![]() ![]() While it's commercially astute for Houston to update her sound, such a move points up the inherent differences between her old-school instincts and her hip-hop aspirations. With a cool Caribbean lilt, it fuses dub reggae, gospel and soul over an empowering millennial message of faith and community. Much better is "My Love Is Your Love," written and produced by Jean and Jerry "Wonder" Duplessis. "I Was Made to Love Him" gets a hip-hop/soul makeover via Hill, but while it features the album's funkiest, most rough-edged vocals, it doesn't really advance or improve the original. ![]() Like Michael Jackson's "Leave Me Alone" or Don Henley's "Dirty Laundry," "In My Business" addresses the difficulties of living in the media limelight, castigates those who question Houston's marriage to Brown and lambastes women envious of that relationship. Much in the same vein is "Oh Yes," an uncharacteristically old-fashioned ballad of emotional (and at times sexual) affirmation. Babyface wrote and produced "Until You Come Back," a pledge of devotion in which Houston evokes Dinah Washington as well as some of her own classic romantic testaments. On the ballad side, the best tracks come from two seemingly opposite sources. But "I Bow Out" (co-produced by Babyface and Jerkins) is a mundane enough-is-enough complaint, while the bombastic "You'll Never Stand Alone" is a pileup of cliches masquerading as inspirational verse. please! The strongest, "I Learned From the Best" (produced by David Foster), finds a coldhearted, hot-blooded Houston gloating as her misery is revisited on a wayward lover. This rippling plaint features Faith Evans and Kelly Price, and the three serve up both lush harmony and warmly intertwined vocals that suggest they know this particular location all too well.Īt times, the album suffers from its split personality. Whatever edgy anger is apparent here quickly dissolves into the palpable sense of frustration and betrayal evident on "Heartbreak Hotel" (not the Elvis Presley or Michael Jackson song, but a new entry from Soulshock & Karlin, who also produced). Over a percolating rhythm track, the singer catches her partner cheating on her, and when the credit card charges and excuses don't add up, she kicks him out. Jerkins's "It's Not Right but It's Okay," which opens the album, is the first of several songs that address marital troubles not unlike those rumored in the media to be affecting Houston and her husband of six years, Bobby Brown. "My Love Is Your Love" aims to serve Houston's established constituency via emotional ballads provided by Babyface and Dianne Warren, as well as to reach out to a younger demographic with hip-hop flavoring from Missy "Misdemeanor" Elliott, Fugees Hill and Wyclef Jean and hot producer Rodney Jerkins (Monica and Brandy's "The Boy Is Mine"). Instead, Houston went into the studio and emerged with "My Love Is Your Love" (Arista), a collection so sudden that its 13th track, a Lauryn Hill-produced flip on Stevie Wonder's "I Was Made to Love Her" (now "Him") was added too late to be included in the album's artwork. The soundtracks for three films she's also starred in over that period - "The Bodyguard," "Waiting to Exhale" and "The Preacher's Wife" - have sold 50 million copies and sparked enough hits that her label was considering a greatest-hits package when Houston and Mariah Carey came together to record "When You Believe," the soaring theme from DreamWorks' upcoming animated feature "The Prince of Egypt." P.S.Whitney Houston's "My Love Is Your Love" may be her first studio album in eight years, but she's hardly been keeping a low profile. You'll find all of these classic anthems available to sing as part of our our online karaoke subscription service, and to help you get in the mood, you can look forward to enjoying a full free month's subscription (usually £6.99) when you enter in the code VALENTINE here:. And with that in mind, we've rounded up – in no particular order whatsoever – some of our favourites. Whether you'll be duetting some of these over a romantic dinner with Bae on Valentine's Day, or belting them out in the shower solo cos you're a strong independent human being who don't need no suitor, everyone can enjoy a good old fashioned love song. Music and romance go together like Ant & Dec, and there really aren't many artists who haven't put pen to paper in tribute of their flame(s) at some point during their career – from John Lennon to John Travolta, we've really been blessed with some wonderful love ballads over the years!
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