![]() ![]() 15 on the Billboard 200 chart and featured a laundry list of iconic R&B songs so long it’s hard to believe they’re on the same album. He may have felt like a little brother trying on grown-folk music for size, but it worked.Īnd My Way, his 1997 sophomore album, showed that he was here to stay. ![]() But, with a bouncy earnest quality reminiscent of Tevin Campbell and a baby-faced yearning not unlike Jodeci, the tracks set 15-year-old Usher up as an R&B newcomer to watch. Its biggest singles, “Think of You” and “Can U Get Wit It,” never broke above the 50s on the Billboard Hot 100. Usher, his eponymous 1994 debut, fell squarely in the tradition of the mid-’90s R&B released around it. I even gave in to the corny conceit that is “U-Turn,” quietly singing the chorus under my breath and reappropriating the wordplay any time my parents pulled one on the road.Īnd now, 15 years after its release, 8701 is still the album I turn to when I am struck with a sudden wave of appreciation for the glory that is early-2000s R&B.Ĩ701 was Usher’s first album released in the 2000s, and it diverged from his previous albums in that it expanded the artist’s range with artful, prominent nods to both pop and hip-hop. I memorized the choreography of the “U Remind Me” video after endless MTV2 loops, letting my shy girl moves take center stage when no one was around to see. ![]() I would dance around the house to “U Got It Bad,” twirling slowly as I imagined myself one day pining so hard after a man that I would “hang up and call right back” (ed. And so, of course, 8701 was the album I couldn’t stop playing. 8701 was the album I probably shouldn’t have been listening to. To my 10-year-old ears, Usher’s 8701 was verified grown ’n’ sexy music. Girl power! Or something.īut it was the other CD that really stuck with me. I would belt along to Songs in A Minor when no one was around and I fancied myself - and my dusty braids - as fly as Ms. That year, I had not one but two albums awaiting rotation. That year, my cousins had snuck me two CDs that signaled ya girl was growing up. Gone were the days of only being allowed to listen to Radio Disney. The easy, fast & fun way to learn how to sing: 30DaySinger.The summer I turned 10, I couldn’t wait to break out my Walkman. Wish I knew, wish I knew how to separate the two You won't believe all of the things that she put me through. So innocent, she seemed, but I was schooled You need to sit down, this may take a while. Kinda hard to explain, but girl, I'll try. Is the same thing that makes me change, my mind. See the thing about you, that caught my eye, The easy, fast & fun way to learn how to sing: Yo, I ain't seeing you in a minute, but I got something to tell ya, listen. Its accompanying music video features Chilli of TLC as one the female leads. The song won Usher his first Grammy Award for Best Male R&B Vocal Performance in 2002. "U Remind Me" topped the US Billboard Hot 100 on Jand also reached the top five in Australia, Belgium, France, the Netherlands, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom. The song served as the lead American single from 8701 following the release of previous single "Pop Ya Collar" which was only included in some editions of the album. A fast-paced mid-tempo contemporary R&B track, the song is about a man who meets a woman who seems like a nice catch, but he decides not to enter a relationship with her because she looks too much like an ex-girlfriend with whom he had a bad breakup. It was written by Edmund ”Eddie Hustle” Clement and Anita McCloud and produced by Edmund "Eddie Hustle" Clement along with Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis for Usher's third studio album 8701 (2001). "U Remind Me" is a song by American singer Usher. ![]()
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