"What About Us?" is a song by American singer Brandy from her third studio album, Full Moon (2002). It was written by LaShawn Daniels, Rodney Jerkins, Kenisha Pratt, Nora Payne and Norwood, featuring main production by Jerkins. An offbeat, aggressive high-tech track, the song's development was motivated by the fact that the singer wanted something different–an aggressive, sexier and edgier sound with a message which would empower women while also reflecting her own growth and maturity.
"What About Us?" was released as the lead single from Full Moon on January 1, 2002, by Atlantic Records. A commercial success, it peaked at number seven on the US Billboard Hot 100, also reaching the top ten in Australia, Denmark, New Zealand, Norway, and the United Kingdom. Steve "Silk" Hurley's remix of the song received a nomination for Best Remixed Recording, Non-Classical at the 45th Annual Grammy Awards (2003).
The accompanying music video for "What About Us?" was directed by Dave Meyers and was filmed in Culver City, California in December 2001. It premiered via MTV on January 10, 2002. Primarily shot in front of a greenscreen, the highly-animated, futuristic video introduced a sexier image of the former teen singer, portraying her as a male-ruling character in an alternate universe. It was nominated for the Viewer's Choice Award at the 2002 MTV Video Music Awards.
Background and development
After the end of the promotional tour for her second studio album Never Say Never (1998), the end of her UPN sitcom Moesha (1996–2001) and a flurry of tabloid headlines discussing her nervous breakdown in November 1999, Norwood went on a lengthy hiatus to reflect and take some introspective looks. In mid-2000, she started reconsecrating herself on her musical career, contributing songs to albums such as Urban Renewal (2001), which introduced a scratchy, evocative edge to Norwood's voice, now having a deeper and warmer tone with a textured lower register and notably stronger falsetto. In late 2000, Norwood finally began conceiving ideas for a third studio album with her label Atlantic Records. While Rodney Jerkins, the main producer of her previous album, and his team, had been working on several new songs for the singer's upcoming project in hopes of recreating the winning chemistry of Never Say Never, Norwood wanted to make sure that she was gaining more creative control over the project and thus, arranged meetings with all her writers and musicians to discuss the lyricals topics and sounds she wanted for the album.
Recording and production
"What About Us?" was one of a couple of new tracks Jerkins worked on while he was putting the finishing touches on Full Moon in Los Angeles. After playing it to her, enthusiastic Norwood asked Jerkins to save the "offbeat, aggressive high-tech track" for the album: "I was like 'Oh my God, Rodney, this is it", she said in an interview with MTV News the following year. "This is exactly what the industry needs. We can maybe change the game with this.' He said, 'Yeah, this is what I'm going for'." She eventually consulted longtime collaborators LaShawn Daniels, Nora Payne and Kenisha Pratt to rewrite several lyrics on the song, saying: "I told them what I wanted to talk about. 'This is an aggressive record – it's edgy, it's sexy. I wanna sing about something that's sexy and edgy.' I revisited my past in my mind and kind of told them what I wanna talk about."
Norwood has noted that it took the team a while to get it because she didn't want "that sound that's already saturated the industry. It's important to me to be a trendsetter and change the game. It was a great feeling to see Rodney soar like that." Norwood co-wrote the lyrics with Daniels, Payne and Pratt, also setting the background track. The song was mixed by Paul Foley and Fabian Marascuillo at Darkchild Studios in Pleasantville, New Jersey, while Norwood recorded the song at the Hit Factory Criteria in Miami.
Music and lyrics
An electro-funk song, "What About Us?", was described as being "offbeat", due to its production which features a "chopping pace and snarky sound effects mugging in the background". The song is four minutes and ten seconds long and includes 12 instruments: Norwood's vocals, six different synths, two percussions and drums. According to the notes published on Musicnotes.com by Alfred Publishing, "What About Us?" features 96 beats per minute, which is a moderate tempo. It was written in C minor and ranges from the note C 2 to Ab 4 . In the book Musical Rhythm in the Age of Digital Reproduction (2010), author Anne Danielsen analyzed "What About Us?", describing it as "very complex" and characterized by its multilinear texture and unstable groove.