Songoftheday 7/21/22 - Girl I know this might seem strange, but let me know if I'm out of order for stepping to you this way...

 

 

"Just Friends (Sunny)" - Musiq Soulchild

from the albums The Nutty Professor II: The Klumps (Original Soundtrack) and Aijuswanaseing (both 2000)

Billboard Hot 100 peak: #31 (one week)

Weeks in the Top-40: 5

 

Today's song comes from neo-soul singer/songwriter Musiq Soulchild, who grew up as Taalib Hassan Johnson in Philadelphia. Signing with Def Soul Records, Musiq released his debut single "Just Friends (Sunny)" on the soundtrack to the Eddie Murphy sequel reboot of The Nutty Professor II: The Klumps, and would later serve as the lead single to his first album Aijuswanaseing. Written by the artist with producer Carvin Haggins, using as interpolation of Bobby Hebb's 60's pop hit "Sunny", the song has Musiq propositioning a girl for a date for either a long-term prospect or just a fling, that the choice is hers. He gets a positive response in the second verse, and still continues to offer even to be a sidepiece. It rode in the same lane as D'Angelo and Maxwell but with someone definitely less self-assured. The music video featured an inventive use of a Volkswagen Bus and strategically placed clips from the Nutty Professor II movie, where it became the film's second top-40 pop hit after Janet Jackson's "Doesn't Really Matter"...

"Just Friends (Sunny)" became Musiq's first top-40 pop hit in December of 2000. The song climbed to #6 on Billboard magazine's R&B Singles chart, while the dance remixes of the track helped it rise to #33 on the Dance Club Play list. The Aijuswanaseing album, released in November of that year, peaked at #24 on the Billboard 200 sales tally, and #4 on the R&B Albums list, going on to sell over a million copies. Both Musiq and the album will be back to the series.

(6/10)

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Here's Musiq performing "Just Friends" live...

Up tomorrow: This country singer is air-worthy.