D.L. Hughley Compares Whitney Houston and Marvin Gaye’s Versions of The National Anthem
Ask anyone which singer performed the best version of The National Anthem, more than likely, they will respond with the singer lauded as “The Voice”: Whitney Houston. Houston performed her iconic rendition ahead of the 1991 Super Bowl. The song was released as a single twice in one decade, and made history on the charts. Despite such, D.L. Hughley thinks there’s one performance that tops Houston’s.
D.L. Hughley says Marvin Gaye’s version of ‘The National Anthem’ is better than Whitney Houston’s
Hughley recently sat for an interview with Vlad TV and spoke on their experiences witnessing some of the greatest performers and athletes of all time. During the chat, Hughley gave an example of the first time he ever saw Houston perform. He’d attended a concert of his favorite artist but was so blown away by Houston that he didn’t even care to see who he originally went to the show for.
“I will never forget I went to see Jeffrey Osbourne at the Greek Theatre, me and my wife went to see him and Whitney Houston opened up for him, when Whitney Houston came out, I went, ‘She won’t be opening up for him again,’” Hughley said, noting that Houston was the better performer and he sensed that her star would rise. “I remember halfway through her performance, I went, ‘This is it for him.’ And I was the biggest fan [of Osbourne], I didn’t know who she was [at the time], but when she was finished, I didn’t even want to see him.”
But despite how great Hughley thinks Houston is, he doesn’t think her version of The National Anthem is the best. When Vlad tells him to name a better version of the performance, Hughley responded, “I’ll say Marvin Gaye.” He added: “Because it was different. I liked it when nobody else did. Not lyrically, but the arrangement.”
Whitney Houston’s version was released as a single and broke records
10 Days into the Persian Gulf War, Houston took the stage to sing “The Star Spangled Banner” during the opening for Super Bowl XXV On Jan. 27, 1991. Houston’s arrangement was coordinated by her longtime producer and collaborator, Rickey Minor. Minor later revealed that Houston recorded the arrangement in just one take.
More than 73,000 attendees were at the game. Houston’s performance was viewed by 750 million people worldwide. The song was released as a single the following month due to the overwhelming positive reception. She was credited with inventing the patriotic feeling needed at the time and her version was lauded as the best of all time, a feat she still owns. An accompanying music video of Houston’s performance was also released. Houston donated all of the proceeds to the American Red Cross Gulf Crisis Fund. The fund provided aid to US military personnel, their families and war victims.
Following the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, Houston’s record label, Arista Records re-released Houston’s version of “The Star Spangled Banner” as a way to show pride in the country and lift spirits of Americans. As she’d done in the past, Houston donated her share of the royalties, as well as the label, towards the firefighters and victims of the attacks.
This time, the single peaked at No. 6 on the US Billboard Hot 100. It was eventually certified platinum by the RIAA. Houston made history as the first artist to take The National Anthem to the Top 10 on the charts in the US, reaching platinum status along the way.
Marvin Gaye’s arrangement was unprecedented
Gaye performed The National Anthem during the 1993 NBA All-Star Game. Though this performance turned out to be his most memorable version, it wasn’t his first. He’d sung the anthem several times before in its traditional format. In 1979, Gaye sang at the second Larry Holmes-Earnie Shavers fight at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas. In 1974, he performed the anthem at the Alameda County Coliseum in Oakland, California, before the Raiders’ vs. the Dallas Cowboys. He did so as well in 1968 when he was the King of Motown Records before Game 4 of the 1968 World Series between the Detroit Tigers and St. Louis Cardinals
This time around, shocked the crowd and viewers by putting a soulful twist on it. Gaye’s rendition is considered to be the most original arrangement ever done. Gaye blew away the crowd of basketball legends, VIPs and fans with his smoothe rendition of the song. Even NBA legend Magic Johnson was impressed with Gaye.
“We were two-stepping, listening to the national anthem,” Magic Johnson said, as reported by andScape. “We were just bouncing left to right. It blew us away. We just got caught into the moment of this man. People just forgot it was the National Anthem.”
Ironically, the moment almost never happened as Gaye was not the league’s first choice. Lionel Richie was the coveted performer due to his recent success from his debut album. But Richie ultimately wasn’t chosen because the league’s office did not know much of about music.
