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JET Jams 2.1.18

JET's Top 20 Singles is one of my favorite magazine staples. I often go through old issues just to see what was dominating radio in any given week/month/year.


February 1, 1993. Soulful songstress Miki Howard covered JET Magazine. Anyone who knows ANYTHING about me KNOWS that I LOVE MIKI HOWARD. She's definitely one of the greatest vocalists to emerge from the 1980's and there will absolutely be MORE on this soulful songstress in the coming weeks.


Two things about this list stood out to me... one: in 1993 we were, unknowingly, entering the end of New Jack Swing's golden age. And two: we were also smack-dab in the middle of the boy band era. Shai, Silk, Hi-Five, After 7, Boyz II Men, Portrait, and Men At Large all make appearances on this week's top 20 playlist. Jodeci, Mint Condition, Tony Toni Tone, H-Town, Color Me Badd, and II D Extreme would all also release albums in 1993. What happened to groups like this?


Whitney Houston topped this week's list with her remake of Dolly Parton's 1974 classic "I Will Always Love You." Dolly wrote the song as her "goodbye" to her partner Porter Wagoner when she decided to pursue her solo career after seven years.




Another standout on the list is After 7's remake of The Originals' 1969 smash single, "Baby I'm For Real". Not only does this remake rank among one of the top R&B remakes of all time for me because of Melvin, Keith, and Kevon's vocals... but also because they were able to interpolate parts of Bloodstone's "Natural High" (1973) into their version. (Marvin Gaye wrote "Baby I'm For Real". That isn't acknowledged enough.)



Positive K, Arrested Development, and Digable Planets represented for hip hop here, while Chaka Demus, Pliers, and Shabba Ranks brought that reggae flavor. (Shabba Ranks, TLC, and Mary J. Blige were all actually opening for Bobby Brown on tour in 1993.)



Check out this week's playlist and reminisce a little. 1993 was a great year! (Also, I included a Baltimore Sun review of the Bobby Brown/Mary J. Blige/ TLC/ Shabba Ranks tour directly under the playlist.)







Best thing about the Bobby Brown package was Shabba Ranks

Package tours look like real bargains going in. So why do they so often feel like total gyps coming out?

Take the Bobby Brown package that played the Baltimore Arena on Wednesday. On paper, its blend of R&B, reggae and hip-hop looked great, since in addition to Brown the bill included dancehall star Shabba Ranks, soul siren Mary J. Blige, plus rap-and-pop trio TLC.

Onstage, however, the show was only an intermittent success, with brief bursts of brilliance sprinkled through hours of poor pacing and overlong set changes, and uninspired performances. wonder the audience -- which didn't even half fill the Arena -- rarely offered more than tepid response; in fact, a good quarter of the crowd was gone before Brown finished his set.

Worst of all was the fact that much of what went wrong Wednesday night could easily have been fixed. For instance, having Blige open the show was a mistake; not only were many of the fans still on their way in after her 7:30 starting time, but she clearly carried more weight with the ticket buyers than the third-billed TLC.

Then there was the PA problem. As anyone who has ever attended one of these affairs knows, the lower an act is on the bill, the worse its sound is going to be. Last night was no exception. Although the sound for Bobby Brown's set was perfectly clear, it tended to mud during Shabba Ranks' performance, and left parts of TLC's segment (particularly those that found T-Boz on the mic) all but inaudible.

Not that a better mix would have helped TLC all that much. Even though the trio's stage show was determinedly upbeat and energetic, its relentless choreography and show-bizzy enthusiasm overwhelmed the music, diminishing the impact of otherwise enjoyable material like "Baby Baby Baby" and "Ain't Too Proud To Beg."

Still, TLC's overactive approach to the concert stage was nothing compared to Bobby Brown's everything-and-the-kitchen-sink strategy. Apparently taking his cues from the last two Hammer tours, Brown arrived with a massive stage set, a huge crew (including eight dancers, seven instrumentalists, five back-up singers, a rapper and a disc jockey) and an array of lights and pyrotechnics.

Yet despite all the razzle, the show rarely dazzled. Brown seemed on autopilot for most songs, merely going through the motions during "Humpin' Around," "Don't Be Cruel" and "Girlfriend." Occasionally, he did give a glimpse of the soulful charisma that made him a star -- "That's the Way Love Is" was particularly fine -- but more often than not he squandered his talent on overlong arrangements. As such, it was Shabba Ranks who came away as the star of the show.

Shabba's musical might and sexual magnetism won the crowd over, provoking more booty-pumping enthusiasm with "Housecall," "Mr. Lover Man" and "Wicked in Bed" than Bobby Brown managed in his entire set. Could it be that Shabba by himself would have been a better bargain than the Bobby Brown package as a whole? -- SOURCE: The Baltimore Sun


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