Songoftheday 2/21/21 - Heard about my past things I used to do, the games I used to play the girls that didn't last...

 

 

"Are U Still Down" / "They Don't Know" - Jon B.

from the album Cool Relax (1997)

Billboard Hot 100 peak for "Are U Still Down": #29 (three weeks)

Billboard Hot 100 peak for "They Don't Know": #7 (one week)

Total weeks in the Top-40: 18

 

Today's song(s) of the day come from R&B singer/songwriter Jon B. (the "B" for Buck), who had scored a top ten pop hit with his debut single, "Someone To Love", and a top-40 follow-up with "Pretty Girl", both reaching the top ten on Billboard magazine's R&B chart. Two years later in 1997, Jon returned with his sophomore album Cool Relax. The lead single from the record, "Don't Say", was a modest hit on urban radio, peaking at #34 on the R&B chart, but stalling out at #68 on Billboard's pop Hot 100. For the second single release from the project, Jon put two songs with different styles on one commercial release. The first, "Are U Still Down", was an hip-hop influenced jam that was notable for featuring the last recorded rap recorded by Tupac Shakur before his murder in 1997. Written by Jon with Tupac and producer Johnny Jackson, the song got a better reception than "Don't Say", and returned Jon to mainstream radio for a bit with sales from 2Pac fans kicking in as well. But for the record itself, it's actually a mixed bag. Jon seems to be pleading with a woman to leave her man to be with him full-time, a common trope in soul music, but then offers up really creepy lyrics like this:

 

Remember that evening
I knew that you were too scared
To go all the way
But you did it to please me
You were crying it was raining
When you gave it to me

Now if that doesn't totally sound like 100% consent than it probably wasn't. Oof. And the music video is even stranger, with Jon playing some gangster-like head that gets enraged over a guy sweet-talking his girl in front of him and within seconds is grinding on another woman in front of her. The production is smooth, as long as you don't pay too much attention...

"Are U Still Down" reached the American pop top-40 in January of 1998 for about a month, before slowly descending the list. It also went to #9 on Billboard's R&B chart as well. But then stations started playing the flip-side of the single, "They Don't Know". Written by Jon with producers Tim Kelley and Bob Robinson, the slow jam has Jon trying to convince his woman to trust him despite the rumors spreading around. The track got an even better reception at radio than the first two offerings, and Jon found himself in the upper echelon of the charts again...

 

 "They Don't Know" returned Jon to the pop top ten in America for the second and final time in June of 1998. The song was huge at urban radio, helping it spend five weeks at #2 on Billboard's R&B chart. Internationally, the single landed the singer his first top-40 hit in Britain at #32. The Cool Relax album also scored Jon his first placing in the top-40 on the Billboard 200 sales chart at #33, while peaking at #5 on the R&B specific albums tally, going on to move over two million copies at retail.

A fourth song from Cool Relax, "I Do (Whatcha Say Boo)", written and produced by Jon, was a decent hit on the R&B chart at #18, while missing the pop Hot 100, only managing to "bubble under" the list at #117. Later that year. Jon was a featured singer on rapper WC's "Better Days", which made the R&B top-40 at #33 while hitting #64 on the pop chart.

Jon returned in 2001 with his third disc Pleasures You Like. Although it had a good start, landing his first top ten album at #6, lead single "Don't Talk" stalled out at #58 on the pop Hot 100 and #21 on the R&B list. Oddly, enough, though, the uptempo track gave Jon his biggest hit in the UK at #29. Conflicts with his label (subbed out to Babyface's wife Tracey Edmonds) saw him going indie afterwards. A set in 2004, Stronger Everyday, which came out on Sanctuary Records (guided by Beyonce's dad Matthew at the time), didn't make a dent on American radio, but did manage to place on the Billboard 200 as well as have a minor British hit with "Lately" (UK #68). Four years later, Jon returned with Helpless Romantic, which is his most recent charting album (#109) and contained single "Oh So Sexy" featuring white trash rapper Paul Wall, which popped on to the R&B chart in Billboard for a single week at #98. His most recent studio album, Comfortable Swagg, was released in 2012.

 

"Are U Still Down": (3/10)     "They Don't Know": (5/10) 

(Click below to see the rest of the post)

Here's Jon performing "Are U Still Down" live at the Apollo in 1998...

...and "They Don't Know" also at the legendary theatre...

Here's Jon on BET television singing "Are U Still Down"...

and lastly, at that same show on BET, with "They Don't Know"...

Up tomorrow: Two rappers get together and they Can't Hardly Wait.