Top 20 Songs 1997 Fixed -
If you look at the , you won’t find a theme. You’ll find a nervous breakdown. Here is the story of that year, told through five unlikely battles. Battle 1: The Diva vs. The Spaceman At #4 was "You Were Meant for Me" by Jewel —a folk singer with a $20 guitar and a poem about loneliness. At #3 was "Foolish Games" also by Jewel . Yes, she occupied two spots in the top five, beating everyone except Puff Daddy and Elton John. Her music was quiet, acoustic, and vulnerable. It was the sound of a girl in a coffee shop.
And at #18: —a murder ballad set to a cheerful acoustic guitar. She won Record of the Year at the Grammys. Then she disappeared. The Final Oddity The #5 song of 1997 was "Un-Break My Heart" by Toni Braxton . A power ballad so dramatic, so soaked in string sections and vocal runs, that it felt like a Broadway death scene. It was the last gasp of the "adult contemporary" diva before Britney Spears and boy bands bulldozed the landscape in 1998. The Moral of the Story If you listen to the Top 20 of 1997 today, you’ll notice something strange: there is no "sound of 1997." There’s a dead princess’s tribute next to a song about a meth-fueled threesome ("Semi-Charmed Life"). There’s a 12-year-old’s falsetto next to a grieving widow’s wail. There’s a kazoo.
In late 1996, the music industry was panicking. Grunge was dead (Kurt Cobain had been gone for two years), and the nihilistic tantrum of Marilyn Manson and Nine Inch Nails was too dark for radio. Executives didn’t know what the future sounded like. top 20 songs 1997
1997 was the last year the music industry had no idea what to do. So it just played everything. And somehow, that was glorious.
But 1997 also gave us the anti-Spice Girl. At #20 was . A rock song with the chorus: "I’m a bitch, I’m a lover, I’m a child, I’m a mother." Radio played it constantly, often bleeping the title while playing the song. The cognitive dissonance was perfect. Battle 4: The One-Hit Wonder Graveyard This is where the chart gets weird. #10: "Where Have All the Cowboys Gone?" by Paula Cole . A feminist anti-cowboy song with a kazoo solo. #14: "Semi-Charmed Life" by Third Eye Blind . A bouncy, doo-doo-doo-doo’d pop hit that was secretly about meth addiction. #16: "Barely Breathing" by Duncan Sheik . A song so quiet you had to turn your car stereo to max to hear it. If you look at the , you won’t find a theme
None of these artists would ever have a top 20 hit again. 1997 was a hit-and-run. You got your 15 minutes, then vanished. At #15 was "Everlong" by Foo Fighters . Wait, no—that's a lie. "Everlong" peaked at #3 on the Modern Rock chart, but on the Hot 100? It didn't even crack the top 40. The future of rock (Dave Grohl) was languishing while "Tubthumping" by Chumbawamba (#17) was a massive hit. Yes, the song with "I get knocked down, but I get up again" was more popular than any Foo Fighters song in 1997.
Tension: 1997 couldn’t decide if it wanted to mourn or dance. At #6 was "I'll Be Missing You" by Puff Daddy & Faith Evans . A eulogy for The Notorious B.I.G. (murdered that March) set to the sample of The Police’s "Every Breath You Take." It was grief as a Billboard hit. Battle 1: The Diva vs
However, lurking at #2 was something alien: . Three blonde brothers aged 11, 14, and 16. A bubblegum pop song with a nonsensical chorus ("MMMBop, ba duba dop") and a guitar riff that sounded like a sugar rush. Critics called it a one-hit wonder. Instead, it became the most optimistic earworm of the decade.
