Robbed hit of the week 5/30/22 - Ideal's "Whatever"...

 

 

"Whatever" - Ideal featuring Lil' Mo

from the album Ideal (1999)

Billboard Hot 100 peak: #47

 

This week's "robbed hit" comes from the R&B vocal group Ideal, who scored a top-40 pop/top ten R&B hit in the fall of 1999 with "Get Gone" from their self-titled debut album. After a second single "Creep Inn", which sampled the Jacksons' "Heartbreak Hotel", became a minor R&B hit at #60, Virgin Records came in for the promotion of the third release from the record, "Whatever". Written by producers Eddie Berkeley and Keir "KayGee" Gist from Naughty by Nature along with R.L Huggar from the group Next, the song features singer/rapper Cynthia "Lil' Mo" Loving, who had appeared as a featured artist on Missy Elliott's top ten pop hit "Hot Boyz" in the beginning of 2000. Lil' Mo also sang on Next's top ten pop hit "Wifey". In 1998, she was lead on a track from the soundtrack to the film Why Do Fools Fall In Love, "5 Minutes". "Whatever" is a slick cruising track that has the guys coming on to their prospective ladies for some fun times at the women's discretion...

While "Whatever" just missed the R&B top ten at #11, the single stalled right under the Hot 100 pop top-40 in August of 2000. The song got to #16 on the dance-oriented Rhythmic radio chart, and #17 on the older-skewing Adult R&B format airplay list. While this will be Ideal's final time on the chart, Lil' Mo (who got cut from being in the video) will go on to have some big hits of her own.

(6/10)