"Save the Best for Last" is a song by American singer and actress Vanessa Williams from her second studio album, The Comfort Zone (1991). Written by Phil Galdston, Jon Lind, and Wendy Waldman, the song had been rejected by several female singers until Williams' record label secured it on her behalf. Produced by Keith Thomas, Wing and Mercury Records released it as The Comfort Zone's third single on January 14, 1992.
A pop ballad, the song is performed by a woman whose love interest overlooks her while pursuing several unsuccessful relationships, before ultimately realizing his feelings for her. Galdston originally conceived the song as an ironic story about romantic partners who conceal their worst traits until a relationship is ending, but Waldman suggested rewriting it into a more uplifting message. Some commentators have interpreted the song's themes of timing and patience as mirroring Williams' music career, which gained momentum in the 1990s following the 1984 nude photo scandal that forced her to resign as Miss America.
Music critics praised the song's production, radio-friendliness, and Williams' vocal performance. A major commercial success, it topped the Billboard Hot 100 for five weeks and became Williams' first number-one song on the chart. It was also successful internationally, reaching number-one in Australia and Canada, and entering the top-ten in five other countries. In 1993, it received three Grammy Award nominations: Song of the Year, Record of the Year, and Best Female Pop Vocal Performance. Two music videos were produced to promote the single; the original version was directed by Ralph Ziman. Williams has performed the song live on several occasions throughout her career, notably at the 35th Grammy Awards while she was visibly pregnant.
"Save the Best for Last" is considered to be Williams' signature song. Although Williams had achieved moderate success on the pop charts prior to the song's release, "Save the Best for Last" is widely credited with facilitating her crossover from urban to pop radio, establishing a signature sound for her musical output, helping rehabilitate her career following the Miss America scandal, and solidifying her status as a viable entertainer.
Background In 1983, Vanessa Williams was crowned the first Black winner of the Miss America pageant. The win proved controversial, and Williams received racist backlash and death threats from those who opposed her selection. Less than a year into her reign, the contest's organizers forced her to relinquish the title after Penthouse magazine announced plans to publish nude photographs she had posed for prior to participating in the pageant, without Williams' consent.
Following her resignation, Williams distanced herself from the public eye and focused on reinventing herself as an entertainer, pivoting towards a music career. After securing a record deal with Wing Records general manager Ed Eckstine, she released her debut album, The Right Stuff, in 1988. The album and its up-tempo title track were moderately successful, but the ballad "Dreamin'" ultimately became its breakthrough single. Although her team was pleased with the album's performance within the dance and R&B communities, Williams' follow-up album was positioned to further expand her reach into the mainstream pop market.
Writing and recording "Save the Best for Last" was written by Phil Galdston, Jon Lind, and Wendy Waldman. Galdston and Lind began working on the song during a March 1989 writing session in New York, USA, where they had originally intended to write a song for Steve Perry. Lind began singing over a motif Galdston had been playing on the keyboard, which became its melody. Galdston suggested the title "Save the Best for Last", a phrase he had rediscovered in his notebook, and they incorporated it into the song's melody. The title guided the song's evolution without a predetermined chorus nor structure. At the time, Galdston envisioned the title ironically, intending it to reflect someone hurt by their partner leaving at the end of their relationship. He later described the early concept as rooted in a pessimistic view of relationships, in which people reserve their worst efforts for the final moments, often when the relationship is already failing. Perry's song ultimately remained unfinished, and the pair wrote most of the music for "Save the Best for Last" in approximately 30 minutes during a single sitting. Galdston described the writing process as "organic", emphasizing heartfelt ideas over formula.
Once the melody was finalized, Lind encouraged Galdston to collaborate with Waldman on its lyrics. Nearly a month later, Galdston traveled to Nashville to work with Waldman. The tape he played for Waldman featured Lind singing "dummy lyrics". Although she liked the melody, Waldman felt the song's bitter, cynical premise did not compliment its uplifting melody, despite Galdston's explanations. She suggested reworking it into a hopeful song about a relationship's surprising turn of events. As the lyrics evolved, lines such as "Sometimes the sun goes 'round the moon" and "Sometimes the sun goes down in June" emerged, although Galdston initially protested that this line makes little sense. Once the lyrics were completed, Galdston and Waldman sent their writing tape to Lind. The following month, the three reunited in Los Angeles to record a demo. Lind and Galdston deliberately kept the demo's production simple and underproduced, omitting a drum machine in favor of electric piano, bass, synthesizer, synthesized strings, shaker, and Waldman's vocals.
After finishing the demo, the songwriters pitched "Save the Best for Last" to at least three high-profile female singers, all of whom rejected it. Barbra Streisand and Bette Midler are believed to have been among them. Around the same time, Williams had been sourcing material for her second studio album, The Comfort Zone (1991), and explicitly told Eckstine she was not interested in ballads about pining after men. Windswept Pacific Music publishing executive John Anderson played the demo for Eckstine, now President of Mercury Records, who sent it to Williams. Eckstine felt the song was a guaranteed hit for his artist and predicted it "would be a pivotal point in her career unless we f—ed it up in the studio". The singer first received the demo on cassette, sometime during the late-1980s. Williams thoroughly enjoyed and felt confident about delivering "Save the Best for Last", although she claims its songwriters doubted her despite having previously recorded and released successful ballads. Williams described its melody as an earworm, and recorded the track in one take. Eckstine doubted producer David Foster would have been interested in producing it at the time; he enlisted Keith Thomas, whose production style he considered similar to.
Both labels Wing Records and Mercury Records release "Save the Best for Last" as the third single from The Comfort Zone, on January 14, 1992. In the United Kingdom, it was distributed by Polydor Records. Although she considered "Save the Best for Last" her favorite of the album's 14 tracks, Williams stated that by the time the song was released as a single, she had essentially forgotten about it.
Music and lyrics "Save the Best for Last" has been characterized as a pop and pop-soul ballad. Although some critics have described it as R&B, Tom Breihan of Stereogum argued that the song "doesn't sound all that R&B". It is performed in the key of E major with a tempo of 96 beats per minute in common time. Williams' vocals span from F3 to C5 in the song. Peter Piatkowski of PopMatters described it as a "lush, orchestrated ballad", while Eric Snider of the Tampa Bay Times classified it as middle-of-the-road. As a ballad, the song was a notable stylistic shift from the album's first two up-tempo singles and most of The Comfort Zone's tracks. Williams sings with a combination of innocence and wonder, and uses nuanced, rueful phrasing on some of the song's lyrics, such as "Isn't this world a crazy place?". Instrumentation includes strings, piano, and acoustic guitars.
"Save the Best for Last" addresses themes of unrequited love and the idea that patience can eventually lead to fulfillment. The song describes two friends eventually entering a romantic relationship that one of them had long considered destiny. Lyrically, the singer observes a platonic partner pursue a series of ill-fated relationships before he eventually falls in love with her, ultimately realizing he has been overlooking what had been in front of him. Music journalist Jason Lamphier observed that "Save the Best for Last" is lyrical anomaly among other ballads released that year, most of which were about rejection and heartache, whereas "Save the Best for Last" is about being friend zoned. According to Songfacts, the song's overall message "is that life is full of unexpected events that often lead to what's ultimately for the best". Its opening lyrics "Sometimes the snow comes down in June / sometimes the sun goes 'round the moon" have drawn particular attention. Journalist Drew Magary said the lyrics make no sense, and ShortList's Dave Fawbert ranked them among the "worst rhyming couplets in songs". Galdston himself joked about getting away with rhyming the word "June" with "moon", and explained that they are intended to invoke surprise. Morgan Enos of Grammy.com said the singer equates such images of cosmological reversals to "capricious love", continuing, "I see the passion in your eyes / Sometimes it's all a big surprise". Singer-songwriter Eric Hutchinson admitted that while the lyric originally confused him, he eventually learned to interpret it to mean longing, patience, and "holding out hope for true love until the last possible second, against all odds, and without a promise of the future".
Some music writers have described the song as topical and poignant within the context of Williams' career, particularly following the Miss America scandal that prompted her pivot into music and acting. Beviglia felt that "the song's message of happiness after a long period of trials and tribulations dovetailed with her story". According to the writer, some of the lines directly "speak to the vagaries of fate and how it takes a special kind of perseverance to withstand them", making it easy to find parallels to the song's own career trajectory.
Reception
Critical response Upon release, "Save the Best for Last" received positive reviews from music critics, who described it as an ideal combination of sexuality, softness and sophistication for Williams. The Orlando Sentinel called it "A sophisticated ballad","Williams Wins Chart Tiara." The Orlando Sentinel. March 20, 1992. while Lynn Norment of Jet called it "wonderful". Larry Flick of Billboard stated its production and orchestration "Proves that [Williams] is possibly best suited to such soothing fare, as her crystalline voice is caressed by soft and wafting strings". Mike Joyce of The Washington Post named it the album's most radio-friendly track, and Arion Berger of Entertainment Weekly declared it a show-stopper. Dave Sholin of the Gavin Report opined, "while Vanessa is by now accustomed to chart success, this effort takes her to a whole new level" and "deserves to become her biggest hit to-date". For the same publication, John Martinucci said the singer "Gives this beautiful ballad a simple and delicate presentation that'll lift any romantic spirit". C.J. of The Minnesota Star Tribune described it as "the most beautifully constructed, lyrically perfect love song to a stupid man ever recorded".