FEATURE:
Groovelines
All Saints – Black Coffee
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THERE are a few reasons…
why I want to feature this song in Groovelines. A classic from All Saints, it is from their 2000 album, Saints & Sinners. There is a reissue coming out on 19th September. Released on 16th October, 2000, it is the second studio album from Melanie Blatt, Nicole Appleton, Natalie Appleton and Shaznay Lewis. Following their eponymous debut album of 1997, Saints & Sinners was a different direction. Produced by William Orbit, some felt Saints & Sinners was too similar to the work of Madonna and Spice Girls. Orbit did produce Madonna’s Ray of Light. There are similar touches between All Saints’ second studio album and Madonna’s Ray of Light. What critics did approve of is the singles released from the album. The second single, Black Coffee, was released on 2nd October, 2000. Turning twenty-five soon, it is one of the very best songs from All Saints. Black Coffee is a piece of music that I can listen to on repeat for ages. It does not get a lot of coverage, so I wanted to spotlight it here. I will get to some critical reaction for this dingle. One that I think ranks alongside the best singles of the early-2000s. Black Coffee was written by Tom Nichols, Alexander von Soos and Kirsty Bertarelli. It is distinct because is the only All Saints original single not to be written by group member Shaznay Lewis. The song has this catchiness that is hard to explain. The harmonies are incredible. Its video is also really memorable. Directed by Bo Johan Renck, it features the group singing as an arguing couple are seen around them. The video was shot in bullet time in a high-rise apartment block. Black Coffee did go through change and evolution. Originally titled I Wouldn’t Wanna Be, after the success of the previous single, Pure Shores, William Orbit, Melanie Blatt and Shaznay Lewis began working on a new arrangement. The song then became Black Coffee. Recording in Los Angeles and London, this direction was new for All Saints. Going more into Electronic and Dance, Black Coffee have the group more freedom and a chance to experiment with new sounds.
What we hear as the single was completely different to the original version. That was recorded by co-writer Kirsty Bertarelli and it was D.J. Gary Davies who believed that it would be perfect to launch her career. Or at least take it to the new level. It was taken to record companies but there was a feeling that it would be better recorded by All Saints. Davies took the demo of the song to Swiss entrepreneur Ernesto Bertarelli. All Saints were his group, so he could see its potential in terms of what they could do with it. Black Coffee is rare in terms of the lead vocals. In terms of singles at least, Shaznay Lewis took lead. Or she had the bigger role. Maybe as one of the songwriter, she felt like leader of the group. Natalie Appleton was frustrated during recording, as she hoped it would be a chance for her and Nicole Appleton to sing lead. However, Shaznay Lewis turned up early for sessions and made her presence felt. Melanie Blatt sang lead on Pure Shores, so maybe she felt her power was waning and that she needed to exert more control. It must have been more intense than it should have been. However, the final arrangement does sound amazing. Black Coffee’s B-side was Don't Wanna Be Alone, which was written by Shaznay Lewis, Ali Tennant, Wayne Hector and K-Gee. In 2018, All Saints released Testament. It saw All Saints reunite with producer William Orbit. DAZED spoke with the group and asked about working with Orbit. It was interesting what they said about working on Black Coffee and how that came about. Twenty-five years after its release and you can see how it is has inspired artists. Aspects of that song being picked up by others:
“The fans are going to freak out about you working with William Orbit again.
Shaznay Lewis: I've seen and spoken to William here and there throughout the years. The contact has never completely been lost. But Nicole and I ran into William one night, and he was like, 'I've heard you guys are doing new music and shows and it's going really well, so when are we going to do something again?' We were literally like, 'Okay yeah, let's do it.'
Nicole Appleton: Honestly, it was like working with an old friend. Things just happened really naturally and fell into place.
Shaznay Lewis: At the end of the day, he's old-school and we're old-school. We come from the school of doing another take, and another take, and another take, until we have a vocal that works. With us, it's not about chopping up the vocals and piecing them together.
Were you apprehensive about working with him again, because “Pure Shores” and “Black Coffee” are such iconic pop songs?
Shaznay Lewis: I know what you mean – but I hate to think that we could never have gone back in the studio with him because we were too scared. We can't make another “Pure Shores” – we'd be mad to try. But at the end of the day, it's about evolving. William is someone who's renowned for a certain sound, so there's always going to be inflections and reminders of past songs. But as long as what we're working on now is good, and we all like what we're creating, it definitely feels right.
How did “Pure Shores” originally come about? Obviously you recorded it for the soundtrack to The Beach.
Shaznay Lewis: It was really Danny Boyle allowing me to see about a minute or so of The Beach. I just saw the scene where they're under the water. William's music was on it already and I went away and wrote to that. I really enjoyed the process because you don't really have to dig too deep into your own thoughts.
Shaznay, “Black Coffee” is one of the few All Saints singles you didn't write. How did that song come to you?
Shaznay Lewis: Someone at London Records played it to us. And it wasn't anything like the version we recorded. But I remember we all thought it was a good song.
Natalie Appleton: Originally, it was almost like a rock ballad or something.
Shaznay Lewis: I think it was definitely the right song to get handed to William to work his magic on. He's quite good like that – he'll take a part that you may have thought was a verse and make it into a chorus, and generally just swap things around. He definitely messed around with that song and made it what it was”.
The reception for Black Coffee was largely positive. It is a track I remember in 2000. I was already a fan of All Saints and I was hooked right away! One of the standout songs from Saints & Sinners, I hold out hope that All Saints will record more music together. 2018’s Testament is their most recent album. Wikipedia brought together critical reaction to Black Coffee. A huge chart success in several countries, this song is one that I really love and would encourage everyone to listen to:
“Black Coffee" received acclaim from music critics upon release. Simon Evans writing in the Birmingham Post described the song as a "beautiful slice of haunting, hypnotic pop". John Mulvey of The Scotsman praised its "sleek, scrupulously mature sound", while AllMusic's Jon O'Brien regarded it among All Saints' most accomplished and mature work, highlighting its "lush electronics". David Brinn of The Jerusalem Post found the song wistful and radio-friendly. In the Sunday Herald, Samuel McGuire characterised the track as "a gem of a truly wonderous lustre"; the newspaper's Graeme Virtue hailed it as one of "the best pop singles ever". BBC Music's Nigel Packer chose the song as a highlight on Saints & Sinners, while Russell Baillie of The New Zealand Herald said "Black Coffee" along with "Pure Shores" and "Surrender" "put [most of the album] in the shade." The Sunday People's Sean O'Brien gave "Black Coffee" a rating of eight out of ten.
In the NME, Siobhan Grogan called the song almost perfect, writing that "it's wistful in all the right places and makes sadness sound rather alluring like only the bitterest love songs can." Grogan also compared it to "Pure Shores" saying that it "has the same mellow, glossy haziness to it, as if they recorded it lying down." Similarly, Eva Simpson of the Daily Mirror wrote that the track "brought the same high-gloss sheen" as "Pure Shores" and cited it as a curtain raiser for Saints & Sinners. A Western Mail reviewer viewed the two songs as "equally tremendous", while The Guardian's Caroline Sullivan found "Black Coffee" superior, describing it as "beguiling treatment of a domestic scenario" and "easily the most alluring depiction of a bleary-eyed morning routine ever recorded." Sullivan also said All Saints "lend radiance to [Orbit's] twinkling fairy lights.” Lindsay Baker from the same newspaper deemed it Saints & Sinners' "particularly infectious" track, while R.S. Murthi of the New Straits Times called it the album's most endearing song, likening it to releases by the Cocteau Twins”.
I will end with a little about the influence of Black Coffee. Before getting there, I want to come to this review. It argues that there is warmth and escapism in the song. However, there is also bite and a harder edge. It is a perfect combination that meant it was always going to be a massive success. Alongside Pure Shores, it was this remarkable sound that we did not really get on the All Saints album of 1997:
“All Saints’ final number one is their most oblique, their most grown-up, also their finest. The song barely glances at its title – a pair of words out of a hundred in the lyric – but the whole record is a glance or a quiet smile, a celebration of tiny satisfactions, and of finding yourself with someone who conjures them so easily. “Each moment is cool / freeze the moment”. It’s a song, most of it, about feeling contented – a rare subject for pop, which prefers to nose out conflict (the video finds some anyway, staging “Black Coffee” as a post-Matrix bullet time break-up drama). There are songs – cousins to this, like “I Say A Little Prayer” – that capture the way love makes the everyday blush with significance, but “Black Coffee” is after something more comfortable. A day with your lover, as casually sweet as all the other ones. Nothing’s perfect, but “Black Coffee”’s rippling, overlapping melody lines make even the quarrels sound blissful.
It’s a lovely record, two late 90s takes on pop meshing and peaking: All Saints’ idea of a British female harmony group, and William Orbit’s gorgeous dissolve of pop into ambient bubbles and flows. (Both now disappear: All Saints split, to largely unsuccessful ends; Orbit, jilted by his primary collaborator, stepped back from the charts.) The combination, as on “Pure Shores”, is irresistibly of its time: unlike that record, “Black Coffee” isn’t pure escapism. Around the edges of this playful song snaps another, one with a harder bite. The opening and breakdown of “Black Coffee” – crunching drums, radar synths – is like a more unforgiving world which our couple spend the mid-song cocooning themselves away from.
The snap and turn of those opening beats makes me think of catwalk photography; the video feels more like a magazine shoot than a relationship. Probably more than anyone since the early 80s, All Saints were a band who felt like they belonged in fashion, a style press imagining of what pop could be like. They always looked the part, but often the music strained too hard to live up to its references. Finally, with the Orbit collaborations, they got there, and “Black Coffee” is the greatest realisation of the All Saints concept – their most perfectly glossy exterior, and only warmth inside.
Score: 9”.
It is clear that Black Coffee paved the way for artists like Girls Aloud and Sugababes. The production on the track definitely influenced these groups. I feel even artists such as Charli xcx are channelling some of Black Coffee’s sound. A certain blend and attitude that has moved and influenced some huge artists. As a track, it is timeless and I don’t think it will ever lose its brilliance. Unforgettable and intoxicating, Black Coffee is…
A perfect pick-me-up.