blog post The Top Five Pleading for Your Love Songs

The theme of pleading for love can form an entire sub-genre in contemporary R&B. Unrequited love, forbidden love and love gone wrong are common scenarios in life and music, and there are no shortage of songs to turn to for comfort and hope. But these five songs make especially persuasive cases for a love that seems out of reach.

And I have to ask, if someone is pledging their lifelong devotion to you, belting out a song on bended knee in the rain, why not give that someone a shot?

"What Kind of Man Would I Be" - Mint Condition

Mint Condition stylishly pleads for your love, but asks that you stay faithful to your man until you are ready. This video also features the late actress Michelle Thomas.

"If I Was Your Man" - Joe

A classic scenario – man loves woman, man does wrong, woman finds new man, old man changes his ways and desperately tries to get her back.  Also, old man sings in a huge, newly renovated kitchen, and new man wears an ugly turtleneck.

"Crazy" - K-Ci and JoJo

There’s a readymade narrative here from Save the Last Dance, the 2001 movie that featured this song, but I think the stars of the video are K-Ci and JoJo and their commitment to delivering many takes of the word “crazy” while being drenched by rain. Are you listening, Julia Stiles?

"On Bended Knee" - Boyz II Men

The amazing and in my opinion the definitive boy band Boyz II Men take the second-to-top spot with "On Bended Knee." It seems as though everything is going right for the Boyz, but then all of sudden their ladies are jumping out of cars, packing their bags and writing Dear John notes in lipstick on mirrors. Whatever the Boyz did wrong, this song makes up for it and in the end everyone is happy and in love again.

"When a Man Loves a Woman" - Percy Sledge

There would be no other pleading-for-your-love song in R&B without Percy Sledge and the all-consuming love he expresses for his woman in When a Man Loves a Woman. And why do R&B singers stand out in the rain? Because, in the words of Sledge, when a man loves a woman, he'd give up all his comfort, sleep out in the rain, if she said that's the way it ought to be.

What do you think? Have you ever turned to Percy Sledge to save Valentine's Day? What are your favourite R&B love songs?  Share your story and song and you may find yourself on the blog later in the week.