There can be no dispute that Whitney Houston is one of the great recording artists of the last three decades. The late singer sold millions of records worldwide to legions of devoted fans and enjoyed massive chart success with a long string of hit singles and albums. It all started with her self-titled debut, a classic collection that is on the verge of reaching its 30-year anniversary milestone. Whitney Houston launched the remarkably talented singer into stardom, with Houston’s stunning vocals brimming with youthful exuberance. Excluding The Bodyguard Soundtrack, which is only half Whitney Houston material, Whitney Houston remains the highest selling album of Houston’s career both in the U.S. and around the world, with nearly 30 million copies sold.  

Whitney Houston emerged from a family deeply rooted in soul music. Daughter of gospel vocalist Cissy Houston and cousin to R&B legends Dionne and Dee Dee Warwick, Houston was a gifted vocalist whose big break came when Arista Records’ Gerry Griffith and Clive Davis saw her perform in a New York City nightclub. Signed to Arista in 1983 at the age of 19, it would be a full two years before her debut album appeared. Davis and his team at Arista worked to gather material and collaborators for Houston, facing some resistance as the young singer’s powerhouse R&B vocal style didn’t exactly fit comfortably with the heavily stylized, upbeat new wave and dance/pop that saturated the radio airwaves and MTV at the time.

With Clive Davis guiding the process and strongly advocating for Houston to various writers and producers, the album slowly started coming together. Houston’s first single landed in May 1984, nearly a full year before her album arrived. “Hold Me,” a romantic duet with R&B vocalist Teddy Pendergrass that appeared on his album Love Language as well as on Houston’s debut, was first recorded by Diana Ross for her 1982 album Silk Electric under the name “In Your Arms.” “Hold Me” was one of four tracks on Houston’s debut co-written by famed songwriter Michael Masser, whose many hit compositions included the Oscar-nominated “Theme From Mahogany (Do You Know Where You’re Going To),” a #1 hit for Ross in 1976. The soulful ballad gave Houston her first taste of chart success: “Hold Me” reached #5 on the R&B singles chart and #46 on the pop chart. It was but the first taste of things to come.

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Houston’s debut album was finally released on February 14, 1985. A highly polished combination of sultry ballads and upbeat pop, Whitney Houston received good reviews, but didn’t exactly fly off the shelves at first. “You Give Good Love” was chosen as the lead single. A soulful, elegant ballad written by New York City-based songwriter LaLa and produced by Houston’s label-mate at Arista, R&B artist Kashif, the song was released in early February and began a slow ascent up the charts. “You Give Good Love” was aimed at R&B radio, but it crossed over and scored on the pop chart in May 1985. By mid-Summer, thanks to steady radio play, “You Give Good Love” climbed all the way to #3 on the Billboard Hot 100. It was Houston’s first major smash hit, with many more to come.

Arista selected another ballad, “Saving All My Love For You,” as the all-important follow-up. Co-written and produced by Michael Masser, the song was originally recorded as a duet between Marilyn McCoo and Billy Davis Jr. for their 1978 album Marilyn & Billy. While working on Houston’s debut, Masser resurrected the song for Houston and she delivered a dynamic vocal performance. Released in August 1985 and featuring a video that MTV played in heavy rotation, “Saving All My Love For You” became the first of eleven #1 singles by Whitney Houston when it hit the top for one week in October. Eight months after its release, Whitney Houston yielded its first chart-topper, but two more were on the way.

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Houston had proven that she could score with romantic ballads showcasing her powerful voice, but could she hit with a more upbeat pop track? Third single “How Will I Know?,” released in November 1985, delivered a resounding “yes” to that question when it became her second straight #1 on the pop chart in February 1986. Written by George Merrill and Shannon Rubicam and intended for Janet Jackson, Arista’s Gerry Griffith quickly snatched the song for Houston when Jackson’s management declined it. As the showcase pop song on the album, Narada Michael Walden was brought in to produce it, and the song became an important bridge between Houston and a younger, pop-oriented audience. The colorful video showing Houston’s more playful side became a fixture on MTV and earned two MTV Video Music Award nominations in 1986.

With “How Will I Know?” its third major hit and second chart-topper, Whitney Houston finally reached #1 on the Billboard Top 200 album chart in March 1986, over a year after its release. It stayed at the top through the spring and into the summer of ’86 for a total of fourteen weeks, buoyed by the release of its final big single “Greatest Love of All.” Another Michael Masser co-composition that was originally recorded by another artist (George Benson in 1977), Houston’s epic take on the song was released as a single in April 1986 and rocketed to #1 where it stayed lodged for three weeks in May. It became one of her signature songs, perhaps her most famous and beloved second only to her iconic take on “I Will Always Love You.”

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Beyond the big hits, Whitney Houston is loaded with strong material, with no filler to be found. The dance-pop “Thinking About You,” written by LaLa and Kashif and produced by Kashif, became a dance and R&B hit. Jermaine Jackson produced three tracks, “Someone For Me,” “Nobody Loves Me Like You Do,” and “Take Good Care of My Heart,” the latter two duets between Jackson and Houston. Another ballad co-written and produced by Michael Masser, “All at Once” became a radio hit in the U.S. and a Top 10 single internationally. R&B singer Jeffrey Osborne, who co-wrote the song, would later record his own version on his 2005 album From the Soul.

As we know, with the third anniversary of Houston’s tragic early death approaching, Houston has a complicated history. Houston’s image was carefully cultivated as innocent and wholesome, while still flirty and sexy, in those early days. The success of her debut was in part attributable to her connection with both R&B and pop audiences, and her cross-generational appeal. Mostly, though, Whitney Houston is one of the great debut albums in pop history because of great songwriting and, most importantly, the towering talent that Whitney Houston possessed as a vocalist. She belted out these songs with grace and power, and audiences responded. Houston didn’t fit into the mould of what a pop singer hitting the Top 40 was in the early ‘80s, but ultimately she was simply impossible to overlook, and she burst through with a sound that slammed open the door for many who came after. Her success helped usher in a more R&B dominated slant to the Top 40 which continues to this day. Thirty years later, Whitney Houston stands as one of the most successful and important albums of the ‘80s, a landmark recording that launched one of the brightest stars the pop world has ever known. “And I decided long ago never to walk in anyone’s shadows. If I fail, if I succeed, at least I will live as I believe.” That she did.