What's The Real Meaning Of Greatest Love Story Never Told By Jennifer Lopez?
On February 16, over 21 years after releasing her album "This Is Me... Then," Jennifer Lopez finally dropped its sequel, aptly titled, "This Is Me... Now." But while the prequel, released in 2002, was just a lone album comprised of 12 songs, the sequel album includes 13 songs and coincides with a musical film component titled "This Is Me... Now: A Love Story," a documentary dubbed the same name as the album's final song, "Greatest Love Story Never Told," AND a tour. Phew! "All of these things that I do amplified this in a way," Lopez explained during an interview with Apple Music's Zane Lowe about the multimedia endeavor. "The actor, the writer, the songwriter, the movie writer, the, you know, producer, the choreographer, the dancer, I think for the first time I was like, 'No, I'm going to take all of the things I do and put them all on this,'" she declared.
Still, it's the last song on the freshly minted album that's got everyone talking. So what's the real meaning behind Lopez's new song, "Greatest Love Story Never Told." Here's what we think!
Greatest Love Story Never Told was inspired by Ben Affleck
After just one full listen, it becomes glaringly apparent that Jennifer Lopez's brand new album, "This Is Me... Now," is a full-on mushy, gushy love letter to her hubby, Ben Affleck — and the last track on the anthology, "Greatest Love Story Never Told," is no different. "There is the person who inspired this for me, who has inspired me my whole life. He just, he inspired an album 20 years ago, and I know he hates that I'm doing this right now," Lopez gushed at the February 13 screening event for the album's film component.
As for the lyrics of "Greatest Love Story Never Told," however, they speak for themselves. At the top of the song, Lopez addresses all the time the couple lost, but notes how they ultimately found their way back together. "Different roads, two lost souls / Never thought we'd find our way back." Later on, however, the lyrics become downright racy. "Missing your body, climbing on top of me, slipping inside of me / Way that I ride it, bodies aligning, look at our timing," the wife and mother and stepmother of five belts out.
... And his poetic love letters
Jennifer Lopez is adamant that "Greatest Love Story Never Told" is much more than just a tale of two lovers who eventually find their way back to one another. The story (no pun intended) goes that during their first Christmas as husband and wife, Ben gifted Jennifer with a book of all of the couple's correspondence throughout their years of knowing one another. "But he also kind of put our story in there in that book, and we had all these letters, and he's a writer, so he writes long, beautiful, poetic letters," Lopez recalled during an Apple Music interview. And according to Lopez, that's what ultimately inspired "Greatest Love Story Never Told," and the rest of the album as well. "I brought it in there, and that kind of really set the tone for everybody to understand what the mission was like," she revealed.
Alas, Lopez's mode of inspiration hasn't been without criticism. Even Affleck himself pondered on the ironic nature of the song's name. "I did really find the beauty and the poetry and the irony in the fact that it's the greatest love story never told. If you're making a record about it, that seems kind of like telling it," he said in the documentary (via Variety) about realizing Lopez's entire team was using the intimate letters he penned to his wife for inspiration. Ben, blink twice if you need help!