Benny Blanco credits Beyonce and Jay-Z as the inspirations behind ‘I Said I Love You First’, the collaborative album with his fiancée Selena Gomez. But where The Carters’ ‘Everything is Love’ gave an unflinching look into the realities of marriage, Blanco and Gomez’s collaborative album, though somewhat charming, often feels unfocused and hesitant to reveal too much.
The album starts strong, with a moving voice recording of Gomez’s last day on Wizards of Waverly Place, where she expresses her hope to make her former castmates proud. It then launches straight into the blissful ‘Younger And Hotter Than Me’, a refreshingly candid look at an industry that classifies female pop stars as disposable: “All of the girls at this party / Are younger and hotter than me / And I hate what I wore / But I hate myself more.” It captures Gomez at her most vulnerable, but also sets an expectation that the rest of the album doesn’t quite meet.
A loose narrative takes you from broken relationships to the couple finding one another. The Gracie Abrams-assisted ‘Call Me When You Break Up’ flaunts the fun of moving on from a bad past, while ‘Sunset Blvd’ paints a cinematic portrait of a first date. Tainy and J Balvin later pop up to inject a dose of Latin pop with ‘I Can’t Get Enough’, which stands out as one of the most confident tracks on the album.
‘I Said I Love You First’ only really finds its strongest moments when it’s stripped-back. The basic production of ‘How Does It Feel To Be Forgotten’ is an intimate backdrop for Gomez to unleash a gleaming diss track masked in the whisper pop vocal style Blanco credits her with creating. It’s direct moments like that that you can actually feel a chemistry between the duo.
However, you can’t shake the feeling that Blanco simply flipped through his little black book of producer and pop star friends to play around with the project, rather than focusing on a clear sonic identity. ‘Don’t Wanna Cry’ gets a touch of Ed Banger disco magic from SebastiAn, while Dylan Brady and Charli XCX corrupt ‘Bluest Flame’ with distorted vocals and rumbling bass. It raises the question: what is the actual sound of this project?
While each track is enjoyable in isolation, the album struggles to establish a singular voice. And that’s a shame, given Blanco’s past pop supremacy. Instead of offering a truly revealing glimpse into their relationship – as the album cover suggests – ‘I Said I Love You First’ maintains a noticeable distance between artist and listener, and leaves you feeling a little empty by the end.
Details
- Record label: SMG Music / Friends Keep Secrets / Interscope Records
- Release date: March 21, 2025