Whitney Houston singles poll

Only one vote on this is pretty brutal. Initial inclination is to lean towards either "Saving All My Love" or "I Wanna Dance With Somebody"

the one i posted without thinking on fb when i learned of her death was "my love is your love". i spent all day yesterday relistening to most of her discography while writing about her though and...i might go for..."i have nothing", which i didn't expect

i'm a little stumped on whether to add to the inevitable deluge of "I Wanna Dance" votes or throw some support to "It's Not Right But It's Okay"

You Give Good Love
Saving All My Love For You
How Will I Know
Greatest Love of All
I'm Your Baby Tonight
My Name Is Not Susan
I'm Every Woman
I Have Nothing
Run To You
It's Not Right But It's Okay
My Love Is Your Love
I Learned From The Best

the winner should be one of these

"how will i know" is kind of like if "i wanna dance..." was a zillion times better imo

"it's not right..." is certainly in my top 5 and will doubtless have a good deal of support of its own

BTW I agree that "I Have Nothing" is the secret standout song on the Bodyguard soundtrack. Maybe I should re-listen to these before I vote.

"I Have Nothing" is pretty essential

"how will i know" is one of my all time favorite songs but i want to pick one song from each one of her eras

i will definitely need to really listen to her catalog at some point but my kneejerk pox is:

I Wanna Dance With Somebody
It's Not Right But It's Okay
Saving All My Love For You
I'm Your Baby Tonight
I Have Nothing
Million Dollar Bill
How Will I Know
I'm Every Woman
Heartbreak Hotel (with Faith Evans and Kelly Price)
I Will Always Love You

It Isn't, It Wasn't, It Ain't Never Gonna Be (with Aretha Franklin)

It certainly wasn't on the pop chart

prob "it's not right but it's okay" but i love "i wanna dance with somebody." also had forgotten how much i liked "love will save the day."

"How Will I Know" is "Who's Zoomin' Who" improved. You had to be in the fall of '85 to know what an aural impact this thing had.

I'm very fond of "All at Once" (cowritten by Jeffrey Osborne!).

Didn't We Almost Have It All
So Emotional
Where Do Broken Hearts Go

the worst of her big hits imo

add in "So Emotional" and "I Wanna Dance With Somebody" and that's my bottom 5

lol I can't read

"So Emotional "Shoop Shoop (The Exhale Song)"

why do you hate i wanna dance with somebody so much, dan? ;_;

he fears her hair in the video

i don't get that shoop song at all. i don't hate it, i just don't understand. waiting to exhale soundtrack is fine by me though because of brandy's "sittin' up in my room"

haha i was going to mention her i wanna dance with somebody hair as the potential reason

"how will I know" by a mile for me

haven't heard everything though

I only learned a few weeks ago that Annie Lennox wrote "Step by Step."

oh i like that one, too. but it's one of the remixes that i like.

So Emotional
Where Do Broken Hearts Go

I honestly don't remember these songs at all when I could easily call everything else she did from that decade to mind. Very strange.

lol I could probably write an essay

- the irritation of a song about dancing sung by someone who couldn't dance to save her life
- her first actually irritating vocal, devoid of the character necessary to sell those terrible lyrics
- the awful, awful video (the hair is not an insignificant part of the antipathy, but also the vacant miming of manic happiness that read more pathetic and controlled)
- the contrast between her initial breakthrough singles, particularly the vastly superior up-tempo "How Will I Know?" and this unappealing frothy nothing
- the sheer ubiquity of the song at the time of its release
- the number of horrible cover versions and dance routines girls my age put on to it
- that every single released from the album managed to be progressively WORSE than the song that preceded it

also can I just say how fucking lucky Mr Ned Raggett is to have "So Emotional" and "Where Do Broken Hearts Go?" excised from his memory, because those songs fukkin SUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCK

- her first actually irritating vocal, devoid of the character necessary to sell those terrible lyrics

come on the "don't you wanna dance say you wanna dance don't you wanna dance" part is sung so exuberantly!

voted My Love Is Your Love

the vacant miming of manic happiness

this is what frightened me about her for years and still does

i feel like "so emotional" was huge, too, like i remember her winning a bunch of awards for it when i was a kid. it was so confusing to me. even then i knew it sucked.

I mean "So Emotional" isn't emotional, like, at all.

Every song from Whitney except "Love Will Save the Day" hit #1 on the pop chart.

come on the "don't you wanna dance say you wanna dance don't you wanna dance" part is sung so exuberantly!

IMO it only reads as exuberant if you are looking at her glassy-eyed rictus grin in the video, and even then only if you're being charitable

otherwise it's just unsubtle honking on a bridge akin to the second chorus of "I Will Always Love You" where she brays really flatly

xpost -- Song or single? We're not talking Thriller here...

no i hate the video, but i found out about her death on Saturday night when i was out, and then when i was driving home they played "i wanna dance with somebody" and "million dollar bill" on the radio and i was struck anew by how infectiously happy "i wanna dance with somebody" sounds! i had been feeling that her death was kind of surreal. that was the moment i got sad.

single, mais oui

i am v biased in favor of upbeat songs about dancing, tbf. madonna's "into the groove" is the best song in history, maybe.

To me "Greatest Love of All" is more horrifying than "I Wanna Dance." Her self-regard is chilling.

Her self-regard is what sells "GLOA"! That and the voice.

Horseshoe, I agree re: "Into the Groove"!

i wanna dance with somebody

Now that we're sharing Whitney experiences, let me mention that one particularly moronic teacher in sixth copied the lyrics in perfect Palmer handwriting, photocopied it, and distributed it as a graduation poem.

Saving All My Love For You

more people should just post song titles that could double as declarative statements itt like lamp and j0rdan

"Could I Have This Kiss Forever" (with Enrique Iglesias)

I have never heard this but I assume it is terrible

i only realized much later that "saving all my love for you" is sung from the pov of a woman having an affair with a married man. i don't know why it surprised me; it just seemed out of place with the smooth AC sound.

that makes the song that much more awesome IMO

more people should just post song titles that could double as declarative statements itt like lamp and j0rdan

― some dude

We Didn't Know

yeah i think "saving all my love for you" is my favorite of the early ballads.

my actual shortlist:

Saving All My Love For You
How Will I Know
Greatest Love of All
I'm Your Baby Tonight
I Have Nothing
It's Not Right But It's Okay

no one's voting for "My Name is Not Susan"?

i like that song, but no

My short list:

You Give Good Love
Saving All My Love For You
How Will I Know
Love Will Save The Day
I'm Every Woman
Exhale (Shoop Shoop)
It's Not Right But It's Okay

You guys are also sleeping on "Love Will Save The Day"

every time I think of "Love Will Save The Day" I start actually humming "Love Will Lead You Back" and I am much happier

You're disappointing me today.

aww "So Emotional" is a good one: "ain't it shockin what..............love can do!" love that pause

voted "How Will I Know", cuz you know about these things.

Saving All My Love
How Will I Know

so torn!!!

But I need to rep for "All At Once"... my grandma died right around that time & my little sister and I used to bawl over that damn song

I love that whole first album, tbh

her first album is really her best

I'd like to hear a band like the Jesus Lizard fronted by a singer like Whitney Houston.

― Euler, Sunday, May 20, 2007 3:59 AM (4 years ago) Bookmark

imagine Whitney covering "This is Not a Love Song."

Oh god, back to the Bill Laswell thing again.

imagine Whitney singing in Last Exit.

It's easy if I don't try.

so emotional and how will i know really
think i'm picking the latter.

Never liked "I Will Always Love You." The bombastic treatment is so totally wrong for the simple eloquence of the song. Plus that fucking sax solo. And the modulation. "I Have Nothing" so much better as big-ballad numbers go, so basically Greg, Alex and Al OTM way upthread.

Am working on getting acquainted with the post-Bodyguard stuff, which I mostly didn't know except "Exhale" and "It's Not Right But It's Okay." For now, though, "How Will I Know" by a mile.

For someone who only released 7 studio albums, she sure had a lot of singles, tho, huh? 29 top 40 hits, all in a 16-year span.

How Will I Know / I Have Nothing
It's Not Right But It's Okay
I Want To Dance With Somebody
Saving All My Love For You
I'm Your Baby Tonight
Love Will Save The Day
Heartbreak Hotel (Remix)
I'm Every Woman
My Love Is Your Love

The key change in "I Have Nothing" is one of the most spinetingling things ever.

Enough! Y'all have swayed me. I'll listen to "I Have Nothing" again.

I think what distinguishes it from other divastraganzas (e.g. "Without You" or "All By Myself", say) is how dangerous it sounds, both in its obsessive intensity and also in its vertiginousness. Whitney sounds like she takes a run-up to the key change with a flying leap over a bottomless chasm.

Listening to the second album on Spotify and it sounds like an '87-era mastering job! Interesting that a record like that would languish so long without being remastered.

the second Whitney album is a giant pile of festering penises

I asked about the third album on the other thread but got no responses. Hot or not?

"I'm Your Baby Tonight" is the only one of her songs I'll admit to liking IRL so that's my vote.

"How Will I Know" is ok. "All The Man I Need" is her best ballad IMO.

"I Have Nothing" and "I'm Every Woman" sounded the best to me the last couple days.

Well, and always.

million dollar bill gonna top this

I'd totally forgotten about 'Queen Of The Night' until I happened upon an obligatory airing of The Bodyguard yesterday. A pretty fierce jam, a la En Vogue. Just wanna point out that it shouldn't be slept on.

Probably always gonna be 'Love Will Save The Day' for me, though.

it's not right but it's ok

BTW I actually voted for "Saving All My Love For You", stone cold classic ballad, right up there with the greatest of all time.

what is it about "Million Dollar Bill" that ppl find appealing

xpost -- Confession -- I loathed that song when it first hit, to the point where I would turn off the radio when I heard it start. ("You Give Good Love" I happily adored.)

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

She had a great voice but all of her songs are borefests imho. Is there any single in here that isn't an over-emotional ballad?

yes

You know, something in the 3 minute mark that doesn't feel like the aural equivalent of a diabetic coma?

I need examples, kevin! pretty please?

if you don't like "how will I know" you should prob give up, yeah

:(

I've just listened to it and I didn't like it :/. It still has all the problems I find in her music; corny synth strings, unnecesary bombast like the sax solo and the filler guitar riffs and the chorus is drilled into your brain 64 times before the song ends.

She had a great, powerful voice... pairing it with excessive gimmicks and maximalist choruses that keep on adding muso rubbish each new bar is overload for me.

Sorry, I tried :(

You are the devil.

^ p much :(

Her first two albums were produced by the same person that brought us Kenny G so I'm not surprised I find no love in my heart for her music. She was typecasted into milquetoast territory since her early days.

Now you are a dog latin devil.

i prefer my Whitney as A+ effervescent dance-pop: How Will I Know vs. I Wanna Dance w/ Somebody vs. So Emotional

Ok, I'm sorry... I'll find my way out of this thread. I just wanted to check if there was something in her entire discography that was different from what I've heard from her and which I might have overlooked.

voted how will i know. nothing else even comes close, such a jam.

I almost forgot to vote! *forehead slap*

"It Isn't, It Wasn't, It Ain't Never Gonna Be" holds up really well. the vid is shameful tho

i also dig her sprechgesang in "I'm Your Baby Tonight" right after the chorus. she had a thing for fast vocal delivery, too bad she became a melismatic nutso instead

How Will I Know vs. I Wanna Dance w/ Somebody vs. So Emotional

OK, scratch So Emotional. It has some fine payoff moments, but the production is cluttery & i could really do without the constant shredding. the chorus is great, though! (which, I guess, must be why I remember it being a favorite, when in fact it is not)

the other two, though.. The vox on HWIK are untouchable, and IWDWS is just pure aces all around. hmmm

voted "i have nothing"

Good choice.

I keep wavering b/w that and "How Will I Know".

DO-ONT. MAAKE. MEEEE. CLO-OSE!!! ONE MORE DOOOOOOOR.

Moka, try I'm Your Baby Tonight. new jack excellence

surprised no one told moka to try "it's not right but it's okay" or "my love is your love" which are the classic whitney songs for the "finally she's not doing power ballads and is singing over ~kool beatz~" crew

(but for all that they are still amazing)

Listening to "Didn't We Almost Have It All". This song makes me think of my dad so much. His favourite pop song is probably "That's What Friends Are For". I don't really understand this approach to pop (for him I think it's the broadway resemblance), but it makes me think of my family home too much for me to hate it.

had to go w/ How Will I Know. anything else would have been a lie.

My Love Is Your Love

As Lex/Tim foresaw upthread, I'm not a big fan of the power ballads (although I appreciate her voice is incredible on these). My Love Is Your Love has such an incredible groove though...

share my life, take me for what i am
cuz i'll never change all my colours for you
take my life, i'll never ask for too much
just all that you are and everything that you do

^^all-time POW opening lines imo

stay in my arms if you dare
or must i imagine you there?

"i have nothing" might actually be an even better example of the "loneliness of queens" as per mark s's essay on "i will always love you"

or must I emerge in you there

Moka, try I'm Your Baby Tonight. new jack excellence

― gospodin simmel, viernes 17 de febrero de 2012 10:20 AM (11 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

surprised no one told moka to try "it's not right but it's okay" or "my love is your love" which are the classic whitney songs for the "finally she's not doing power ballads and is singing over ~kool beatz~" crew

― if u leave imma crank wu-tang in my black matte truck (lex pretend)

Ok, this is more like it. I always thought 'it's not right' was a Tony Braxton song, dunno why. I actually like these ones much better.

"Saving All My Love For You" is the only one, for me, where the production doesn't spoil and date the song, the 1980s/90s equivalent of "with strings."

I was warbling "The Greatest Love of All" while getting my two-year-old dressed this morning and my four-year-old daughter told me to quit singing Christmas songs.

"I Wanna Dance With Somebody", duh.

lol PP

I was warbling "The Greatest Love of All" while getting my two-year-old dressed this morning and my four-year-old daughter told me to quit singing Christmas songs.

I blame it on my cat like screetching. :-( They ALWAYS tell me to stop. :-(

I Wanna Dance With Somebody

Never ever would pick that one. That video was so awful. But difficult to choose a fave.

the I wanna Dance w Somebody hair is problematic for me

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

"So Emotional" with its synthetic production reminds me of Wilson Phillips deliberately singing "I wanna be impulsive!"

Greatest Love of All 0

!!

You Give Good Love 0

o_O O_o

Guess I should've voted my heart and "I Have Nothing."

My Love Is Your Love 7
Heartbreak Hotel (with Faith Evans and Kelly Price) 0

Not sure I really get this preference.

am I wrong for loving the "I Wanna Dance With Somebody" hair?

yes, yes you are

it's just...so...EPIC tho

it's terrible

it's amazing

i have to say, i wasn't gonna like actively hate on on campaign against IWALY getting votes itt, but i really feel it is an appropriate tribute to her body of work to see it tied for 10th place here

"Impulsive" is my favorite Wilson Phillips single.

My Love Is Your Love 7
I'm Your Baby Tonight 4
Love Will Save The Day 3

^^^ this is amazing. I'm genuinely shocked at these results -- in a good way.

i like "my love is your love" but it seems like a really odd song to hold up as whitney's best

I suppose it's one of her most understated vocal performances, so if you don't like vocal overstatement it might be a default choice.

Wasn't "The Star Spangled Banner" from 1991 Super Bowl intro released as a single (and a minor hit)? May be her best vocal performance; certainly it's the best I've ever heard it sung.

Two degrees of separation: my college roommate's girlfriend's brother was the guitarist in Whitney's touring band at the time (roomie's gf also a friend of mine) so got lots of insider scoops and stories. She was also a musician, and I remember going to some music-industry convention with her, and considered taking advantage of that connection to have her pass on some of my songs to Whitney in hopes she would cover one of them for an album track, but I wasn't particularly into WH and our styles don't exactly mesh, so I didn't bother.

xp that's exactly it, it's a good song, but it misses her whole essence.

I suppose it's one of her most understated vocal performances, so if you don't like vocal overstatement it might be a default choice.

yeah "my love is your love" has long been the whitney song of choice for people who don't actually like what whitney houston was all about.

i mean, it's still a great song, but still.

Wasn't "The Star Spangled Banner" from 1991 Super Bowl intro released as a single (and a minor hit)? May be her best vocal performance; certainly it's the best I've ever heard it sung.

it was, and it charted again after 9/11. but she had 51 singles and it seemed like the odd one out that would make sense to cut from the poll options.

Fuse is running Whitney videos all day today, just heard "If I Told You That" for the first time and it was pretty good!

Wasn't "The Star Spangled Banner" from 1991 Super Bowl intro released as a single (and a minor hit)? May be her best vocal performance; certainly it's the best I've ever heard it sung.

I kind of hate this actually! The national anthem is the national anthem and is kind of destroyed by soft-rock backing.

Missed this but would have voted "How Will I Know" like everybody else.

what about a dubstep backing

I actually thought the instrumental arrangement was impressive - lots of interesting and unusual chord changes and such to go with the vocal flourishes.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YHmdu_I_0zI&feature=fvst

Rob Sheffield's twelve favorite Whitney songs.

"Million Dollar Bill" (2009)

Whitney’s last shot was a return to the original Eighties game plan, except at this point, her vocals were too ravaged for either pop or soul.

For anyone not aware of this, her funeral service is all over the television right now.

When I was in...probably sixth grade and listening to pop radio incessantly, I awoke to "Love Will Save The Day". The sun was just coming up and the light was slightly violet through the window and everything felt very calm and peaceful as the vibraphone came in and it really did feel like love might save the day. It's still one of my more idyllic childhood memories.

I wish my radio station had played "Love Will Save the Day."

yeah "my love is your love" has long been the whitney song of choice for people who don't actually like what whitney houston was all about.

I actually do like what Whitney was all about, and it's still my favorite of her singles. That song just puts me in a good place.

whitney....
this was incredible... much (very very much) as i have always loved Whitney, 'I will always love you' is the one song of hers that I never really loved, certainly never felt, didn't appreciate - and also about the very single song i haven't listened to after she died.
to suddenly hearing it now, after all those thousands? of times i heard it, and now feeling every little part of it. it was me, not Whitney, that hadn't gotten it. the most beautiful thing she's ever sung. beautiful.

guess this belongs in the Whitney Houston R.I.P. thread

I just heard My Love Is Your Love again for the first time in I don't know how long. Catchy as hell, that one!

wow for some reason i had no idea that "i have nothing" was titled "i have nothing," it was easily my favorite whitney hair salon jam when i was a kid

I heard her Jermaine duet on quiet storm a few weeks ago.

I Have Nothing has been on my Spotify playlist for the last five years or so.

"I Have Nothing" is the squarest, greatest song of all time.

Good thing Brad heard it at the beauty parlor, for the women would need hair implants after Whitney blasts the chorus.

"I Have Nothing" is tres pretty and one of the two Whitney songs, along with "Exhale," that I continued to groove to even during those ill advised years of indie snobbery where I was obligated to regard Whitney as The Enemy.

My top fifteen. Thanks for help, some dude.

I don't really need to look very much further
I don't want to have to go where you don't follow
I will hold it back again this passion inside
I can't run from myself THERES NOWHERE TO HIIIIIIIIIIIDE
YOUR LOVE! I'll RE MEM BER! FOR EV ER

we should do a legit ballot poll on Whitney so we can show Alfred all the ways he is misguided

This is a refrain he often hears.

Alfred: Wrong on Whitney, Wrong for America

giving me ALL THE RONG THAT I'LL EVER NEEEEEED

YOUR LOVE! I'll RE MEM BER! FOR EV ER

Don't make me clooooose--

*does shoo hand gesture*

--one more door!

Greatest Love of All	0

Admittedly, Toni Erdmann wasn't out yet when this poll was done but ... damn.

I'd have voted for her version.

Sandra Hüller's?

wtf alfred, no "i have nothing"?

*reads last few posts before the thread bump* ah

i guess i don't understand what more you could even want from whitney if "i have nothing" isnt yr pinnacle or at least top 5

there are other value judgements at play that i guess i dont fully understand?

or yr heart is a lump of coal, either or :)

now imagine Glenn Frey singing "I Have Nothing"

'It's Not Right But It's Okay' still rules.

The album version, yes.

Alfred revise your opinions4u on "I Have Nothing".

Or must I emerge in you there.

DONT WALK AWAY FROM MEEEEEEE

How's this for a poll: Cinematic covers of "The Greatest Love Of All"--Loren Dean in SAY ANYTHING VS. Sandra Hüller in TONI ERDMANN?

Alfred revise your opinions4u on "I Have Nothing".

Or must I emerge in you there.

― Tim F, Wednesday, June 7, 2017

emerge away

Her most depressing song.

RONG

All this discussion about her worst single and no mention of One Moment In Time?

this thread is an abomination

...because "How Will I Know" wasn't a total sweep?

NOW i mean