''Liberation'' is the fourth
studio album
An album is a collection of audio recordings (e.g., music) issued on a medium such as compact disc (CD), Phonograph record, vinyl (record), audio tape (like 8-track cartridge, 8-track or Cassette tape, cassette), or digital distribution, dig ...
by American singer-songwriter
Mya. It was intended to be Harrison's debut release with her then new record label
Universal Motown following her departure from
Interscope
Interscope Records is an American record label based in Santa Monica, California, owned by Universal Music Group through its Interscope Geffen A&M imprint. Founded in late 1990 by Jimmy Iovine and Ted Field as a $20 million joint venture ...
in 2005. Before leaving, she had begun work on an album for Interscope called ''Control Freak'' set for a summer release 2005 with production by a host of other producers. Ultimately, she decided to leave
A&M and Interscope Records and her management; subsequently Harrison made the transition within
Universal Music Group
Universal Music Group N.V. (often abbreviated as UMG and referred to as Universal Music Group or Universal Music) is a Netherlands, Dutch–United States, American multinational Music industry, music corporation under Law of the Netherlands, ...
to Universal Motown.
Within a three-month period Harrison had completed and submitted ''Liberation'' to her new label. Production on the album, which was classified as "energetic
nd ghetto" with a less
classic R&B edge, was primarily handled by
Scott Storch and
J.R. Rotem with additional contributions from
Bryan Michael Cox,
Kwame,
Carvin & Ivan, longtime contributor
Tricky Stewart, and a handful of others. Guest appearances included
Long Beach native
Snoop Dogg
Calvin Cordozar Broadus Jr. ( ; born October 20, 1971), better known by his stage name Snoop Dogg (previously Snoop Doggy Dogg), is an American rapper, record producer, and actor. Rooted in West Coast hip-hop, he is widely regarded as one of t ...
,
Murder Inc. rapper
Charlie Baltimore and
New Orleans
New Orleans (commonly known as NOLA or The Big Easy among other nicknames) is a Consolidated city-county, consolidated city-parish located along the Mississippi River in the U.S. state of Louisiana. With a population of 383,997 at the 2020 ...
rapper
Lil Wayne.
''Liberation'' spawned two singles, the Storch collaboration "
Lock U Down" and R&B ballad "
Ridin'". Both singles failed to make an impact at radio and on the charts. Due to the industry's budget cuts, the album suffered numerous delays and pushbacks. However while delaying the album's release again Universal Motown accidentally
leaked the album in Japan, and ''Liberation'' was subsequently released solely as a digital download in Japan on October 22, 2007, ''Liberation'' also later received a digital release in Canada.
''Liberation'' marked Harrison's only release on Universal Motown label following her departure in 2008.
Conception and production
Aside from several recording pauses, Mya had been working on her fourth studio album since 2004 and featured on a few singles, one of them being rapper
Cuban Link's single "Sugar Daddy" from Cuban's ''
Chain Reaction'' album. Originally conceived as a project called ''Control Freak'', the main production of the album was initially financed by
A&M Records
A&M Records is an American record label owned by Universal Music Group and functions as a branch of Interscope Geffen A&M Records, Interscope-Geffen-A&M. Established in 1962 by Herb Alpert and Jerry Moss, the label initially operated independent ...
, following Mya's departure from the
Interscope
Interscope Records is an American record label based in Santa Monica, California, owned by Universal Music Group through its Interscope Geffen A&M imprint. Founded in late 1990 by Jimmy Iovine and Ted Field as a $20 million joint venture ...
label after the mediocre commercial success of her previous effort ''
Moodring'' in 2003, and expected to involve contributions by producers and songwriters
Scott Storch,
Dr. Dre,
Jodeci,
Lil Jon
Jonathan H. Smith (born January 17, 1971), better known by his stage name Lil Jon, is an American rapper, DJ, and record producer. Regarded as a progenitor of the club-oriented hip-hop subgenre crunk, his production and voice presence were inst ...
,
Rockwilder and songwriter
Sean Garrett.
Mya, who took control of the album in her own hands by producing part of the record herself, described the album as "a combination of a
Gwen Stefani, because it's energetic, and
Lil Jon
Jonathan H. Smith (born January 17, 1971), better known by his stage name Lil Jon, is an American rapper, DJ, and record producer. Regarded as a progenitor of the club-oriented hip-hop subgenre crunk, his production and voice presence were inst ...
, very ghetto," with a less classic R&B edge,
explaining further: "''Control Freak'' is basically learning how to gain control of a situation yourself, gaining control in order to be
free and beautiful person in life."
However, although she intended to release a dance track called "Let It Go" at a particular time,
she eventually decided to leave both her management and A&M Records in fall 2005 due to personal differences, before signing a new contract with
Universal Motown.
During the following months Mya began consulting a few other producers to collaborate on the album, renamed ''Liberation'', including
Tim & Bob,
Bryan Michael Cox,
Kwamé,
J. R. Rotem and
Tricky Stewart.
In search of a new vibe for the album, she drew inspiration by leaving
Los Angeles
Los Angeles, often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, most populous city in the U.S. state of California, and the commercial, Financial District, Los Angeles, financial, and Culture of Los Angeles, ...
,
California
California () is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States that lies on the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. It borders Oregon to the north, Nevada and Arizona to the east, and shares Mexico–United States border, an ...
and moving back to
Washington, D.C., where she spent her formative years. "I just knew that I had to get back to my roots and rediscover what had made me excited in the first place," she said in an interview with ''
Billboard'' magazine. "I have all this creative energy and all these ideas but LA it was too impersonal of a place to develop a real creative family."
Back home, Mya bought a house and enlisted her brother to build a
recording studio
A recording studio is a specialized facility for Sound recording and reproduction, recording and Audio mixing, mixing of instrumental or vocal musical performances, spoken words, and other sounds. They range in size from a small in-home proje ...
, where she began experimenting, laying down rudimentary tracks and learning how to engineer. Pushed by her newfound abilities in
mixing and production, Mya once again intensified work on the re-worked ''Control Freak'' album, with most of it eventually being completed in a stretch of only three month.
"It was an easy process because I knew what I wanted to do when I went in," she commented, comparing the making of the album with a
therapy
A therapy or medical treatment is the attempted remediation of a health problem, usually following a medical diagnosis. Both words, ''treatment'' and ''therapy'', are often abbreviated tx, Tx, or Tx.
As a rule, each therapy has indications a ...
. "I've been honest with myself and have been able to admit some things and analyze myself and save myself at the end of the day
..''Liberation'' is a clean slate; my most expressive, vulnerable album."
Music and compositions
''Liberation'' opens with "I Am", a throbbing
uptempo song produced by
Kwamé.
One of the first songs recorded for ''Liberation'', Mya recalled creating it "kind of therapy" and described it as "very grown and sexy, very spring time, just an all-around feel-good record."
Early versions of the song featured guest vocals by
St. Louis rapper Penelope Jones instead of
Charlie Baltimore.
"Walka Not a Talka" incorporates an organic
Cali
Santiago de Cali (), or Cali, is the capital of the Valle del Cauca department, and the most populous city in southwest Colombia, with 2,280,522 residents estimate by National Administrative Department of Statistics, DANE in 2023. The city span ...
ambiance and harks back to the exoticism of
Britney Spears's "
I'm a Slave 4 U". It begins with the sound of a
siren, while Mya addresses listeners by saying, “I never should’ve left you.”
Lyrically, the reflective song chronicles a self-conversation with Mya reminding of all the things she had to get rid of in order to get what she want in life.
West Coast rapper
Snoop Dogg
Calvin Cordozar Broadus Jr. ( ; born October 20, 1971), better known by his stage name Snoop Dogg (previously Snoop Doggy Dogg), is an American rapper, record producer, and actor. Rooted in West Coast hip-hop, he is widely regarded as one of t ...
appears as a guest vocalist on the track.
[ Aggressive "Still A Woman" tells the story an independent woman who needs a man's touch at the end of the day, declaring that she's "always on the hustle doing what a man would do".]
"No Touchin'" is a seductive mid-tempo ballad, produced by Konvict inhouse musician Noel "Detail" Fisher.[ It combines ancient tribal beats and oriental sounds.] Similarly, " Lock U Down" featuring Lil Wayne mixes a prominent Eastern harp
The harp is a stringed musical instrument that has individual strings running at an angle to its soundboard; the strings are plucked with the fingers. Harps can be made and played in various ways, standing or sitting, and in orchestras or ...
sample with a guitar riff. A street-but-sweet hip-hop soul jam, it exposes what kind of man a woman wants and needs. "Lights Go Off" is a slow jam, produced by duo Carvin & Ivan,[ that features Mya adopting a low, subtle vocal tone.] Built around a piano
A piano is a keyboard instrument that produces sound when its keys are depressed, activating an Action (music), action mechanism where hammers strike String (music), strings. Modern pianos have a row of 88 black and white keys, tuned to a c ...
, the song starts out with Mya's man leaving her a voice message and ends with another girl answering Mya's boyfriends phone. Ballad " Ridin'" is a break-up throwback to her earlier work in the late 1990s and was inspired by a former relationship in which Mýa suspected her ex-boyfriend of cheating. Frustrated and fed-up with the situation, it details her traffic route past the homes of people important to her man, including his mother, ex-girlfriends, and new lover.
The Carvin & Ivan-produced "Switch It Up" served as the album's ninth track. With a hard hand clap beat and hard lyrics to match, "Switch It Up" shows Mya's man a different side to her. She's being his waitress, his mistress, his everything, but not for long. She's being all these things as a soon to be slap in the face for cheating on her. Mya continues to "Switch It Up" until the end of the song when she begins a little rap verse. Track ten, "Give a Chick a Hand" is a new kind of futuristic crunk sound of music. A different approach to the typical "she stole my man" song, Mya is actually giving kudos to the woman who stole her man. She knows she's hot, but wants to learn how the next woman actually got what was hers. "All in the Name of Love", the album's eleventh track was produced by J. R. Rotem and samples the theme song from the horror film ''Halloween
Halloween, or Hallowe'en (less commonly known as Allhalloween, All Hallows' Eve, or All Saints' Eve), is a celebration geography of Halloween, observed in many countries on 31 October, the eve of the Western Christianity, Western Christian f ...
'' (1978). Produced by Bryan-Michael Cox, "Life's Too Short" begins with the sound of piano. Mya expresses that she is not going to dwell on anything bad that has happened in her past and is forgetting things that do not matter, expressing that "life is too short for tears". ''Liberation''s final track, "Nothin' at All", was a "pleasant way" to end the album, '' Rap-Up'' noted. Produced by Tricky Stewart, "Nothin' at All" sounds like snap music but in slow motion. In the song, Mya addresses plenty of issues that have occurred in her life in the industry. '' Rap-Up'' commented, "in this ballad, she clearly is singing her soul out. You can hear and feel her passion. Every line of the song has meaning behind it, even when she sings, 'What don't kill you makes you stronger, stand up longer.'"
Release and promotion
A release date for her Mya's fourth studio album was first suggested in February 2005, when she expressed her intention of releasing it the same year on her longtime label A&M Records
A&M Records is an American record label owned by Universal Music Group and functions as a branch of Interscope Geffen A&M Records, Interscope-Geffen-A&M. Established in 1962 by Herb Alpert and Jerry Moss, the label initially operated independent ...
through its partnership with Interscope
Interscope Records is an American record label based in Santa Monica, California, owned by Universal Music Group through its Interscope Geffen A&M imprint. Founded in late 1990 by Jimmy Iovine and Ted Field as a $20 million joint venture ...
under the Universal umbrella. In June, she confirmed in an interview with '' MTV News'' that recording for the album was concluding and she was looking at a late summer release for her the album, tentatively titled ''Control Freak'' then, with a first single "Let It Go" to drop soon. However, in January 2006, '' Billboard'' magazine announced that the singer had left A&M Records in 2005 to transition to Universal Motown Records, then headed by Sylvia Rhone. While much of the earlier material recorded under A&M was left with the label, Mya set up new recording sessions for her fourth album and renamed it ''Liberation''.
In September 2006, promotional single " Ayo!" was released. Although two further singles from the album followed throughout the following year, ''Liberation'' was repeatedly bumped from the US schedule, lastly in September 2007. Mya attributed the delay to "litigation
A lawsuit is a proceeding by one or more parties (the plaintiff or claimant) against one or more parties (the defendant) in a civil court of law. The archaic term "suit in law" is found in only a small number of laws still in effect today. ...
s, court
A court is an institution, often a government entity, with the authority to adjudicate legal disputes between Party (law), parties and Administration of justice, administer justice in Civil law (common law), civil, Criminal law, criminal, an ...
, transitioning from label to label, teaching kids t the Mya Art & Tech Foundationand building a studio" at first, also citing business related differences as a reason for its push backs. "It's just business you know ..The music industry is suffering so record companies have to scrap for money. Plus I would rather wait for them to get it right before I do an album." In October 2007, ''Liberation'' was accidentally released to the Japan
Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of the Asia, Asian mainland, it is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan and extends from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea ...
ese music market due to label changing the release date again, leading to its overall leak
A leak is a way (usually an opening) for fluid to escape a container or fluid-containing system, such as a Water tank, tank or a Ship, ship's Hull (watercraft), hull, through which the contents of the container can escape or outside matter can e ...
on the Internet
The Internet (or internet) is the Global network, global system of interconnected computer networks that uses the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP) to communicate between networks and devices. It is a internetworking, network of networks ...
. As a result, Universal Motown decided to shelf a physical CD release elsewhere as the company feared that heavy bootlegging would affect sales.
Though ''Liberation'' was never released officially. The singer and her label heavily promoted the album through various promotional activities. To kick off promotion for ''Liberation'', the singer graced the covers of the November issue of '' Sister 2 Sister'' magazine and the winter issue of '' Rap-Up'' magazine. Beginning in April, promotion intensified, Mya co-headlined the eighth annual Seagram's Live Tour with rap duo Clipse. In between touring, the singer performed at the ''GIANT'' Show Vol.2 in New York City
New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's largest natural harbors. The city comprises five boroughs, each coextensive w ...
. She performed the album's first intended single "Lock U Down" as well as a new track entitled "I Am," " Best of Me, Part 2," and " Lady Marmalade." In May, she performed "I Am" at Fashion Cares 2007 in Toronto, Canada
Toronto ( , locally pronounced or ) is the List of the largest municipalities in Canada by population, most populous city in Canada. It is the capital city of the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian province of Ontario. With a p ...
. In June, the singer graced the cover of the June/July issue of '' Vibe Vixen'' magazine. In July, Mya was invited to perform at the WNBA's All-Star festivities where she performed a medley of her hits as well as a new song "Still A Woman" during the game's halftime show. The following month, she performed new single "Ridin'" at the R&B Live Showcase at Spotlight Live New York City. Starting in September, she was featured on the 2007's BET Black College Tour where she performed at various historical black
Black is a color that results from the absence or complete absorption of visible light. It is an achromatic color, without chroma, like white and grey. It is often used symbolically or figuratively to represent darkness.Eva Heller, ''P ...
universities. In October, she participated and performed new material from ''Liberation'' at the Nokia Trends Lab concert in Athens, Greece
Athens ( ) is the Capital city, capital and List of cities and towns in Greece, largest city of Greece. A significant coastal urban area in the Mediterranean, Athens is also the capital of the Attica (region), Attica region and is the southe ...
.
Singles
Universal Motown issued three singles from ''Liberation''. Initially, " Ayo!" was intended to be the album's first single, however the single was scrapped. Produced by Chris "Deep" Henderson, the go-go inspired "Ayo!" featuring DJ Kool was released August 21, 2006 and peaked at number seventy on the Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs
The Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs chart ranks the most popular R&B and hip hop songs in the United States and is published weekly by '' Billboard''. Rankings are based on a measure of radio airplay, sales data, and streaming activity. The chart had 100 ...
chart. A music video
A music video is a video that integrates a song or an album with imagery that is produced for promotion (marketing), promotional or musical artistic purposes. Modern music videos are primarily made and used as a music marketing device intended to ...
was planned, however nothing ever materialized. Next up, the street but sweet hip-hop soul jam " Lock U Down" featuring Lil Wayne. Released March 27, 2007, the song was appointed as the album's official first single. A Scott Storch production, the single peaked at number 101 on the bubbling under Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs chart only. A commercial failure due to poor radio airplay and lack of promotion thus delaying the album's release. Ballad " Ridin" was the second and final single taken from ''Liberation'' and peaked at number fifty-eight on the Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs chart. Though the single fared better than its predecessor, it received little radio support and general promotion as well. Universal Motown had also planned to release "Walka Not a Talka" as a single at some point. David LaChapelle was originally supposed to direct a music video for the song, with Patricia Field consulted for styling—but the then-head of marketing of the label thought it was "too weird".
Critical reception
Reviewed by a few American critics only, ''Liberation'' garnered a generally mixed reception. Dorian Lynskey of ''Blender'' magazine gave the album two and a half stars out of five, stating: "A decade into her career, two songs raise the 27-year-old's game—the insidious snake-charmer melody of "'Walka Not a Talka' and the bracing blast of betrayed-housewife rage of 'All in the Name of Love.' Elsewhere, boilerplate slow jams and generic sass paint Mya, her claims to the contrary, as a talka not a walka." Writing for '' Vibe'', Julianne Shepherd gave ''Liberation'' a favorable review, noting, "on her fourth album Mya breaks out and swaggers into an intriguing new role".
Track listing
Notes
* signifies a co- producer
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Liberation (Mya Album)
2007 albums
Mýa albums
Universal Motown Records albums
Albums produced by J. R. Rotem
Albums produced by Detail (record producer)
Albums produced by Scott Storch
Albums produced by Tricky Stewart