Faithfully

Faithfully is the third studio album by American singer Faith Evans. It was released by Bad Boy Records on November 6, 2001, in the United States. A reflection of her musical studies, Evans was inspired by a variety of classic R&B, pop, rock, and jazz artists such as Chicago, S.O.S. Band, Ella Fitzgerald, and Sarah Vaughn during the production of Faithfully. The result, a sample-heavy album, which the label described as "old school flavored", features production by Mario Winans, Buckwild, Vada Nobles, Michael Angelo Saulsberry, the Neptunes, Battlecat, and others, with material ranging from ballads to dance tracks that built upon the contemporary R&B, funk music and hip hop genres. The album earned generally favorable reviews from most critics who called it her best effort yet, though others were critical with its length and the amount of ballads on Faithfully. It received a Grammy Award nomination for Best Contemporary R&B Album and debuted and peaked at number 14 on the US Billboard 200, selling 101,000 copies in its first week, and went on to sell more than 834,000 copies, eventually reaching gold status in the United States. Faithfully spawned four total singles, including "You Gets No Love", "I Love You" and "Burnin' Up". Faithfully was Evans' last album to be recorded under the Bad Boy imprint before her departure in 2003. Recording Evans worked closely with her husband and manager Todd Russaw on her third album. Before recording songs, the pair spent a year studying the work of classic R&B, pop, rock, and jazz artists such as Steely Dan, Michael Franks, Chicago, S.O.S. Band, Ella Fitzgerald, Sarah Vaughn and others, sitting around and playing them to learn about their techniques and performances. With her label Bad Boy Records nearing transition from distributor Arista Records to Universal Music and mentor Sean "P. Diddy" Combs being involved in several projects, including his second album Forever (1999), Evans and Russaw started working on new songs their own. After sending them to Combs, he urged them to come to Miami to start recording sessions for the album with him and his team, which Evans called "really enjoyable". While Combs and in-house producer Mario Winans would craft the majority of the album production, Evans also collaborated with Battlecat, Bink, Buckwild, Hozay Clowney, Kip Collins, Havoc, The Neptunes, Vada Nobles, Michaelangelo Saulsberry, and frequent contributor Chucky Thompson on Faithfully.