"All I Have" is a song by American singer Jennifer Lopez,
featuring American rapper LL Cool J. Written by Lopez, Makeba
Riddick, Curtis Richardson, and Ron G and produced by Cory
Rooney, Ron G, and Dave McPherson, it was released in early
2003 as the second single from Lopez's third studio album,
This Is Me... Then(2002). The song reached number one in
the United States and New Zealand, and entered the top five and
the top ten in several countries. After the success of "All I
Have" with LL Cool J, the track was later included on the
re-issue of his album
10.
The song is based around a sample from Debra Laws' 1981 song
"Very Special", written by Lisa Peters and William Jeffrey. It
was originally intended to be titled "I'm Good", but was
changed because it sounded too similar to her 2001 hit "I'm
Real".
The music video for the single was shot in New York City in
November 2002 and released in January 2003. It features Lopez
and LL as former lovers now broken up. The two recall the good
and bad times while dealing with being alone for the holidays.
Lopez shows up to LL's house with a gift. With him not there,
she puts the gift under the tree. He later sees the gift under
the tree and realizes it was from Lopez. He opens the gift and
sees a golden key. Upset at the relationship being over, he
throws the key in the fireplace while a tearful Lopez gets help
from her friends with her things. The video was shot right
before Thanksgiving, but did not premiere on television until
after Christmas.
On the U.S. Hot 100, "All I Have" debuted at number
twenty-five the last charting week of 2002, which was December
28, easily becoming the highest-debuting song of that year.
"All I Have" made impressive strides on the survey, reaching
the penthouse by February 8, 2003, where it remained for four
weeks, becoming Lopez's fourth Hot 100 number-one single and
the first for LL. The single was one of the most popular pop
and R&B singles of the spring of 2003, remaining in the top
ten for twelve weeks, nineteen weeks on the top thirty, and
twenty-one weeks on the top fifty. Moreover, it charted inside
the top five in the United Kingdom, the Netherlands,
Switzerland, and Australia and the top ten in Canada and
Ireland.
In March 2003, Debra Laws sued Sony Music Entertainment/Epic
Records in the United States District Court for the Central
District of California, claiming that the use of samples from
"Very Special" without her consent (even though the writers of
"Very Special" and Elektra Entertainment Group—successor to
Elektra/Asylum Records, which had released the original
recording of "Very Special"—had given their consent to the use
of the samples) violated her statutory and common law right of
publicity under California law. In November 2003, Judge Lourdes
Baird granted Sony Music's motion for summary judgment on the
ground that Laws's state law claims were preempted by Section
301 of the United States Copyright Act. In 2006, that decision
was affirmed by the United States Court of Appeals for the
Ninth Circuit.