Songoftheday 4/30/20 - I'll always think of you inside of my private thoughts. I can imagine you touchin my private parts...
from the albums Secrets (1996) and Waiting To Exhale (Original Soundtrack) (1995)
Billboard Hot 100 peak: #1 (one week)
Weeks in the Top-40: 39
Today's song(s) of the day come from soul/pop singer Toni Braxton, whose self-titled debut album in 1993 went on to score six top-40 pop singles with "Give U My Heart", "Love Should Have Brought You Home", "Another Sad Love Song", "Breathe Again", "You Mean The World To Me", and the double-hit single "I Belong To You"/"How Many Ways", as well as the #1 R&B hit "Seven Whole Days". The record sold in the millions and reached #1 on the albums chart, and won her three Grammy Awards including Best New Artist. In 1996, Toni returned with a single that featured two songs that would both get heavy radio airplay. "You're Makin' Me High", written and produced by Babyface along with Bryce Wilson (who previously had been in the act Groove Theory), was a more mature and sexual jam, equating her love with the rush from an illicit smoke, per se. It was taking a chance to delve into more sensual waters, but in the age of R. Kelly the public approved resoundingly. That song served as the lead single to Braxton's sophomore effort Secrets...
Meanwhile, the other track on the single was "Let It Flow", which had already been released on the soundtrack to the Whitney Houston flick Waiting To Exhale. Written and produced by Babyface, this track was a much softer and acoustic guitar-led midtempo ballad, and especially found favor with "easy listening" radio stations. It would be the fifth song from the movie to make the pop top ten, after Whitney Houston's "Exhale (Shoop Shoop)", Brandy's "Sittin' Up In My Room", Mary J. Blige's "Not Gon' Cry", and Whitney's duet with CeCe Winans "Count On Me"...
Considering that Billboard magazine combined the airplay for both of the songs, the pair rose to #1 on the official pop Hot 100 chart in July of 1996. The song also spent two weeks at the top of their R&B chart as well. However on the "easy listening" radio-only charts, the songs were calculated separately, with "You're Making Me High" stopping at #28 on the Adult Top-40 format, while "Let It Flow" rose all the way to #9 on the Adult Contemporary format tally. The dance remixes of "You're Making Me High" helped it become Toni's first club hit, topping the list for two weeks. Internationally, the "You're Making Me High" single (which may or may not have included "Let It Flow" depending on country) reached the top ten in Australia (#2), Canada (#5), New Zealand (#5), Spain (#5), and the UK (#7). It also made the top-40 in Sweden (#11), the Netherlands (#18), and Ireland (#21). At the Grammy Awards in 1997, Toni won Best Female R&B Vocal Performance for the third time in four years, while Secrets, which went to #2 on the sales chart, was nominated for Best Pop Album, losing out to Celine Dion's Falling Into You. She also won a pair of American Music Awards for Best R&B Album and Female.
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Here's the slamming club remix from David Morales that transformed the song into a #1 dance hit...
Here's Toni performing the song live (I think on Showtime At The Apollo) in 1996...
And doing "Let It Flow" in 1999...
Up tomorrow: Speed metal heroes wait for slumber.
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