Songoftheday 2/2/23 - You can say I'm plain Jane but it's not the same, I ain't into big names but I like nice things...

 

 

"Caramel" - City High featuring Eve

from the album City High (2001)

Billboard Hot 100 peak: #18 (one week)

Weeks in the Top-40: 20

 

Today's song comes from the R&B trio City High, who reached the pop top ten with their debut single "What Would You Do?" in the spring of 2001. Their follow-up single was "Caramel", which had the unfortunate release date of September 11th. The song sample, "Silent Treatment" from the alternative rap group the Roots, which was on their own debut album and only "bubbled under" the R&B chart in Billboard magazine in 1995 (#105). The song has Claudette Ortiz taking the lead first, rap-singing about her attributes. Then Ryan Toby and Robby Pardio come in with their attempt to get with her, when rapper Eve, who was then riding high from her top-10 smash "Let Me Blow Your Mind" with Gwen Stefani", with a tacked on verse about being her own woman that I'm not sure really is necessary here, but at least doesn't sink the already just passable record. Add a video with typical early-2000s special effects, and City High found themselves with their second, and last, hit...

"Caramel" became City High's second top-40 hit on Billboard magazine's Hot 100 in February of 2002, while landing their biggest hit on their R&B Singles chart, and sole top-10, at #9. On the radio, the song went to #12 on the Mainstream Top-40 airplay chart. Internationally, the single was their second to make the British Top Ten at #9, while making the top-40 in Ireland at #21. 

However, that high didn't last, for after their third single, "City High Anthem", stiffed, and they wouldn't be back for another album. Curiously, Ortiz, who had been involved with Pardio since school years, ended up marrying Toby, which must've been not good for the relationship. Claudette went solo, appearing on Wyclef Jean's single "Two Wrongs", which returned her to the top-40 later in 2002 (it will be on this series). In 2006, Ortiz released a new single, "Can't Get Enough", which featured rapper Mase of Puff Daddy's Bad Boy crew. That song made the top-40 on the R&B chart at #37, and popped on to the pop Hot 100 at #89. More recently, Ortiz was in the cast of the reality show R&B Divas: Los Angeles (even though she's a New Jersey girl). 

(4/10)

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Here's the group appearing on Top Of The Pops...

Up tomorrow: A colorful singer is in a festive mood.