Vanessa Williams, "Save the Best for Last"

"sometimes the sun goes round the moon"

no

The best what?

The last when?

When I was about 12 years old this song was the favourite song of the boy I despised above all others, so of course I hated it. I was very much into Efua's "Somewhere" and Janet Jackson's "If" at around this time.

I don't know what I'd think of it now.

assuming those final two questions are not intended in an obtuse/ bitchee ILM manner, the answers are below…

Sometimes the snow comes down in june
sometimes the sun goes 'round the moon
I see the passion in your eyes
sometimes It's all a big surprise
'cause there was a time when all I did was wish
you'd tell me this was love
It's not the way I hoped or how I planned
but some how it's enough

and now we're standing face to face
Isn't this world a crazy place
just when I thought our chance had passed
you go and save the best for last

all of the nights you came to me
when some silly girl had set you free
you wondered how you'd make it through
I wondered what was wrong with you
'cause how could you give your love to someone else
and share your dreams with me
sometimes the very thing you're looking for
is the one thing you can't see

but now we're standing face to face
Isn't this world a crazy place
just when I thought our chance had passed
you'd go and save the best for last

Ah right.

Still...

those lyrics seem straightforward enough reading them like that, but i could have sworn this song felt i dunno, quite ambivalent at the time? perhaps i'd assumed they were already together, and he'd been cheating on her.

Well, I thought it was something like "you aint seen nothing yet" BTO in content. Guess not.

all of the nights you came to me
when some silly girl had set you free
you wondered how you'd make it through
I wondered what was wrong with you
'cause how could you give your love to someone else
and share your dreams with me

= "it's complicated"

The general sadness of the music doesn't quite fit the "You finally wised up and got with me" theme.

Maybe after years of pining after her best friend they finally hooked up and he was shit in the sack - no wonder all his former girlfriends had dumped him.

I don't think the arrangement is sad as much as it is very very delicate and reflective…very suitable, IMHO.

ain't it crazy that the most imfamous Miss America is the only one (barring Bess Myerson and Phyllis George) who has gone on to anything of note creatively?

was she? oh.

yeah i could never discount the "you go and save the best for last" line being a bit sarcastic!! the music does sound quite sad but the tone was kinda self-empowering? like "i am glad you finally realized how awesome i was you big loser"

i guess maybe i can only hear wilhelmina slater singing this song now

scherzinger could cover this

That would SO work.

Great song.

Shanice's "I Love Your Smile" is much more fun. I'm reminded of it only 'cause they were in the UK charts around the same time.

Also, for some reason the only music video I have downloaded from the iTunes Store?!

xpost Weird, I was just thinking of Shanice, too. For the same reason. But the US chart instead. Early 1992.

scherzinger could cover this

-- r|t|c, Tuesday, September 11, 2007 4:29 PM (5 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

That would SO work.

-- Tim F, Tuesday, September 11, 2007 4:29 PM (5 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

maybe jeff koons could re-paint... ah fuck it you get the idea.

strangely i don't think anyone could cover that shanice better than scherzinger either - what is the common ground?!

although no, megan rochell actually

"(barring Bess Myerson and Phyllis George)" I should have said that the gifts of these ladies do not exist in the creative arena…

THIS is shanice's secret classic jam anyways

meteor man soundtrack holla

this song is v good for what it is

strangely i don't think anyone could cover that shanice better than scherzinger either

ha ha, guess what just momentarily occurred to me...

I always loved this song: her anonymity is her virtue; it could be anyone singing it. The production's rather restrained for a big budget ballad too. Close call b/w this and "Love Is" as her best tune.

Coincidentally, I listened to this song today in the mall. I don't think it's horrible but it's pretty boring, innit?

It's beautiful man.

this is the best song i've ever heard

or something

and this whole album ain't bad, like at all

the best is listening to "Work To Do" when you're getting ready for work

because it goes

"IIIIIII -- I got work to do
I got work, babe
I got a job, baby
I got work to do
I got work to do!
Yeahh."

It's very encouraging.

this was popular when I was in elementary school and I kinda liked it then but never thought much of it again.

added it to my "pop tunes" Spotify playlist on a whim and wow, it's much better than I remembered! not just the lyrics, but the arrangement, her earnest performance.

what else (if anything) of note did ms Williams do, musically? (excluding her turn as the Witch in Into the Woods, which was dreadful).

(excluding her turn as the Witch in Into the Woods, which was dreadful).

― Hammer Smashed Bagels, Sunday, May 3, 2015 10:14 AM (9 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

get out

she didn't have the character down whatsoever. I mean yeah nobody's Bernadette Peters but she brought nothing to the role.

I know nothing about Into the Woods, but "Save the Best For Last" is indeed gorgeous.

She had eight R&B top ten singles in the 1988-1992 period, the first of which was "The Right Stuff," plus some additional chart hits up till 1997. She made a jazz album. She sang "Colors of the Wind" for the Pocahontas movie which won an Oscar and was a #4 pop hit.

The moment her vocal leaps in the middle of the line "Isn't this world A CRAAAZYYYY PLACCE?" = goose pimples

what else (if anything) of note did ms Williams do, musically?

I'm fond of the Brian McKnight duet "Love Is." "The Comfort Zone" is a good early nineties house-inflected dance track.

I had forgotten about Colors of the Wind. will look up Brian McKnight song cos I'm already a fan of his so this would be a good combo i'm wagerin'...

My chills moment starts with "All of the nights you came to me..." and subsides somewhere around "how could you give your love to someone else and share your dreams with me," but really the whole song is a beautiful example of how to get inside the most shopworn of romantic cliches and make them feel affecting and relatable.

I never get ILM's fetish for this song, but listening to it again ... it has a lot of the stuff I love about "Rush Rush." I miss ballads with that BAOW-ey bass sound. (See also Tevin Campbell's cover of "Tomorrow.")

the bass's re-entrance on "isn't this world a crazy place" is so well timed

xpost i honestly didn't know this was ILX-canon until today. I usually like really horrible 80s/90s pop that everybody hates (a la Glenn Medeiros "Nothing's Gonna Change My Love For You").

I want a playlist of square but ILM beloved '80s/'90s ballads stat.

Kenny Loggins, "Meet Me Halfway"

I'll let myself out

The Jets, "You Got It All"

totally forgot about that one! just threw it on and it's bringing back memories. I used to hear this on the way to school.

I'm also tempted to offer "Oh No" by the Commodores, not because the Commodores aren't cool (quite the contrary!), but because my first and thus main association with the song is its use in The Last American Virgin.

for some reason that song is the one where I most noticed Richie's lisp. great tune, sang it at karaoke last year during a Motown themed night

Bette Midler - From A Distance

this is definitely

yeah i have no words for this song

Vanessa Williams is one of my all time favorite entertainers, she's just dabbled in so much; one of my generation's last vestiges of a performer who can do it all

I want a playlist of square but ILM beloved '80s/'90s ballads stat.

Sweet Sensation, "If Wishes Came True"? Or not square enough?

definitely one of my favorite songs of the last 20+ years. i even like it more than vision of love and unbreak my heart.

Expose - "I'll Never GEt Over You"?

Duran Duran - "Ordinary World"?

"Ordinary World" is liked in a lot of places, actually.

lol I'm just going through my list at this point

definitely one of my favorite songs of the last 20+ years. i even like it more than vision of love and unbreak my heart.

― scott seward, Sunday, May 3, 2015 8:19 PM (33 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

same, weirdly

this is a well constructed song, i hate the keyboard sound though

The Jets, "You Got It All"

YES!!!

this whole album is p astounding tbh

I forgot about "Just for Tonight" - that's a good one too.

also she is stunning on this album cover

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Comfort_Zone_(album)#/media/File:Vanessa_Williams_-_The_Comfort_Zone_album_cover.jpg

bah

lol at the AllMusic review:

"Typically, Vanessa Williams' albums are mixed bags. She's at her most exciting when taking chances and coming from the heart, and at her worst when recording frightfully dull material that is designed strictly for commercial radio airplay. This is certainly true of her sophomore effort, The Comfort Zone. Williams is at her best on the sexy, alluring title song and a striking remake of the Isley Brothers' "Work to Do," and at her worst on the hit adult contemporary ballad "Save the Best For Last." The song isn't genuinely romantic, only corny and insipid. One wishes Williams would stick to songs that are worthy of her, but when artists are under pressure from labels to sell as many albums as possible, artistic considerations easily fall by the wayside."

boring rockism

yea sorry all credibility lost on the diss on STBL

can't even read further than that

i love lots of square ballads, not sure how beloved they are by the rest of ilm tho

like does "un-break my heart" have its boosters here? if i have to pick one song that would have been crap in the hands of a lesser singer but is instead amazing due to its vocal performance, it would be that

Fired up a list:

https://open.spotify.com/user/ephender/playlist/6fv3OlLIQLrkxlm1eJhli2

"like does "un-break my heart" have its boosters here?"

i just mentioned it on this thread! i've always loved it and i'm sure there are plenty of ilxors who love it too.

Diane Warren's best song. To ask if there's boosters on ILM is to ask if LCD Soundsystem is loved by Brooklyn.

for sure. my favorite non-MC ballad growing up.

I like Un-Break my Heart, even if I'd felt that the 'seductive Spanish guitars' had been overused in mainstream pop around that time. but her riffs during the last chorus are awesome.

tho for all time Braxton it's "Breathe Again" but that one is hardly 'square' nor a ballad.

my all time TB is makin me high

baby baby baby BABY

crazy

i love that song too. i also like the video, it is like a beautiful semi-misandrist fantasy world in which men basically line up to present themselves to be rated on attractiveness by rich powerful black women <3

i'm going to watch it now

it's really very 90s, these outfits are so feel-good

but speaking of videos, when Toni stood up on that stage and sang unbreak my heart with that afro, the whole world stood up and took notice.

whenever i hear this song, it segues (in my head, anyway) into a medley of early-90s pop balladry that also includes a number of themes from disney movies. "just when i thought a chance had passed / a whole new word..."

the segue on youtube was of course "The boy is mine"

o no wait that was for Toni. yea i mean i really can't talk enough about the video for this. it's like top 5 disney movies i've ever seen.

Not at the level of "Save the Best For Last" or "You Got It All," but ever since I heard J0hn Darn1elle cover Peter Cetera/Amy Grant's "Next Time I Fall" on a recent concert recording, I've found myself firing up the original a few times.

WHAT? oh I gots to hear that.

He only does a snippet of it on one of the NYC shows that was recently posted online--it's not even indexed in the track listing. If I had more than just my phone at my fingertips at the moment, I would look it up for you, but it should be linked on the Mountain Goats thread.