I guess ... to me, I see as much variation among them as I do, say, Bruce Springsteen, Tom Petty, Bob Seger and John Mellencamp, who could be summed up in a similar fashion.
Except for this song, Regina Belle didn't really have a pop hit ("Make It Like It Was" and "If I Could," while songs I personally enjoy, can't really be called hits on the Hot 100), but she was much better known on the R&B/black/urban charts. Peabo Bryson, thanks to his "If Ever You're in My Arms Again" as well as this duet, "Beauty and the Beast" and "Tonight I Celebrate My Love," would have had more pop name recognition.
I'd give it an 8 as well, mainly because Peabo and Regina do such a great job with it. I was expecting a low score (remembering Tom's score for "Baby, Come to Me," which this reminds me of a little bit), so a 5 didn't bother me much. If anything, it was higher than I thought it might get.
I don't believe in passively hiding behind a downvote. So let me be clear.
Every time you use the word "breeder" in an otherwise inclusive, friendly comment section, you are going to get a downvote from me. There's a time and place for that term of irony. This isn't it. It just comes off as a nasty slur. Unless you're referencing the band of the same name, you're going to get a downvote from me.
I don't have to approve of your language; free speech rules, certainly. But I can register my disapproval of your contempt. And putting all the distancing/contextualizing emojis that you want after the sentiment doesn't change that.
From the "so bad it's almost good" department:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SFpsDAL4oKE
"I Love You Period" is one big eye-roll. But as a journalism/English double major, I had a grudging fondness for its chorus. And it's almost as much of an earworm as Dan Baird's group Georgia Satellites' "Keep Your Hands to Yourself."
Oh ... and listening to the vocal track of the video ... I know the recording has more time between the pauses in the first 90 seconds than that. I remember when I was converting the cassette to digital, the CD kept separating the songs as different tracks because there was so much time between the moments. This track has been edited to remove some of that silence, and it reduces the drama as a result.
Jon kind of got at this a bit above, but to me the moment that grabs you isn't so much the climactic end (although it is in itself amazing), but the first 90 seconds of this record. Who else could get away with that cold a cappella opening and true moments of silence before gliding into her first rendition of the chorus. If you're not a fan of Ms. Houston, you'll turn away. Otherwise, you're compelled from the get-go. It's a bravura moment in a recording that has several of them, and one of the few times Whitney's church tradition is able to break through the MOR arrangements she frequently was given.
I will always give this song a 10, because Whitney earns it. For all of the bombast she unleashes later on, there are so many moments of intimacy and vulnerability in the front half of the song that the dynamic ending feels earned, not canned. (This, despite the production elements so many rightly criticize.)
This is the best of balladeer Whitney. "I Have Nothing," "Run to You," and later songs like "I Believe in You and Me" or "I Learned from the Best," are fine, but they're overshadowed by this performance. The rest of Whitney's strongest performances move in a more R&B, less AC/pop mode (which makes for some interesting listening in itself). But after this, she pretty much puts the Barry Manilow/Air Supply template in the attic. At the risk of permanent vocal cord damage (how could she do this performance repeatedly?), she does everything a ballad could expect of her and more.
It's a bravura show-stopper like none else. The song that will break its No. 1 run in a few virtual years doesn't come close.
Another good round of music from all genres in the Top 40 during the reign of “I Will Always Love You” – I’d give these 10’s or 9’s. (Again, thanks, poorlittlefool and Aaron, for pulling these together)
10’s
Real Love – Mary J. Blige
Rhythm Is a Dancer -- Snap!
The Last Song – Elton John
No Ordinary Love – Sade
Ordinary World – Duran Duran
Love Shoulda Brought You Home (From "Boomerang") - Toni Braxton
9s
Do You Believe in Us – Jon Secada
If I Ever Fall in Love – Shai
Drive – R.E.M.
Who’s Gonna Ride Your Wild Horses – U2
These Are Days – 10,000 Maniacs
Faithful – Go West
Walk On the Ocean – Toad the Wet Sprocket
Love Can Move Mountains – Celine Dion
I'm Every Woman (From "The Bodyguard") - Whitney Houston
Revolution (From "Malcolm X") - Arrested Development
Johnny Have You Seen Her? - The Rembrandts
Groovin' In the Midnight - Maxi Priest
I think you're onto something here ... but it's missing a key element, to me.
I think the big, broad success, almost back to back, of "End of the Road" and "I Will Always Love You" as pop ballads with R&B and gospel overtones by Black artists, is significant. I'm not sure it's directly connected to the news of the time.
Rather, I think it could be a reaction to the music that was directly connected to the news of the time, the chart-ascending rap and hip-hop hits that were starting to become more noticeable in the SoundScan era (and will be even more so in the next virtual couple of years). I wouldn't be surprised if, consciously or subconsciously, Top 40 and adult R&B radio programmers were playing the heck out of these behemoth MOR tracks by black artists to segue into or out of not only rap hits but hip-hop songs like Mary J. Blige's "Real Love."
It felt to me like this was about the time where rap/hip-hop stations were starting to catch on outside of major metro markets and Top 40 stations had to catch up to keep younger demos. Blending these known airplay quantities with the sales giants would help them figure out where to go.
5 and three 10's.
I'm guessing from Bix's note that Eric Carmen is an anti-vaxxer, a racist or both. Sigh. "Go All the Way" is a classic, nevertheless, and since it's not an EC solo hit, I don't have to feel conflicted about giving it the top mark.
In a year when nondescript songs like Tag's "The Way I Feel," Truth Inc.'s "The Very Best of Me" and basically any of Curtis Stigers' singles did well on my charts, I should have been predisposed to like today's No. 1. Nope. I guess it didn't help that it came from a Fox soap, since I was never a fan of either 90210 or Melrose Place and so had little reason to check out the new show. (A 90210 song does do well on my charts not all too long from now, though.)
This week, the weekend of Nov. 14/15, 1992, on my personal chart -- at https://www.crownnote.com/charts/cstolliver/music-of-a-lifetime-top-25-715 -- we have a rare country song that wasn't a Top 40 crossover hitting my charts:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7pdSzY5QbxU
Reba McEntire became a major name in the country world during the years when I wasn't paying much attention to country radio (sorry, Irish). Oddly, she made more of an impression on me via a guest appearance in summer 1992 on "One Live to Live," an ABC soap I was regularly watching. That, plus my sister’s fondness for her, led me to check out the single “The Greatest Man I Never Knew.” I found it to hit the same emotional beats as Harry Chapin’s “Cat’s in the Cradle” or Mike and the Mechanics’ “The Living Years.” It resonated, enough to peak at No. 12 amid a disparate bunch including Snap, Sade, Elton John and Eric Clapton, Charles and Eddie, and Bad Company, but no other country act.
Friday, another day for a drive-by set of 10’s (and maybe some 9’s) as these multiweek chart-toppers make spotlights almost impossible.
Some really close calls this time ... almost every position earned an asterisk, and the '90s certainly came to play.
8* 9* 7* 9* 8*
6 9* 7 8* 8*
1. Survivor just edges out Andy Gibb.
2. Boyz II Men barely triumphs over my homeboy, Mr. Cougar (Mellencamp).
3. The Emotions will trump anything, but PM Dawn made it a really tough contest.
4. Shai barely beats Fleetwood Mac, with Rita Coolidge a distant runner-up
5. Peter McCann and Chicago have won before, but this time the Smyth/Henley duet takes them out.
6. Nothing will ever beat Percy Faith (a k a our wedding dance).
https://i.ibb.co/vwmg6ch/firstdance.jpg
7. Snap barely beats the Commodores.
8. Pablo Cruise wins in a light faceoff (TLC's song is OK but not their best).
9. The Motels win out over Alice Cooper.
10. Ditto for the Human League triumphing over the Bay City Rollers.
1) One of a Kind (Love Affair)
2) Could It Be I'm Falling in Love?
3) I'll Be Around
4) (They Just Can't Stop It the) Games People Play
5) Then Came You
Honorable mention to Working My Way Back to You/Forgive Me, Girl
That No. 1 run for “End of the Road” was so long that the song not only was No. 1 when I turned 29 in August but it had just vacated the spot in November for today's No. 1 when I met the man who is now my husband in a gay bar in Mishawaka, Indiana.
https://i.ibb.co/hLFhzc1/lettticelovage.jpg
Truman's was in 100 Center, a complex built in 1853 that once was the main building for the Kamm and Schellinger Brewery. By the time I was a high school senior in the early ‘80s, the main building was a restaurant called The Ice House. But by 1992, it was Truman’s, a multilevel entertainment center with a dance floor downstairs, seating for drinks and appetizers upstairs and an adjacent piano bar. It was about as classy a gay establishment as you could imagine in the early ‘90s. So why was I only going about once every six months? Well, it really catered to the Notre Dame boys and adults only a few years older, and even though I wasn’t 30 myself yet, I was not attracted to boys or even boys-to-men.
So, when I arrived the night of Nov. 14 after attending a play in downtown South Bend, looked across the dancefloor and saw a man at the bar in a leather jacket with salt-and-pepper curly hair and glasses, I could not believe my eyes. I did what I normally did not do in a bar – went up to him and started chatting. “If you were programming the music, what would you put on?” I asked. “Donna Summer,” he said.
Bold statement. That old, questionable tale about whether she called AIDS a punishment for gay men had made her persona non grata for a bit in parts of the community. (I didn’t believe it for a minute, and the fact that this guy didn’t either was a good sign.) I told him if Donna Summer were put on the turntable, I’d be right out there with him on the floor.
It didn’t happen immediately. But it did happen with an hour – the 3-year-old “This Time I Know It’s for Real” (a 10 for sure) was put on, and he and I were out with the undergrads.
We danced a bit – talked a lot more – took in the piano bar, and then chatted some more before I told him I needed to get going; I was getting up early Sunday morning to take a church youth group on an outing. (True story.) Didn’t faze him. He asked if he could call me to go out to dinner later in the week and I gave him my number.
We went out the following Wednesday and were more or less inseparable on the weekends from Thanksgiving until Easter. That November night, he had just sold his house in Elkhart to move back to North Carolina, where he had lived from 1971 to 1987 before moving up north for a job. Fortunately, the folks in California who bought his house needed time to wrap up their own affairs before moving, so he stuck around six months. By the time he moved to North Carolina in May 1993, I knew it was only a matter of time before I followed.
That night, I was 29 and he was 47. When we celebrate our anniversary this November, I’ll be 59, and he, 77. This time, we knew it was for real.
In this 13-week run, I feel like Oprah: You get a 10! And you get a 10! Everybody gets a 10!
Well .... maybe, not everybody, but there are a LOT of songs mentioned today that I would give the top number to, beginning with today's song. If I didn't hear it for the first time while watching "Boomerang," it wasn't long after ... and my enjoyment of that movie certainly contributed to how much I enjoy the songs from it, as you'll see below. I can understand how, divorced from the context of the soundtrack and the movie, the song's lyrics certainly could come across as skeevy, desperate, stalkery ... any or all of the preceding.
Thanks to all of you who touted such a diverse set of songs today, and specifically for Aaron3000 and Poor Little Fool's extensive lists of the songs in Billboard and R&R that peaked during this period. From your extensive lists, here are my 10's. I will readily admit there are a lot -- it was a great time for Top 40 music.
End of the Road (From "Boomerang") - Boyz II Men
You Remind Me (From "Strictly Business") - Mary J. Blige
Life Is A Highway - Tom Cochrane
Giving Him Something He Can Feel - En Vogue
All I Want - Toad The Wet Sprocket
Give U My Heart (From "Boomerang") - Babyface (Featuring Toni Braxton)
The One - Elton John
Sometimes Love Just Ain't Enough - Patty Smyth With Don Henley
Not Enough Time - INXS
Constant Craving - k.d. lang
Start The Car - Jude Cole
Always The Last To Know - Del Amitri
I'd Die Without You (From "Boomerang") - P.M. Dawn
Free Your Mind - En Vogue
Have You Ever Needed Someone So Bad - Def Leppard
Would I Lie To You? - Charles & Eddie
Everybody’s Free (to Feel Good) – Rozalla
Stay – Shakespear’s Sister
Walking on Broken Glass – Annie Lennox
There were others mentioned today that earned 10s, but I’m going to wait until their Billboard peaks down the line to give them their props.
I suspect this may need to be the route I use for the rest of the ‘90s since these stays at the top become so l-o-n-g….
"The Bitch Is Back" didn't hit No. 1, but Daryl Hall and John Oates' "Rich Girl" did, and like "Bad Blood," the same word is in the chorus. Don't know whether it was banned in your house, too.
This weekend, the weekend of Aug. 8/9, 1992, on my personal charts -- https://www.crownnote.com/charts/cstolliver/music-of-a-lifetime-top-25-699 -- the long-haired AC guy not named Michael or Kenny moved up with the last of his Billboard Hot 100 singles from his self-titled album. For me, it was the B side that clinched the deal.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PPA77-FgxsI
"Sleeping With the Lights On" was the A side of single three from Curtis Stigers , the album that included the Billboard Top 10 (fake as it may have been, BigPapi) "I Wonder Why." But when you listened to a cassingle (as opposed to listening to a vinyl 45), you usually heard the B side as well, and sometimes I'd find myself preferring the B side, or at least liking it as much as the A side -- think Texas' "Believe Me" alongside "I Don't Want a Lover" or Michael Bolton's "Forever Eyes" following "How Am I Supposed to Live Without You."
"Sleeping With the Lights On" was OK, but the lyrics of "People Like Us" reeled me in:
People like us got no business in love
Yeah, that's what the people say
But people like them got nothing better to do
Than chase our dreams away
Well I've finally found you and I won't let go
They say it's never gonna last
But baby, what do they know
When they say people like us got no business being in love
Today, those seem like a pedestrian Romeo-and-Juliet story. But for me, hearing them in 1992 when most songs that men sang about love explicitly referenced a woman, I really appreciated a gender-neutral lyric that I could hear myself in. I realize if I'd been listening to the music y'all reference from the alternative side of contemporary music, I'd probably have found a friendlier home when it comes to lyrics, but in those days at least I was still very much a Top 40/AC guy. So I took my inclusion where I could find it.
That was it for Stigers, both in Billboard ("Sleeping With the Lights On" hit No. 96, just a bit better than single two, "You're All That Matters to Me") and on my personal chart, where this double-sided hit went to No. 4 later in August. As I checked a few facts for this highlight, I saw that he still is actively performing and recording (and, goodness, he's aged quite nicely ... shallowcst approves).
Have a good weekend, everyone!
Whew, it's been quite a couple of weeks. I'll share more later when I have more to share, but I've been unable to spend a lot of time here since early in the month when I learned my dad's eldest sister passed away and I traveled north for the funeral. Since then, it's been a mad combination of catching up for lost time at work, holidays, snow days and rinse, repeat with catching up at work. I did manage to pop in for occasional quick responses before signing off, but today's the first time I've had to really sign in and catch up with TNOCS ... not the same harried feeling as catching up at work, though. Thank God.
So ... to today's No. 1. I'd give "Playground" a 7. It's very moving to me, but also not very exciting. How can it be both?
Unrelated to the events in my family I referenced above, I've always found this song to be funereal. Even when it was a hit, I immediately absorbed it as a reflection in the pre-AZT cocktail, Freddie Mercury and others gone age because of HIV/AIDS.
Don't look back
Keep your head held high
Don't ask them why because life is short
And before you know you're feeling old
And your heart is breaking
Don't hold on to the past
Well that's too much to ask
At the time of this song hitting No. 1, I was one week away from turning 29, and feeling as old then as I am today (oddly feeling closer to 29 now than my age). I spent the '80s coming out only to feel in the early '90s extremely wary, having been burned by a predatory boss and terrified by a government that seemed not to care if I lived or died and a mass media reinforcing an internalized homophobia that left me feeling one wrong move would be a death sentence. Friends of my mother's had died of AIDS, and my mom herself had had a scare that left me shaken. I was just beginning to date (a good decade after my high school and college classmates) and struggled to shake the notion that an early death was inevitable. So, yeah, "This Used to Be My Playground" resonated.
At the same time, I recognized the risk of getting caught in this despair, and fortunately there was always the music -- great stuff like "Rhythm Is a Dancer," En Vogue's "Free Your Mind" and the like to snap me out of the funk.
Indeed it would be barely three more months before life was going to change permanently for the better.
1. Into the Groove (the exception)
2. Live to Tell
3. Beautiful Stranger
4. Crazy for You
5. I'll Remember
6. Don't Cry For Me Argentina (the dance/Top 40 version, not the soundtrack version)
7. This Used to Be My Playground
8. You Must Love Me
9. Die Another Day
10. Causing a Commotion
11. American Pie
12. Who's That Girl
Yes, I hate "quien es ..." so much that I even prefer Madonna's wretched remake of "American Pie" to it.
7-10-8
My thoughts on today's No. 1 are below. TL/DR version: I appreciate it, but Madonna's had much better ballads.
"Leader of the Pack" is a classic. No more need be said.
I love the Supremes, but "Baby Love" is part of their trio of "baby-baby" songs that get old fast.
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