Monica & Missy - M&M (2015)

Monica Denise Arnold was born and raised outside Atlanta in College Park, and started singing in church as a toddler, diversifying quickly by competing in talent shows. When she was 11 years old, a winning performance of 'The Greatest Love Of All', patterned after Whitney Houston's version, impressed a talent scout and led to connections with Dallas Austin and Queen Latifah. Signed to the former's Arista-affiliated Rowdy label, Monica debuted at the age of 14 with 'Don't Take It Personal (Just One Of Dem Days)', with the Austin-produced single entering the Billboard charts in April 1995, and only missed the top of the Hot 100 by one spot. Recorded over a period of three years, parent album 'Miss Thang' arrived that July and was further boosted by two highly successful double A-side singles. She also showed uncommon maturity on the Usher duet 'Let's Straighten It Out', a vintage ballad that preceded the neo-soul movement by a couple years, and in a few collaborations with Tim & Bob, such as a cover of the S.O.S. Band hit 'Tell Me If You Still Care'. In 1998 she duetted with Brandy on the 'The Boy Is Mine' single, which topped the R&B and pop charts for three-months, and Monica' like-titled album was issued on Arista Records. For her third album, she co-wrote much of 'All Eyez On Me', but it was delayed repeatedly, even after the feel-good title song was issued as a single, and ultimately it was released only in Japan in October 2002.

She quickly rebounded in the studio with Missy Elliott heavily involved as a producer and writing partner, and the first result of their work together was 'So Gone', released in April 2003. It topped Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Singles, went Top Ten pop, and became the lead single of the 'After The Storm' album, a collection of mostly new material that went straight to number one upon its June release. Throughout each successive album that arrived every few years, Monica continued to mix and match contemporary trends while drawing from traditional R&B, with Jermaine Dupri and Dem Franchize Boyz helping her tap into the Atlanta snap sound with 'Everytime The Beat Drop', while the 'Still Standing' album was another Elliott collaboration, and 'Everything To Me' was based on Deniece Williams' 'Silly', with Jazmine Sullivan on-board as a co-writer. 'Still Standing' capped Monica's run with J Records, and she moved to RCA, which essentially absorbed the label. Her 'New Life' album was led by 'Until It's Gone', another ballad aided by Missy Elliott and Jazmine Sullivan, and in 2015 'Code Red' followed, with the title song released as a single, and featuring Elliott, and introduced by Monica's daughter Laiyah. She parted ways with RCA after 'Code Red', and by the end of the decade she'd established her independent phase with the singles 'BeHUMAN', 'Commitment' and 'Me + You'. During her career she has kept up her friendship with Missy Elliott, and has worked with her as co-writer, producer, and guest artist on her records, and this collection features rare unreleased works over the years recorded by Monica, featuring guest vocals and/or production by her good friend Missy Elliott. 

Track listing

01 I Love Him (Intro)
02 U Turn Me On
03 No Stoppin'
04 Don't Be Cruel (feat. Beenie Man)
05 Let Me Know
06 Remember When 
07 Girl, Please 
08 If You Were My Man (feat. Jazmine Sullivan)
09 Everything to Me (Remix) (feat. Notorious B.I.G.)
10 Blackberry
11 (Anything) To Find You (feat. Lil' Kim)
12 No Stoppin' (feat. Fantasia)

Missy Elliott - Block Party (2008)

Melissa Arnette Elliott, better known as Missy Elliott or Missy "Misdemeanor" Elliott, embarked

on her music career with R&B girl group Sista in the early-to-mid 1990's, and later became a member of the Swing Mob collective along with childhood friend and long-time collaborator Timbaland, with whom she worked on projects for American R&B acts Aaliyah, 702, Total, and SWV. Following several collaborations and guest appearances, she launched her solo career in 1997 with her debut album 'Supa Dupa Fly', which spawned the top 20 single 'Sock It 2 Me'. The album debuted at number three on the Billboard 200, the highest charting debut for a female rapper at the time. Her second album, 'Da Real World', was released in 1999 and produced the singles 'She's A Bitch', 'All n My Grill', and top five hit 'Hot Boyz'. The remix of the latter song broke the record for most weeks at number one on the US R&B chart in January 2000, as well as spending 18 weeks at number one on the Hot Rap Singles chart from December 1999 to March 2000. With the release of 'Miss E... So Addictive' (2001), 'Under Construction' (2002), and 'This Is Not A Test' (2003), Elliott established an international career that yielded hits including 'Get Ur Freak On', 'One Minute Man', '4 My People', 'Gossip Folks', and 'Work It', with the latter winning her a Grammy Award for Best Female Rap Solo Performance. Since 2007, Elliott's seventh studio album has had several different forms with extensive delays. Initially she worked with Timbaland, Swizz Beatz, Danja, T-Pain and DJ Toomp and planned to release the album at the beginning of 2008. In January 2008, 'Ching-A-Ling' was released as the lead single for the soundtrack of the film 'Step Up 2: The Streets', which also featured 'Shake Your Pom Pom', produced by Timbaland. 'Best, Best' was released the same year, and Elliott renamed the album from 'FANomenal' to its new tentative title 'Block Party'. Things went quiet over the next few years, and then in 2012 she released two Timbaland-produced singles, '9th Inning' and 'Triple Threat', exclusively to iTunes. Though the songs managed to chart on Billboard Hot Digital Songs, this was not the impetus that Elliott needed to resurrect 'Block Party', saying in an interview with Yahoo's The Yo Show, that sometimes "Your brain needs time to refresh!". In between the recording of her seventh album, Elliott found success behind the scenes, with her writing and production being involved in hits for Keyshia Cole ('Let It Go'), Jazmine Sullivan ('Need U Bad'), Monica ('Everything To Me'), Fantasia ('Free Yourself'), and Jennifer Hudson ('I'm His Only Woman'). All this extra-curricular work has kept her from completing her own music, and so it's now unlikely that 'Block Party' will ever see the light of day, so it's up to us to piece it together so that we can hear what could well have turned out to be Elliott's final album under her own name. 

Track listing

01 Ching-A-Ling
02 Shake Your Pom Pom
03 Best, Best
04 Warped (interlude)
05 Talk That Shit
06 All 4 U
07 9th Inning (feat. Timbaland)
08 Swat That Fly
09 Act A Fool
10 Pep Rally
11 Put It On Ya (feat. Teyana Taylor & Pharrell)

12 Triple Threat (feat. Timbaland)