How will you know? It’s hard to know what to do in a given moment. But when it comes to big decisions, one might find the answer they need by listening to instinct, learning from experience, or taking advice from a family member or sage friend.
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But the truth is, before making a big decision, one might never know what is right, best, or fit for the crucial point in time. Sometimes you have to guess. And sometimes those guesses turn out wrong. As in the story of the hit Whitney Houston song “How Will I Know.”
Wait, She Passed?
The synth ’80s dance song was written by George Merrill and Shannon Rubicam. At the time, the duo had a singer in mind. But it wasn’t the rising, big-voiced Whitney Houston. It was instead, Janet Jackson. (The two would later write “I Wanna Dance With Somebody (Who Loves Me)” for Houston).
But when Jackson’s management team heard the song, they passed on it for their client. The reasoning? The song wasn’t strong enough compared to the other work Jackson was releasing and planning to release at the time.
Upon hearing the news from Jackson’s team, Merrill told interviewer and writer Fred Bronson, “We were pretty upset because we thought it was perfect for her at the time. We had written it with her completely in mind.”
Picking Up The Pieces
Undaunted by the no from Jackson’s team, the songwriters sent out the song to other people in the business through their publisher. Gerry Griffith, director for R&B music at A&M and Arista Records, heard the song. At the time, too, Griffith was working with an up-and-coming singer—Ms. Whitney Houston—and putting together tracks for her debut LP.
Griffith, after hearing the song with now-legendary music businessman Clive Davis, told Bronson, “We had a lot of R&B-based tunes, we had a few ballads, but we didn’t have a pop crossover song. So when I heard ‘How Will I Know,’ I said, ‘This is absolutely perfect.’ I played it for Clive [and] he fell in love with it. I wasn’t very familiar with her family background; I didn’t realize that, even at that time, there was a pretty big industry buzz about her future.”
1984
After hiring producer Narada Michael Walden, an artist who had recently then worked with Aretha Franklin, to work on the track, Griffith got the song’s production into gear. But there were hiccups. Walden wanted to rework the song, which at first came as a surprise to its writers. After a great deal of negotiating, Walden was allowed to change the key and tempo. With a satisfactory offering for all, Houston came in and recorded her lyrics and her mother Cissy Houston provided background vocals along with Whitney.
The Release
The song was the third single released from Houston’s self-titled debut LP. The track, which is all about wondering whether a boy likes you back, hit No.1 on the Billboard Hot 100 in early 1986. The video, bright and pastel and flirtatious, earned Houston an MTV Video Music Award for Best Female Video and she also earned Best New Artist.
While passing on the song was likely a mistake for Jackson and her team, you can’t win them all. No one bats 1,000 in the big leagues after all. And the song helped establish Houston as a rising star.
There’s a boy I know, he’s the one I dream of
Looks into my eyes, takes me to the clouds above, mmm-hmm
Oh, I lose control, can’t seem to get enough, uh-huh
When I wake from dreaming, tell me, is it really love?
Ooh, how will I know? (don’t trust your feelings)
How will I know?
How will I know? (love can be deceiving)
How will I know?
How will I know if he really loves me?
I say a prayer with every heartbeat
I fall in love whenever we meet
I’m asking you what you know about these things
How will I know if he’s thinking of me?
I try to phone but I’m too shy (can’t speak)
Falling in love is so bittersweet
This love is strong, why do I feel weak?
Photo by Gary Gershoff/Getty Images
