There's an undercurrent of self-confidence and strength. I'm in a different headspace, so everything feels different. Nonetheless, Harrison worked with Beyonce on Crazy in Love two years prior, and with Kelly Rowland on her 2002 track, Can’t Nobody. (Sony, her record label) has never gotten involved creatively as far as my image, the videos, or the actual music. Fans attribute Amerie’s disappearance from the industry to the two replicating her sound and aesthetic, a recurring conversation for years on end. Over the last five years, I've learned about what I like. A lot of times with a female artist, you have people telling you what to do. It was usually me, the engineer, and my business partner and manager Lenny (Nicholson) in the studio. Most of that time, with a couple of exceptions, I approached it the way rappers do their albums. I worked with Rich and other producers as well.

But it was also a struggle to get the album finished. So we didn't have to question ourselves and be defined by others.ĪP: How does 'Touch' differ from 'All I Have'?Īmerie: This album was a lot about growing. My parents were very strong in bringing us up as both black and Asian. What kid doesn't get teased? Kids will latch on to anything that makes you different. You'd get the ignorant 'chink' or 'n-word' comments, but I didn't take it to heart. Of course, growing up you get comments from other kids and your friends sometimes. 1 thing is cool too, but it did not have the impact like crazy in love / Beyonce. Still to this very day, so many new young female artists still try to copy the video and bey performances of that song. I remember when it came out and so many female artists tried to get better with their performances and do the Tina Turner approach but it only worked for bey. The black culture is a very inclusive culture and the Asian culture is the same way. Crazy in love is the song that set it off for the mid 2000s. But if we did, we always said we were both Korean and black. So we didn't really feel that or get asked what we considered ourselves. In any case … both songs turned out to be hits – a lot of Harrison’s tracks did, in fact – and one question a lot of people are asking as a result is … why can’t we just appreciate everyone’s achievements and let the past live in the past ? Indeed.Amerie: We grew up in a military environment and we were around black kids, white kids, Asian kids, and mixed kids. Upon learning this, they said Amerie went ahead and leaked ‘1 Thing’ to radio stations on her own, and because it became so popular … Columbia had to back down and let it be. This has been a recurring theme in J Lo’s music career – Fat Joe even touched on it not too long ago – but the alleged tale goes … ‘1 Thing’ was supposedly being shopped to J Lo BTS, and the Columbia label heads actually wanted it to go to her instead of Amerie. However, there’s one other element here that’s also getting some attention as it relates to Amerie and J Lo, specifically … namely, old stories / rumors that Jen was allegedly getting prioritized over labelmates / contemporaries. Amerie and J Lo, meanwhile, came out with their songs, “1 Thing” and “Get Right,” around the same time in 2005 … with JL getting a slightly earlier release in January.Īnd spoiler alert … ALL of these songs were produced by Harrison, so of course they sound alike! Everybody was dipping their toe into the RH pool here.Īs for who did what first – between Bey, J and Amerie, that is – it would appear Beyonce was, in fact, the first of the 3 to trot out Harrison’s sound with ‘CIL’ (’03), even though KR might’ve arguably had it first with ’02’s “Can’t Nobody” – and perhaps others used it even before then. Fact is, he was making “go-go” beats for just about all of them, and others in the game too … including Toni Braxton, Kelly Rowland and even Mary J. Harrison was a producer in the 2000s who was working a lot with Columbia Records – who had all these ladies under their roster in the early to mid-2000s. – Norf Amaruca February 26, course, a proper timeline of events is necessary here to put things in context … as is an explanation of who the heck Rich Harrison is, because he’s at the center of all of this – and the main reason for the comparisons being made in the first place. Beyoncé snatched up her producer, Rich Harrison production & amerie’s writing style became the formula that made Beyoncé # 1

Amerie 1 thing crazy in love