Best Natalie Cole Song?

I adore her. There's nothing she couldn't sing well. There's a beautiful thread out here somewhere, from when she died. Many great performances are posted there.

OP, seems odd that you didn’t include Unforgettable.

This Will Be (An Everlasting Love):

Yes! She was great. I love the Leavin album - it was loose like her early stuff

[quote] OP, seems odd that you didn’t include Unforgettable.

Yes, sorry it was not intentional. There were so many good hits, I only included 70s/80s.

Not my favorite, but something fun and gorgeous from Nat in her party days. What a great singer. Ella loved her and Aretha hated her. We can see why.

This is up there

"This Will Be" was her first big hit, and it's a really upbeat memorable melody

But Natalie really got a chance to show her incredible vocal range and unique style with "I've Got Love on My Mind"

BAM!

Gorgeous singing. Class. The best.

"This Will Be" is one of the few songs I really, REALLY hate (another is "Benny and the Jets"). The screaming ending drives me up, and possibly through, a wall. Just thinking about this song puts me in a bad mood. Austin City Limits is on and is helping.

Her best song was “Your Car (My Garage)”.

AKA “Your Dick (My Bussy)”.

The incredible "Our Love", from Natalie Live:

Miss You Like Crazy:

She and Whitney were great friends of course. Though Natalie couldn't SANG like Ms. Houston, she could find her way around those same notes. Natalie was not as sober as rumored to be, but that's okay too. She certainly tried to help Whitney later on.

My two favorite girls.

Thanks so much for posting that, R15.

Fantastic. Under rehearsed and wonderful. All those amazing runs and ad libs, the gospel exclamations and loose rhythm. Two very different different voices and singers in a classic call and response. I LOVE them.

Natalie visits the "The View" in 1999 and sings:

Who else would dare? Natalie was something else.

A bad bitch. Go on.

I liked her upbeat 80’s pop albums (Dangerous, Everlasting, Good To Be Back) better than her boring jazz standards and ballads.😴

La Costa

I listen to it all the time. So beautiful.

What R11 said. That shrieky, ear-splitting, so-over-the-top-it's-in-outer-space ending makes TWB one of the WORST songs ever recorded.

I also blame Cole for the likes of Mariah Carey, Whitney Houston and all of the others who followed in her wake, who confuse overblown melisma and fake-phony opera antics with actual singing. Give me Etta James or Betty Lavette any day.

Inseparable. It has been covered many times, but no artist can beat Natalie's version.

You couldn't be much more wrong. R24. Natalie Cole and Whitney and Mariah sing nothing alike. Aretha was the queen of glissandos and melisma to be honest. And Etta James had a very unpleasant tone. Bettye Lavette has a one octave range that she croaks out soulfully. BUT you're a famous racist here. GoldStarElderGay. All the black folk "caterwaul" as far as your concerned. Here is one of your posts on Whitney Houston:

[quote]It's called "extraness." Certain people of a certain race simply can't help themselves.

R24, you don't seem to have any idea what you are talking about. A truly ignorant, and ridiculous, comment.

Of all the people who have covered these classic songs, only Natalie Cole mastered them. Was her voice as great as Ella, Aretha or Whitney? No. But she was a first class singer. Wunderbar.

^^^ It took you 18, 19 words to say absolutely nothing. Congrats.

The Very Thought of You

GSE is a RACIST.

Natalie didn't like this Springsteen song, but she made it fun.

Can't be done better.

The album of classic songs in Spanish is top notch in regard to production, arrangements and musicians. Her pronunciation isn’t bad, and I have to admit I really like the album, even though I didn’t expect to. It’s funny because I find myself singing along the way she pronounces the lyrics in Spanish when I listen LOL

Thanks to R4 for mentioning the Leavin album.

Here's her uplifting cover of the Des'ree song:

Sting cover:

I love these threads - the make for great playlists! Thanks!

Who sang it best?

Natalie Cole, "Someone That I Used To Love":

Barbra:

Gotta be This Will Be

One of the best songs EVAH! not just best by Cole

Another vote for This Will Be, with I've Got Love On My Mind the runner up, and Our Love third

When This Will Be was on the radio, my mother would switch if off towards the end and complain about the endless caterwauling.

R33, her recording of "Lush Life" is probably my favorite. I first heard that on Donna Summer's 1982 album and later learned it was a standard sung by almost everyone. However, when I heard Natalie's I was like "this is the one!" Glad I am not alone.

"This Will Be" is winning by a very large margin. Seems to be her definitive hit.

First four albums say it all - she was a dynamic, incredible soul, pop and R&B singer. She could challenge Aretha. Everyone should own Natalie Live! - captures the full power of her singing.

Favorite songs

1. Love on My Mind - Live version from Natalie Live! 2. La Costa

[quote]OP, seems odd that you didn’t include Unforgettable.

A. It isn't "her" song.

B. It is a duet.

This Will Be is only winning because most of DL is 75 years old. They love their disco youth. Natalie Cole was too fine a singer to be remembered only for that fun hit. She was pretty undisciplined when she sang it. She screeched a bit too much when she could have fineessed and soared. It has a slow beat, that's all about the spitting fast syncopation.at the end. She sang everything much better later. Including that song. It's a good song. But far from her best work.

Wild Women Do, from the Pretty Woman soundtrack, is my Natalie Cole chanson préférée.

Amazing that Miss You Like Crazy was her biggest hit in the UK. The song was released around the same time as the Hillsborough football disaster and was kept from the top spot by the official charity record. Maybe it resonated with people at a time of loss.

Miss You Like Crazy isn't bad but it's one of Gerry Goffin and Michael Masser's less imaginative offerings. But then Glenn Medeiros had a month long number one the previous year with one of their old songs.

[quote]Miss You Like Crazy isn't bad but it's one of Gerry Goffin and Michael Masser's less imaginative offerings.

It’s funny this is one of her biggest hits because I always thought the song was just OK, but nothing special.

[quote] First four albums say it all - she was a dynamic, incredible soul, pop and R&B singer. She could challenge Aretha.

What? I don't think so.

I always loved "Joey"

"Jump Start" was a jam:

The double punch of Party Lights and I've Got Love on My Mind on her live album is just heaven.

Natalie's Live album is one of the best live albums of all time.

^True true true, R53. That girl was born to sing. She could always sing. And her voice just kept getting better and better.

I wish she would have made more pop/dance music like she did in the 80’s. After that boring (and overrated IMO) Unforgettable album, she never let go of the boring jazz/adult contemporary sound.

D-D-D-D-Dangerous!

Jump Start was 1987.

Snowfall on the Sahara

R55. I'm always suspicious of the musical taste of people who think that Natalie Cole's albums of jazz, blues and swing American classic songs were "Boring?" If you hate that music, I guess so.

But that fat sow awkward blaring artless Linda Ronstadt did a few albums like that. And she IS terrible. They may have been hits at the time, when I was 3 years old, but she murdered, destroyed and understood nothing about that kind of song or singing. Ok, that's not true. She understood it, but she couldn't do it. Her blaring choppy artless phrasing is worse than boring - I've never been able to listen to more than 3 songs off her three "HIT" albums. She made something else of those songs, similar to what Gaga would do later. It's posing while showing off your voice. Linda Ronstadt hurts my ears when she attempts to sing American Classics. She shied away from the jazzier numbers, because she hasn't a clue how to do anything but whisper or belt. Not so Natalie. Her voice has every nuance. Subtle.

Rod Stewart, Lady Gaga, Diana Krall and Queen Latifah have all made concept albums of American standards. Natalie Cole sang the fuck out of disco and soul and pop music. But her albums of the most sophisticated and underplayed jazz and pop standards are among the best and most tasteful recordings of the last fifty years. Her dad is one of the top five greatest pop singers of all times. She took her time to do it. The duet was creepy. Natalie wasn't blessed with a singular voice, but she has every nuance and sound and pitch and intonation to color each lyric and phrase. She has a talented voice and impeccable taste as a singer. She's spectacular in those classic "cover" recordings. Really. And in my opinion, she's the only one who has ever been.

Linda Ronstadt stomps all over them like a horny Godzilla. She's wasn't intent on murdering, not after all the hard work that she put into them. But they are every single one of them, terrible. Murder them she does.

If Natalie Cole is boring - it's because she is faultless. The world is flat. She's not.

[quote] But her albums of the most sophisticated and underplayed jazz and pop standards are among the best and most tasteful recordings of the last fifty years.

It showed incredible range to go from the Janet/Pebbles pop of R52 to Unforgettable in just four years.

Here's the Natalie Cole Tribute w/ Rachelle Ferrell & Deborah Cox from the 1999 the Soul Train Lady of Soul awards:

"It showed incredible range to go from the Janet/Pebbles pop of [R52] to Unforgettable in just four years."

And, she started as an exceptional soul/R&B singer.

Listen. Her voice is never too much. She doesn't force emotion - she imbues the lyric with it. That's not the only kind of singing I like. But Natalie's voice was so uniquely tempered to interpret melody and words in a beautiful composition. And she had the best timing in the world. You either got it or you don't. Her phrasing and rhythm lend a weirdly perfect sense to most every song she sings. Her great jazz syncopation is as finely tuned on a classic folk song as a shouting gospel exclamation. One of her great and understated gifts. She had flashier and more free ones too. Ha. The best. Joyful. Soaring. Almost Aretha. No one was really like Natalie. We can hear echoes of others in the cadence and tone of her voice. She's way too great to forget. Not much she couldn't sing. Beautifully.

Is it terrible I can't see her name without thinking of "Natalie Cole sings with the rest of her dad's dead friends?"

"I am not dead yet! Cut it out, bitch!"

I seldom find it sad that anyone is dead. But great talents should never be undermined or dismissed. If you love them, defend them forever. My first professor told me that - never defend your art - just expand on it and explain the best you can. If the worst criticism of Natalie Cole is that she sang boring songs in the later half of her career - then let it be known that she sang them impeccably. I find something very sad about watching her perfection - the beautiful gowns and wigs, the perfect phrasing and intonation. Her desire to always be classy. She refused to hit a bad note even if it means the most artful modulation and selling her freak short. Something is sad in there. And though wasn't beautiful, she worked so hard to look like a million bucks, every damn time. So much talent, so much real struggle with drugs and illness and drugs again. And always this controlled presentation. And that voice - the air in the vocal, the clarity as she wants it, the little rasp she adds at will, the soaring sharp sounds and her faultless pitch and timing. A long held breathy note or a behind the beat short strike. Ugh. She was just too good. And sometimes just a bit boring. But why? Sad girl, great talent.

R18. That was fabulous! I Say A Little Prayer with Natalie and Whitney. The best!

It was a bit of a jolt when Natalie moved from the pop/dance of Jump Start, Pink Cadillac and Wild Women Do to Unforgettable, but like r64 eloquently said, she always strived for the best so you can't say the quality of the music was poor. And she did occasionally go back to dance ("Livin' for Love") and Snowfall on the Sahara is a strong album where Natalie echoed the soulful power of her '70s material (covering "Stay with Me" and "A Song for You").

And if you were around in 1991, you can't deny the sheer magic of the Unforgettable duet. It was played EVERYWHERE here in Canada. I loved the video. Natalie looked gorgeous and her voice blended so well with her father's.

That album was so massive in 1991. It really was a game-changer. It won a whole bunch of Grammy Awards including Album of the Year. Natalie's follow-up album, Take a Look, is also very good.

[quote]I'm always suspicious of the musical taste of people who think that Natalie Cole's albums of jazz, blues and swing American classic songs were "Boring?"

Jazz, blues and swing don’t automatically equal good music sweetheart, just as pop/dance doesn’t automatically mean bad music.

I love "Ask A Woman Who Knows." I think it is the best singing of her career. She has never sang 'prettier' than on that CD: "Tell Me All About It", "Calling You", "I Haven't Got Anything Better To Do" and the title song.

I liked her cover of “Old Man”

Applause for R68. Someone who knows what they're hearing and talking about. Natalie was such an impeccable singer that her voice was it's very best in her forties. That is how a well trained healthy voice should age. It all comes together. Ideally.

*her voice was at its very best in her forties.

Here's Natalie narrating her life story (Part 1/4):

Impeccable, irresistible, irreplaceable. Natalie Cole. Always pristine singing with a sense of spontaneity and swinging for it. Elegant, but soulful. And those back up girls - twenty feet from stardom! Real good.

Why has this OP been labelled a "troll"? Who did that and how? Just askin'. I see that all over DL yet those threads remain active and we are able to respond/post to them. Explain!

Tank Tops can be worn for more formal occasions too.

My favorite is 'Miss You like Crazy.'

And I LOVE Linda Ronstadt's albums of the standards.

[quote] Why has this OP been labelled a "troll"? Who did that and how?

Natalie declined to make political statements. Silence is literal violence!