"Never Forget You" is a pop/R&B slow jam

Slow jam

A slow jam an umbrella term for music with R&B and Soul influences. Slow jams are commonly R&B ballads or down tempo songs. The term is most commonly reserved for soft-sounding songs with heavily emotional or romantic lyrical content. This definition has led to intense debate over whether...

 song written by American singer Mariah Carey

Mariah Carey

Mariah Carey is an American singer-songwriter, record producer, and actress. She made her recording debut with the release of her eponymous studio album in 1990, under the guidance of Columbia Records executive Tommy Mottola, whom she later married in 1993...

 and Babyface, produced by Carey, Babyface and Daryl Simmons

Daryl Simmons

Daryl Simmons is an American Grammy Award winning R&B songwriter, musician and record producer who is best known for his association with the LaFace Records production duo of Antonio ‘L.A.’ Reid and Kenneth "Babyface" Edmonds....

 for Carey's third album Music Box (1993). It was released as the third single from Music Box in the first quarter of 1994, as a double A-side with a cover of Badfinger

Badfinger

Badfinger were a British rock band consisting originally of Pete Ham, Ron Griffiths, Mike Gibbins and Tom Evans, active from 1968 to 1983, and evolving from The Iveys, formed by Ham, Griffiths and David "Dai" Jenkins in Swansea, Wales, in the early 1960s. Joey Molland joined the group in 1969,...

's "Without You." There was no music video commissioned for the album version or any of the remixes, making it Carey's first commercially released single not to be accompanied by a video. Carey never performed this song live.

Chart performance

At the time of the single's release in the U.S. as "Without You & Never Forget You," Billboard

Billboard (magazine)

Billboard is a weekly American magazine devoted to the music industry, and is one of the oldest trade magazines in the world. It maintains several internationally recognized music charts that track the most popular songs and albums in various categories on a weekly basis...

 magazine's rules allowed double-sided singles to chart together as one entry on the singles chart. The song that would pick up the most airplay and/or sales for the respective chart would be listed as the A-side. On the U.S. pop charts, it was listed as "Without You/Never Forget You" and reached number three on the Billboard Hot 100

Billboard Hot 100

The Billboard Hot 100 is the United States music industry standard singles popularity chart issued weekly by Billboard magazine. Chart rankings are based on radio play and sales; the tracking-week for sales begins on Monday and ends on Sunday, while the radio play tracking-week runs from Wednesday...

, remaining in the top forty for 21 weeks.

The maxi-single of "Never Forget You" was only released in the United States and promoted to Urban

Urban contemporary

Urban contemporary is a music radio format. The term was coined by the late New York DJ Frankie Crocker in the mid 1970s. Urban contemporary radio stations feature a playlist made up entirely of hip hop/rap, contemporary R&B, pop, electronica such as dubstep and drum and bass and Caribbean music...

 radio audiences, charting as the A-side when it appeared on the R&B charts. As "Never Forget You/Without You," it reached the top ten on Billboards Hot R&B Singles

Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs

Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs, is a chart released weekly by Billboard in the United States.The chart, initiated in 1942, is used to track the success of popular music songs in urban, or primarily African American, venues. Dominated over the years at various times by jazz, rhythm and blues, doo-wop, soul,...

 chart primarily due to sales, and the RIAA

Recording Industry Association of America

The Recording Industry Association of America is a trade organization that represents the recording industry distributors in the United States...

 certified it gold.

Remixes and other versions

Jermaine Dupri

Jermaine Dupri

Jermaine Dupri Mauldin , known as Jermaine Dupri or JD, is an American record producer, songwriter and rapper.- Early life and career :...

's R&B remixes of the song are included on its maxi-single release. A radio edit, an extended version and the instrumental version of the remix replace Babyface's original production with a new, pulsating synthetic R&B rhythm. The instrumental version was used on Carey's episode of MTV Cribs

MTV Cribs

MTV Cribs and CMT Cribs, depending on which channel it airs, is a franchise reality television program that originated on the MTV Networks' MTV. It later aired on its CMT channel that features tours of the houses and mansions of celebrities. The first show aired September 2000...

.

The song has been covered by a Japanese R&B singer Double

Double (singer)

Double is the stage name for Japanese R&B singer . Double used to be the name for the two member R&B group consisting of Takako and her sister Sachiko. After the death of her sister in May 1999, Takako started her solo career adopting Double as her stage name...

 and is featured on her greatest hits album 10 Years Best: We R&B.

Tracklist

U.S. CD maxi-single

1. "Never Forget You" (radio edit) – 3:38
2. "Never Forget You" (extended) – 5:19
3. "Never Forget You" (album version) – 3:48
4. "Never Forget You" (instrumental) – 3:35
5. "Without You" (album version) – 3:33

Peak positions

Chart (1994)	Peak position
U.S. Billboard Hot 100	3
U.S. Billboard Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs	7

End of year charts

End of year chart (1994)	Position
U.S. Billboard Hot 100	16

Sales and certifications

Provider	Sales	Certification
United States Recording Industry Association of America The Recording Industry Association of America is a trade organization that represents the recording industry distributors in the United States...	500,000+	Gold