Amerie has had fans belting “Why Don’t We Fall in Love” since 2002, making it arguably one of the summer’s forever anthems. Now, after a long hiatus from music, she is back with those same powerhouse vocals but a slightly new sound.
“Mine,” a track she co-wrote with producer Troy Taylor, landed in March. Her resurgence was first teased in October 2024 when she confirmed a project was in the works on “Questlove Supreme.” It is due out sometime in 2025 and will mark her first studio album since 2009’s In Love & War.
Her debut album, All I Have, cracked the Billboard 200 chart, peaking at No. 9 in 2002. Touch was dropped off in 2005, boasting the high-energy, go-go-inspired single “1 Thing.” The song, which appeared on the soundtrack for Will Smith’s rom-com Hitch and peaked at No. 8 on the Billboard Hot 100.
Her followers have since witnessed studio sessions during the rare occasions when she livestreams the process of her and Taylor creating magic. On an episode of “The Joe Budden Podcast,” Amerie revisited the journey she has been on as an artist, her massive hit records, and finally addressed the swirling narratives that Beyoncé’s breakout solo record, “Crazy in Love,” was a hit that producer Rich Harrison originally made for her.
Truth vs. fan lore: Amerie was never going to sing “Crazy in Love”
She assured the hosts that she didn’t even know the details of the numerous tales suggesting otherwise. The former Columbia Records signee said, “I didn’t hear anything about it, but a lot of people would be like, ‘Wait, that’s not your record? Why didn’t he give that record to you?’ And I’m like, he never, he never played that record for me.”
She and Harrison masterminded her debut album and were close collaborators on her sophomore LP. They ultimately charted separate creative paths after the latter body of work was completed. Beyoncé’s solo project, Dangerously in Love, was a tsunami of success unleashed in June 2003, two years before “1 Thing” hit airwaves. For more than two decades, comparisons between the 35-time Grammy Award-winning legend’s lead single and Amerie’s “1 Thing” have been a contentious topic of discourse among music lovers.
“After the first album came out, it made a lot of noise, and people, like, really love that album… But during that, he’s [Harrison] also a producer that’s coming up, so now he has all these people coming to him for records, you know what I mean. And we did create a sound together,” she explained of the similarities some individuals picked up on between the two ladies’ sonic endeavors.
Moreover, the “Talkin’ to Me” vocalist shared, “There were so many artists who were trying to work with him, so you know… he’s going to work with different artists. He’s going to have different songs… He’s gonna want to play some songs for me as his artist, right, but he’s going to want to play some songs elsewhere because he’s trying to grow and make his name as a producer.”
Amerie is giving R&B a dose of sensuality on “Mine”
The new track was recorded from start to finish on Instagram Live, allowing for Amerie to get real-time feedback from her fans. The end result is that her supporters have embraced the song. Taylor teased, “They say it’s the soft girl era. Well, here is a soft yet firm song that shows a woman seeing what she likes and not afraid to make her claim. A woman going for what she wants in a very sensual way. ‘Mine’ giving you tones, layers of harmonies and a surprise bridge. This is a great collab with myself and the beautiful Amerie. Oh, and we have more trust.”