Forgive Me - Lynden David Hall (Artful Dodger Vocal Mix) (2000)
Slick, loved-up UKG from its heyday, which saw one of the genre's most celebrated producers remixing the vocals of a late British neo-soul legend
Whilst completing a Q&A recently, I was asked to submit a go-to song for a sunny spring day, given the turning time of year. Right away I went to my UKG playlist to see what felt most appropriate.
I submitted Artful Dodger’s Vocal Mix of Lynden David Hall’s Forgive Me without giving it much thought. After doing so, I realised that I’d been listening to the song for years without digging into its history.
Everyone who cares about UK garage knows about the significance of the producer, but I had little knowledge about the man behind the vocals.
Lynden David Hall grew up in Earlsfield, south London, and attended the BRIT School for Performing Arts in Croydon. A demo tape he recorded there found its way to the desk of BBC Radio 1 DJ Trevor Nelson who signed him to a subsidiary of Virgin EMI called Cooltempo.
Hall released his debut album, Medicine 4 My Pain, in 1997. With the help of its heartfelt title song and raunchy single Sexy Cinderella, it went on to sell over 100,000 copies, earning Hall a Mobo Award for best newcomer in 1998.
He was soon labelled Britain’s answer to D’Angelo, nominated for best male artist at the 1999 Brit Awards and he became the first British artist to win the best male category in the Blues & Soul magazine awards.
The neo-soul original of Forgive Me featured on Hall’s second album, The Other Side, in 2000. Despite Hall’s cemented reputation, its sales performed poorly, and he was later dropped from EMI.
Artful Dodger remixed various versions of the song during the same year that the producer was propelling UK garage’s popular takeover through collaborations with soulful vocalists, most notably Craig David.
All are packed with the genre’s joyous bounce and Hall’s unique voice, capturing a pocket of sound that only feels possible to have come from that turn-of-the-millennium time.
Hall later had a brief appearance in Love Actually (2003) as the lead singer at Keira Knightley and Chiwetel Ejiofor’s characters’ wedding; he released his third and final album, In Between Jobs, independently in 2005, having been diagnosed with Hodgkins lymphoma.
As the Guardian’s obituary, published after his passing on Valentine’s Day 2006, closed:
A bone-marrow transplant is the only cure for this rare cancer, but donors must be of the same ethnic group, and Hall discovered that a shortage of black donors gave him a minuscule chance of finding a suitable match. A stemcell transplant in late 2004 failed to arrest the disease. Last November, his wife Nikki held a benefit concert at London's Jazz Cafe, featuring Lynden's friends Beverley Knight, Ms Dynamite and Shola Ama. At the end of the event, she phoned her husband in hospital and asked the crowd to say hello. The cheers raised the roof. Nikki survives him.
Rest in peace Lynden David Hall and thank you for the timeless vocals.