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 Love & Life, 2003
MJB: "Love & Life was during a point where, once you have forgiveness for people and want to start anew, you let that guard down of being wise and watchful. You go against what you really feel and what's really in your heart — and what's really in your heart is you don't trust anyone around you. So Love & Life was really like a fictional album because it was based on me doing what people wanted me to do again. I was around a group of people that said I was crazy, and I didn't want people to think I was crazy and I really didn't want to share with my fans what was going on in my life. And what was going on is that I was still emotional and still disappointed in my life — not because of my relationship but because I didn't know how to have a relationship. I didn't know how to love somebody, I didn't know how to be patient, so I was going through hell on Love & Life. That was pitiful because I thought it was all about using the 'Oh, I forgive and I love,' and it turns out it's a fictional album when you don't use that wisdom."
RATING: I would give Love & Life a 5. Not based on the material that was on it, but based on the deception of where it came from.
 The Breakthrough, 2005
MJB: "Basically, The Breakthrough is Mary J. Blige not being what everybody else wanted her to be. You either like me or you don't: This is who I am and f--- if I've lost fans. I've made the choice to be happy — it's a choice that you make. This is the only place where I'm going to survive, and that's what The Breakthrough is about: making a choice to survive, to hell with everybody that has something negative to say.
"If I'm not sad, I'm not going to pretend to be sad to make a record. I'm going to go back to my experiences and grab something from the pain, or grab something that people never even heard about from me and put it on paper. But I'm not going to lie to my fans because my fans are not stupid and I do not look at them as stupid. I look at them as they're me, so I give them the real deal. And it's like, Mary's happy. Mary has problems too, but Mary chooses to be happy because Mary could also choose to be miserable. It's a bigger deal than just people — it's about what God thinks. He's given me all this, and I'm not going to spit in his face."
RATING: "I would give this album a 10 because I have broken through. I'm in a place where people can relate to me if they are ready. I know we did a great job. We put a lot of hard work and time into this."
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Photo: Geffen
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