This Is Me... Now
This Is Me... Now is the ninth studio album by American entertainer Jennifer Lopez. It was released on February 16, 2024, via Nuyorican Productions and BMG Rights Management, marking her first release under this partnership. The album is heavily inspired by the rekindled romance between Lopez and Ben Affleck as well as their subsequent marriage, with themes of love and self-healing throughout. It is a sequel to Lopez's third studio album This Is Me... Then and her first studio album in a decade since A.K.A.. It was recorded between May and August 2022 and completed on June 29, 2023. It is the first Lopez album to feature no rappers on its standard edition since J.Lo. Lopez contributed rap verses to three of the album's songs and co-wrote every one on the album, with production primarily from Rogét Chahayed, Jeff "Gitty" Gitelman and Angel Lopez.
Part of a three-part project documenting Lopez's search for love, self-healing, and her reunion with actor Ben Affleck, This Is Me... Now is accompanied by two further components. The second is a similarly titled, narrative-driven musical film, This Is Me... Now: A Love Story, co-written by Lopez, Affleck, Dave Meyers and Chris Shafer, with Meyers also directing. Aside from containing choreographed visuals for songs from the album, the film is a stylized and fictionalized narrative loosely based on Lopez's own life and her trials as a serial romantic. It features a cast of celebrities, including Fat Joe, Trevor Noah, Jane Fonda, Post Malone, Keke Palmer and Sofía Vergara, among others. The project's third component, a behind the scenes documentary called The Greatest Love Story Never Told was inspired by a collection of letters from Affleck to Lopez of the same name and explores the making of the music, film and documentary. It was released on February 27, 2024. All three components were produced simultaneously and were self-funded by Lopez with a budget of around $20 million.
This Is Me... Now was preceded by the lead single, "Can't Get Enough", which samples Alton Ellis's 1967 song "I'm Still in Love with You". Following its release, the song appeared on several national single charts and spawned a remix featuring rapper Latto. Alongside Latto and rapper Redman, Lopez performed the song on Saturday Night Live. A remix for "Rebound", featuring Puerto Rican rapper Anuel AA, was released alongside the album, as the second single. The title track and a remix of "This Time Around", featuring I-dle, were released as promotional singles.
Upon its release, This Is Me... Now received mixed-to-positive reviews, with praise for Lopez's matured vocals and criticism for its themes. Commercially, the album entered at number 38 on the US Billboard 200 and sold 18,000 copies in its debut week. It would also chart within the top 10 of charts in Austria, Belgium, Germany, and the United Kingdom, and peak at the top of the UK R&B Albums and US Indie Store Album Sales charts. Lopez was set to embark on This Is Me... Live to promote the album, her first tour in five years, but was canceled citing Lopez's need to be with her family. In August 2024, it was revealed that Lopez and Affleck were divorcing.
Background and inspiration
In mid-2021, Lopez signed a multi-year deal with Netflix to produce a range of films and television shows through her own Nuyorican Productions. Lopez co-produced and starred opposite Owen Wilson and Maluma in the romantic comedy Marry Me, which was filmed in late 2019 and released in February 2022. During this time, Lopez had also reunited with former fiancé, actor Ben Affleck and the couple got engaged in April 2022. This reunion would serve as the primary inspiration for much of the album, film and documentary. On November 25, 2022, the 20th anniversary of the release of This Is Me... Then, Lopez announced her ninth studio album, This Is Me... Now with a video she released on her social media, featuring her recreating that album's cover which morphs into a photograph for the new album. It is Lopez's first album in a decade, since 2014's A.K.A.Lopez described the album as an "emotional, spiritual, and psychological journey she has taken over the past two decades." The album's lyrics are very confessional, with Lopez discussing the reputation of her love life. She stated, "People think they know things about what happened to me along the way, the men I was with—but they really have no idea, and a lot of times they get it so wrong. There's a part of me that was hiding a side of myself from everyone. And I feel like I'm at a place in my life, finally, where I have something to say about it." After initially securing investment for the project, Lopez forged ahead with a budget of around $20 million for the three-part conceptual project: This Is Me... Now, This Is Me... Now: A Love Story and the accompanying documentary The Greatest Love Story Never Told. After one of the funders pulled out, due to "not understanding the project", Lopez forged ahead before selling the rights to A Love Story to Amazon Prime. Later during a 2024 interview with Variety, it was noted that This Is Me... Now is a direct sequel to This Is Me...Then, and a deliberate nod to "old-school Lopez".
On June 29, 2023, Lopez posted a photo of herself featuring the album's title and the caption "album delivery day", alluding to the album being completed. In comments following the post, one of the album's producers, Rogét Chahayed said "It's time". On September 11, 2023, it was announced Lopez had signed a "recording and publishing partnership" deal with BMG Rights Management, in conjunction with her own Nuyorican Productions. Speaking about the album ahead of its release, Lopez stated she wanted to create an experience for fans, "We did a bunch of different album covers... We try to do stuff that's very special for the fans and do collector's items and things like that that they can have forever and ever", later in the same interview with Entertainment Tonight she opined, "the truth is I don't even know if I'll ever make another album after this. It's such the kind of quintessential kind of Jennifer Lopez J.Lo project and I really feel very fulfilled, so they really will be collector's items at a certain point."
The album was supposed to be supported by the This Is Me... Live tour in 2024; however, by May that year, the tour was cancelled, citing Lopez's need to be with her family. It was subsequently revealed in August 2024 that Lopez and Affleck were separated and pursuing a divorce.
Concept and production
This Is Me... Now is a pop and R&B album, with critics noting its "old-school" stylings. According to The Independent, this is in part due to the "cupid-plucked" harps present throughout the album's production. When discussing how the album came about, Lopez remarked that it was inspired by a conversation between her and her manager Benny Medina, where she told "untold stories about her search for love in the years between her first time with Affleck and the triumph of their reunification". It was Medina who first suggested making an album about the reunion, with Lopez subsequently convening a songwriters camp at her home. The starting point for the album was a collection of letters which Affleck wrote to Lopez and titled "The Greatest Story Never Told". According to Affleck, he found beauty and irony in the fact his and Lopez's love was the greatest love story never told, and remarking that "if you're making a record about it, that seems kind of like telling it". The album's final track and accompanying documentary are named after this collection of letters. According to Lopez, the collection of letters featured writings from Lopez and Affleck's original relationship as well as things that had been written since the duo reunited. Affleck gifted the letters in a book to Lopez on the first Christmas since their reunion. During an interview with Zane Lowe on Apple Music, Lopez confirmed that she worked primarily with a small group of producers on the album. It was primarily produced by Rogét Chahayed, Jeff "Gitty" Gitelman and Angel Lopez. During the first day, studio sessions led to the completion of the title track and the album's closing song, "The Greatest Story Never Told", which took its inspiration and name from the collection of letters.Others like Kimberly "Kaydence" Krysiuk also joined the team. This Is Me... Now was written and produced primarily from May to August 2022, amidst Lopez's reunion and marriage to her ex Ben Affleck. Lopez confirmed that the reunion inspired her to get back into the studio and write honest music, in ways that she had not done since This Is Me... Then. Lowe asked Lopez about the connection between This Is Me...Now and This Is Me...Then, wondering if the album would be about "rekindling that previous relationship and everything being great", Lopez responded "No. Its about celebratory moments with the person who is your soulmate. Yes I found him then and it didn't work out.... We had work to do." Further sessions and additional credits come from Chauncey "Hit-Boy" Hollis, Tay Keith, Yeti Beats and Carter Lang, with the album completing recording and production in 2023. According to BMG, the album was mainly recorded at Lopez's home studio, Lola's House in Beverly Hills, Los Angeles. Several fellow artists contributed to the album including Justin Timberlake and Timbaland, British singer-songwriter Raye, Madison Love, and Jason DeRulo. Lowe noted that the harp features heavily in the production of the whole album, while Lopez also confirmed that this was deliberate in the sound she hoped to achieve, also commenting that "I didn't want to create a sound that was current or sounded like everything else being released at the moment".