My Paula Abdul Top 10 Countdown
Paula Abdul's reign on the pop charts didn't last long but between 1989-1991 she was arguably the biggest selling and most popular female pop artist along with Janet Jackson. Paula was beloved back in her day but when her time passed people seemed to toss her into the trash can of history unfortunately. Paula kept working hard though between exercise videos, acting, helping write hits for others such as Spinning Around for Kylie Minogue, being a judge on American Idol and So You Think You Can Dance and still being a choreography (she did the cheerleader routine in American Beauty). That said in the past year or 2 we have experienced a Paula Abdul renaissance! Between her touring, her Vegas residency and her mind blowing performance at the Billboard Music Awards Paula Abdul is back and I am here for it! There's is even talk of new music which is very exciting.
As I mentioned in my previous post I have always had a real soft spot for Paula and I find myself returning to her music a lot when I need a pop diva fix. My list is all singles though some were bigger than others but there are no deep cuts. I may do a second list of my favorite deep cuts by Paula though since she does have a solid amount I love especially off her 1995 album Head Over Heels. As always this is just my opinion and not a definitive ranking but I do think this is a good starter guide for anyone who is new to Paula and wants to hear some of her best/most popular songs.
10. Opposite Attract
Opposites Attract is the Paula song that a lot of guys seem to like most by her. At least a lot of guys I've met. Of course the song while very cute and catchy is more remembered for it's groundbreaking music video where Paula danced around with an animated character named Skat Cat! It's also the song that finally pushed the Forever Your Girl album to #1 after being on the charts for over 60 weeks which I still think is a record. Every time Paula performs these days everybody still asks if Skat Cat will appear and Paula is always very gracious answering that same question over and over again. Paula knows the people want Skat Cat and she gives it to them every time.
09. Dance Like There's No Tomorrow
When Paula announced a new single in 2008 I couldn't believe it! She had been on American Idol for years but no new music seemed forthcoming. She even put out a second greatest hits in 2007 that had no new or unreleased songs so it felt like that was that. But then she put out Dance Like There's No Tomorrow which I downloaded off iTunes as soon as it posted. At first I was a little thrown by her vocals. They sounded a lot different than any of her previous songs, but eventually I got used to that and this become one of the most played songs in my college apartment Senior year. Along with Britney Spear's Blackout and Janet Jackson's Discipline my friends and I played Dance Like There Is No Tomorrow all the time so it does bring back a lot of good memories. The fact that we even got a new Paula song in 2008 was pretty awesome because I was resigned to the fact that she wouldn't release any new music ever again. Now in 2019 we might be getting an album and I am over the moon!
08. Vibeology
Diehard fans of Paula know that this is one of the best songs she has ever done. Vocally it's easily her most daring performance, the song's structure is definitely unique and experimental and the choir singing the song's title in an operatic fashion is most definitely weird. It can seem off putting at first but when you put all the pieces together it's one of the best dance records of the 90s and one of the most groundbreaking too proving Abdul was on the cutting edge during her heyday. Unfortunately Paula's VMA performance in 1991 tarnished the song's reputation. Most of the negative criticism at the time was because Paula had put on weight and not because of the song or the performance itself which goes to show you the impossibly high standards female pop performers have compared to their male counterparts. Vibeology was set to be the 3rd single off Spellbound but ended up getting pushed back to 4th single. It was then her first song to miss the pop top 10 since Straight Up went # 1 and launched her career and her next few singles would chart lower and lower until she quietly disappeared from the pop charts in 1996. All this is the say the Vibeology has been forgotten for the wrong reasons. I loved that Paula slipped Vibeology into to her performance at Billboard and in fact did a lot of her most impressive dancing and stunts during Vibeology. As many fans were saying on social media the next day it was #justiceforvibeology. I have attached two links below and the first is the music video edit which cuts off 2 minutes which is why I also included the original 5 and half minute album version, because Vibeology deserves to be heard in its entirety. This Paula Abdul song is the one most ripe for re-discovery. Final note how great is that early 90s House Piano!
07. Cold Hearted
I actually remember seeing this video when I was really young. I was at my relatives house with my family right before a wedding and VH1 was on the TV. I remember seeing 2 videos that day for the first time ever, Sledgehammer by Peter Gabriel and Cold-Hearted by Paula Abdul. It actually creeped me out a little bit because I was too young to understand the sexual energy of this video. This video was definitely Paula's sexiest and most edgy video until the mid 90s music videos off Head Over Heels. The video itself pokes fun of how edgy it is at the beginning with the worried music executives. The song is one of Paula's best and feels very influenced by Janet Jackson's Control album especially Nasty and What Have You Done For Me Lately. Like Janet in those songs Paula is not gonna suffer fools gladly and encourages her to friend to dump this cheating jerk who doesn't really care about their relationship anyway. Love the bridge with all the violins too!
06. Rush, Rush
It was a bold move for Paula to release a ballad as the first single on her follow up album to Forever Your Girl. As much as I love Forever Your Girl it's one really weak song was Next To You which was the only ballad off the album. Based on that song alone it didn't seem like ballads were Paula's forte but she knocked it out of the park with Rush, Rush. People forget that this was her biggest # 1 spending five weeks at the top of the billboard charts. It feels timeless in a way a lot of her other songs, as great as they are, don't. Abdul's music is very much tied to its time but for someone like me who loves the 80s and 90s that is not a bad thing. Still Rush, Rush feels like the kind of love song that has always existed we just happened to un-earth it in 1991. The violin solo is a real nice touch too that makes the song even better.
05. The Promise of a New Day
This was Paula's 6th but final # 1 and spent just 1 week at the top. I feel because of that it sometimes gets lost in the shuffle of her other # 1 hits. I had never heard it until I bought the Japanese import of her Greatest Hits but I really liked it after hearing it just once. This one definitely has that early 90s vibe to it which I love and a positive message about how things can change for the better. I'm always in the mood for this one.
04. Crazy Cool
Despite this song missing the top 40 this is actually the first song I really knew and loved by her (My memories of Cold-Hearted were pretty fuzzy). Of all the places I actually first saw this music video on Beavis & Butthead! I thought it was catchy from the start and that was the only way I could see the video for years because I had it taped off TV and youtube was a long ways off. So I used to watch that Beavis and Butthead clip a lot just so I could at least catch glimpses of the video which BTW is Paula's most sexual music video ever. I love the mid 90s RnB production on this one but it's best heard in it's music video mix. Whereas Vibeology's music video edit is unnecessary I find the music video edit/remix of Crazy Cool far superior to the album version. So I would recommend streaming this track off either of her Greatest Hits albums because the version on there definitely trumps the album version.
03. Blowing Kisses In the Wind
This was Paula's last top 10 hit and it's long been one of my favorites. I love the cinematic quality of this ballad which also has some strong classical/baroque influences too. It's just so dramatic and dripping in atmosphere that I can't help but love it. Spellbound is the one album where Paula had amazing ballads and for me this ranks as her very best ballad. I also love how dark, moody and artistic the music video is too. Also as a 14 year old I definitely noticed her dancer's muscular arms every time I watched this music video...
02. The Way That You Love Me
This is a just a great 80s dance song with some hot guitar solos during the bridge and fade out. There's really not much else to say about it other than that from now on whenever I hear Paula sing "It's not your friends at the top" I will now always envision her jumping off a platform into the arms of 2 dozen dancers at the billboard music awards. Go Paula!
01. Straight Up
Straight Up saved Paula's career. What's funny is that her record label didn't want her singing it. Apparently the demo for the song was so bad that nobody had faith in it. Paula could hear something in it though and she said if the record label let her record it she would record another 2 songs she didn't want to. After the album was completed Straight Up was relegated to b-side status as Knocked Out and The Way That You Love Me both failed to crack the top 40. Then a DJ flipped the Knocked Out single over and played it's b-side which was Straight Up. Before her record label could react the song was already in the top 20 and a music video had not even been filmed yet. By the time the video came out the song was # 1 and Abdul was now officially a superstar. Over the years a lot of Paula's music and her contributions to dancing and music videos seemed to fall by the wayside but people still remembered Straight Up. I remember in college one of the DJs on the station I was working at didn't think she had good music until I played Straight Up one night and he ended up realizing how good it was. My parents both like this song too and I also remember a fellow co-worker saying Straight Up was one of her jams. This seems to be the one song by Paula that transcends her career for the simple fact that it's just a really great pop song. Maybe a perfect pop song. Everything about this song works from the keyboards, whistle flute and electric guitars. Straight Up is one of those songs where everything comes together in such a way that you can't resist it no matter how hard you try. For me this is one of the greatest pop songs ever recorded and it had to be played at my wedding. My mom and I had a dance off to Straight Up. I love Straight Up to pieces. I always have and I always will.
