"Brown Sugar" (D'Angelo)

It was summer 1995, and I'd come home late from hanging out with friends.  We'd been drinking cappuccinos at the local coffeehouse all evening, because that's what you did in the 90s, and I was too wired to go to bed.  So I turned on MTV (because that's what you did in the 90s) and sat there mindlessly watching music videos, trying to let the caffeine wear off.
Anyway, in the middle of a lineup of hedonistic gangsta rap and gloom-tastic grunge clips, here comes this video set in a smoky jazz club with this young cat crooning something about brown sugar.  And damned if he didn't sound like the reincarnation of Marvin Gaye.
There were elements of 70s acid jazz and vintage soul—throwback, but not in a ham-fisted way.  There also was this swagger and flow that felt a little hip-hop without resorting to money-cash-hoes clichés.  It was like he'd figured out the perfect mix of components that groups like The Brand New Heavies and Tony! Toni! Toné! had been toying with for years.
And then to find out the dude had written, arranged, and performed the track and 95% of the entire Brown Sugar album himself?  Well, that took the cake.  I was an instant fan.
I can't overstate how much this one song affected my taste in music at the time and thereafter.  After hearing "Brown Sugar," I pretty much stopped listening to any mainstream pop music and sought out anything that felt soulful, organic, and slightly off-the-radar.  I also started playing keyboards differently, adding in jazzier cluster chords and more blue notes when I'd solo.  (Hell, I even convinced the members of my alt-rock band to do a jam built around "Brown Sugar" for a small live show that we played at a friend's music store!)
It's one of the few tracks from the 90s that I can still play without a tinge of irony.