Usher — Confessions
Throwback Review | February 2024
One of the last blockbuster albums of the “album era”, Confessions by Usher marked his peak as an artist from both a commercial and artistic perspective. Completing a phenomenal three album run along the way.
Usher
In the throwback review for Destiny’s Child’s The Writing’s On The Wall, I marked that the 1990s was a revolutionary decade for R&B music and that Destiny’s Child was one of the acts that set the tone for what R&B would sound like for the most part of the 2000s. But they weren’t the only ones, Usher was another act from the same era who also helped set the tone. Signed to LaFace Records, it would be a difficult journey to the top as Usher struggled to gain the confidence of his label initially and his self-entitled debut album failed to fully propel his career. However, Usher would turn things around by releasing his first commercially successful album in 1997 with My Way, and followed that up with another great album, 8701, which was released four years later in 2001. By this point, Usher had become not only a huge R&B artist, but an actual popstar. With both My Way and 8701 spawning multiple hit records and both going multi-platinum. With two great and commercially successful albums back to back, Usher wasn’t finished quite yet and with his fourth studio album, Confessions, he was about to reach his full peak both commercially and artistically.
With five singles from the album, the first four went number one on the charts each respectively. The first being “Yeah!” featuring Lil Jon and Ludacris. “Yeah!” is not only the album’s biggest single, but Usher’s biggest single to date, and it can confidently be said that it will forever be his biggest single. Without a shadow of a doubt it is one of the most iconic records of the 2000s and it’s a single the defines the decade and the time period it came out. This is because, on the record you have Usher, one of the the biggest R&B singers of the decade. Ludacris, one of the biggest rappers of the decade and Lil Jon who at one particular point was arguably the biggest producer in Hip-Hop and R&B. Along with “Yeah!”, Lil Jon helped make Crunk music become a huge sub-genre in Hip-Hop, and also helped other artists score hit songs, from the likes of Petey Pablo to Ciara.
“Yeah!” was a number one single for multiple weeks consecutively, until it was replaced by Usher’s second single from Confessions, “Burn”. Unlike “Yeah!”, which was a huge club hit, “Burn” became one of the biggest R&B ballads of 2004. Produced by frequent collaborators, Jermaine Dupri and Bryan-Michael Cox, the song is allegedly inspired by Usher’s separation with Chilli from TLC, the single is based on the difficulties and necessity of moving on from a dying relationship. With an infectious chorus and a phenomenal vocal performance, “Burn” is a huge standout from the album. Jermaine Dupri continued to produce great tracks for Usher, as he also helped to produce two other number one singles, “Confessions Pt. II” and “My Boo”, the former also being co-produced by Cox. Both singles are also great additions to this album, as they both consist of incredible song-writing and vocal performances. Content wise the two singles are complete polar opposites, whilst “My Boo” is a love duet with Alicia Keys, “Confessions Pt. II” is a song about infidelity that leads to the mistress becoming pregnant.
Usher and Jermaine Dupri have stated the inspiration of the album’s content came from not only Usher’s life, but from the lives of his friends also. This is shown with the album’s singles. They are a great reflection on the versatility you get on Confessions. Sure, Usher’s previous two albums showed that as well, however not to the same level of his fourth album. You have a mix of great club and dance bangers, phenomenal love songs, to ballads that touch upon infidelity, heartbreak and moving on. Additionally, the singles aren’t the only area where Usher struck gold, as the album cuts are also worth mentioning and shining a spotlight on. Legendary producers Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis, who previously and frequently worked with Janet Jackson, produced great album cuts such as, “Truth Hurts” and “That’s What It’s Made For”. Usher also teamed up with another production duo, Dre & Vidal, who not only produced “Caught Up”, which was another successful single, but they also produced the album’s best album cut, that being “Superstar”.
Unfortunately, it must be noted that Confessions is just shy of perfection, as it does slightly suffer from a couple of songs that don’t live up to the standards of the other records. This includes “Simple Things”, which sonically is just okay with the content of the song only being the true highlight, as it’s based on a man who foolishly neglects to spend time with his partner nor provide her attention. But without a shadow of a doubt, the album’s weakest moment and its worst song is the remix to “Confessions Pt. II”, which features Twista, Kanye West and Shyne. The remix is completely unnecessary and adds nothing to the original version, especially Shyne’s inclusion which was a short verse he delivered during his time in prison, so you can imagine that the quality of the sound isn’t great.
Other than the records mentioned previously, Confessions is a great album to say the least. On it’s own it’s a well produced and well written R&B album. It’s easily Usher’s best album and it marked the completion of a formidable three album, that included My Way and 8701. Although, Confessions isn’t just a great album from twenty years ago, similarly to the likes of a blockbuster album such as Get Rich or Die Tryin’ by 50 Cent, Confessions marks a moment in time where it became the soundtrack for so many people when it came out. Released during a time where the “album era” was dying, meaning the physical album was starting to not be the dominant form of consumption and soon the digital era would take over. Usher’s fourth LP is one of the last albums to sell a substantial amount of physical copies, it went on to become Diamond and the next album to do that was Adele’s, 21, which came out seven years later in 2011. To close off, Confessions is one of the definitive albums of the 2000s, not for just R&B but for Pop music as a whole, it’s essentially Usher’s “Thriller” moment, hence why it is still loved and fondly remembered two decades on since from its release date.