Before achieving Top Five placements on the pop, R&B, and dance charts in early 1991, Tara Kemp had already contributed vocals to Valery’s obscure 12" single “Heat of Your Touch,” a track produced by Tuhin Roy. The Bay Area native, signed to Irving Azoff’s Giant label under its Warner Bros. distribution deal, subsequently teamed with Roy as her chief collaborator on songwriting and production for a self-titled debut album. Ahead of that album’s arrival came “Hold You Tight,” Kemp’s clearest commercial breakthrough, whose polished yet gritty texture evoked a more modestly financed take on Soul II Soul with a singer in the lineage of Teena Marie. Later singles failed to replicate that broad crossover impact, although “Piece of My Heart” reached the pop Top Ten. Kemp also placed a track on the Beverly Hills 90210 soundtrack and issued the independent single “Come Closer” in 1994, yet no follow-up album appeared. Over time “Heat of Your Touch” gained cult status among freestyle collectors, with original pressings commanding prices in the hundreds of dollars.
