r/janetjackson

Janet looking good!

For starters, Stevie and Janet are 3rd cousins, which is just iconic to me! Also, they’re both Tauruses with Stevie being born on May 13, 1950 (happy birthday Stevie!) and Janet on May 16, 1966. I’m not some astrology expert but there’s got to be a connection there, lol. Another similarity Stevie and Janet have is that they both have 10 #1 each, putting them in a two way for the 7th artists with the most Billboard Hot 100 #1’s.

Anyway, on to the meat and potatoes of this discussion. I was listening to Billboard’s Greatest Pop Stars podcast on Janet Jackson and something the host mentioned was how her 5 album run from 1986’s Control to 2001’s All For You is comparable to Stevie’s classic period from 1972’s Music of My Mind) to his 1976 magnum opus, Songs In The Key of Life.

Both artists’ first albums in these legendary runs (Control and Music of My Mind) started a renaissance period where they given more artistic control over their work. Each album built on the last one by delving deeper into who they were as people. They explored love in all its facets, loss and addressed social issues. Where Stevie’s spirituality deepened on each album, Janet’s explored her sexuality in bolder ways.

All 5 of Janet’s albums in this run went #1 and produced a #1 single (with RN1814 having 4 chart toppers). Stevie’s albums from Talking Book through Songs won him a whopping 12 Grammys (with 3 AOTY wins).

I love revisiting these parts of their catalogues because of the journey it takes you on. The music is rich, varied and displayed their versatility with such aplomb. To say they were locked in is an understatement, Stevie and Janet were operating at their highest frequencies here and very few artists in popular music have reached.

Bernadette later married Sugar Ray Leonard in 1993, after being introduced to him in 1989 by Kenny G at a Luther Vandross concert. That same year, Randy became a father for the first time.

Janet Jackson's "If" music video from 1993 received various accolades, including Best Female Video and Best Dance Video at the MTV Video Music Awards and a Billboard Award for Dance Clip of the Year. It was also voted the second best female video of the decade by Idolator. Watch this beautifully upscaled 4K video of Janet performing "If" at the 1993 MTV Video Music Awards in a medley with "That's the Way Love Goes" 🔥

I have loved the "If" music video from the first moment I watched it. Everything about it: drop dead gorgeous Janet in her halter-style crop top and black pants with choker necklace, the strong Asian imagery and influence, the sensual underground Asian nightclub setting featuring futuristic touch-screen technology and surveillance cameras (which didn't exist at the time!) ~~ all evoking a cool AF cyberpunk Blade Runner-esque atmosphere. And of course, the intense choreography by the legendary Tina Landon is and will forever be ICONIC❗

But perhaps most importantly for me was seeing all the beautiful people who looked like me or similar to me in this video was truly awe-inspiring! 🤩

In the documentary, Janet talked about how this was a traumatic time as people tried to force them to be competitive and make sure that they were far away as possible from each other during the filming of ‘Scream’ music video.

But I am glad that they got this moment together.

I wish we got more of them.

Source: https://www.instagram.com/reel/DXC7SfZD8ul/?igsh=MWprOXp2cHZscXVhag==

It seems like outside of Janet’s fanbase, her discography is undervalued. People in general recognize her as a legend and can name all of her classic albums, but the amount of respect and recognition for those albums doesn’t match up to the legacy that Janet has left behind her.

Never mind her first two albums, which I think are just as good as the rest of her discography. (Not everybody is an instant success, though. Even Michael’s first two albums as a teenager paled in comparison to his albums from 1979 and later, even if his 1972 debut did pretty well in particular. We’re not even going to speak on his third and fourth albums, because those really didn’t work out for him… and I mean no disrespect with that claim.)

Janet’s most memorable hits are probably from Control and Rhythm Nation 1814.

Standout hits from the former include “Control” (the title track) and “Nasty”. The latter has literally given Janet a popular catchphrase that has cemented itself into her legacy: “Ms. Jackson if ya nasty”. The Control album spawned five Billboard Hot 100 top-5 singles, which is an incredible feat. “When I Think Of You” and “Let’s Wait Awhile” are probably much less celebrated hits than the two I mentioned earlier, and “What Have You Done For Me Lately” is the odd one out—the hit that barely gets mentioned.

Standout hits from the latter include “Miss You Much”, “Escapade”, and “Come Back To Me”. Other hit singles include “Alright”, “Black Cat”, “Love Will Never Do (Without You)”, and “Rhythm Nation” (the title track). Most of these went #1 on the Billboard Hot 100, with only “Rhythm Nation” and “Come Back To Me” going #2, “Alright” going #4, and “State Of The World” (not previously mentioned) being ineligible due to not being released domestically. However, only those hits I mentioned in the first sentence of this paragraph have proven to be memorable cuts from the album, as nobody ever mentions the others named here.

Now I’m putting so much emphasis on her late-1980s breakthrough era… but I would be wrong to downplay her 1990s success. It was on a lesser scale than her 1980s run, but it was still a pretty solid run. She actually scored at least two big hits on both of the albums she released that decade.

From Janet’s self-titled 1993 album, some of the most memorable hits include “That’s The Way Love Goes” (arguably her signature song, went #1) and “Any Time, Any Place” (another strong contender, #2 Billboard peak, and one that makes the previous selection “arguable”—not even accounting for one song from her 1997 album, which I will get into later). While she achieved several other top-10 singles (“If” at #4, “Again” at #1, “Because Of Love” at #10, and “You Want This” at #8), the general album gets overlooked outside of TTWLG and ATAP (the first two songs I mentioned in this paragraph). Some of these other hits don’t get a lot of attention outside of the R&B community (very important distinction, especially since Janet is big among both pop and R&B audiences).

From her 1997 album, The Velvet Rope, Janet’s most memorable hits are “Together Again” and “I Get Lonely”. The latter song is what I was referring to in the previous paragraph about being a potential third signature song. Those songs reached #1 and #3 on the Billboard Hot 100, respectively. The only other memorable hit single on this album is “Got Til It’s Gone” (ineligible for the chart, but still a major hit for the album). Other singles were either ineligible for the chart (and did not get the same luck as “Got Til It’s Gone” … these singles are “Go Deep” and “You”) or only made the Billboard Bubbling Under Hot 100 chart (“Every Time”). While “Got Til It’s Gone” is very memorable and still relevant today, it’s generally overshadowed by “Together Again” and “I Get Lonely”. Still, many people consider this album to be Janet’s magnum opus.

All For You (2001) was probably Janet’s most successful album of all, eclipsing even her albums from the 1980s! As I’ve recently posted on the album’s 25th anniversary, all three singles were major hits! “All For You” (the title track) reached #1 on the Billboard Hot 100 and was certified Platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA). “Someone To Call My Lover” reached #3 on the Billboard Hot 100. “Son Of A Gun (I Betcha Think This Song Is About You)” peaked modestly at #28 on the Billboard Hot 100, and although this isn’t bad, it was Janet’s first single since her 1986 Control album run to peak outside of the top 10 on the chart (with the exception of “The Pleasure Principle” from that same album, which peaked at #14). “Doesn’t Really Matter” (which did, in fact, peak at #1 on the Billboard Hot 100) was not released as a single for the album, although it was released as a single for the 2000 film The Nutty Professor II: The Klumps. The All For You album run is regarded as the unfortunate end of Janet’s “golden era”.

After listing out all of these hits, you may be wondering why I still believe that Janet’s discography doesn’t get the amount of appreciation that it deserves. My belief stems mostly from the fact that out of all the high-charting and high-selling singles that Janet achieved, people outside of Janet’s core fanbase only remember select singles. On top of that, Janet is regarded as one of the greatest stars both in pop and R&B culture, yet many of her biggest hits are only appreciated by the R&B audience. It’s a statistically proven fact that the pop audience is larger than the R&B audience, and since Janet has the general support of both, this makes it seem like there’s some disparity between how each of her successive career efforts are received. Her brother Michael Jackson has arguably more support from the pop audience than the R&B audience (even if his legacy is “something different”), which is probably why his stuff has done so well. The commercial performances of his R&B material may have paled in comparison to his pop work, but the difference wasn’t too drastic. Janet has always been big in both the pop and R&B fields, but her support has been very oddly divided throughout her career, and it’s clear to see.

For every one hit single, classic single, or major career effort that Janet Jackson accomplished, there are probably about 2-3 other “hit singles”, “classic singles”, “major career efforts”—or whatever else you want to call them—that fell under the radar of the public (on average). A lot of these things are also buried under what happened to her in 2004, because you know the public loves to forget about all the things that contributed to the MAKING of a legend after something notorious happened in their career or said legend underwent a major shift in their personal life (not referring to scandalous behavior).

Janet Jackson gets respect as a legend by most people (I actually think she’s quite disrespected, but she’s also adored by many), but the amount of attention that her discography receives is varied. It makes you question exactly how much people appreciate Janet Jackson’s contributions to music when they speak her name or mention her work.

Janet speaks on RHYTHM NATION’s ongoing influence.

Mo’ Money Original Motion Picture Soundtrack All produced by Jimmy Jam & Terry Lewis