Would Phyliss Hyman have been a superstar if she accepted Clive Davis attempts to make her sing Pop music?

Her voice for those of you that have never listened.

Not with that surname, Buster.

Answer the question limp dicks

Her voice fit pop standards rather can current pop.

When she sings the Duke Ellington songs in Bway's Sophisticated Ladies, it's the perfect material

She also had pretty severe mental health issues and that got in the way of her career.

I don’t see why she couldn’t have been a huge rb/ jazz star.

No, first of all people can't say Hyman without giggling.

Second, it's too close to Hyatt, which means they would've sued

Third, who the hell is she?

She had a number of hits but her unique voice just didn't fit in pop or traditional R&B

R7 An R&B/Jazz artist that was originally signed to Arista records before Whitney Houston. It’s been claimed that he wanted to make her a Pop star. She refused to sing the music he gave her and he discovered a 19 year old Whitney Houston not long after. Hyman never found mainstream success but she did have a faithful following of fans throughout the 80s and 90s before committing suicide in 1994.

Actually, Clive initially wanted Phyllis to do disco in an attempt to rival Donna Summer. And she complied, releasing the You Know how to love me album. The trouble started when she went to do Sophisticated Ladies on Broadway, which he was against. He wanted her to do pop, which she did do, with the Riding the Tiger album. Trouble is she hated the song and most of the material on the album, so she cut her promo tour short. It wound up being her last album for Arista.

R10 You know, I’ve always thought Clive was incredibly overrated. Whitney became a star in spite of him not because of him. Whitney’s voice and vocal arrangements carry most of her 80s material and her best tracks like Saving All My Love for You and You Give Good Love weren’t even songs that he picked out. He was also against her doing The Bodyguard The Bodyguard Soundtrack and film. It’s no wonder he was never able to recreate the same success with other singers.

Phyllis was lovely as she was.

Great voice! I saw her open for Kieth Washington just before she died.

Also, Miss R1, if you're going to share that song, show this live version, where she slays the entire motherfucking stage and puts it in her back pocket.

That's my new drag name: Phylthis Hymen

Phyliss Hyman had it all. Looks, singing  TALENT, opportunity and stardom. She had a range of hits on the  (R and B) charts, during the late 70s and early 80s., but her illness made it impossible to hold it all together. Superstardom for Whitney didn't deliver Whitney to safer shores or save her from a lifetime of abuse.

Would you all fucking spell her name right!!

No wonder she killed herself.

PHYLLIS

The ops pic was taken at the end of her life, in her prime she had model looks and singing talent and stage presence .

Are those letter openers hanging from her ears? I guess people did get a lot more mail back then.

Dude, it was the 80s. Big hair, big accessories, bold colors. More of everything .

R16 At what point in this thread did anyone say that superstardom saved Whitney from anything? I imagine that Hyman’s end would have been the same regardless of her success level. She was a deeply disturbed woman. The question is wether she could have been a star before her inevitable demise.

R18 She lost her looks very early on into her career. That was the point.

R21 I have no idea why you're combative about this subject. But carry on.

Nothing sadder than a few queens talking about whether or not someone lost her looks when said woman has been dead for 20+ years.

She struggled with mental illness. God forbid she not look effortlessly flawless for Squinty Faced Queen #8 On The Left.

#23 = go to bed, Rosie

[quote]I imagine that Hyman’s end would have been the same regardless of her success level. She was a deeply disturbed woman.

If she had attained a level of success on par with Whitney, her psychological problems and behavior would probably have been even worse. God, just look what happened to Whitney.

There was no way Phyllis could've been a star in the MTV era. Her look and style of singing just didn't fit with what made a person a star in that time. And it's a shame, because she was so talented.

A deep voice didn't hurt Karen Carpenter's pop career, nor Ruth Pointer's.

The blonde singer from Ace of Base is waiting for Clive Davis to drop dead before she makes a comeback. He fucking raped her.

r11

You haven't made a very good case that Clive Davis is overrated. The man's success is undeniable. Even in recent times, he was right about that dreary album Kelly Clarkson wrote.

R24 Take your meds, Mariah. No one rang for you.

First, she didn't lose her looks early on, she kept them until the early 90's, when things started spiraling out of control for her.

Second, she wasn't a mainstream pop music artist. Philly International marketed her as a quiet storm Anita Baker-esque artist, and it worked.

OPs comparisons to those other artists is ridiculous. Phyllis was a genuine artist and didn't need to rely on having some manufactured public persona. And to use any of those three as examples of career success at this point makes your point tenuous at best.

[quote] At the beginning of their careers, Madonna had a “bold and lively” persona, Whitney was “reserved and innocent”, and Janet was “shy and sexy”. The kind of personalities that the public eats up in regards to young women.

Perpetrating the weird sexist and racist BS the music industry visits on female artists.

If Phyllis was starting out today - or still alive - she'd be far better appreciated than she ever was on pop or R&B radio, where A&R men and radio programming DJs wanted to label her or stick her in a category.

[Quote] Phyllis was a genuine artist and didn't need to rely on having some manufactured public persona.

That's why getting her tits out for OUI seems so odd. I wonder if she was high/manic when she agreed/shot the spread.

The library is open and Miss R30 is reading!

Yesssss hunty! Testify!

R17 Clive Davis raped a woman? With a vagina? I don’t believe it

That was meant for 27

R30 Lol, they were all far more successful than her. Why wouldn’t use them as examples? Two are amongst the highest selling female artist of all time. Even if you remove some of their public scandals from the equation, no one stays on top forever.

Hyman didn’t have a successful career. I don’t know what warped reality some you’re living in.

One of the most controversial performances of her career. Should she have done this as a solo? It was a TV show, and I love both these ladies, but some love the performance while others think Melba ruined it. Video/sound quality not the best.

She was rumored to be secretly gay, so being closeted didn’t exactly help her mental health issues.

Why was that performance controversial?

[quote] [R18] She lost her looks very early on into her career. That was the point.

She began her career in the early 70s. She died in 1995. She did not lose her looks “early” in her career. Her weight fluctuated in the 1980s, but she retained her beauty. Here she is in 1988.

1991 heavier but beautiful.

R27 Did he actually rape her? I just thought he forced her to record the lead vocal on a certain track which was the last straw (she only obliged a single take, which was used). She seemed to have mental health issues, was nervous after some pyscho fan tried to attack her mother and sister (who is also her bandmate) with a knife, and slowly but completely disappeared from public life forever.

But still, Clive is an asshole.

He's an asshole to which plenty owe a huge chunk of their career.

*to whom

Anyway, I LOVE Phyllis but it’s clear she wasn’t ever going to be a major pop star. Anyone at Arista who felt that was mistaken… even in her modelesque prime (physically) she was always going to be an Anita Baker / Angela Bofill type of ‘quiet storm’ singer. The slower, jazzier material suited her phrasing better. She had a mature personality (probably because she was a little older than most pop stars when she finally broke through to TV spots and the charts - almost 40 at the point of Living All Alone and Prime of My Life), a deep voice, and rather campy styling.

Her voice was good enough to sing jazz, disco, soul, R&B, even rock songs. But it probably was the Duke Ellington type stuff where she shined the most. And that was never going to be in the mainstream again. The closest it got was Amy Winehouse I guess (I can picture Phyllis singing songs like 'Love Is A Losing Game' and 'Back to Black'), who like Phyllis was very troubled, but young and hip enough to be able to break through with that kind of music.

Sadly there were a lot of ladies of that era with some of the most incredible voices ever (Phyllis, Lisa Fischer, Rachelle Ferrell, Michel’le) who barely have any body of work because nobody at the record labels knew what to do with them, and they had issues with public life.

Phyllis recorded a lot of great material, there's a compilation called The Legacy of Phyllis Hyman that's outstanding. Her first big song in the mid-70s was a cover of "Betcha By Golly Wow" and she was sublime.

You can't fail with a Connie Stevens cover.

Just listen to the damn song r47. Phyllis turned shit into gold.

R46 Yes, that's a fabulous version!

In interviews she constantly complained that no one was interested in dating her

R50 Probably because she was overweight and out of her mind by the time.

Nah. More likely she said that as a smokescreen when she actually had girlfriend(s).

I may have a bias because I love Phyllis Hyman and (still) often tear up when I hear her sing (yea, go Mary!)...

...but I'm wondering if all this talk of being unstable and her mental health issues is evidenced somewhere in an interview (written or otherwise), or merely based on the fact that she committed suicide?

I don't remember any YouTube type interview where it was apparent to me that she was seriously mentally unbalanced. Or more tilted than any other entertainer.

Is it generally believed that suicide = nuts? And not just overwhelming pain?

Thoughts?

No. The talk is not merely based on her suicide.

R54

Yes, I understand. But what is it based on? Personal experience?

I don't recall any specific behavior in ether written or video interviews.

She doesn't reference a diagnosis but...

[Quote] About ten years ago, Phyllis was diagnosed as being "bi-polar", a medical term for someone who suffers from the dis-ease of manic-depression. As she got older, her dis-ease became more and more difficult for her to manage. She elected not to use pharmaceutical medication. She elected to self medicate. Her self medication distorted her dis-ease more and more, until she felt helpless about ever being able to recover from it.

- Glenda Garcia

Here's an interview with Garcia. (I haven't watched it.)

Family?

[quote] If Phyllis was starting out today - or still alive - she'd be far better appreciated than she ever was on pop or R&B radio, where A&R men and radio programming DJs wanted to label her or stick her in a category.

There is nothing for a real singer in the music industry today. Contemporary commercial sounds are incompatible with a real voice. You have to sound nasal and breathy to get on radio. A young Phyllis Hyman starting out today would have a frustratingly uphill struggle.

She'd be Lalah Hathaway.

Thank you for the responses.

[quote] She'd be Lalah Hathaway.

Lalah released her first CD in 1990 -- 30 years ago. Her first single was a top 10 R&B hit "Heaven Knows" and so far that has been the highest charting single of her career. Phyllis Hyman had a few Top 10 chart singles (including a No.1) AFTER Lalah's one and only hit. They were almost contemporaries.

Lalah has been showered with Grammys in the last 10 years -- deservedly -- but struggles commercially. Her new music is never played on radio. Hyman would have committed suicide 100 times over if she'd had Lalah's career.

Phyliss = too crazy, too gay

I believe Lalah Hathaway's first album came out about the same time Mariah Carey's first did. I recall an article comparing Hathaway, Carey, and Oleta Adams' first albums.

[quote] Phyliss = too crazy, too gay

Bipolar, not gay. She dated men. If I remember correctly she contacted her current or ex boyfriend before her suicide. However, she had threatened suicide more than once in the past.

[quote] A young Phyllis Hyman starting out today would have a frustratingly uphill struggle.

Unless she was white. A young white Phyllis Hyman could be the next Adele.

[quote] She doesn't reference a diagnosis but...

Hyman was bipolar. One of her sisters spoke about it, after her death. Pretty typical bipolar, self medicating, resistant to treatment.

[Quote] A young white Phyllis Hyman could be the next Adele.

You show little understanding of Phyllis' output and Adele's output with that comment.

Phyllis was at the very least bisexual. Whether that was an authentic part of her orientation, or more a part of her emotional troubles that she would reach out for comfort with women too, we don't know.

She may well have been primarily straight but several same sex relationships have been acknowledged.

[quote] A young Phyllis Hyman starting out today would have a frustratingly uphill struggle.

Most female singers doing any kind of authentic music struggle today. The last 10+ years have been filled with manufactured, overproduced nonsense. From Britney and Xtina, now Demi and Ariana. All manufactured to within an inch of its life.

The rise of iTunes and streaming means the dullest, most repetitive stuff wins, and most of the people who have had interesting music and beautiful voices are struggling. R&B is a tough genre anyway, as there are a limited number of stations and most play a mix of heavy rap and club music and don't leave room for the more "neo soul" stuff. Jill Scott, Erykah Badu, et al have all had great albums die on the vine. Janelle Monae has had a limited impact, and really only hit on the last album after watering down her sound (to be real about it).

Bump

The other question is would Whitney Houston still be alive if she had not been a global commercial superstar? If Whitney had just had 6 or 7 hits in the 80s and 90s and then faded into the background would she still be here...singing...like a Stephanie Mills or a Anita Baker?

Drugs were a part of Whitney's life before she became famous, though.

[quote] Drugs were a part of Whitney's life before she became famous, though.

Yes, I know. But would she have remained a lifelong recreational user as opposed to someone whose addiction spiralled out of control because her soul was crushed under the weight of extraordinary fame and expectation?

[Quote] because her soul was crushed under the weight of extraordinary fame and expectation?

So he shitty personal life was incidental to her drug use?

Chaka Khan isn't extraordinarily famous. Khan's rehab stints, and concert performances while high, show that she's not just a recreational drug user. Drug users gamble their lives. Whitney lost. Chaka hasn't... yet.

[quote] Janelle Monae has had a limited impact, and really only hit on the last album after watering down her sound (to be real about it).

Testify, Miss R69.

I really loved ArchAndroid and Electric Lady but Dirty Computer.....errr, not so much.

I'm not feeling her voice like I do Whitney's. She seems like she had very limited. Now, Lisa Fischer, that bitch could sing!

^^^ *very limited range.

Phyllis limited?

May I recommend an audiologist for your broken ass ears?

Lots of people don't appreciate deep voices. Gays especially love their high belters. Personally, I love a rich, creamy voice - male or female.

No she still wouldn’t have been a superstar because she was in her late 30’s when she finally got her career going, and in the 80’s, dancing and music videos were essential to your career and I can’t imagine her doing choreographed dancing and making sleek music videos.

Yeah, gotta be a dancer in the 80s.

R81 Whitney was a shitty dancer but she had youth on her side.

Nah, Whitney had the close up shot on her side.

r72 I think Whitney would have been fine if she never married Bobby. Obviously, she struggled with drugs and had many of her own issues but getting into a relationship with another addict is the worst thing that an addict can possibly do. It would have been far easier to force her into rehab if she didn’t have Bobby to use as a codependent shield.

If drugs were never an issue with Whitney and she was still alive right now, I don’t think she would be making music. She never seemed to enjoy her celebrity status at any point.

I think she would have probably still forced herself into a heterosexual marriage and produced children. She would have also still done most of the projects she did in the 90s with an additional Christmas album. If she maintained her voice at least at it’s 1996-1999 level, I imagine she would have made as much money as possible in Vegas during the 2000s and then fallen off the face of the Earth. She quietly produced The Princess Diaries and Cheetah Girls. I think she would have also done more projects like that for additional income to support her extended family of leeches.

I do wonder if Robyn would have hung around as a side chick for a longer period of time if the drugs and an aggressive husband weren’t involved.