One Hit Wonders of the 90s (Part 40)

Hello, dear reader. I have a favour to ask you. The original post begins after all of the asterisks, if you want to skip this.

Now that the One Hit Wonders of the 90s series is over, I'm not going to be doing my weekly revisiting of all these posts (I had to do that to add the new post to the bottom). Thus, I won't be able to catch any broken picture links or deleted videos any more. Yet I want these posts to be as good as possible.

Please, if you happen upon one of these posts, or if you take a walk through a whole bunch of them, let me know if you find anything that doesn't work. You can leave a comment, or you can send me a message using that handy "Contact Me" page linked above.

Also, feel free to let me know what you think of the post or any of the videos!

Thank you.

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Forty weeks.

A lot can happen in 40 weeks. Hell, a baby can be conceived *and* born in that time!

And in that time, I've conceived and birthed the monstrosity that is known as the one-hit wonders of the 90s list. Yes, my dear reader, you've been the witness to history. Not only have you seen me make somebody laugh (something that has never been done in the span of human existence...or, well, my existence, anyway), but you've also seen me complete a 40-week project without *any* gaps.

That's right, my plot to take over the world has had many starts and stops

but these posts have come out like clockwork.

We have now reached the end of the line. Week 40. The final edition of...

THE ONE HIT WONDERS OF THE 90S!!!!!!

We're gonna have a party!

But no silliness allowed!

Hey, that means you! Get out of here!

Stupid people who can't read the signs.

Now, I don't want you to overindulge or anything. Or I will take away your key...boards.

So why don't we put some music on? What would you like to hear? The greatest hits of William Hung? William Shatner does techno? The greatest dance classics of Luciano Povarotti?

Tough! You don't get to choose. This is my party. And I say we're going to listen to...

the final edition of the show! I'll bet you forgot that we're not done yet, didn't you?

As usual, you can find the list here. And, since this is the final edition, I really don't give a shit whether you go look or not.

Here we go!

1) Fastball: "Out of My Head" (#20)



My wife was a big fan of Fastball, so I heard a lot of their stuff early in our marriage. I had forgotten that this song was really their only hit. Actually, they had one other one ("The Way"), but Wikipedia says something like it was only on the Top 100 "Airplay" chart that they hit #4 (whatever the hell that means).

I really do like this song, and the video's pretty cool too. How can you go wrong with family memories?

Ok, maybe if you're the Manson family, but other than that?

Here's "The Way," which is my favourite Fastball song, and the one I would have thought would be their biggest hit (and it was, if you go by "airplay" charts, and maybe we just all should just for our own piece of mind?)



2) Lou Bega: "Mambo No. 5" (#3)


5Lou Bega - Mambo Number 5
Uploaded by djoik. - Explore more music videos.

Anybody who was listening to pop music at the time knows this song, as it was *everywhere*. Literally. I think I found it in my clothes hamper one night (I didn't bother to ask what it was doing there. I just picked it up on a piece of paper and threw it outside. You know, because I can't kill any of God's creatures. At least it's not as icky as a spider, anyway).

This is ultimately a silly song about *lots* of women, all who seem perfectly all right with being one of "the group" of Lou's ladies. Or at least he's paying them lots to smile at him and shake their booty for him.

And there is *lots* of booty in this video! I was having KC & the Sunshine Band flashbacks.

No, not from the music, you idiot!

Whoops. I didn't mean to call you that. Please, come back! It...it...it was the booze from the party that made me do it. It will never happen again.

As an aside, I've never wanted to be a trumpet so badly in my life. Whew!

I just love the music in this song. The words are pretty worthless and silly, but you can really dance to the music. In fact, this might be the theme song for our last episode party. I'll just try and make up my own words.

No, don't wait up.

3) Len: "Steal My Sunshine" (#9)



(Yay, Vevo!)

This song was *so* overplayed when it was popular that I quickly became tired of it. It really overstayed its welcome, like when Uncle Lou comes to live with you for a while because Aunt Helen threw his worthless ass out, and you keep running into him on his nightly naked jaunts to the toilet?

Ok, maybe not *that* bad (Uncle Lou is hard to beat), but you know what I mean.

That being said, I haven't heard the song in a while, and now that I've been removed from it for a while, it's actually not that bad. The beat is kind of infectious and the beach imagery in the video is pretty cool. I would suggest turning down the sound if you watch it more than once to get out of the Winter doldrums, though, as otherwise the song might just put you back into that mood.

4) Ideal: "Get Gone" (#13)



We can't leave the 90s without one of these musical groups!

Sorry buddy, but those earrings along with that jacket? It...uh...just doesn't work. Let's leave it at that. It looks like a cat exploded on it.

Maybe I shouldn't make fun. Maybe it did? That would actually be kind of traumatic, wouldn't it? Not to mention pissing the cat off.

Yeah, kind of like that.

It seems to be the formula, though. Get 2-4 great looking guys, come up with some really soulful songs, rinse, and repeat.

Sadly for some, the "repeat" part became the hurdle they couldn't get over.

Is there anything to set this song or this group apart from any of the others? I can't think of anything.

I guess Ideal followed its own advice after this song.

5) Clint Black & Lisa Hartman Black: "When I Said I Do" (#31)



It's another part of the Country invasion!!! These people are like cockroaches: you stamp out a couple of them, and then you find another one deeper in your house. This one went to #31! Away with you! Away!!!!

It's Country, so of course it's sappy as all hell. You know that you either get sappy love song or silly (sometimes both!). They also seem to love real-life married couples doing duets too.

Yeah, yeah. It's a beautiful song and all that. But once again, I have no idea why this song made the crossover but none of Black's others did.

A burble in the space-time continuum?

Maybe!!!

6) Kevin Edmonds: "24/7" (#10)



(Yay, Vevo!)

Wow, the end of the decade is bringing us an example of *everything* from the 90s!

Ok, this video did *not* need the Bonnie & Clyde motif. And the video's a total indictment of the police! I mean, really. Ten cars following them down a lonely desert road, and they lose him and his companion? Are they incompetent? On the take? Stupid?

That being said, Edmonds may be kind of hunky and everything, but he's no Bandit.

Wow, did I just make an "old folks" statement? "Everything was better in my day, Sonny! Eh? What's that? Let me turn up my hearing aid."

7) Mo Thugs Family: "Ghetto Cowboy" (#15)



How can we end the decade without a rap hit? At least it's kind of original (though all of the bad words are being bleeped out, so you really can't get any idea of what he's "singing" about).

Give them props for that.

The song still sucks, though.

8) Marc Nelson: "15 Minutes" (#27)



And we end the decade on a soulful note with a song that's blatantly sexual! For some reason, this song just does not match a sci-fi video motif. What was the director thinking?

And what is that woman wearing? Plastic boobs? Is that what we're doomed to see in the future?

Ok, I'm listening to the words to this song, and they're actually *very* bad. All I've got is 15 minutes. "No time to talk. Just come and bring me off." Um, excuse me??????

Yeah, sister! You tell him!!!

They have devices for that, don't you know. Besides, she's busy making you breakfast. And cleaning the house (or do you call that the "Living Pod?") And what have *you* got to do that's so important, Mister High and Mighty Soul Singer????? Fifteen minutes?

Did your hand fall off?

Lady, I feel for you. Trapped in that Habitat Dwelling with a loser like this guy.

I don't think I want to know what's been edited out of this song.

*shiver*

And there you go! We have now come to the end of the decade. The 1990s went in cycles, starting with some decent one-hit wonders, then sinking into some kind of rap funk that just made doing these (and perhaps reading these) kind of depressing. Then we got out of that in the later 90s and the music quality vastly improved.

Soul music one-hit wonders seem to be sprinkled all over the decade, as artists tried to capitalize on the success of groups like Boyz II Men, Bell Biv Devoe, and the like.

The musical battlefield was littered with the decaying remains of these artists, successful for a brief moment in time, but then forgotten.

Or, sometimes even worse, remembered for only the one thing despite trying to become more than that.

Of course, some of them deserved to become one-hit wonders, and you wonder how even *that* song became popular.

What have I learned after 40 weeks of this? Not to mention all of the 80s ones I have done?

That it actually takes a lot to make your ears bleed.

Oh, you were expecting something about "perseverance" and "regularity" and the like? I did learn those too.

But the ear-bleeding thing is the most important part.

Speaking of "regularity," I'm going to take next week off. It's been 40 weeks (actually, 39 weeks, as I did the first two episodes in the same weekend) of doing this every Sunday (or every weekend, if I had to do a Saturday one) without fail, and I want a break.

And then....



We move on to the 2000s!

That's right. We're going to just keep on moving forward, never looking back (because this might be gaining on you)

And since we're now in the 2010s decade, I can safely do a 2000s decade countdown.

Will the music be any better?

Can it get any worse?

Don't answer that.

Those of you who have stayed around through all 40 episodes, I thank you very much. I hope you've enjoyed these as much as I've enjoyed writing them. You can leave your comments (and your cash, because I've got bills, you know) at the bottom of this post to let me know what you've thought of them.

I appreciate my regular commenters, and I hope you stick with me through the next series!!

So the party is winding down, the bouncers are starting to let any riff-raff in (both this guy:

and this guy

and I have mastered the "pictures in parentheses" grammatical conundrum!!!! I rule!!!!!) and it's time to call it a night.



Don't forget to clean up after yourselves, though. On this blog's budget, I can't afford cleaners.

I also have some...personnel issues to deal with.



He is so fired.

See you in two weeks!



One-Hit Wonders of the 90s
Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4
Part 5
Part 6
Part 7
Part 8
Part 9
Part 10
Part 11
Part 12
Part 13
Part 14
Part 15
Part 16
Part 17
Part 18
Part 19
Part 20
Part 21
Part 22
Part 23
Part 24
Part 25
Part 26
Part 27
Part 28
Part 29
Part 30
Part 31
Part 32
Part 33
Part 34
Part 35
Part 36
Part 37
Part 38
Part 39
Part 40