Brown Sista

Part 2
Heavier on dance tracks than seductive jams (Jackson’s other forte), “Discipline” is classic Janet. The title track is one of her typical frisky bedroom cuts, featuring lyrics like, “I need some discipline tonight/I’ve been very bad” and “Daddy, make me cry.”

Yet, there is an air of newness to the album that is partly the result of Jackson creatively straying from her longtime go-to production team of Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis.

“I was hoping we could do something together, but sometimes you have to explore and kind of kick yourself out of the nest,” Jackson says of her decision to escape her production comfort zone. “It was something that I needed to do for myself, but I think [Jam and Lewis] felt it coming, too, ’cause I kept working with a different producer here or there.”

Stewart agrees that Jackson was in need of a fresh direction. “She’s made a career of going to the same two producers and whatever environment she’s been going to, it’s become routine,” Stewart says. “More than anything, I was excited that she was open to working with people that she hasn’t worked with. The producers have come together and taken it retro, but also fast forward to the future.”

In addition to production by Jackson’s longtime boyfriend Jermaine Dupri, Island’s head of urban music, “Discipline” also features tracks by newcomers the-Dream and Tricky Stewart (”Umbrella,” “Bed”), Lil Jon, Stargate and songwriters Ne-Yo and Johnta Austin. The beats and lyrics that these contributors initially presented to Jackson were, serendipitously, true to her choreography-based roots.

“I never had to tell them, ‘No, this is what it should be,’ ” says Jackson, who stopped rehearsing for a tour in support of “20 Y.O.” to focus on the album. She was also in the middle of shooting her third starring film role, in Tyler Perry’s “Why Did I Get Married?,” which opened at No. 1 at the box office last year. “I felt like they really did their homework and whatever they felt a Janet song was—rock, pop or urban—they hit it right on the nose.”

“It sounds like songs that were written for her, and I think that’s a beautiful thing,” Dupri says. “You could tell that these records were made for Janet.”

With “Discipline,” the aim was to innovate without totally reinventing the wheel. “There’s so much that I’ve done, from ‘Black Cat’ to ‘I Get Lonely’ to ‘That’s the Way Love Goes’ to ‘Together Again.’ I have never stuck to one style of music ever,” Jackson says. “There are some things that maybe I’ll try for right now and some things I’ll wait later on to try. It’s [about] sticking to who I am. Even lyrically, something that I’ve experienced or someone that I know has experienced, it has to relate to my life and myself.”

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