She worked on it with hip hop producer 9th Wonder and intended to release it in 2004, but the album leaked prematurely and spawned various pirated versions of the unfinished project.

The booklet for the album contains faithful recreations of classic Hip Hop album covers,[2] featuring images of Grae and 9th Wonder superimposed onto covers of Public Enemy's It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back, Das EFX's Dead Serious, Raekwon's Only Built 4 Cuban Linx..., and Black Sheep's A Wolf in Sheep's Clothing.

"[1] Alexander F. Remington of The Washington Post felt that 9th Wonder is "not at his best, and as a result the album is merely great rather than classic", but concluded that Grae "proves that she's one of the best MCs alive" with Jeanius.

[11] XXL said that she connects with listeners on "an intimate level" with her honesty and "willingness to recount vivid details of painful, haunting past experiences".

"[13] Robert Christgau of MSN Music found her rhymes "jam-packed" and "infinitely smarter about her 'insecurities' and 'moodiness' than her shoegazer counterparts", and gave Jeanius an "A−".