It was recently announced that ’80s and ’90s hitmaker Kenneth “Babyface” Edmonds and frequent collaborator Toni Braxton (star of the reality show Braxton Family Values and the recent Lifetime original movie Twist of Faith) have reunited to record a new duets album together, set for release this fall on Motown Records. Braxton, who fake-retired from recording music and announced her desire to play a lesbian in a movie earlier this year, has sold over 60 million albums worldwide, while Babyface has, according to Billboard, written or produced over 125 Top 10 R&B and pop hits, including 16 #1 pop songs. During a Wikipedia binge on all things late-20th-century R&B and new jack swing, we decided to take a look back at Babyface’s impressive list of hits and pick our 15 favorites, including two Braxton singles and one by the ‘Face himself.
Editor’s Note: Listen to our Babyface playlist on Spotify.
15. After 7, “Heat of the Moment”
Babyface had every reason to give some of his A-grade material to After 7. After all, two of its members were his own brothers. Their big hit was the stately “Can’t Stop,” but in retrospect the bouncy “Heat of the Moment” sounds a lot more like what today’s retro hunters want when they seek out new jack swing: spare, hollow synth hits, aggressive drum patterns, and, perhaps most of all, dudes who aren’t afraid to beg “Please, baby, let me ex-plain,” and then proceed to do so in full-out tenor. Eric Henderson
14. The Whispers, “Rock Steady”
The title may as well be referring to the Whispers themselves, an L.A.-based R&B group who started their career with faux-Philly soul in the early ’70s, jumped aboard the disco express just in time to score a few of boogie’s greatest moments (“And the Beat Goes On,” “It’s a Love Thing”), and, well into middle age, staged a remarkable, trend-bucking comeback with Babyface. Common sense says they should’ve ended up looking like this. The R&B history books will list them among the spiritual godfathers of new jack swing. Henderson
13. Boyz II Men, “End of the Road”
In his quasi-Kurt Cobain biopic Last Days, Gus Van Sant positioned Boyz II Men’s “On Bended Knee” as the piss take of the sort of mid-’90s schmaltz that truly took off with the group’s 1992 single “End of the Road,” then the longest running pop hit ever. The silly spoken bridge prevents the song from aging as well as some of Babyface’s other hits, but his timeless hook and the boyz’ cooleyhighharmonies created a template that countless R&B and pop artists would emulate for nearly a decade. Sal Cinquemani
12. En Vogue, “Whatever”
By the time Babyface teamed up with multiplatinum girl group En Vogue, then down one member after Dawn Robinson’s departure, hip-hop had begun to overtake R&B and electronica was on the verge of becoming the next big (brief) thing. The result was a surprisingly understated, trip-hop-inflected midtempo number more reminiscent of the sleek title track from the group’s 1993 EP Runway Love than their smash swan song with Robinson, “Don’t Let Go (Love).” Cinquemani
11. Pebbles, “Girlfriend”
If Babyface crowned Bobby Brown and Toni Braxton as his king and queen, then Pebbles, for at least a few brief years before her misguided sojourn into backstage management, was his Disney princess. Albeit, a jaded, boy-weary incarnation who just wants to let Ariel and Belle know their main things ain’t all that. Not one, not two, but at least three of her tracks stand among Babyface’s most urgent, paranoid anti-love bangers. The beautifully skeptical “Giving You the Benefit” puts Pebbles in the drivers’ seat, but she’s truly on her home turf with “Backyard” and the enduring underdog “Girlfriend,” in which her tough love is matched by tougher synthesizer hits. Henderson
10. TLC, “Baby-Baby-Baby”
I’m partial to the other singles from TLC’s debut, particularly “Ain’t 2 Proud 2 Beg,” but there’s a reason the midtempo “Baby-Baby-Baby” became the biggest hit from the album, not to mention one of the biggest singles of 1992: Babyface-Babyface-Babyface. Cinquemani
9. Toni Braxton, “You’re Makin’ Me High”
The lead single from Toni Braxton’s sophomore effort, Secrets, was somewhat of a departure for the singer, whose past hits, all co-written and produced by Babyface, were largely G-rated. “You’re Makin’ Me High” found Braxton making reference to her “private parts” and adopting a sultrier, more sexual persona to go with ‘Face’s thick beats and squelchy porn synths. Cinquemani
8. Babyface, “My Kinda Girl”
“Whip Appeal” is the obvious classic from his arguable peak as a performer, but if Babyface’s ensuing solo career proved nothing else, it’s that the man is a big old softie. That alone makes the bright, sunshiny radio mix of “My Kinda Girl” a more appropriate selection from Tender Lover, but it’s not mere tokenism. To compare those rapturous synthesized washes of arpeggiated good vibes in the context of the nervy contemporary tracks he was giving Pebbles and Bobby Brown at the time is to rip away any pretense that new jack-era R&B was in any way monolithic. And when Babyface leaps to the top of his register on “When I needed love/You were always there for me,” try not to smile. Henderson
7. Madonna, “Take a Bow”
Madonna once likened Babyface’s songs to Mercedes-Benzes. In short, durable and classic. And while “Forbidden Love” might be the superior Babyface collaboration on her 1994 album Bedtime Stories, “Take a Bow” certainly lives up to the Queen of Pop’s metaphor. The production, right down to the stately but decidedly flat drum programming, screams mid-’90s pop radio, but there’s something timeless about Madge’s bittersweet hook and Craig Armstrong’s cinematic orchestral arrangement. Cinquemani
6. Tevin Campbell, “Can We Talk”
Poor little Tevin Campbell spent the salad days of his career playing a precocious Mini Me to Prince and Quincy Jones. It wasn’t really until Babyface gave him “I’m Ready” and “Can We Talk” that he really came out of his custodial period…and with a big flourish. “I’m Ready” is sweet, but it’s “Can We Talk” that arrives with the gravitas of the early pangs of adulthood, especially in the descending chords of its pleading chorus, which turn Tevin’s “I just want to know your name” into a bittersweet directive the listener has to presume won’t actually result in dialogue. Henderson
5. Karyn White, “Secret Rendezvous”
Babyface may have become a household name in the ’90s thanks to his crossover ballads by Toni Braxton, Boyz II Men, and others, but his groove-driven dance-pop tracks, as evidenced by this list, are some of his most enduring. Atop a new jill swing beat and Middle Eastern-tinged synth strings, White sings, vamps, and, yes, raps about the imminent titular encounter, even squeezing in a reminder for her furtive beau to bring the wine. Cinquemani
4. Paula Abdul, “Knocked Out”
On the album, it wins on points, but doesn’t quite land a “Love TKO.” But pair Babyface’s tangy R&B chorus with the post-production artistry of remixer Shep Pettibone, who elongated the juiciest bits, let the maladroit flourishes (those cheerleader chants! “Hi!” “Hello there!”) hang provocatively out to dry, and otherwise turns Paula Abdul inside out, and “Knocked Out” suddenly seems like Forever Your Girl’s sleeper MVP. Henderson
3. Bobby Brown, “On Our Own”
Don’t Be Cruel was a masterpiece because it embodied every paradox of new jack swing. It was hard and urban, but also soft and pop, nasty and masculine, but also sweet and adolescent, safely dangerous. The title track and “My Prerogative” zigged to one end of the continuum, while “Roni” and “Every Little Step” (the song I will never not imagine Eddie Winslow rocking out to) skewed in the opposite direction. “On Our Own,” the song Babyface and Brown contributed to the soundtrack of Ghostbusters II (which easily eclipses Ray Parker Jr.’s title track from the original), wraps all those contradictions up in one state-of-the-art package, five minutes of soul singing, “too hot to handle, too cold to hold” playground flow, and smooth, house music-derived piano licks. Henderson
2. Toni Braxton, “Breathe Again”
While Whitney, Mariah, and Celine were singing songs designed to flaunt the power of their pipes, Babyface was churning out less showy compositions like “Breathe Again,” the quintessential Babyface ballad. Toni Braxton became a star not for her impressive vocal range, but because of the texture and tone of her voice, for which “Breathe Again” was the perfect showcase. Cinquemani
1. Whitney Houston, “I’m Your Baby Tonight”
It’s called new jack swing, not new jack shuffle. But, as though under orders to change up his game for the future “Queen of the Night,” Babyface made the latter happen with a tune simultaneously among his best and most incongruous, a Skinemax-tinged bump-n’-grinder that put Houston, whose persona back then was still about as Teflon as they came, into pretty incongruous territory herself. No longer concerned with whether or not the children are the future, no longer making “somebody who loves me” the prerequisite for filling her dance card, no longer sure whether her name is or is not Susan, “I’m Your Baby Tonight” gets Houston to lay all her cards on the table before sweeping them aside and pulling the guy she never laid eyes on until that night on top of her new jack sinuating body. Babyface might not have a reputation for it, but with “I’m Your Baby Tonight,” he gave Houston good love. Make that the best love. Henderson
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