Our survey brings us now to 1997. Like the previous year, we have 11 songs to choose from, including Toni Braxton’s carryover. This year marks the last time a double A-side appears at #1 before Billboard changes its singles/album cuts policy, and what was for many years the best-selling single of all time to boot. We also have the only time I’m aware of that an artist scored not one but two posthumous #1s, along with a third song dedicated to that person.
Insert comment about how all these songs suck and you’re abstaining. Insert comment about how music used to be better and this is the worst year ever. Insert comment about how the best song of the year was some alternative song by Radiohead or something.
And once you’re done with that, tell us what your favorite is from this list.
Ugh. From this remove, I had to give it to Hanson, which is at least catchy (as is the Spice Girls song) and harkens back to '70s pre-teen hits (if not the Jackson 5, at least the Osmonds).
“Wannabe” kicks the asses of all the other songs. I missed all the pop songs of the 80s, and “Wannabe” was the first song in years that reminded me of a more fun era in pop music. The era of R&B ballads was really getting tiresome. “Mo Money Mo Problems” finishes a distant second place in the world-famous** Ponch8 Music Rating System.**
For the fourth year in a row, Boyz II Men finish in dead-ass last place. I liked some of their songs when the group was first popular, but they sure went downhill.
Easy, it’s gonna be one of the two Notorious B.I.G. songs. I still enjoy listening to them, which I can’t really say about any of the other songs. I ended up going with “Mo Money Mo Problems,” but “Hypnotize” is neck-and-neck with it.
Actually, I take back not enjoying listening to any of the other songs. “Can’t Nobody Hold Me Down” is also pretty awesome–I somehow glanced over it. Can’t stand “I’ll Be Missing You,” though. The Hanson and Spice Girls are fine bits of pop songwriting, but I don’t ever need to hear them again. And the Toni Braxton is good, too. Like I said in the follow-up, a pretty decent year after the last few.
“Most quickly recognizable” is really what the study was going for. Also, the study was in Europe, and I don’t think “MMMBop” was as big there. At least I don’t remember hearing it, while “Wannabe” was everywhere. Both reasonable, fun pop songs. Just a bit boring to me compared to some of the other options.
It’s a sign of the end times when you see Spice Girls on a list of songs and think they might be the best thing there.
1997 was a big year for me musically, though. I was up studying at 2 am, when my regular radio station would stop to play an album all the way through. They chose Dream Theater’s Images and Words (which is odd, since it was a 1992 release, and that station didn’t play any of those songs individually). I was hooked.
The '97 version was something that naturally struck a chord with a lot of people at the time, though it’s definitely grown dated now.
One good thing I’ll say in its credit is that I don’t recall ever having heard the original on the radio before '97 (and I listened to classic rock radio pretty much exclusively in those days), and after the new version came out, the original came into rotation and has stayed there pretty much to this day.
