My Life

Following the multi-platinum success of her 1992 debut album What’s the 411? and the release of the certified gold What’s the 411? remix album in 1993, Mary J. Blige connected with Sean “Puff Daddy” Combs and Chucky Thompson to create her critically acclaimed 1994 sophomore album My Life, which traded in the New Jack Swing/Hip-Hop Soul sound from her debut in favor of soul samples primarily from the 1970s as a sort of recall to Mary’s childhood.

Mary called My Life her “most important” album but also said it was probably her “darkest album.” Despite her early success, Mary was dealing with clinical depression as she battled suicidal thoughts fueled by drug and alcohol abuse. At this time, she was also involved in a rocky relationship with Uptown Records labelmate K-Ci Hailey from Jodeci. Mary wanted to give listeners a look into her life and she explained the significance of the album’s title:

My Life, it’s just like a mirror. So, you say ‘my life’ and everybody says ‘It’s my life, too.’ It’s their life and things that happen, good and bad situations. And it’s just about love and life, and things that go on realistically, things that happened for real, whether they be good or bad. So, the most realistic title is My Life.

Producer Chucky Thompson talked about how he got involved in the project:

I knew that Mary and Puff were going through a ton of records. And I knew that Puff had somewhat of an idea to continue the What’s the 411? album vibe, but they only had like one song. […] By the time I met her, I was only contracted to do one song and one interlude. ‘Be With You’ was the record that I submitted. The crazy part is that it was someone else’s record. She wasn’t even supposed to get that. […] When she finished that one song it kinda lit things up and changed the vibe from What’s the 411?.

My Life debuted in the #1 spot on the Billboard Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums chart and peaked at #7 on the Billboard 200. Before the end of 1995, the album was certified triple platinum with support from the official singles “Be Happy,” “I’m Goin' Down,” and “You Bring Me Joy,” as well as the promo singles “My Life,” “Mary Jane (All Night Long),” and “I Love You”–the latter two songs featuring remixes with LL Cool J and Smif-N-Wessun, respectively. A remix of “Be With You” featuring Lauryn Hill, a remix of “Be Happy” with Keith Murray, and a remix of “You Bring Me Joy” with Lin Que and MC Lyte were also released as B-sides.

The album has been praised by numerous publications, including a rank of #126 on Rolling Stone’s list of the 500 Greatest Albums of All-Time, a spot on Time magazine’s list of the All-Time 100 Albums, and named by Complex as the Best R&B Album of the ‘90s.

On November 20, 2020, a 25th anniversary edition of My Life was released featuring five previously released remixes along with Mary’s cover of “(You Make Me Feel Like) A Natural Woman.” On June 25, 2021, the behind-the-scenes documentary Mary J. Blige’s My Life was released on Amazon Prime, which showed Mary talk about the making of the album and perform it live.

Sean “Puff Daddy” Combs talked about how My Life impacted his life:

It really got me understanding the concept of seeing sounds, how much music can affect your emotion. If you’re gonna sing, you need to sing, and make something people can relate to. And that album’s gonna be played forever.

Combs also said:

The vulnerability and the nakedness of the overall production, musically and from an artist singing standpoint, it was pure. […] My Life is just pure, it’s just raw emotions. It’s just like, I know there’ll never be R&B records made like that—like that—'cause that’s a certain time. Just like you’ll hear some stuff from The Beatles or you’ll hear some stuff from Nas—you just know this right here was something special in this moment in time.