"When I Think of You" is a song by American singer Janet Jackson from her third studio album, Control. It was released on July 28, 1986, as the album's third single. Written by Jackson, Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis, and produced by Jam and Lewis, the song is about a person who finds relief and fun in a lover. It was Jackson's first number-one single on the US Billboard Hot 100, and also peaked at number 10 in the United Kingdom. Pitchfork included the song on their "The 200 Best Songs of the 1980s" list at number 48. The song was resurrected in 1995 when released on two limited-edition CD single formats in the United Kingdom, one containing remixes by Deep Dish and Heller & Farley, and the other containing remixes by David Morales. That same year these remixes were included on certain releases of "Runaway". "When I Think of You" has been included in each of Jackson's greatest hits albums: ', Number Ones and '.
Commercial performance
"When I Think of You" became Jackson's first number-one single on the US Billboard Hot 100, spending two weeks atop the chart. After "When I Think of You" reached number one, it made Jackson and her brother Michael Jackson the first, and so far only, siblings to both have solo number-one singles on the Hot 100. At the time she was 20 years old, making Jackson the youngest artist since Stevie Wonder to top the Billboard Hot 100. It also reached number three on the Hot Black Singles chart and number one on the Hot Dance Club Play chart in 1986. "When I Think of You" was the 32nd biggest Hot 100 single of 1986, as well as the 47th biggest Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs single of 1986 and the 22nd biggest Hot Dance Club Play single of 1986.
Music video
The music video for "When I Think of You" finds Jackson going around a neighborhood. Each location she visits has the same mysterious man in different costumes saying a brief statement to her and then vanishing as she turns around. The director of "When I Think of You", Julien Temple, would later direct Jackson's "Alright" video, and both videos have a similar style. Some scenes were staged by Hollywood choreographer Michael Kidd. "When I Think of You" has only five cuts. The video is similar to the opening segment of Temple's 1986 film Absolute Beginners, which stars David Bowie and Sade. The style is that the video is assumed to be one long take, but in fact it is five smaller takes. Although fluid in nature, obvious differences can be seen in the edits, especially when she comes out of the back door of the club, and a photographer takes her picture, with the flash acting as an edit. Two of Jackson's nephews, TJ and Taryll Jackson, make a cameo in the video. The video was choreographed by Paula Abdul, who also appears in the video. The video uses an edit of the 12″ Dance Remix version of the song, instead of the album version. In February 2007, the video was made available on the iTunes Store. Jackson would later repeat the same type of format for her video "Rock with U" from 2008's Discipline.
