Whitney Houston – Just Whitney... 2002

 

Just Whitney is the fifth studio album by American singer and actress Whitney Houston, released on November 27, 2002, by Arista Records. It was her first studio album to be released after her greatest hits compilation, Whitney: The Greatest Hits (2000), and the follow-up to her multi-platinum fourth studio album, My Love is Your Love (1998). Just Whitney was also Houston's first to be released after re-signing her contract with Arista in 2001 for $100 million - the largest recording contract for a female artist at the time.

In the United States, Just Whitney debuted at number nine on the Billboard 200 and number three on the Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums chart, with sales of 205,147 copies in the first week. That beat the previous high first-week sales of 177,284 copies with the Waiting to Exhale soundtrack, and also logged her highest debut sales out of her Nielsen SoundScan-era albums at the time of its release.

The album spawned four singles (in order), "Whatchulookinat", "One of Those Days", "Try It on My Own", and "Love That Man", with the first, third and fifth singles peaking at number one on Billboard's Dance Club Songs chart. "Try It on My Own" also peaked at number ten on Billboard's Adult Contemporary chart. Just Whitney has sold over 2.5 million copies worldwide and has also earned Platinum certification in the United States and Switzerland, and Gold in France, Brazil and other countries. In 2003, the album was nominated at the Soul Train Lady of Soul Awards in the category for Best R&B/Soul Album of the Year.

 

Just Whitney is Houston's fifth studio album, that she recorded after renewing her contract with Arista for a record $100 million.^[3] It is mixed with R&B ballads, R&B mid-tempo numbers, and dance songs. It also includes a rock song, "Tell Me No". Houston said that she wanted to make a "very soul oriented" album, something she felt was missing on the radio.^[3] It was somewhat a departure from her previous studio album My Love Is Your Love, which was blended with R&B, hip hop, and reggae.

She worked with Kenneth "Babyface" Edmonds, with whom she had worked with previously, and Kevin "She'kspere" Briggs. Other producers included Missy Elliott, Teddy Bishop, Gordon Chambers, Rob Fusari, and Troy Taylor. Her then-husband, recording artist Bobby Brown, also co-produced one of the songs.

According to Houston,

"[t]his album for me is about surviving, raising a family, being a wife or girlfriend and all the challenges that go along with those things. These songs are more about creating a mood than about anything in particular."^[4]

She also said that she wanted to give something to the fans, songs which they can sing along to and love the melody.^[3] She also incorporated samples into her songs such as in "One of Those Days" ㅡ album's second single, which sampled The Isley Brothers' song "Between the Sheets". She also covered Debby Boone's classic "You Light Up My Life".^[5] The album also contains the rock influenced "Tell Me No", which was produced by Babyface, who also produced some other songs on the album including the ballad "Try It on My Own" and dance-pop song "Love That Man" ㅡ both of which became singles. The song "Whatchulookinat" was produced by Brown and Mohammad 2G and became the project's lead single. The song, co-written by Houston, was taken by critics as an answer to the media for deeply invading her personal life.