Luther Vandross, If I Didn’t Know Better | Bangerz N Bopz 🔥

In the 86th edition of Bangerz N Bopz 🔥 (2024), we highlight “If I Didn’t Know Better” performed by Luther Vandross. 

Bring on the bold, fierce songs! Bangerz N Bopz 🔥 serves up background info and insight into songs of various styles, especially songs that raise eyebrows and stir the pot.  Featured records can be classic or brand new. In the 86^th edition of Bangerz N Bopz 🔥 (2024), we break down “If I Didn’t Know Better” performed by Luther Vandross.

Dance with My Father is considered a significant album in the Luther Vandross discography.  It was the late Grammy-winning R&B singer/songwriter’s 13^th and final studio album.  Before the album was released in 2003, Vandross suffered a severe stroke. In 2005, he passed away, at age 54 from complications of a stroke.  When the Grammy-winning album is examined, the title track, “Dance with My Father”, gets the majority of attention.  If not “Dance with My Father,” it’s “The Closer I Get To You”, a cover of the Donny Hathaway and Roberta Flack duet featuring Beyoncé.  Still, Dance with My Father begins with a super-smooth, adult contemporary R&B bop: “If I Didn’t Know Better”. Vandross, Reed Vertelney, and Ezekiel Lewis penned the opener.  Vandross produced it.

“If I Didn’t Know Better” finds Luther Vandross at his best.  His vocals are silky smooth – simply angelic.  As he sings, it never sounds like Vandross breaks a sweat.  Sure, we’ve seen videos with Luther perspiring, but he never sounded like he did.  The production is firmly planted in a grown folks’ brand of R&B but doesn’t sound out of touch with the contemporary R&B of the aughts either.  Vandross sings about R&B’s favorite topic: L-O-V-E.  In “If I Didn’t Know Better,” the girl, who is Luther’s friend,  has a man. However, Vandross believes their friendship is more.  Oh, snap! “I see the things that your man can’t see,” he sings in the first verse, adding, “And who is there for you and love you like no other  / Then you kiss and tell me that you love me like a brother.”  In the second verse, he admits his read on the situation could be incorrect but, “I don’t rub up on my friends that way.” Ooh-wee! Besides his brilliant vocals, Luther is supported by sweet background vocals.  Notably, one of the background singers appearing on the track is the late, great Cissy Houston (1933 – 2024).  The chorus is the centerpiece with Vandross expanding on their ‘relationship’:

“If I didn’t know better

I’d think that you were mine, you’re with me all the time

If I didn’t know better

I’d swear we’re more than friends, you’re touching me again

If I didn’t know better

I’d think we were in love

Girl, do you wanna tell me something?

Oh, oh, oh.” 

Yes, “Dance with My Father” and “The Closer I Get To You” get the most attention on the final studio album by Luther Vandross but “If I Didn’t Know Better” is a fine non-single that deserves its flowers as well.

Luther Vandross // Dance with My Father // Sony Music Entertainment // 2003

Luther Vandross, If I Didn’t Know Better: Bangerz N Bopz 🔥 No. 86 (2024) [📷: Brent Faulkner / The Musical Hype; Sony Music Entertainment; cottonbro studio, Harry Shelton, Kool Shooters, Lucas Pazeta, Mavluda Tashbaeva, Teddy Yang, Wesley Souza from Pexels]