"... generating a robot mantra devoid of embellishment or variation, the perfect underpinning for Rosie's piercing, disembodied-siren vocal. With 'Angel Baby,' rock had regressed as far as it could, some nameless dread loosed within the collective Top 40 mind had run its course and spent itself in a lost mournful wail. 'Angel Baby' was the final moonlit flowering of rock's medieval phase, paean to a purity and innocence no longer possible in the real world."
"Rock's medieval phase"? So which phase are we in now? The Concentration Camp phase? I kid, I kid. But as "Angel Baby" served as the departing, plaintive, youthful sigh of its era, I believe there is a song from the Summer of '88 that embodies a similar spirit. In my humble opinion, there is a hit that captures that last flicker of '80s musical guilelessness, before the tide of '90s crassness would swiftly rush in and snuff out those faintly glowing embers once and for all. If there is a "final moonlit flowering" of '80s pop, a "paean to a purity and innocence" that would no longer be possible in the world of '90s Top 40 radio, it is Brenda K. Starr's "I Still Believe."
Allow me to explain, with a few handy links. In just a few short years after 1988, at least 75% of the R&B-flavored, drum machine-powered Top 40 ballads that, musically speaking, weren't terribly far removed from "I Still Believe," would feature lyrics such as these:
Allow me to explain, with a few handy links. In just a few short years after 1988, at least 75% of the R&B-flavored, drum machine-powered Top 40 ballads that, musically speaking, weren't terribly far removed from "I Still Believe," would feature lyrics such as these:
- "Let me lick you up and down, till you say stop/Let me play with your body baby, make you real hot/Let me do all the things you want me to do/'Cause tonight baby, I wanna get freaky with you"
- "Good lovin' body rockin' knockin' boots all night long/Makin' love until we tire to the break of dawn"
- "I can do it soft or I can do it hard/I can make you scream if you let down your guard my baby/If it ain't good enough baby, I'll work harder/I'll keep pumpin' every minute girl"
- "Do you mind if I stroke you up/Do you mind if I stroke you down/All through the night/Until your body's tired"
Now, flash forward to the Spring of 1999. I am sitting in my freshman dorm room, which I share with my Vietnamese-American roommate (suffice to say, while we share a room, we do not share remotely the same taste in music). Suddenly he begins playing a new Mariah Carey song, and begins playing it more times than I deem necessary, but that's neither here nor there. I instantly recognize the track as a cover version of a song that had originally been an omnipresent hit in the Summer of '88. I recall, incorrectly, that the song had originally been performed by Debbie Gibson. All I can think is, "Why the fuck is Mariah Carey covering some old Debbie Gibson song?"
Was there a memo I missed where Debbie Gibson had suddenly become ironically hip and cool again? Ah, but my perennially flawless pop music memory had erred for once - although the error was quite understandable. You see, in my foggy recollection I conflated "I Still Believe" with "Foolish Beat." Both are melancholy break-up ballads that prominently feature the words "love again" in the chorus, both had been hits right around the same time (although "I Still Believe" only peaked at #13 as opposed to #1), and, according to Wikipedia, both songs merited inclusion in Rolling Stone's "50 Awesomely Bad Break-Up Songs." For several years I expressed confusion over Mariah Carey's covering of a dopey Debbie Gibson tearjerker, while somehow sensing that I was off the mark. Finally, in February 2011, I wrestled myself free from the shackles of Summer of '88 ignorance and learned the true identity of the original recording artist.
Here's the deal. Once upon a time, Brenda K. Starr (possibly a distant cousin to Ringo?) employed an unknown back-up singer named Mariah Carey. In fact, it was Brenda K. Starr who fatefully handed Mariah Carey's demo tape to Tommy Mottola. In other words, we owe Mariah Carey to Brenda K. Starr. Not really, but the point is, ten years later and sitting on top of the R&B diva Matterhorn, Mariah wanted to pay tribute to the singer who gave her that big break. From Wikipedia:
Was there a memo I missed where Debbie Gibson had suddenly become ironically hip and cool again? Ah, but my perennially flawless pop music memory had erred for once - although the error was quite understandable. You see, in my foggy recollection I conflated "I Still Believe" with "Foolish Beat." Both are melancholy break-up ballads that prominently feature the words "love again" in the chorus, both had been hits right around the same time (although "I Still Believe" only peaked at #13 as opposed to #1), and, according to Wikipedia, both songs merited inclusion in Rolling Stone's "50 Awesomely Bad Break-Up Songs." For several years I expressed confusion over Mariah Carey's covering of a dopey Debbie Gibson tearjerker, while somehow sensing that I was off the mark. Finally, in February 2011, I wrestled myself free from the shackles of Summer of '88 ignorance and learned the true identity of the original recording artist.
Here's the deal. Once upon a time, Brenda K. Starr (possibly a distant cousin to Ringo?) employed an unknown back-up singer named Mariah Carey. In fact, it was Brenda K. Starr who fatefully handed Mariah Carey's demo tape to Tommy Mottola. In other words, we owe Mariah Carey to Brenda K. Starr. Not really, but the point is, ten years later and sitting on top of the R&B diva Matterhorn, Mariah wanted to pay tribute to the singer who gave her that big break. From Wikipedia:
She explained that the song "reminds me of the fact that not long ago I was a teenage girl with nothing to my name but a demo tape, my voice, and my ability to write songs. Brenda K. Starr treated me like a 'star' and gave me a shot." ... "I'm really glad that I got a chance to remake the song 'I Still Believe,' because the album is called '#1's' and this is the first song that I sang as a professional singer. I would go on the road with Brenda. I was a little skinny kid with no money that she took under her wing and she was so nice to me. I auditioned to be her back-up singer and she hired me and she used to bring me clothes and food, and she really took care of me like a big sister. A lot of people wouldn't have done that. The main thing was that she believed in me and it's really hard to get people to listen to your tapes. [...] She was always real cool and helpful and supportive. I always loved this song. When I sing it now, it reminds me of those times."Brings a tear to your eye, but personally, I feel like Mariah Carey's version of "I Still Believe," with its Brett Ratner-directed video (!), is a stellar example of how '90s pop lost so much of the directness of '80s pop in an effort to seem more "sophisticated." Mariah doesn't simply sing the song. She does all this "stuff." She slathers herself all over the intro, rather than simply letting it play as Brenda does. She constantly shifts from a creaky whisper to high-volume belting. I am not going out on a limb if I suggest that Mariah Carey is a more talented singer than Brenda K. Starr, but I hear so much calculation and decision-making in Mariah's vocal choices. Mariah sounds like she "really loves this song that helped her get her big break" and she wants you to know how much it means to her. Brenda K. Starr sounds like she just told the construction worker across the street who cat-called her to fuck off. There's nothing "off-the-cuff" about Mariah's version. It's too lush, too spotless, too professional to be the butt of blogger jokes. The Mariah Carey version knows that it's going to be "significant," that it's going to be "remembered" by her fans. No thank you. The Brenda K. Starr version, the one that was merely hoping to hang around on the airwaves for a couple of months before its three minutes and forty-five seconds of fame were up, is the one for me.
You see, Brenda K. Starr had one shot - one chance at pop music immortality - and she took it. This was her one spark of hope, and Brenda grasped it with both hands.
"I Still Believe" rises up from the bowels of the Hudson River on a sludgy wave of tinkling keyboard, synthesized bass, and ambient seagull sound effects. I feel like a '90s pop song would have gone to greater lengths to sound "state-of-the-art" and "high-tech," but "I Still Believe" makes zero attempt to mask its low-budget origins. It could have been recorded in some derelict office park in New Jersey by some guy whose day job was, I don't know, bouncer at a strip club (amusingly enough, it was produced by Eumir Deodato, the man responsible for every J.T. Taylor-era Kool & the Gang hit, which might explain the recycling of the seagull sound effect from "Cherish"). I'm sure there were exceptions, but why do I get the impression that Top 40 hits in the '90s couldn't simply show up off the street and walk right into the charts like this one did? To me, "I Still Believe" is the last of a dying breed, like an '80s pop hit sung by Marisa Tomei's character from My Cousin Vinny. (According to Wikipedia, Brenda is half-Jewish/half-Puerto Rican - she's like a walking borough.)
It's the little touches, the unintended moments, that elevate a track like this over more deliberately ambitious material:
- 1:02 - I hear just the faintest whisper of mic distortion on the word "again," as if Brenda is straining at the boundaries of the technology in order to ensure that her pain can be heard
- 1:55 - Were you afraid there might not be a sax? Of course there was going to be a sax. It announces its arrival with a stream of ascending notes in the middle of the second verse, just as Brenda lets loose with a rapid-fire series of "No-no-no-no-no"s
- 2:03 - She reaches down into the depths of her Tri-State agony as she growls "Rrrrr-ah-still-buh-leave-that-we-can-be-to-geh-thuhhhhhh! Huh-ohhh!," before some double-tracking kicks in on "If we believe that true love," suggesting a momentary burst of inner strength. You're going to get through this, Brenda, you really are.
- 2:28 - An army of overdubbed "back-up" Brendas enters and proceeds to sing the chorus, while the real, lead-singing Brenda waits until 2:31 to let loose with an intense "Yeah-eahhh"
- 2:42 - The fade-out is really where Brenda kicks it into gear. First she emits a soulful "Oh baby yeah!" before jumping an octave on "I had a dream." Then at 2:52 she sings ever-so-slightly behind the beat, letting out a rushed "will-find-ourselves." She's so ... sensual. However, nothing may top the supremely New Yawk delivery of "Ooh-ooh baby oy do-woo!" and "Just gimme one mo' troy" that follows. You couldn't contrive that kind of attitude.
Brenda not only brought it in the studio, she brought it in the video (as if you had any doubts). First of all, she's wearing exactly the kind of outfit you'd imagine she'd be wearing: a leather jacket over a cropped white short-sleeve sweater and leather skirt, with giant hoop earrings. My guess is that she didn't even dress up for the video; this was probably just what she happened to be wearing that day. The video alternates between shots of Brenda dancing in an abandoned brick warehouse with rays of white dust being illuminated by the light from the windows a la "One More Try" and shots of Brenda strolling dejectedly along what appears to be the Brooklyn shoreline as she passes an endless stream of happy couples holding hands in the park. Can't anyone see her torment?
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