Not the Fat Boys, but I need to play more old school rap on the DVA…
After a month of shopping at Mecca every Monday, The Nest is burning the credit card and digging out the key that opens up everyone’s favorite music chest! It’s time once again to select another overripe fruit from the produce stand and take it to that self checkout from that clearance rack full of lesser remembered hits we like to call the Dusty Vinyl Archive! DJ Scratchy’s got a sale on slightly worn earworms today, while the Sponkies are sent out to fetch all the shopping carts off the lot the customers were too lazy to take to the corral. Cleanup on Aisle Three!
That love-it-or-hate-it concept of the boy band was quite popular at the bookends of the 1990’s. Acts like New Edition, New Kids on the Block, and Boys II Men kept the barely post-pubescent testosterone-fueled harmonies flowing from our boomboxes in the late 80’s and early 90’s, while young men like the Backstreet Boys, N*Sync and 98 Degrees sang their way into the new millennium.
Guess which one is gay and you win a prize!
But what about the grungy middle of this Oreo cookie that was filled with lots of eardrum shattering singing from Mariah Carey and more dead gangsta rappers than you can fill a bullet-ridden back alley with? America certainly offered up no boy bands to compete with Pearl Jam and P. Diddy for Top 40 radio airtime in the mid 90’s. And all Britain did was just flip the gender and give the world the Spice Girls……. right?
It’s boy band day at Glamour Shots.
Wrong! While America was smelling like teen spirit and somehow tolerating Celine Dion… a group of five young men was being formed in Manchester that went by the name of Take That. Though they were inspired by and modeled somewhat after the US hit group New Kids on the Block, Take That was told to take a hike by Americans who had no idea just how horrible our music of the 90’s actually was at the time. The quintet was huge everywhere else in the world, but they did manage to sneak one solitary hit of theirs onto the US charts…
“Back For Good” infiltrated the American Top 40 in 1995, peaking at #7… turning one of the world’s more popular boy bands into just another of our one hit wonders…. not that many 90’s enthusiasts even remember THIS song. It’s slow and ballady, but it’s a huge favorite of mine from a decade I’d usually rather forget. I landed upon this song only after considering a solo song by one of the members of this group during last month’s Mecca Muzak Mondays, but I’ll save that for the next time MMM reappears…
I wonder if Angel knows which song it is?
I want you back….. next Monday for another lost hit from the past!
Evil Squirrel's Nest 
I liked boy bands in the old days… mostly for the scandals and the great drama after they ran away in different directions after they were one direction or something like that…
More like One Dimension… most of them sound the same.
fun, fun!
Fun Fun Fun was a different “Boy” band!
))
I did like and still like the boy bands – great harmony.
That they have, even if they probably can’t play an instrument.
That was nice. I’ve never heard of them. Wow. I sort of avoid boy bands so this is a surprise. Pretty faces. Pretty voices. They’ve got it all. I hope some of them went on to do other things (I’ll have to look it up.) I always look forward to checking out what DJ Scratchy shares on Mondays.
Robbie Williams had a solo career after the band. The Mecca earworm I alluded to is his song “Angels.” You should check it out because I really think you’ll like it…
Nothing wrong with Boy Bands although I must say I do not recall this being played in my ‘Hood. Happy Labor Day Monday.
I don’t recall it either, but in 1995 I wasn’t listening to new stuff at all. Heard it on Music Choice about 15 years ago and never forgot it…
Remember that British boy band called The Insects or something like that? Oh yes – the Beatles. 😉
The Beatles? Never heard of them! Did they do any songs I would know?
😁
huge Robbie Fan here – and I like his Angry Young Man Version of Back for Good.
I saw this version referenced to in the Wiki article, but didn’t dare look it up. But since you posted it, I went ahead and watched. Ok, I enjoyed that more than I care to admit…
I thought you would. ☺️ [/shmaltzmode] “you lipstick marks on your coffee cup” [/shmaltzend] “wash it up” – cracks me up every time!
I was never a fan of “early” Take That. They had some fairly good songs more recently, though, now they’ve grown up a bit and started shaving and whatnot.
As for this song… bleurgh. I couldn’t even bear to actually play it. I already know it, to my shame.
Nothing like forty-something boy band music! Pretty soon their audience will be throwing adult diapers on stage at their concerts…
Not familiar with the group or the song but enjoyed the video….Not exactly the “dancing in the aisles” kind of music Mecca serves up to keep the worker bees motivated maybe but if you wanted to curl up on the shelves behind the toilet paper and have a snooze it would work!
Pam
We don’t allow anyone to sleep behind the TP! They have to use the luggage aisle like all the other customers do…