The 90's Billboard #1s Rate: 1990-1994 - AND WE ARE DONE
- Thread starter Ironheade
- Start date
D
Deleted member 26234
Really? Are you sure? What are you doing to me? More Than Words can't be out right now?
@londonrain not sure about the R&B-thing but yes Madonna (Justify My Love) has to go.
@londonrain not sure about the R&B-thing but yes Madonna (Justify My Love) has to go.
I swear if All The Man I Need goes anytime soon I am throwing one hell of wobbly.
Not you guys rating this slimy song by f**king Extreme higher than the legitimate bop by Mr. Big.
londonrain
Staff member
Aw, you guys.
More Than Words was instrumental in helping teenage me to understand how harmonies worked and how to perform and balance them. I’ve been arranging harmonies (both a cappella and accompanied) for small groups and choirs for over half my life and, although I did learn arranging in my music theory lessons, More Than Words was really key to understanding how that worked in pop.
More Than Words was instrumental in helping teenage me to understand how harmonies worked and how to perform and balance them. I’ve been arranging harmonies (both a cappella and accompanied) for small groups and choirs for over half my life and, although I did learn arranging in my music theory lessons, More Than Words was really key to understanding how that worked in pop.
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Hey, at least Nirvana and Faith No More can enjoy a top 10 hit apiece! Really, that move was always far more reflected in album sales (and airplay - alternative rock was perhaps the genre hardest hit by the "no physical singles = no Hot 100" rule) than it was on the singles charts; just for one example, Soundgarden's Badmotorfinger went double platinum, even though it had no singles that even made top 40 on the rock charts.
(Extreme actually adapted fairly well to the alternative era, all told. III Sides to Every Story went gold despite being released in September of 1992, right when grunge was absolutely the new hotness. An interesting if perhaps over-ambitious record, that.)
I get that, but you see, when there's already been The Everly Brothers.....that's absolute heaven for harmonies.
It's a sweet song though, it feels more genuine than, say Mr Big or any of the other hair-metal-goes-acoustic stuff of the era.
Oh, I preferred III Sides To Every Story as an album. Stop The World was sublime. Tragic Comic had the groove, but naff words.
londonrain
Staff member
Yes, but it was a current song that used simple two-part harmonies brilliantly. Obviously the mid-nineties and late nineties were better for more complex harmonies as boy bands and girl bands took off and started to use them - I could go on about the counterpoint and harmonies in We’ve Got It Goin’ on by the Backstreet Boys, or the complexity of the vocal arrangement in Boyz II Men’s Thank You - but as a simple but beautiful starter, More Than Words was perfect.
I still have a recording of me and five of my friends singing a four-part vocal arrangement of More Than Words when we were about fourteen. Basically we took the two main vocal lines and built full chords around them.
he/him
I love how @Ironheade continually gives us the tea on all these 90s acts that you wouldn’t expect to have such rich histories or backstories. Suddenly the ignoramus is me!
Ladies and gentlemen... it's a big 'un. For the first time, we lose a year's biggest hit, and I can't think of one more deserving.
"Now, now, the Canadian government has apologized for Bryan Adams on several occasions!"
66. Everything I Do (I Do It For You) - Bryan Adams
Average: 5.892
Highest score: 5 x 10 (@Sprockrooster , @MollieSwift21 , @P Grandson , @Filippa , @Conan )
Lowest score: 4 x 0 (@Ray , @Empty Shoebox , @soratami , @ohnostalgia )
Weeks at #1: 7 consecutive Hot 100, 8 consecutive airplay
Year-End Hot 100: #1 (1991)
Look at those statistics. Seven weeks at the top of the Hot 100 and eight on top of the airplay charts. Most successful single of the year. Certified three times platinum. And of course, in the UK, it still holds the record for the longest consecutive run at the top of the charts – sixteen weeks, a record that remains completely unchallenged at that (a single tear for Mariah, please). Essentially, it served as the first massive success of the big soundtrack ballad that every big blockbuster 90's movie had to have - "I Will Always Love You", "My Heart Will Go On", every subsequent Bryan Adams song, you know the drill. Was it, perhaps, in any way justified that “Everything I Do (I Do It For You)” should have such a level of success?
Hell no it isn't! The song's dreadful! And it's still only the third-worst Bryan Adams soundtrack ballad!
The only reason it made it as high as it did for me (a 2.75) is that I actually quite like the piano opening, and it's a relief to hear a piano that's not electric at this point. Also, because it's not a godawful cover. But beyond that, it all goes wrong. Firstly... this is a Mutt Lange production? For the man who laboured so hard over Hysteria a few years before, it's downright depressing to hear how slapdash and empty this one is – the actual mix is so sugary it makes me mildly queasy, but all the guitars except for the solo sound like Mutt playing a Casio with his testicles, the strings (contributed by the normally not nearly this bad Michael Kamen) barely do anything of interest, and the electronic drums sound awful, overly loud yet flat and empty. Even in the moments where “Everything I Do” tries to build to a bigger, grander climax, there's barely any dynamics, it just has no impact, and it will almost certainly get deflated by the song going back to the sap quickly. And as for that guitar solo... yep, it definitely doth protest too much. Bryan, you're an AC balladeer at this point, not a rocker, so this sounds just as out-of-place as it did on Michael Bolton's songs. Well, I suppose it's appropriate given that he's stuck with a melody that's almost as turgid as anything Bolton did, one that is perhaps somewhat memorable, yet is so sappy and snail-paced that it certainly isn't anything that I would want to remember.
And these lyrics, they're just terrible. They sound like Bryan just regurgitated the Big Book of Love Song Cliches, run through without a first thought. What really gets me about them, though, is two things: one, the faux-courtly phrasings of the lyrics and attempts at some sort of medievalist gallantry, which only serves to enhance the sliminess and insincerity; two, the promises of eternal devotion and him doing EVERYTHING for this girl, which ring completely hollow. “I'd die for you”?! No, Bryan, you wouldn't. We can tell because you blandly croaked through it in your dull-as-ditchwater voice, unable to summon up the tiniest hint of passion or devotion or anything. And that, like so many other ballads I've discussed here, is what kills it – insincerity. And overall, I have no idea how it's hung on this long, but good fucking riddance!
Spiral (9) - Bryan Adams is a massive guilty pleasure of mine. I started enjoying his music when he released When You're Gone with Mel C. And he has a few amazing ballads under his belt. This being the ultimate one of course. I don't care if it got overplayed, to me it's a great experience everytime I listen to it. (Oh, hey? You like stuff!)
Sprockrooster (10) - Powerful song. (Insert @ohnostalgia shading you here.)
Filippa (10) - Who could not love this song? (Hi there. - Ed.) When was love ever expressed more gallantly and a huskier voice? What a melody!
GimmeWork (9) - OMG I had completely forgotten about The Robin Hood song!!! LOVE IT! As far as power ballads go this one is up there.
berserkboi (8.25) - Classic emotive Bryan, not completely in my wheelhouse although he does manage those notes quite well? (I like the question mark there.)
Rooneyboy (8) - It is a lovely song, but I wouldn’t mind if I never heard it again.
iheartpoptarts (4) - ‘Heaven’ is the Bryan Adams ballad that doesn’t suck. (She speaks the truth. - Ed.) Sorry about this one. (Seriously, who was still buying this song after fifteen weeks?!)
WowWowWowWow (6) - I think Bryan is the same for me as Bon Jovi, where I prefer the bops to the ballads. Also six and a half minutes of this is torture. Radio edit please! (Which is why the radio edit was my video link. I feel like I should compensate everyone who listened to the album version somehow.)
DJHazey (2) - I had a 4 lined up, but this song just freakin' drags on like forever.
ohnoitsnathan (6) - HATED this one with a passion at the time, but now can stomach it. The "there's no love like your love..." bit in the middle is really the only highlight. (What gets me about that bit is how he follows it... "there's nowhere unless you're there". Really, dude? Ran out of time to finish the lyrics, did you?)
londonrain (6.5) - I got profoundly sick of this song after it was played to death at the time, but after a nice long break from it I’ve found I really enjoy it again. Brandy’s highly unnecessary cover is still better, though. (...Well, now I know a Brandy cover of "Everything I Do" is a thing that exists.)
Empty Shoebox (0) - Urgh. [vomiting noises] (Get that the hell off my carpet!)
Ray (0) - EVIL INCARNATE 666. (And so it goes at 66! COINCIDENCE???)
japanbonustrack (3) - *yawn*
mung_bean (2.5) - Never liked this, sorry. (No apology necessary!)
Hudweiser (4) - The summer of Bryan. To quote Linda Hamilton around the same time: “Why. Won’t. You. Just. Fucking. Die?” (TERMINATED.)
Also Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves was fucking wank and the only good part of it was Alan Rickman hamming it up. So there's that.
"Now, now, the Canadian government has apologized for Bryan Adams on several occasions!"
66. Everything I Do (I Do It For You) - Bryan Adams
Average: 5.892
Highest score: 5 x 10 (@Sprockrooster , @MollieSwift21 , @P Grandson , @Filippa , @Conan )
Lowest score: 4 x 0 (@Ray , @Empty Shoebox , @soratami , @ohnostalgia )
Weeks at #1: 7 consecutive Hot 100, 8 consecutive airplay
Year-End Hot 100: #1 (1991)
Look at those statistics. Seven weeks at the top of the Hot 100 and eight on top of the airplay charts. Most successful single of the year. Certified three times platinum. And of course, in the UK, it still holds the record for the longest consecutive run at the top of the charts – sixteen weeks, a record that remains completely unchallenged at that (a single tear for Mariah, please). Essentially, it served as the first massive success of the big soundtrack ballad that every big blockbuster 90's movie had to have - "I Will Always Love You", "My Heart Will Go On", every subsequent Bryan Adams song, you know the drill. Was it, perhaps, in any way justified that “Everything I Do (I Do It For You)” should have such a level of success?
Hell no it isn't! The song's dreadful! And it's still only the third-worst Bryan Adams soundtrack ballad!
The only reason it made it as high as it did for me (a 2.75) is that I actually quite like the piano opening, and it's a relief to hear a piano that's not electric at this point. Also, because it's not a godawful cover. But beyond that, it all goes wrong. Firstly... this is a Mutt Lange production? For the man who laboured so hard over Hysteria a few years before, it's downright depressing to hear how slapdash and empty this one is – the actual mix is so sugary it makes me mildly queasy, but all the guitars except for the solo sound like Mutt playing a Casio with his testicles, the strings (contributed by the normally not nearly this bad Michael Kamen) barely do anything of interest, and the electronic drums sound awful, overly loud yet flat and empty. Even in the moments where “Everything I Do” tries to build to a bigger, grander climax, there's barely any dynamics, it just has no impact, and it will almost certainly get deflated by the song going back to the sap quickly. And as for that guitar solo... yep, it definitely doth protest too much. Bryan, you're an AC balladeer at this point, not a rocker, so this sounds just as out-of-place as it did on Michael Bolton's songs. Well, I suppose it's appropriate given that he's stuck with a melody that's almost as turgid as anything Bolton did, one that is perhaps somewhat memorable, yet is so sappy and snail-paced that it certainly isn't anything that I would want to remember.
And these lyrics, they're just terrible. They sound like Bryan just regurgitated the Big Book of Love Song Cliches, run through without a first thought. What really gets me about them, though, is two things: one, the faux-courtly phrasings of the lyrics and attempts at some sort of medievalist gallantry, which only serves to enhance the sliminess and insincerity; two, the promises of eternal devotion and him doing EVERYTHING for this girl, which ring completely hollow. “I'd die for you”?! No, Bryan, you wouldn't. We can tell because you blandly croaked through it in your dull-as-ditchwater voice, unable to summon up the tiniest hint of passion or devotion or anything. And that, like so many other ballads I've discussed here, is what kills it – insincerity. And overall, I have no idea how it's hung on this long, but good fucking riddance!
Spiral (9) - Bryan Adams is a massive guilty pleasure of mine. I started enjoying his music when he released When You're Gone with Mel C. And he has a few amazing ballads under his belt. This being the ultimate one of course. I don't care if it got overplayed, to me it's a great experience everytime I listen to it. (Oh, hey? You like stuff!)
Sprockrooster (10) - Powerful song. (Insert @ohnostalgia shading you here.)
Filippa (10) - Who could not love this song? (Hi there. - Ed.) When was love ever expressed more gallantly and a huskier voice? What a melody!
GimmeWork (9) - OMG I had completely forgotten about The Robin Hood song!!! LOVE IT! As far as power ballads go this one is up there.
berserkboi (8.25) - Classic emotive Bryan, not completely in my wheelhouse although he does manage those notes quite well? (I like the question mark there.)
Rooneyboy (8) - It is a lovely song, but I wouldn’t mind if I never heard it again.
iheartpoptarts (4) - ‘Heaven’ is the Bryan Adams ballad that doesn’t suck. (She speaks the truth. - Ed.) Sorry about this one. (Seriously, who was still buying this song after fifteen weeks?!)
WowWowWowWow (6) - I think Bryan is the same for me as Bon Jovi, where I prefer the bops to the ballads. Also six and a half minutes of this is torture. Radio edit please! (Which is why the radio edit was my video link. I feel like I should compensate everyone who listened to the album version somehow.)
DJHazey (2) - I had a 4 lined up, but this song just freakin' drags on like forever.
ohnoitsnathan (6) - HATED this one with a passion at the time, but now can stomach it. The "there's no love like your love..." bit in the middle is really the only highlight. (What gets me about that bit is how he follows it... "there's nowhere unless you're there". Really, dude? Ran out of time to finish the lyrics, did you?)
londonrain (6.5) - I got profoundly sick of this song after it was played to death at the time, but after a nice long break from it I’ve found I really enjoy it again. Brandy’s highly unnecessary cover is still better, though. (...Well, now I know a Brandy cover of "Everything I Do" is a thing that exists.)
Empty Shoebox (0) - Urgh. [vomiting noises] (Get that the hell off my carpet!)
Ray (0) - EVIL INCARNATE 666. (And so it goes at 66! COINCIDENCE???)
japanbonustrack (3) - *yawn*
mung_bean (2.5) - Never liked this, sorry. (No apology necessary!)
Hudweiser (4) - The summer of Bryan. To quote Linda Hamilton around the same time: “Why. Won’t. You. Just. Fucking. Die?” (TERMINATED.)
Also Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves was fucking wank and the only good part of it was Alan Rickman hamming it up. So there's that.
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I ended up giving this a rather generous 9.5 - I think because I knew it would suffer from being rather marmite here. I didn't really get why it was so popular at the time and was truly sick of it after FOUR MONTHS at UK #1 but it's worn better than most blockbuster themes of the time.
Slightly homoerotic Christian Slater
Alan Rickman campery
What's not to love about that film?
OK so Maid Marian was godawful and it will always be inexplicable that Kevin Costner even had a career in acting, let alone was so massive in the 90s.
Slightly homoerotic Christian Slater
Alan Rickman campery
What's not to love about that film?
OK so Maid Marian was godawful and it will always be inexplicable that Kevin Costner even had a career in acting, let alone was so massive in the 90s.
londonrain
Staff member
Hey, no need shading from @ohnostalgia as I think the issue stands with Ryan Adams?
You can keep Brandy, this is the best cover of the song:
londonrain
Staff member
She gave this a zero as well, so I suspect it’s a case of whynotboth.gif.
No, it's more about the score disparity.
(...Wait, what's the deal with Ryan Adams? I mean, I know the guy's a jackass, but I do like me the sane part of his career [pre-2009].)
Well, 1989 aside, he also covered @ohnostalgia favourite song from her favourite act (I think). So no, me not touching him hehe.
Bryan and Ryan share a birthday so that’s fun.
Robin Hood POT is shit and so is the song.
Robin Hood POT is shit and so is the song.