New Jill Swing was a cheeky response to the very male, late 80s world of new jack swing, and it was the dawn of a golden age for female R&B in the 90s.

The original source of new jack swing – or swingbeat – could be found in key records like Janet Jackson’s “Control”, produced by Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis, which mixed hard beats with soul, real R&B with 808s and a tough shuffle. Producer Teddy Riley took these sounds a step further at the end of the 80s, blending them with hip hop because – strange as it now seems – hip hop in the 80s was barely integrated into R&B.

Solo acts like Karyn White (‘The Way You Love Me’) and Jasmine Guy (‘Try Me’) followed in Janet Jackson’s future-perfect footsteps, inspiring a bunch of female groups who followed in the early 90s. The initial ground-breakers were a Motown act called the