#RSFlashback: 25 Years Ago, Jyoti Mishra aka White Town Scored A Global Smash

British act White Town was the brainchild of Rourkela-born, British-Indian singer-songwriter Jyoti Mishra. Originally a multi-member band, by the time their second album Women In Technology released, Mishra was already flying solo. His single “Your Woman” became an unexpected smash hit in 1997, shooting all the way to Number One in the U.K. and becoming a Top 20 hit throughout Europe, and even reaching the Top 40 of the United States.

The offbeat alt-pop song was an instant hit thanks to the brilliant sampling of the 1932 song “My Woman” by Lew Stone & His Monseigneur Band. Mishra infused Seventies funk with electronica and some hip-hop beats to the instrumental hook of the sample creating a memorable hit that he was never able to replicate again.

Lyrically, the song focuses on the complicated feelings that exist in love and relationships, starkly different from the Stone recording. Bing Crosby actually wrote the lyrics to “My Woman,” which today would not be seen as sexist. Mishra turned the tables and instead painted a lyrical picture where the response is somewhere between the realities of love and the loss of rational emotions.

“Your Woman” was praised universally by critics who noted that Mishra’s single, in theory, shouldn’t have worked, but somehow, he managed to create a brilliant, irresistible slice of synth-pop that you can dance to, sing along to and also, never get tired of hearing.

It’s no surprise then that despite the lack of any other mainstream hits, “Your Woman” continues to impact us. Continually ranked as one of the best singles of the Nineties, the song and its most memorable sample also recently got the attention of Dua Lipa’s team who ended up using a near identical sample of “My Woman” for her 2021 hit “Love Again”.

While the original team of that song were credited as songwriters for her hit, notably absent was Mishra. One might argue that without the existence of his fantastic “Your Woman” in the pop zeitgeist, there’d likely not have been “Love Again.” Or at the very least, Lipa’s hit would likely not have charted as highly as it did without an in-built love for the sample.

“Your Woman” brings up an interesting question that as songs from the Eighties and Nineties are now being seen as the classic oldies for the younger generations, many of those come from the first generation of songs to feature notable samples. Now as younger artists begin to cover or sample those songs, royalties and credits continue to go to the original sample, but those tracks likely wouldn’t have garnered the current classic status without the more recent interpretation.

There’s likely no one in the modern pop listening audience or in a courthouse that would dispute that “Your Woman” didn’t serve as an inspiration for “Love Again,” but should Mishra get any credit for bringing the “My Woman” sample into the mainstream?

I ask this question because I think about the current culture we are living in. Cover songs are getting far more streams and views than originals, and while younger artists may be shelling out royalties and be willing to share credits more flexibly, what happens to the impact of the music from before? “Love Again” credits “My Woman,” yet for 25 years, the only song we have heard and loved that featured that hook was one iteration or another of “Your Woman”.  For a whole new generation, the song doesn’t exist because without the lack of credit or acknowledgment, there is no record then of the connection, so to speak. So does the inspiring song then just disappear?

While that’s a larger debate, for Mishra, he has continued to produce eclectic music over the years, and he remains one of the most-talented one-hit wonders of modern times. It should be noted how remarkable it is that Mishra managed to skip any ethnic attachments to his name. The incredible achievement to score such a big hit at a time when no other Indian was making waves (Bally Sagoo to an extent), it is worth noting and celebrating the man and his inescapable contribution with the classic “Your Woman.”