The 1990s File Feature
Give You What You Want (Fa Sure)
"Give You What You Want (Fa Sure)" — Chico DeBarge's Late 1990s R&B Moment A Musical Legacy Under Pressure By the close of the 1990s, the DeBarge name carrie…
01 The Story
"Give You What You Want (Fa Sure)" — Chico DeBarge's Late 1990s R&B Moment
A Musical Legacy Under Pressure
By the close of the 1990s, the DeBarge name carried enormous weight in American R&B circles. The family group had been one of the defining acts of early 1980s soul pop, their lush harmonies and romantic balladry reaching millions of listeners before internal and personal struggles derailed the collective enterprise. Chico DeBarge, one of the younger siblings, had spent years working to establish his own identity outside the shadow of that legacy while simultaneously drawing on the vocal gifts and musical instincts that the family shared. "Give You What You Want (Fa Sure)" arrived in the autumn of 1999 as a piece of precisely calibrated contemporary R&B that positioned Chico as a fully formed solo presence.
The late 1990s R&B landscape was fiercely competitive and sonically diverse. Producers were exploring combinations of hip-hop rhythms, neo-soul influences, and the smooth production aesthetic that had come to define adult contemporary R&B. Chico's vocal style, warm, sensual, and rooted in the melodic traditions his family had helped establish, fit comfortably within that landscape while carrying enough individual character to stand apart from the anonymous production-line material that crowded the format.
The Song and Its Sound
The track operates in the tradition of romantic R&B that the DeBarge family had long embodied, centered on devotion, desire, and the promise of emotional and physical satisfaction. The production reflected the sonic preferences of late 1990s urban radio, a blend of smooth rhythmic beds and carefully layered vocal harmonies that owed debts to both the Quiet Storm format and the more rhythm-forward production styles that hip-hop influence had introduced to R&B across that decade.
The parenthetical "Fa Sure" in the title gave the song a vernacular edge that situated it squarely in the cultural idiom of its moment. Chico's vocal performance carried the weight of genuine feeling rather than mere technical display, which was a consistent quality of the DeBarge lineage and a distinguishing factor from the more calculated R&B that saturated radio formats at the time.
The Billboard Chart Run
The single debuted on the Billboard Hot 100 on October 23, 1999, entering at position 94. Its climb was gradual, moving through the nineties and eventually reaching higher positions over the following weeks. The track peaked at number 71 on December 4, 1999, completing a ten-week chart run that demonstrated the steady, loyal R&B audience that Chico had built. A ten-week presence on the Hot 100 for a solo artist carrying a complex family reputation was a meaningful achievement, confirming that his appeal was genuine rather than borrowed entirely from name recognition.
The chart performance placed the track primarily within the R&B airplay context rather than crossing over to pop radio in significant numbers. This pattern was common for artists working in the Quiet Storm tradition who built deep loyalty within a defined audience rather than broader but shallower mainstream recognition. The dedicated R&B audience that followed Chico's work understood his place in a continuum of Black American romantic music that was both commercially viable and artistically serious.
Chico DeBarge in Context
Chico had released his debut solo album in 1986, and his career had moved through periods of activity and absence before the late 1990s saw him return with renewed focus. The personal challenges that affected the entire DeBarge family had complicated every member's career trajectory at various points, and Chico's resilience in continuing to make music with quality and integrity was itself a kind of statement. This single appeared on his album Long Time No See, a title that acknowledged both the gap in his commercial presence and his determination to return to the audience that remembered him.
The R&B climate of 1999 still had room for the kind of voice-centered romantic material that Chico represented. Artists like R. Kelly, Maxwell, and Joe were demonstrating that there was a large and hungry audience for sophisticated adult R&B, and Chico's entry into that competitive space showed he understood both his strengths and his market.
A Voice Worth Revisiting
There is a particular pleasure in hearing a vocalist who understands restraint, who trusts the melody and the listener enough to resist the temptation to oversell every phrase. Chico DeBarge brought that restraint to "Give You What You Want (Fa Sure)," and the result holds up with quiet elegance. Go find it and give it the listen it deserves.
"Give You What You Want (Fa Sure)" — Chico DeBarge's singular moment on the 1990s charts.
02 Song Meaning
"Give You What You Want (Fa Sure)" — Devotion, Promise, and the R&B Grammar of Desire
The Language of Romantic Certainty
At its core, "Give You What You Want (Fa Sure)" belongs to a long and distinguished tradition of R&B songs built around unambiguous romantic commitment. The title itself encodes the essential message: a declaration of intention, accompanied by an expression of absolute sincerity. The vernacular confidence in that phrasing is not decorative; it is the point. The speaker in this song is not uncertain, not hedging, not navigating the emotional complications that characterize more ambivalent romantic material. This is a statement of purpose, and its directness is a significant part of its appeal.
R&B has long been the popular music genre most willing to address romantic and sexual desire with explicit emotional honesty. Where pop music sometimes retreats into metaphor or abstraction, and rock has often preferred emotional distance or irony, R&B in the tradition Chico DeBarge inhabited has tended to speak plainly about what people want from each other and what they are willing to offer. That plainness, executed with vocal craft and genuine feeling, is the genre's great strength.
Family Legacy and Personal Voice
The DeBarge family's contribution to American R&B across the 1980s was substantial. Their recordings combined the vocal harmony traditions of gospel and soul with the polished production of the Motown era, creating a sound that reached across racial and demographic lines. Chico's solo work carried those DNA markers while incorporating the sonic vocabulary of the 1990s. His approach to romantic subject matter reflected a maturity that came partly from lived experience and partly from the accumulated musical intelligence of a family steeped in the tradition.
That combination, family legacy processed through individual experience, gave his recordings a texture that was specific rather than generic. When he sang about giving someone what they want, the phrase landed with the weight of someone who understood what desire costs as well as what it promises.
The Late 1990s R&B Landscape as Context
The R&B of 1999 was navigating several simultaneous directions. Hip-hop had so thoroughly transformed the rhythm and production sensibility of Black American popular music that even the most traditionally inflected R&B recordings carried traces of that influence in their rhythmic construction and sonic texture. At the same time, there was a strong counter-movement toward neo-soul and more organic production values, driven by artists and producers who wanted to reconnect with the acoustic warmth and melodic sophistication of earlier decades.
Chico's positioning in this landscape was that of an artist who embodied continuity, who represented the through-line from the classic DeBarge sound of the early 1980s to the polished urban R&B of the late 1990s. His audience appreciated that continuity even as they embraced newer sounds and styles.
Why Devotion Songs Persist
Songs built around the promise of giving someone what they need and want continue to resonate because they address one of the most fundamental human desires, the desire to be fully known and fully cared for. The ten weeks that "Give You What You Want (Fa Sure)" spent on the Billboard Hot 100, peaking at number 71, documented an audience that found genuine emotional connection in this material. The chart performance was modest by pop radio standards but meaningful within the R&B context where Chico built his audience, a community of listeners who valued vocal authenticity over commercial formula.
The song's enduring appeal lies in that authenticity. It does not pretend to complexity it does not have, and it delivers the emotional simplicity it promises with real skill and genuine warmth.
"Give You What You Want (Fa Sure)" — Chico DeBarge's singular moment on the 1990s charts.
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