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Grace were a 1990s dance music act, consisting of DJs Paul Oakenfold and Steve Osborne and jazz singer Dominique Atkins.^[1]. The group's debut single (originally released in 1993 and then again in 1995) 'Not Over Yet' featured lead and backing vocals by original front-woman Patti Low. Atkins then recorded her own lead vocals for Not Over Yet when it was featured as the first track on the group's only album "If I Could Fly".^[2]

[edit] History

The band was initially named "State of Grace" but it later renamed Grace, following the discovery of another band of the same name.^[3] In existence from 1993 to 1997, the band served mainly to showcase Oakenfold and Osborne's production talents. During this timeframe, they had seven Top 40 hits, most notably the dance anthem "Not Over Yet", which peaked at #6 in the UK Singles Chart,^[4] and topped the Hot Dance Music/Club Play chart in the US. Original front-woman Patti Low also recorded 1 other track whilst involved with Grace called 'Helpless', which was only released as the B-side on the tape cassette release of 'Not Over Yet' in 1995. Patti featured in the 1995 promotional video for 'Not Over Yet' and also performed live lead-vocals in Grace's appearance on Top Of The Pops in early 1995. For some reason Patti was then replaced as the lead singer with Dominique Atkins, who Oakenfold had become aware of through her vocals on the previous Perfecto release 'PASSION' by Jon of The Pleased Wimmin. Subsequent vocals, PAs and appearances always featured Atkins as lead singer of Grace. The September 1995 track "I Want To Live" (UK #30^[5]) which was a cover of the song by Gavin Friday^[6] (also covered by Naomi Campbell^[7]) featured "Not Over Yet" lead singer Patti Low on backing vocals. Further singles by Grace were "Skin on Skin" (UK #21), "Down to Earth" (UK #20), "If I Could Fly" (UK #29), "Hand in Hand" (UK #38) and a re-release/double A-side of "You're Not Mine" / "Down to Earth" (UK #29). The group released an album entitled "If I Could Fly" though this did not chart.

Dominique Atkins also recorded vocals for Tilt on their track 'Rendezvous', which was retitled 'Invisible', and was originally to be titled 'Tilt feat. Grace', but the Grace title was dropped for the release.

The group was dissolved in 1997, when Oakenfold was touring as a performance DJ more frequently and could not commit to recording.

The group were on Perfecto Records.

In 1999, "Not Over Yet" was re-released with new mixes by Planet Perfecto (another Oakenfold pseudonym) though the radio version was an edited version of the original 1995 Perfecto Radio Edit. All new versions / remixes on the re-release however, contained a combination of the original backing vocals by Patti Low and lead vocals by Dominique Atkins. It again reached the UK Top 20, peaking at number 16.^[4]

In 2007, "Not Over Yet" was reworked by the band Klaxons, and renamed "It's Not Over Yet", for their album Myths of the Near Future. In July 2011, new remixes of "Not Over Yet" were released by Perfecto.Also in december 2011 a new track for Grace (Dominique Atkins) was announced on tilt's official facebook page as being currently written.^[8]

[edit] See also

• List of number-one dance hits (United States)
• List of artists who reached number one on the US Dance chart

[edit] References