Love Is Like
Love Is Like is the eighth studio album by American pop rock band Maroon 5. Released on August 15, 2025, by 222 and Interscope Records, the album serves as a follow-up to their seventh studio album, Jordi. Produced by Federico Vindver, Jacob "JKash" Kasher Hindlin, and the band's bassist Sam Farrar alongside Noah "Mailbox" Passovoy, Elof Loelv, Bobby Love, and Rio Root, the album was written and recorded throughout the band's Las Vegas residency and into early 2025 at Conway Studios, Westlake Studios, and Secret Garden, among other studios around the Los Angeles and Santa Barbara areas.
Inspired by the creative process of their earlier works, frontman Adam Levine wanted the songwriting to come internally as opposed to recent studio albums, such as Jordi and Red Pill Blues, where outside writers would produce demos for the band to later expand on. By virtue of its sample-based production, it has been labeled a pop, R&B and hip-hop album with prominent influences of soul, funk, and new wave. The album features guest appearances from American rappers Lil Wayne and Sexyy Red and Thai rapper Lisa. A deluxe digital edition of the album was released on August 16, 2025, featuring three additional tracks, including "Closer" featuring American EDM producer Marshmello.
To support the album, the band embarked on the Love Is Like World Tour, in North America with support from American pop singer-songwriter Claire Rosinkranz in October 2025. "Priceless" was released as the lead single on May 2, 2025, peaking at number 76 on the US Billboard Hot 100, later becoming a top-ten single in eighteen other regions. The disco-inspired "All Night" was released as the second single in June 2025, followed by "California" in July. The fourth and final single, "Love Is Like", was released on August 14, the day before the album. The band appeared on The Today Show and performed at the iHeartRadio Music Festival to further promote the album. The album is also the first by the band to fully feature Sam Farrar on bass.
Background
On April 7, 2025, Maroon 5's lead singer Adam Levine confirmed on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon that the band was planning on releasing an album coming "over the summer". He also revealed that the album would precede a tour starting "in the fall-ish". On June 23, Maroon 5 officially announced their eighth studio album Love Is Like for release on August 15. It is the band's first album in four years since Jordi. They also announced a US arena tour in support of the album beginning on October 6 in Phoenix and ending November 25 in Detroit.Levine stated that, for the album, the band decided that it was time to start writing as a collective again, wanting to re-capture the vibe they had when they first began. Lead guitarist James Valentine said that, while the band decided to pull back from using outside producers in the beginning, they didn't fully cut them out, though the first five tracks the group wrote for the album were mainly written between just the members.
Singles
The album was promoted by four singles. The lead single, "Priceless" featuring Lisa, was released on May 2, 2025. The song debuted at number 76 on the US Billboard Hot 100. The second single, "All Night", was released on June 23. The song debuted at number 76 and peaked at 67 on the Croatia Single Chart. The song's music video is a tribute to Robert Palmer's 1986 hit, "Addicted to Love". The album's third single, "California", was released on July 17. The title track "Love Is Like", was released as the fourth and final single on August 14, the day before the release of the album.Critical and commercial reception
Love is Like was panned by music critics. On the review aggregator website Metacritic, the album received a score of 46 out of 100 based on 4 reviews, indicating "mixed or average reviews".In a negative review Linnie Greene of Pitchfork wrote that "the swagger is unconvincing; the odes to reconciliation tepid; even LISA and Lil Wayne can’t rescue these songs from banality" and that "Love Is Like is the latest repackaging of benign background noise for people who register music as something that happens without registering its particulars".
Compared to their previous records, Love Is Like did significantly worse commercially than all other releases under the Maroon 5 name. The album peaked at number 36 on the US Billboard 200 with about 18,000 units, becoming their first studio album not peak in the top-ten; it was also their first album to not have any top-40 hits. It also became their first studio album that failed to enter the UK Albums Chart. Elsewhere, it entered the top-twenty in Japan and Switzerland.
Track listing
- Japan special edition includes standard 10 tracks CD and bonus DVD :
- "This Love"
- "Sunday Morning"
- "Payphone"
- "Memories"
- "Sugar"
Personnel
Maroon 5
- Adam Levine – vocals, guitars, additional drums, executive production
- James Valentine – guitars, additional engineering, additional percussion
- Jesse Carmichael – guitars ; additional keyboards, additional acoustic guitars
- Matt Flynn – drums, percussion, additional percussion
- PJ Morton – keyboards, synthesizers
- Sam Farrar – bass, engineering, programming, additional percussion, additional keyboards, additional engineering ; production ; additional production
Additional musicians
- Federico Vindver – synthesizers, drum programming, programming, keyboards programming, additional guitars, additional percussion, additional keyboards, string arrangements, backing vocals, Wurlitzer ; additional bass, additional drums ; additional electric guitar, additional acoustic guitars, drums
- Lil Wayne – vocals, guitars
- Noah "Mailbox" Passovoy – additional percussion, programming, backing vocals
- Fred "Papa Freddy Boi" Levine – saxophone
- Jacob Scesney – saxophone
- Davide Rossi – string arrangements, violin, cello, viola
- Lisa – vocals
- Kiel Feher – additional drums
- Naliya – backing vocals
- Sexyy Red – vocals
- Viktor Thylwe – additional guitars, additional bass
- Elof Love – additional guitars, additional bass
- Ryan Tedder – additional vocals
- Kii Kinsella – additional keyboards
- Griff Clawson – additional keyboards
Technical and visuals
- Federico Vindver – production, engineering ; vocal production
- Jacob "JKash" Hindlin – production, executive production
- Rio Root – production
- Bobby Love – production
- Elof Loelv – production ; additional production
- Ryan Tedder – production
- Tyler Spry – production
- Marshmello – production
- Noah "Mailbox" Passovoy – vocal production, engineering ; additional production ; production coordination
- Naliya – vocal production, engineering
- Manny Marroquin – mixing
- Randy Merrill – mastering
- Trey Station – mix engineering
- Ramiro Fernandez-Seoane – mix engineering
- Manny Galvez – vocal production and vocal engineering for Lil Wayne
- Kuk Harrell – vocal production and vocal engineering for Lisa
- Fermin Suero Jr. – vocal engineering for Lisa
- Mateus Mendes – vocal engineering for Sexyy Red
- Tyler Graham – additional engineering
- Tyler Beans – additional engineering, engineering assistance
- Ryan Baer – additional engineering
- Noah Bruskin – engineering assistance
- Eric Eylands – engineering assistance
- Vladimir "Sunny" Laurent – engineering assistance
- Chris Maguire – production coordination
- Michael Lewis – production coordination
- Mat Maitland – art direction, imagery, design
- Hugh Lippe – band photography
Charts