Black Community Across Her Music And Art

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