Songoftheday 6/4/17 - All the lonely nights I spend alone, never 'round to love me you're always gone...
from the album Rhythm Nation 1814 (1989)
Billboard Hot 100 peak: #1 (one week)
Weeks in the Top-40: 12
Today's song of the day is from Janet Jackson, whose landmark album Rhythm Nation 1814 had already spun off five top-five pop hits in the U.S. with "Alright", "Come Back To Me", "Rhythm Nation", and a pair of #1's in "Escapade" and "Miss You Much". The sixrh single from the record would be her rock excursion "Black Cat". Written solely by Janet, who co-produced it with the Time's "Jellybean" Johnson, and with tough talk language about the perils of living the hard life whether it be drugs or partying, she sold it ten times better than "Bad" could. While studio axe Dave Barry played for the album, various mixes had the likes of Vernon Reid from Living Colour and Nuno Bettancourt from Extreme filling in, the latter appearing on the video single mix...
"Black Cat" became the third #1 pop hit from Rhythm Nation 1814 in October of 1990. The song also climbed to #10 on Billboard's R&B chart, while the remixes made it to #17 on their Dance Club Play list. Internationally, the record reached the top-10 in Canada (#4), Norway (#5), Australia (#6), and Switzerland (#10), while getting to #11 in Ireland, #15 in the UK, and #34 in Germany. Janet was nominated for a Grammy for Female Rock Vocal Performance, losing out to another "ebony" pop #1, Alannah Myles' "Black Velvet".
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Here's Janet performing "Black Cat" to open the MTV Music Video Awards...
...and from her Rhythm Nation concert in Japan...
...and lastly, the album version...
Up tomorrow: An "airy" sophist-pop group gets on their knees.
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