Songoftheday 5/23/24 - Said I know it's somebody's birthday tonight somewhere, and I know somebody's gonna celebrate tonight somewhere...

 

 

"Step In The Name Of Love" - R. Kelly

from the albums Chocolate Factory (2002) and The R. in R&B Collection, Vol. 1 (2003)

Billboard Hot 100 peak: #9 (one week)

Weeks in the Top-40: 21

 

Today's song comes from R&B singer/songwriter/producer and current incarcerated felon R. Kelly, whose scandals were just starting to brew at the start of the millennium, yet he was able to score a pair of big hits from his Chocolate Factory album with "Snake" and "Ignition (Remix)", with the latter spending five weeks in the runner-up spot on Billboard magazine's Hot 100 chart. In the autumn of 2003 he put out a hits collection The R. In R&B Collection Vol 1 (pretty hopeful, huh) which landed yet another top-20 hit with "Thoia Thoing".  After that, a song from Chocolate Factory started to gain traction, especially amongst the "Chicago stepping" dance scene. "Step In The Name Of Love", written and produced by Kelly, originally appeared on Billboard's R&B Singles chart in October of 2002, a month before "Ignition". But eventually, and with a remix taken from the Collection to boost exposure (no pun intended), the song grew organically until it topped the R&B chart and started its rise on the Hot 100. The lyrics mostly are an innocuous call to the dance floor over a lite-disco groove, but his insistence on calling himself the Pied Piper with all we've found out really takes the piss on the record (pun well intended). If it weren't for that it'd be quite the pleasant affair but damn him. The music video has him attempting the swag of a man on top as a crowd of people do the stepping, but that would change, but not for many more years than I thought initially...

"Step In The Name Of Love" climbed into the top ten on Billboard's Hot 100 in December of 2003, when it also topped their R&B Singles chart for two weeks. It ultimately spent 70 weeks on the latter chart, which is still the 6th longest trip on the list. On the radio, the song peaked at #4 on the Mainstream R&B chart, spent a week at #1 on the older-skewing Adult R&B airplay list, and rose to #21 on the dance/R&B-oriented Rhythmic format. Internationally, the single made it to #14 on the British singles chart. At the Grammy Awards in 2004, "Step..." was nominated for Best Male R&B Vocal Performance, losing out to Luther Vandross for his "Dance With My Father". 

Kelly will be back to the series.

(6/10)

(Click below to see the rest of the post)

Here's the original version of "Step" from the Chocolate Factory album...

And lastly, live on an awards show...

Tomorrow, I'll run down my top hits of this week a day early, then SOTD will be on a one week break before coming back on June 4th with the Queen of Hip-Hop Soul audibly pleased. Thanks for being here, please come back!