What makes a hit song? There are a lot of factors at play beyond just the music. How much support does it have from the label? What is the popular sound at the moment? Do people even know or care about the artist? Do fans even want this kind of song from them? Sometimes, the label doesn’t get it right, and a song might flop. But when they’re right, songs can become anthems for years to come.
This was true for Boyz II Men when they released “I’ll Make Love To You”, which was released on this day in 1994. In The Billboard Book of Number 1 Hits by Fred Bronson, the legendary R&B group admitted they didn’t want to record the song at all. Essentially, their concern was flooding the market with songs that sounded the same. Even if it was centered around sex, it was still structured like a standard romantic ballad.
Eventually, Boyz II Men relented and sang the Babyface-written classic accordingly. As group member Nathan Morris put it, they were glad to be wrong. “Not that [‘I’ll Make Love To You’] wasn’t a great song, just that we didn’t want our fans to get bored. We wanted to give them something different. But the record company talked us into doing it, and thank God it worked,” he said.
On This Day in 1994, Boyz II Men Released an All-Time Love Song They Thought Wouldn’t Work
“I’ll Make Love To You” turned out extremely well for the iconic R&B group. The song sat comfortably atop the US Billboard Hot 100 for 14 weeks. Moreover, it won the Grammy Award for Best R&B Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocals and was nominated for Record of the Year.
Critics at the time also fawned over the Boyz II Men record. Larry Flick reviewed the single for Billboard, marveling at its musical arrangement. “Silky harmonies waft over a well-measured arrangement chock-full of bright, glistening synths and soft-yet-punctuating percussion. Lovely sing-along chorus initially will remind many of past glories, but [the] single ultimately will provide a refreshing cool breeze to any of numerous radio formats it graces,” he wrote.
However, one critic expressed similar critiques as Boyz II Men. They felt like it was essentially a carbon copy of “End Of The Road” musically, just with a different context lyrically. “Weeell, in their favour are the facts that they are still the meanest warblers in pop and that soul doesn’t come much more silky or supersmooth than this. Against them is the fact that this is basically just ‘End Of The Road’ with new lyrics,” Mark Sutherland wrote for Smash Hits. “And blimmin’ presumptuous lyrics at that.”
(Photo by Ron Galella, Ltd./Ron Galella Collection via Getty Images)
The post On This Day 32 Years Ago, Boyz II Men Released One of Their Biggest Hit Songs… Even Though They Really Didn’t Want To appeared first on VICE.
