R&B Love Songs

More than any other genre, contemporary R&B can transform the glowing embers of desire into a roaring inferno — its most skilled practitioners can be silky smooth, soulfully sincere, and passionately intimate . . . all in the course of one track. We open up with the self-proclaimed king of R&B, R. Kelly, who straddles the love/raunch divide with "Bump n' Grind", before moving onto pure romantics like Eric Benet (dueting with Tamia on "Spend My Life With You").

Our hot tub of R&B really starts to bubble in Next Steps.

No question, it's getting hot in here, thanks in no small measure to Color Me Badd (and their 1991 #1 hit, "I Wanna Sex You Up"), D'Angelo ("Feel Like Making Love"), and Pretty Ricky's dirty talkin' "On the Hotline". It's not all one-way traffic to the bedroom, though, as Cassie challenges a potential lover's amorous boasts on "Long Way 2 Go" and Gabrielle expresses everything that feels true and real to her on "Dreams".

R&B love shows its darker colours, in Deep Cuts.

While some R&B stars (usually the fellas) seem to spend their love life in a heightened state of sweet seduction, others step back and take stock of the bigger picture — Janet Jackson tries to avoid the pain of a broken heart on "Again" but the odds are stacked against her, while Faith Evans resolutely embraces the bad times because they've made her stronger. Amy Winehouse senses the dark side of love shrouding her soul on "Back to Black".

In the amorous quarters of contemporary R&B, love is incomplete unless it comes swathed in immaculate production values: the digital tweaks and echoes that fizz like champagne bubbles, the fluttering beats that seem to forge a direct connection with your racing pulse, the cascading harmonies that give your love-struck soul the texture of fondue. And at the centre of it all, world-class artists who sing directly from the heart, about the pleasure and the pain. Here, you'll find standout solo turns from John Legend and Aaliyah, a cheeky threesome featuring Timbaland, Nelly Furtado, and Justin Timberlake, and a host of loved-up group tracks from the likes of Destiny's Child, En Vogue, and the Pussycat Dolls.