Survivor is Destiny's Child's third studio album that was released on May 1, 2001 by Columbia Records.
Tracklisting[]
- Independent Women Part I 3:41
- Survivor 4:14
- Bootylicious 3:27
- Nasty Girl 4:17
- Fancy 4:12
- Apple Pie À La Mode 2:58
- Sexy Daddy 4:06
- Perfect Man 3:41
- Independent Women Part II 3:45
- Happy Face 4:19
- Dance With Me 3:43
- My Heart Still Beats 4:08
- Emotion 3:56
- Brown Eyes 4:36
- Dangerously In Love 5:06
- The Story Of Beauty 3:31
- Gospel Medley (Dedicated To Andretta Tillman): You've Been So Good / Now Behold The Lamb / Jesus Loves Me / Total Praise 3:24
- Outro (DC-3) Thank You 4:04
Album Background[]
In December of 1999, LeToya Luckett and LaTavia Roberson tried to split with their manager, Mathew Knowles, claiming that he was keeping too much of the group's profits and that he favored Beyoncé Knowles and Kelly Rowland.
When the music video for "Say My Name" debuted in February 2000, Roberson and Luckett found out that they were being replaced with Michelle Williams (a former backup singer for Monica) and Farrah Franklin, an aspiring singer-actress.
In July 2000, (just five and a half months after joining), it was announced that Franklin would be leaving the group.
According to the group, Franklin missed a handful of promotional appearances and concerts and was asked to leave the group; however, she stated that she quit because of negative vibes in the group and her inability to assert any control in decision making.
Recording[]
After emerging as the group's focal point, Knowles assumed more control taking a greater hand in writing the material and even producing some of the record herself.
However, Beyonce's intention was not to monopolize the spotlight; she did co-write and produce all of the album's 18 cuts. She explained, "I only wanted to do like three songs... The label kept saying "Do another song, do another song, do another song". It wasn't planned. It wasn't like I said, OK, I'm going to take charge."
The album was originally planned to be called "Independent Women", but was later changed to "Survivor" because of the turmoil that has coincided with the group.
The song "Survivor" was inspired by a joke that a radio station had made about the fact that three members had already left the group, comparing the band to the reality tv game show "Survivor." Beyonce was inspired to take the negative comment and turn it into a positive thing by writing a song out of it.
Beyonce wrote the song "Bootylicious" on a plane flight to London while listening to the track "Edge of Seventeen" by Stevie Nicks when the word "Bootylicious" just popped in to her head; this claim has been highly disputed as Rob Fusari said in a 2010 interview that he alone had the idea for the song and had wanted to use a guitar riff from the song "Eye of the Tiger" but after not being able to find it used a similar riff from the Stevie Nicks song "Edge of Seventeen".
After hearing Beyoncé claim credit for the song in an interview with Barbara Walters, he telephoned Mathew Knowles: "And he explained to me, in a nice way, he said, "People don't want to hear about Rob Fusari, producer from Livingston, N.J. No offense, but that's not what sells records. What sells records is people believing that the artist is everything." And I'm like, "Yeah, I know, Mathew. I understand the game. But come on, I'm trying too. I'm a squirrel trying to get a nut, too."
While recording sessions were going on, Kelly Rowland recorded the song "Angel" which appeared on the soundtrack to the film "Down to Earth."
Chart Performance[]
"Survivor" debuted at #1 on the Billboard 200 with first-week sales of 663,275 copies, making it the highest first-week sales figures of any female group in the Soundscan era and the highest first-week sales figures of any album in the history of Columbia Records.
Critical Reception[]
"Survivor" received generally positive reviews.
On Metacritic, it received a score of 63 out of 100 based on 17 reviews, indicating "generally favorable reviews".
Entertainment Weekly praised the album, calling it "the divas' premature, but inevitable growing pains album."
Spin commented that "Survivor is relentlessly inventive in its recombinations."
New York was less impressed, saying: "All fifteen tracks are one-dimensional disses and dismissals of scantily clad women, vengeful boyfriends, and the group's assorted doubters."
AllMusic commented that the album is "as contrived and calculated as a Mariah Carey record, only without the joy."