Still standing is Monica’s brand new anticipated sixth studio album. Through the preparation of this album, Monica allowed her fans a chance to watch her in the studio, witnessing her prepare this album in her reality series Monica: Still Standing on the BET network. In this reality show, we see Monica working with various artist and producers, on this album, such as Jermaine Dupree, Polow da Don, Ludacris, Bryan-Michael Cox, Missy Elliot, Timberland and many more.
The show allowed fans to have an idea of the direction Monica was going with her new album and to see how hard Monica worked with this album. It also allowed Monica too reintroduce herself and let her fans know what she has been doing and how she has matured as a woman, mother and specifically, an artist.
The album starts with the interlude of her show, ‘Still Standing’, a very personal and self motivating song’ “This is more than just song to me.” ‘Still Standing‘ reveals the pain that Monica has been through and is thankfully overcoming, reassuring us that through faith, love, believing and dedication in yourself you can overcome anything, still standing.
Over the years Monica has blessed others with her graceful vocals which she manages to bring out with more power and strength throughout this album, specifically in ‘Love All over Me’ and ‘Everything To Me’; my two favourite two ballads on this album.
‘Everything To Me’ [click to watch video] is her first single and it was produced by Missy Elliott, featuring a sample of Deniece Williams’ hit song ‘Silly’. Monica put’s her touch to this song transforming it to be about the joys of true love and the thought of life without the people you love rather than it being about a messy heartbreak of a broken woman, as with Deniece Williams’ original.
The album is generally a great ballad album, which I and many others expected from Monica as a loyal fan. I am as proud of this album as I was with each of her previous albums. The album honestly has it all, even an upbeat party starter, ‘If You Were My Man’, which also suits Monica’s voice with a fun, uplifting tempo.
On ‘Here I Am’, ‘Mirror’, ‘Believing In Me’ and ‘Superman’, Monica manages to weave a story and a positive moral, demonstrating maturity and a true role model for women and young women as someone who advocate generally loving yourself and being a confident, independent and comfortable in your own skin and is able to overcome tribulation which is shown all over this album – and the title, of course: Still Standing.
–Diana Ayok
Still Standing is currently in stores.
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