| "Twenty Foreplay" | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
 | ||||
| Single by Janet Jackson | ||||
| from the album Design of a Decade: 1986–1996 | ||||
| Released | December 5, 1995 | |||
| Recorded | July–August 1995 | |||
| Studio | Flyte Tyme (Edina, Minnesota) | |||
| Genre | Funk | |||
| Length |
| |||
| Label | A&M | |||
| Songwriter(s) |
| |||
| Producer(s) |
| |||
| Janet Jackson singles chronology | ||||
| ||||
| Music video | ||||
| "Twenty Foreplay" on YouTube | ||||
"Twenty Foreplay" is a song by American singer-songwriter Janet Jackson from her first greatest hits album, Design of a Decade: 1986–1996 (1995). Written and produced by Jackson and Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis as one of the two new songs on the album, it was sent to radio stations in the United States as the second single on December 5, 1995, while being issued as the third single on March 25, 1996 in the United Kingdom, by A&M Records. The song is a play on the word "foreplay" and "24 hours a day", and has an unusual musical structure, containing "over-the-top" lyrics that find Jackson singing to a boyfriend.
"Twenty Foreplay" received positive reviews from music critics, yet was unable to enter the Billboard Hot 100 or the Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs charts in the US due to the lack of a commercial release. Overseas, it achieved moderate success commercially, reaching the top 40 in Australia, Canada, and the UK. The song's black-and-white music video was directed by Keir McFarlane, and features Jackson visually inspired by actress Dorothy Dandridge, living the glamorous Hollywood life. Once, the song was performed on the State of the World Tour in 2017.