#throwback hits

If I Ain't Got You - Alicia Keys (2004)

“If I Ain’t Got You” is the 6th track on Keys' second studio album The Diary of Alicia Keys.

Un-Break My Heart - Toni Braxton (1997)

“Un-Break My Heart” is Toni Braxton’s 2nd single released via LaFace Records off of her second studio album, Secrets, with Diane Warren as the writer of this ballad. Braxton, however, expressed dislike for this song, explaining that she didn’t want another “heartbreak track” even though it was a worldwide success, and won her a Grammy Award for “Best Female Pop Vocal Performance” in 1997. Producer L.A. Reid was able to convince Toni Braxton in the end to record and feature “Un-Break My Heart” in her album.

“Un-Break My Heart” peaked at number one on the Billboard Hot 100 in the United States, and stayed there for eleven weeks, while achieving similar success on the Hot Dance Club Songs and Adult Contemporary Charts. In 1998, when Billboard celebrating their forty years of charting from 1958 to 1998, “Un-Break My Heart” was declared the most successful song by a solo artist in the history of the Billboard Hot 100 Chart.

“Un-Break My Heart”, expectedly, achieved success in Europe as well. By topping the charts in Austria, Sweden, Belgium (Wallonia), and Switzerland, and reaching the top number fives in more than ten countries.

The corresponding music video was directed by Bille Woodruff and premiered on September 10, 1996 via MTV. “It portrays Braxton mourning the death of her lover, while remembering the good times they had together.”

Toni Braxton’s live performances of “Un-Break My Heart” include the ones at the Opening Ceremony of the Billboard Music Awards in 1996 and as the closing number of the Libra Tour of 2006.