I think “Sin Pijama” and “Ram Pam Pam” really showed that we only shine brighter if we come together, and that was my intention. You know, a lot of people told me not to do the song with anyone. I had “Sin Pijama” in my phone recorded, ready to go for over a year before I sent it to Natti to get on it and it is because a lot of people didn’t believe in the song and said, “If you think it’s such a hit, then why would you want to share it?” I said, “Because hit songs happen every day, and I don’t want a hit song. I want a moment in history, and I think this is it.” And we were right.

It’s that gut instinct that I had. When we did our first pass of “Sin Pijama” together and they yelled “cut,” we were jumping up and down so giddy. We hugged each other and were shaking because we’re like, “This is it, something is big here.” We felt like it was going to be a game changer.

Even if I’m saying no to something, it’s important to express the why to whoever is bringing the opportunity my way. Knowing that my voice is worthy of being heard in those spaces, and I don’t want to just be the pretty face of a show. I want to also be an executive producer, and I want to have a say in the meetings when it comes down to what topics we’re going to be talking about, and who we’re going to be hiring and empowering in some of those power positions. I can give Treslúce as a great example as well. It’s a female-forward-driven company. Although we have some men that are a part of the team, they are full feminists and are all about empowering us. It’s really about having the conversations and saying, “Hey, why is it that this doesn’t feel right? Why is it that I’m the Latina face of something, but everyone that is not me is not Latinx or not representative of these topics or these communities that we’re going to be trying to connect with?” It’s important to be a reflection of your audience, and you can’t fake that. Especially nowadays—we’re too smart to be able to see something and consume it without feeling like it’s a little performative. My responsibility is to call people out on it behind closed doors too.

“Mala Santa”

The lead single off Becky G’s debut album of the same name, “Mala Santa” set the tone for the rising star’s reggaeton-forward music with lyrics that contain double meanings and emphasize a woman’s right to express her own sexuality.

“Mala Santa” was the lead single off of my first album. It’s kind of hard to look back at because soon after I released the album, I was gonna be on a Mala Santa–themed tour and then the pandemic happened. Sadly, I don’t know if that tour will ever get to really see a stage again because you evolve as an artist…. As time goes by, it doesn’t feel relevant anymore. But to go back to “Mala Santa” feels really special because I remember what a huge accomplishment this album, this song, was for me, and I feel like it really embraced my duality. As a young woman, I have very strong, masculine energy as well as a feminine energy; it’s embracing the two that has really allowed me to flourish in an industry like the one that I work in. Within my personal relationships, that duality to be dorky and goofy and then also feel like an empowered boss bitch…. I can be both. Women can be both. We can be the angel who’s bad sometimes. That duality was so fascinating for me, and that’s what the album represented.

“Shower”

The Radio Disney Music Award–winning song that put Becky G on the map, “Shower” recently had a revival as a TikTok trend with her sound being used by Bella Poarch and Addison Rae.

I was not expecting “Shower” to have a revival on TikTok. I remember “Shower” started charting again and I was like, “What is going on?” Then my siblings were like, “There’s, like, a shower challenge on TikTok.” It was so funny to me because it’s an era in my career that happened very early on. I was 16, 17 years old when “Shower” came out. That song will always be so special to me because it taught me so many things. It really taught me a hard lesson more than anything, which is that artistic identity is so important. Anyone could have sang that song. The song was a catchy song that I love so much, but it was bigger than me, and it didn’t really say much. It was just a catchy tune. It was what it was and it did what it did and it took me to so many amazing places. I got to be an opening act on so many tours for big artists, because the song was doing so well. 

If there was one woman you looked up to coming of age as a young Black girl in the 2000s, it was Eve. With divine bone structure, a powerful short blonde haircut, and bars for days, Eve was like the beautiful, tough older sister we all wish we had.

She dropped her debut album, Let There Be Eve…Ruff Ryders’ First Lady, in 1999. It charted number one on the Billboard 200, making the Philly native the third female rapper to achieve the accolade. What followed was a career that places Eve as an undeniable icon in the rap game. “Who’s That Girl,” the first single from her 2001 album, Scorpion, was listed number 97 on VH1’s 100 Greatest Songs of Hip-Hop; in that same year she won the BET award for best female hip-hop artist. Eve also took home a Grammy in 2002 for her song featuring Gwen Stefani, “Let Me Blow Ya Mind,” for best rap/sung collaboration.

But Eve didn’t just stop at music. After starring in hits like Barbershop and appearing in other movies like Charlie’s Angels, she dropped her namesake comedy sitcom, Eve, on UPN. In 2014, Eve became a cohost on talk show The Talk and just last year received a Daytime Emmy Award nomination along with her Talk costars.

Now married with four stepchildren, Eve is living in the U.K. and still doing what she does best: living her life to the fullest. The rap queen returned to the screen on October 19 in Queens, a new ABC series starring Eve, Naturi Naughton, Brandy, and Nadine Velazquez as former girl group members trying to recapture the height of their glory days.

And 20 years after the release of Scorpion, Eve spoke with Glamour about some of her most memorable rap moments. For the latest edition of 5 Songs, 5 Stories, the rapper talks about how some of her favorite songs came to be.

“Let Me Blow Ya Mind” featuring Gwen Stefani

Considered one of the most successful rap/pop collaborations of all time, “Let Me Blow Ya Mind” propelled Eve into an entirely new musical orbit. Her lyrics tackle what it means to be mainstream and the longevity of her rap career. Eve took home a Grammy for the song, and the music video won an MTV Video Award.

It’s the one song that I wrote fully—like, literally every single thing, every word. I write my own stuff, but usually I get lazy after I write verses. I don’t want to write the chords, and Dre was like, “You’re not leaving the studio until this song is done.” I hated him that day, but I’m so happy he made me stay.

JoJo has been a pop-music fixture since 2004, when she was 13 years old. You no doubt remember “Leave (Get Out),” the R&B-pop smash that soundtracked many middle school relationships. 

But JoJo’s grown leaps and bounds since then, of course. After “Leave (Get Out)” came “Too Little Too Late,” which reached an impressive number three on Billboard‘s Hot 100. Record-label limbo shortly followed, but JoJo bounced back stronger than ever in 2016 with Mad Love, a triumphant album that felt quintessentially her. 

That’s been the key ingredient of her music ever since. JoJo’s essence—heart-on-her-sleeve and vulnerable, with undeniable R&B influence—is pervasive on her new EP Trying Not to Think About It, out now. “I’m feeling really excited,” she tells Glamour. “And on the flip side of that excitement is nervousness. I’m always nervous before I release anything, so it’s no shock there that I’m feeling nervous. I’m looking forward to [the EP] being with people and for people to then have their own relationship to it and experiences with it.” 

Before you look forward to the new music, though, let’s take a look back. For Glamour‘s latest edition of 5 Songs, 5 Stories, JoJo reveals the inspiration behind some of her most essential tracks. Read (and listen) on, below.

“Worst (I Assume)”

The lead single off Trying Not to Think About It, “Worst (I Assume)” places JoJo’s out-of-this-world vocals front and center, as she muses about old behaviors trickling into new relationships.

This was my first session in with Tiara Thomas, who’s actually joining me on tour dates in October and who’s a really dope artist and songwriter. She just won Song of the Year at the Oscars and the Grammys. We hit it off right away in the studio. We had about an hour before the producer got there, and we started talking about our life stories and relationships and where we were at. I was telling her about my new relationship and how I project my fears. We were talking about projection and fear versus love and sabotage and how we sometimes bring things that have happened to us in the past into our present and how that’s harmful.

So it really just started from a conversation and me being like, “I don’t want to do those same things and keep those same protective mechanisms that actually are detrimental to a positive, healthy relationship.” It was a lot of acknowledgment and also through being grossly vulnerable with one another, and we just found that we related on some things. And then we wrote about it.

“Say So” (with PJ Morton)

“Say So” won a Grammy in 2020 for Best R&B Song. A true duet between Morton and JoJo, the track breathes fresh life into a classic topic: being transparent in a relationship. 

I’m a huge PJ Morton fan, and we had followed each other for a while. I’m just so inspired by his whole story—by him as an artist in general, what he’s doing in New Orleans, and his journey back to himself, of being signed to a major label and being put in a box and then saying, “I have to step out on my own. Do things my way.” And in doing that, he was greatly rewarded. That’s when he started winning Grammys and selling out tours. I really admire that.

So when he sent me this song, it was so timely. It hit me at a point when I was in a situation-ship, and there was no clarity. I had reached my limit for that, and I was like, “I need to know what is going on. Do you love me, do you want to be with me? Because I can’t stay in this limbo.” So when he sent me the song, I was like—it was so immediate for me that I wanted to sing it with him. It ended up really changing the way I saw my own future and realizing I could follow my gut. I could trust myself to be the captain of my own ship and do the collaborations I wanted to do. To really embrace my foundation and my heart, which is rooted in R&B. 

“Marvin’s Room” (Drake cover)

JoJo’s 2011 cover of this Drake deep-cut went viral. In it, she flips the script, telling a fuckboy he’ll never do better than her. 

Once again, this was inspired by a boy who just pissed me off or had me feeling dumb. A friend of mine sent me the song. I was hungover on a couch somewhere in New York City—I was in that party phase of my life where I was trying to distract myself, get outside my mind, and not feel anything. Or feel everything. I was also trying to not think about this idiot boy I was dating at the time. So when I was sent the song, it made me think of how I would respond as a woman to it. It inspired me immediately.

So I asked another one of my friends at the time if they could recreate the track, because it’s very simple and cool and atmospheric. They were able to do it. When I flew back to L.A. that night, I had written something on the plane while I was listening in my headphones, and then I recorded it that night and played it for my manager. It wasn’t even a single for Drake, but I was like, “I just really liked the song.” So we put it up on Rap-Up, which is this website that has been super supportive of me over the years. And then it really caught on, and then a lot of other artists put their own spin on it. Drake showed love about it.

“Too Little Too Late”

“Too Little Too Late” is perhaps JoJo’s biggest hit; it certainly has her most infectious chorus. The subject of the song is straightforward: boy wants girl back after fucking up, but, surprise, it’s too little too late. JoJo said her response to this track was immediate. 

I really believed in “Too Little Too Late.” From the moment the song was sent to me, I knew it should be the first single off the second album. I just loved it so much. I was obsessed with it, and I was like, “Oh my God, I can’t wait to record this song.”  

The multitalented Jill Scott hardly needs an introduction. As an actor, singer, songwriter, and producer, Scott has graced the entertainment industry for over two decades with her soulful energy. Born in Philadelphia, Scott attended Temple University with the goal of becoming a teacher before leaving college in her third year. She made a name for herself as a spoken-word poet and caught the attention of Questlove (Amhir Thompson) from The Roots. That led to her first cowriting credit in 1999, on the song “You Got Me,” which was performed by The Roots featuring Erykah Badu and Eve. The following year Scott debuted her first album, Who Is Jill Scott?: Words and Sounds Vol. 1. Besides introducing the R&B-soul singer on a global stage for the first time, the project was nominated for Best R&B album at the 2001 Grammy Awards.

Since then, Scott has made some 12 projects, including studio albums, live albums, compilation albums, and even a remix album. And while Scott’s music is what she has became the most known for, her talent as an actor was cemented in her role as Mma Ramotswe in the BBC/HBO series The No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency in 2008. This came after her film debut in Hounddog and Tyler Perry’s Why Did I Get Married? Since 2019, she’s starred as Hazelle Rachelle in the BET+ series First Wives Club, the second season of which premiered July 15. 

Reminiscing on the entirety of her career journey, Scott caught up with Glamour on the five songs in her vast career that hold a special place in her soul.

“The Way”

“The Way” is the third single from her debut album, Who Is Jill Scott? Scott cowrote the song with songwriter and producer Andre Harris. “The Way” reached the top 20 of Billboard’s Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Singles & Tracks chart.

I was definitely in love. My boyfriend at the time was just so sweet to me and very kind and thoughtful and was real nice. I was being pretty literal in the song, talking about the day that I experienced waking up and making breakfast—like it was very, very literal. There really wasn’t a lot of science to it…I was talking about the day. I even worked on Third Street, as the lyrics say.

Why was I so happy? I was questioning if it was the way he loves me. This mutual sweet love started with a friendship. That’s what made it so different—it being mutual. That’s what made me write about it in the first place. It was precious, you know?

“Whenever You’re Around”

“Whenever You’re Around” was the third single from Scott’s 2007 album, The Real Thing: Words and Sounds Vol. 3. Released in 2008, the song was cowritten by Scott and songwriter and producer JR Hutson. Although there was never an accompanying video, it did well on R&B charts and reached number 16 on Hot Adult R&B Airplay.

“Whenever You’re Around” is a song I wrote when things took a left. When the relationship wasn’t as sweet anymore; we had been married, and it was time to part ways. I had this awesome rhythm that easily could have been like a party song. In fact, Musiq Soulchild asked me why didn’t I make this a jam, and I said that’s the story that came out of me when I heard the music. Because it was bittersweet, at least. That’s the best way I can describe it—the hook of the song says, “I’m lonely whenever you’re around.”

Jessie J is a pop music veteran. The 33-year-old Brit splashed onto the scene in 2011 with “Price Tag,” and the bops have been coming ever since. From the punchy electro-pop banger “Domino” to the tectonic plate-shifting “Bang Bang” and, a personal favorite of mine, “Burnin’ Up,” Jessie J knows how to deliver a song that sticks in your head and shows off her impressive pipes. 

She continues this tradition with “I Want Love,” her latest single released earlier this summer. It’s a bright, bombastic tune, and she’s never sounded better. That’s because with this song (and the album coming soon), Jessie’s main focus is having fun. “Look, I’m 33. This is my fifth album,” she tells me. “I really just want to make songs that celebrate what makes me special and what I know I can do that some other people can’t.” 

The tracks Jessie J opened up about for Glamour‘s 5 Songs, 5 Stories column are perfect examples of this. They’re all beautifully, quintessentially her. Read on to learn the origin stories behind “Price Tag,” “Bang Bang,” and more. 

“I Want Love” 

Jessie J’s latest single is an anthemic, disco-fied ode to, well, wanting love. It has all the hallmarks of a classic Jessie J tune: a thumping bass line, killer vocals, and a shimmery, earworm chorus. It’s co-produced by hitmaker Ryan Tedder, who’s worked with Lady Gaga, Ariana Grande, and Katy Perry, among others.

I was in a relationship, and we had done this huge red carpet. Afterwards, we got into an argument, and I drove to a bar and got drunk with random people I’d never met before. You know when you’re stuck in a rut and need to do something really out of your comfort zone? You almost feel like you’re training for a fight but without fighting someone? Like Rocky, almost? That’s how I felt when I was in the bar that night. This was a couple years ago, and I just remember going into the mirror and looking at myself saying, “You deserve everything.” I was tipsy and I was just like, “You’re going to be okay.” I remember speaking to my friends and my family and being like, “I just want love. I want the fire, the passion. I want to break the rules. I want to work through things.” 

When I was with Ryan [Tedder, the co-producer] and we started talking about this idea—he already had an idea that I then teamed with my idea with this song. There’s so many people that make amazing music I could never make and vice versa. With “I Want Love,” I was like, I just want it to be big singing. I want it to feel classic, I want it to feel musical, I want it to feel timeless, and I want it to feel fun and diva-y and performance-y. The kind of thing you hear and you want to run and perform it. When “I Wanna Dance With Somebody” comes on and and there’s that guitar, you go, “Oh my God.” When “I Want Love” starts, I just see people grabbing a hairbrush and singing into it. 

“Big White Room” 

Easily one of her most emotional songs to date, “Big White Room” is based on an experience Jessie J had while in the hospital as a child. A live version of the track is available on her debut album. She tells me she could never muster up the right emotions to deliver this song in a studio—she needs to feel the audience. 

When I was 9, I had an ablation. I have WPW, which is Wolff-Parkinson-White Syndrome. It’s a heart disease, and I’ve had it since I was a kid. It’s weird because every time I was in hospital—as much as I was in hospital with a heart disease, it never felt like my purpose in being there was to feel like I was sick. It always felt like I was there to hold the other kids’ hands in the ward. I would be the kid that would walk around and hand out magazines. I don’t remember in my head being in pain. I know I was, and I know I struggled and I had seizure and all these things, but I never felt like I was experiencing something as traumatic as everybody else. 

So I remember sitting and watching this boy and wanting to help and feeling really helpless. That was the biggest emotion I remember feeling, as well as confusion of what was happening. I couldn’t really register the fact that he was praying to a god. I wasn’t brought up in a major religious family, so it was the first time I’d experienced someone pleading with God to keep them here. So when I woke up the next day and he’d died, I remember saying to my mom, “He asked God so nicely to stay, and he’s not here. My mom said, “Sometimes God needs his angels nearer to him.”

One night, two of my frequent collaborators and really good guy friends were like, “Hey, one of our other friends is bringing pizza. We’re going to hang around and listen to demos. You down to hang?” So me, Forest Glen Whitehead, Josh Kerr, and Lance Carpenter sat around the lobby of this publishing house, eating pizza, and talking about the stuff we were listening to. Forest said, “Kelsea, I really want to hear you do something with the swag of ‘Take a Bow’ by Rihanna.” Josh picked up a guitar, and we started with the staccato. The “If you’re gonna…” We started messing with that and threw in every sassy phrase we could think of.

It felt fun and flirty and young and all the things that I felt like I was at in my life then. It was the song that got me my record deal. It was the song that I got to put out into the world first, and it was my first number one.

The first three songs for The First Time we had were, “Love Me Like You Mean It,” “The First Time,” and “Peter Pan.” I’ll never forget this: We sat around a conference room at the record label and had a conversation [about which song to release first.] We knew “Peter Pan” was the song, but it could easily become gimmicky. We wanted to protect it. It couldn’t be the first single, because then I’d just always be the “Peter Pan” girl. So we thought about the climate of country radio at the time and people like Sam Hunt, who were really pushing boundaries and having other influences from the R&B and pop world. “Love Me Like You Mean It” followed suit with that. 

There’s magic to a first single. Whether it’s massive or not, it’s the song that starts your career. It’s the song I’ve also sang the most over the last seven years, but I always have an appreciation and love for it. Because I write everything, it honors where I was at in my life then. Right now, I would never write “Love Me Like You Mean It.” But at 19, that was exactly where I was and what I wanted to say. That gets me excited still.

I still think it’s such a good message. When I look back on my first record, I wanted there to be a positive, empowered energy through the whole thing. “Love Me Like You Mean It” set the tone. If you don’t listen to the words, it’s a bop. I love that. But if you do listen to the words, it’s telling your partner, “If you don’t respect me, this is not going to work.” I love that I led with that message because that’s always been an arc of my career, trying to layer things with confidence and empowerment.

“Peter Pan”

Co-written with Forest Glen Whitehead and Jesse Lee, “Peter Pan” was a breakthrough for Ballerini’s career. The ballad, about a lost love who refuses to grow up, topped the country charts and reached number 35 on the Billboard Hot 100.  

If I could pinpoint a moment that my life changed, it’s this song. I love taking something—a phrase or word or whatever—that feels so obvious and trying to write it in a way that breathes new life into it. Peter Pan is so universal. Everyone knows that story. It was so much fun to write a story of a relationship that fails because there’s a lack of maturity and commitment and wrap that into a fairytale people know. At the end it’s, “You’re just a lost boy. And you don’t know what you lost, boy.” There’s that one little twist that’s like, “I got me.” That, to me, is my favorite part of the whole song. It’s saying, “I’m going to be sad. I’m going to honor my feelings. But at the same time, it’s your loss.”

That was the first time I really understood the depth of which I would go to expose the truth because the song was very polarizing. It was a real turning point for me as a songwriter and as an artist. I was very unwilling to be unwavering in my truth.

To be able to perform that song with Stevie Nicks in the studio was a defining moment. To have her open up to me about what that song meant to her…it felt so good to be validated by another artist. Especially because I had so many women who were like, “How could you write that? This is so hard to listen to.” But to me, it’s like, “How do you think it was to write?”

“What I Cannot Change”

The third single on her 2007 album, Family, “What I Cannot Change” earned Rimes a Grammy nom for Best Female Country Vocal Performance. Rimes loved the sentiment behind the song so much that she also wrote a book and launched a website with the same name. She used both projects to connect with readers about the hardships in their own life.

That song was probably where I started speaking truth through my music as a songwriter. “What I Cannot Change” is about a moment in time with my parents where I was having a challenging time. I was in my early 20s and trying to become an individual and find a new relationship with them. This song was my version of the serenity prayer. Since it came out, I’ve seen these words tattooed on people’s bodies. It’s just one of those songs that so many people relate to because it’s about that deep surrender. For me, it’s the ultimate high to see people use these words for different things.

“Remnants”

“Remnants” is the title track to Rimes’s 15th studio album, released in 2017. The song is an anthem for picking up the pieces of your life and showcases the powerhouse vocals that made Rimes famous all those years ago.

I was really focused on uplifting people out of darkness because I know there are a lot of people who have lived in some dark corners. This song has the lyrics “I will build a kingdom from my remnants.” It’s about reclaiming your power, saying no matter how many pieces have been shattered, you will be whole again. I was in the studio recording it and had to hide behind a wall because I was working with Darell and the genius producer Mark Batson and he told me, “I really want you to dig into it.” But I didn’t want him to watch me, so I was singing behind a wall. There was this anger and rage coming from me. Over the last year and a half, I’ve been playing around with this song on the piano a bit and I’ve turned it into this very sad, heartbroken midballad kind of thing. I can’t wait to play it live.

“Throw My Arms Around the World”

Rimes released this track in December 2020, in the middle of the pandemic and on the heels of her massive Masked Singer win. She performed it during Fox’s New Year’s Eve broadcast after releasing a BTS video about making the recording.

It’s a rallying cry for people to wake up to all of the destruction against Mother Earth. The message here is that we’re all connected to her, on physical, emotional, and spiritual levels. I’m at that time in my career where what’s being asked of me is more of service to something than what’s been of past works of mine. On this album specifically, I worked first with the rhythm and the drums, and then built it out from there. I can’t think of that song without crying.

“Innocent”

“Innocent” has yet to be released but will appear on Rimes’s next album, God’s Work, due out later this year. It’ll be her 18th studio album and follows 2020’s Chant.

Alessia Cara is only 25 years old, but her music résumé is stacked: A Best New Artist Grammy win, four top 10 hits on Billboard’s Hot 100, not to mention a holiday E.P. you can listen to year-round. (There’s never a bad time for Christmas music, okay?) And more tunes are coming. Today (July 15), Cara releases the first two singles from her upcoming third album, “Sweet Dream” and “Shapeshifter.” 

But before you check out the new stuff, let’s venture back to some of AC’s most memorable songs, from “Scars to Your Beautiful” to “Here” and deep-cuts like “October.” Alessia Cara is the latest singer to participate in Glamour’s new series 5 Songs, 5 Stories, where your favorite artists reveal the origins behind meaningful tracks from their catalogues. Stans, this one’s for you. Read (and listen!) on, below. 

“Here” 

This mid-tempo track was the debut single from Cara’s first album, Know-It-All. Produced by pop heavy-hitters, including Pop & Oak and Sebastian Kole, the track centers on a party Cara attended that she quickly realized she hated. 

I was still in high school when I made “Here” with Sebastian Kole, who I wrote a lot of my first album with. He was my writing partner for my whole first project. I was at this weird period of time where I was starting my music career, but I was still in high school. I would go to school and then after school, I would go to the studio and write songs about my day or whatever I was dealing with.

With this song in particular, it was the weekend, and I went to this party that I just felt so out of place at. A lot of my friends were there, but I just felt so uncomfortable. I didn’t drink at the time and I didn’t smoke. I didn’t really dance. I was just at that period where I was shy and not really down to party. I went to the studio the next day, and Sebastian was like, “What did you do over the weekend? Is there anything we could write about?” And I was like, “Not really. I’m not really going through anything. I’m just bored.” And he was like, “Well, what did you do this weekend?” I was like, “Oh, I went to this party, but it was, like, whatever. I just felt super uncomfortable, and it was just not my scene.” And then he’s like, “Oh, well, that’s what we’re going to write about.” I was like, “Really? Okay. Boring, but whatever.” 

He was asking me questions about what I did at this party, and I was just listing things that I was seeing, things I was doing, and that song just happened. It was a stream of consciousness-type song, and it happened super fast and ended up being my favorite thing I’d ever made. It still is one of my favorite songs I’ve ever made. It was just one of those magic moments.

“Scars to Your Beautiful”

Cara tackles body image on “Scars to Your Beautiful,” arguably her biggest hit to date. The track reached number eight on Billboard’s Hot 100, her second entry into the top 10 after “Here.” Culturally, “Scars” was everywhere, making appearances on The Bold Type, Law & Order, and, most notably, A Wrinkle in Time. 

When I started writing with Sebastian, I knew I wanted us to talk a little bit about self-confidence and body image, because it was something  I did struggle with and something I’ve seen a lot of my friends and peers struggle with. I did want to speak to that. One particular day, we had a bit of writer’s block, and we were watching TV in the studio and there was this marathon of a plastic surgery show on. We were just talking about it, being like, “Why did people feel the need to do this? Why are people doing this to their faces?” It led to this super deep conversation about standards and where insecurity actually comes from and how deep-rooted it is. And I was like, “I think today’s the day we’re going to write the song,” and we wrote it. It was one of those things that felt really special immediately and yeah, I think everybody knew it would be something awesome to put out.

You may know Kandi Burruss for her starring role in The Real Housewives of Atlanta, or maybe you’ve watched her as Roselyn Perry in the Showtime drama series The Chi. But the multihyphenate got her first taste of stardom as part of the ’90s R&B girl group Xscape. The quartet, formed in 1992, consisted of Burruss, Tameka “Tiny” Cottle, LaTocha Scott, and Tamera Coggins-Wynn. The group released their first album, Hummin’ Comin’ at ‘Cha in October 1993 when Burruss was just 17 years old and still in high school at the Tri-Cities High School in East Point, Georgia.

Four years and two albums later, Xscape disbanded and the group members pursued their solo careers. In 2000 Burruss released her debut solo album, Hey Kandi, which featured the popular “Don’t Think I’m Not.” A decade later came Kandi Koated, though by that point Burruss was just as well-known for her acting career, reality-show stardom, sex-toy company (Bedroom Kandi), and several restaurant ventures. Still, since her earliest days in the music industry, she has been a renowned songwriter, penning some of the most notable R&B hits of the ’90s and early aughts, including Destiny Child’s “Bills, Bills, Bills” and TLC’s “No Scrubs.”

Going down memory lane, Burruss told Glamour five stories about five songs she’s either sung, written, or cowritten that mean a lot to her. 

“No Scrubs”

Debuting in 1999 as the lead single for TLC’s third album, Fan Mail, the song “No Scrubs” remains one of the group’s most popular and successful hits and an anthem for women shunning partners who don’t have their life together. Alongside Burruss, producer Kevin She’kspere Briggs, Tameka “Tiny” Cottle, and the late Lisa “Left Eye” Lopes, a member of TLC, are credited as songwriters.

At that particular time, I used to put titles in my notepads that I felt would be great song titles or concepts. So I had “scrubs” written in my notepad as a title I would want to use one day. I remember I was riding down the highway with a friend of mine. She was dating the brother of the guy that I was dating, and we were both talking trash about the guys. I started freestyling over a track that She’kspere had given me. So it was really me joking with my friend, freestyling, and talking trash about this guy. I wrote the verse, the B section, and the hook right there. Because we were in the car, it was on an old envelope.

“Bills, Bills, Bills”

“Bills, Bills, Bills” was Destiny’s Child lead single on their second album, The Writing’s on the Wall. Cowritten by Burruss and She’kspere, alongside the group’s members, the song earned two Grammy nominations: Best R&B Song and Best R&B Performance by a Duo or Group With Vocals.

When I got with the girls at the studio, we were singing them the idea. I had the melody of how I felt like the verse should go, and we came together for the lyrics. 

I use a lot of my past relationships as inspiration. The relationship I had been in prior to [writing the song], I took inspiration from it…though I didn’t tell them that. Now, this is the really funny part: One of the girls that was in the group was dating my ex at the time. So I didn’t tell them that some of the lyrics in there were inspired by him. The part that was a clear inspiration—using my phone and pretending like he didn’t use it, driving my car and not putting any gas in it—that was real stuff that had happened to me! But I won’t tell you who from the group was dating my ex.

“Don’t Think I’m Not”

The first single from Burruss’s first solo album, Hey Kandi, “Don’t Think I’m Not” was released almost 21 years ago and peaked at number 24 in the Billboard Top 100. Burruss wrote with She’kspere as well as producer Bernard Edwards Jr. a.k.a. Focus.

This was a scary time for me, because it was my first time doing something by myself outside of my group. I was working on this album, and I knew I wanted something with that uptempo beat that goes from slow into a fast beat. And the inspiration, once again, was one of my old relationships.

We all know Sara Bareilles writes absolute bangers—songs with driving beats and almost sermonic messages. Her anthems make us want to write a letter to an ex and burn it by the flame of a scented candle. After “Love Song”—reportedly an angry response to a record label looking for more bankable lyrics—became a staple, we thought, Okay, we get it. Sara Bareilles is a pop-star with a twist of integrity. She rocks a side part. She makes us wish we had taken piano lessons.

But we’ve underestimated Sara Bareilles every step of the way. First, she became a major pop star without selling out. Next, she’s succeeded where many, many successful musicians have failed—we’re talking Bono, Sting, and Sheryl Crow—in that she wrote original music and lyrics for what became a hit Broadway musical, Waitress. The songs of Waitress have touched people so deeply, they’ve inspired countless covers and a full-on TikTok trend.

Okay, we thought. We get it—she’s a singer-songwriter, and she’s also a theater nerd who got the last laugh. Then, in May, Bareilles starred in Girls5Eva, a TV musical comedy on NBC’s Peacock from Tina Fey and Meredith Scardino. Bareilles is so effortlessly funny, it’s almost crazy-making—how is this the same woman who we’ve been bopping to on the radio for so many years? Why hasn’t she hosted SNL?

Bareilles isn’t offended that people are surprised. “I’m surprised too,” she tells Glamour, laughing. Her funny, acting self is the part of her that only her friends had known before Girls5Eva. “I think humor is one of the secrets to making it through this life.” 

Now, she’s back at the piano—she just released her new live album Amidst the Chaos: Live at the Hollywood Bowl, recorded in 2019 and delayed during the pandemic. Recently, she performed her first live show in New York City since 2020—a fundraiser for a non-profit that brings free meals to homebound people.“It was just a tremendous gift to return to the stage and to return to human beings in seats,” she says, her voice catching in a very real, very Sara Bareilles way. “It was just—a miracle.”

In some ways, Bareilles even underestimated herself—she never thought she would write a book, produce a show, or act on TV. “Life has showed up bigger and better than I ever could have imagined,” she says. Celebrating her new album and the return of live music, Glamour sat down with Bareilles to break down the real stories behind some of her greatest hits, for an installment of our new series, 5 Songs, 5 Stories.

“Gravity”

“Gravity” is Bareilles’ sleeper hit—she wrote it as a teenager as a kind of letter to her high school boyfriend, long before she was attached to an agent or a studio. When her first album, Careful Confessions, was released in 2004, “Gravity” was the first track. It’s the oldest song Bareilles plays in public and a fan favorite. 

I wrote “Gravity” when I was about 18 years old. It’s the first time I processed my intimate personal experience in a song in a way that expanded out to deal with metaphor and these larger themes. “Gravity” is really about having my heart broken by another person and feeling physically unable to keep myself away. It didn’t matter how much I would give myself pep talks, or feel my own resolve in moving forward, or think, He treated me poorly so we’re over. I just felt like I physically didn’t have the strength to not respond to his calls, or not go see him if he asked me to. Those kinds of things felt like a gravitational pull. I think the reason that song remains so special to me is that I got to see for the first time that as brave as I could be in sharing my vulnerability, the more connective it was for my audience. I couldn’t possibly have imagined that the song would have this life. It was never on the radio! To have a song that never ended up on the radio be probably my number one most-requested song is a very special thing.

“Love Song”

“Love Song” was the debut single on Bareilles’ first studio album with a major music label. The song, released in 2007, rose to number four on the Billboard Hot 100, spending more than forty weeks in the charts. Bareilles earned two Grammy nominations for it—Song of the Year and Best Female Pop Performance.

To be perfectly honest, over the years the story of Love Song has gotten shortened to a one-liner that’s less factually accurate. The song wasn’t a specific response to my record company. Nobody sat me down and said, “I need this kind of song from you.” There was more of a subtle, nuanced…withholding. I was getting ready to release the first record, and I had a whole boatload of songs so I was like, “What’s the deal? Let’s get in the studio. Let’s make the record.” There was a withholding of the green light. I was encouraged to keep writing and meet with co-writers. The co-writer thing was a total disaster, devastating on every level. I felt invisible and unimportant and manipulated and all the things. But I knew—because I’m a smart person—that they didn’t have a song they felt they could go to radio with. So I shifted to the idea of a love song.