Hope

Album: Hot Shot (1999)
Charted: 19
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Songfacts®:

  • Shaggy wrote this based on his personal experiences. Raised by a single mother in Jamaica, they didn't have much, but they always had hope. Looking back on his success, he realizes how valuable those experiences were.
  • "Hope" first appeared in 1999 in the Kevin Costner movie For Love Of The Game. Shaggy had recently been dropped by Virgin Records and picked up by MCA, which did the movie's soundtrack and had him contribute the song to it. It was released as a single but went nowhere; neither did the soundtrack despite Jonny Lang's cover of "Paint It Black" and tracks from Steely Dan, Vince Gill and Lyle Lovett.

    But Shaggy didn't give up "Hope," including it on his 2000 album Hot Shot, which in 2001 was outsold in America only by Linkin Park's Hybrid Theory. It included two #1 hits: "It Wasn't Me" and "Angel."
  • In the UK, this was released as a double-A-side single with "Dance And Shout" and reached #19 in 2001.

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