i’ve been totally geeking out on obscure early 90’s r&b and pop music in the last few days, mostly because of this jezebel article. yes, while some of my contemporaries were discovering the beatles and zepplin at such a tender age, i was memorizing the dance to “if”, by janet jackson. i had recorded the video on our vcr… pause, rewind, play… pause, rewind, play… wondering how i could be like her. how i could be that sexy, and attract the attentions of the popular boys at school.
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i’ve always felt ashamed of my love of lame pop and r&b, being around so many music elitists over the last few years… until now. through the article, i see that other smart ladies my age loved the same stuff!! i feel so validated.
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well, it’s bringing back a lot of memories. i’ve been frantically downloading since saturday. listening to the songs, i almost feel like i’m back there – i’m instantly a 12-year-old again. walking around memories in my mind that i’ve linked with a particular song. isn’t it awesome how music does that? it’s a fountain of youth and a time machine.
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so, i’m going to share some of my favorite lame songs with you, via youtube, and tell some memories that i have associated with them. also, i will add that through the course of finding these videos, it was kind of hard to find ones that didn’t disable embedding.
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“fantasy” – mariah carey
if you were any girl growing up at any time in the 1990’s, you pretty much wanted to be mariah carey. this should make it the least embarrassing installment. however, it is still embarrassing to me, because i was that girl x100. every year, i would sing a mariah carey song in the school talent shows, regardless if i sounded good or not. of course i never practiced and refused vocal lessons, i was just convinced that if you were naturally good like her, you shouldn’t HAVE to practice! lol. (i still know people who think like this as adults.) i feel like subscribing to that thinking, and seeing its subsequent failures, is where i got my stage fright from. i always think i won’t do well before a performance, to this day. but she was my favorite for a long, long time, and i still feel like some traces of my vocal style are derived from her.
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the afforementioned “if” – janet jackson
i had a sick obsession with this song and video… it’s fucking awesome! it takes place in some sort of “futuristic” asian sex club. i’m soooo glad i found this version on youtube, because i remember they used to play this one on mtv all the time at first, then they switched to an all-dance version. this made it easier for me to learn the dance moves, but aggravated me because i missed the one with the sex-club storyline. i’ve never been able to find it until now! i wonder why they changed it? but anyway, i still remember/ can do the majority of the dance from this song. don’t test me.
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“too many walls” – cathy dennis
NOW we’re getting into the dirt a little. okay, so cathy dennis was never really a favorite growing up. but i find that listening to songs like “touch me” and “just another dream” now in life is really satisfying. they remind me of the time period of the early 90’s. not really being there, but just the idea of it. i think part of that is because these songs are often included in montages for things (shows, products) associated with the early 90’s. c.d. also remind me of beverly hills 90210 (which i loooved, but only the episodes with brenda in them), because she played at one of their proms or something.
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with this song of hers, though, it’s different. it reminds me of a very specific time of living on the poor side of town with my family. those years were probably some of the best of my life, despite the view that poverty always equals unhappiness. my parents were always around, and i was still young enough to like that fact. i remember my mom woke me up at night once, because this song came on the radio. she knew that i loved it but didn’t get to hear it often; it wasn’t played that much. also for some reason, we always thought it was tara kemp that sang it, and i just discovered yesterday that it was, in fact, cathy dennis.
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“finally” – ce ce peniston
omg, i HATE this version of this song, but stupid universal music doesn’t allow embedding of the normal one. go here if you want to hear the good version. but yeah! this song is FUCKING AMAZING, okay? i remember singing it with jillian harrison in 7th grade, while waiting in the gym for school to start. btw, why did they do that? they used to pile us into the gym, like cattle, until we could be directed to our classrooms. they didn’t just allow us to go to class ourselves. but yeah, so many good memories associated with this song. it’s a classic.
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“i wanna sex u up” – color me badd
alright, i’m just gonna put it out there. i love this song. i don’t even think i have any specific memories of it, or that i even liked it overly much back then. i think even when i was 11 i thought these guys were lame. but this is just a great, lame song. highlights include “we can do it till we both wake up,” and “making love until we drown.”
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“i wanna love you down” – jade
i gotta tell you guys, this was my ULTIMATE jam in 7th grade. i remember listening to q105 (the local radio station) for weeks – WEEKS waiting for it to play. the day it finally did, i scrambled my ass to the tape player and hit record as fast as i could. i think i still have that mix tape. i’d play it over and over. it reminded me of jacob lamb, a boy who i was desperately in love with – just the first of many unavailable boys over the years that i’d form an obsession over, and never actually consummate anything with.
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“knockin the boots” – h town
on the same mix-tape of “love you down,” brings back the same feeling… having a growing interest in sex, but stuck in my room, listening to songs about it rather than going out on dates. i had this notion that everyone else was out there, having this big life, having boyfriends, kissing, doing all these verboten things, and i wasn’t. wtf. we were 12. it couldn’t have been that exciting.
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“every heartbeat” – amy grant
pure popness. so catchy. check out that huge shirt! she’s a total geek in this video, but i remember thinking she was really cool and relating to her. it reminds me, again, of the time living on the poor side of town. there were 2 other families in the apartment building that we were all friends with. there were tons of kids down the street that we would ride bikes with. i would make up dances and teach them to the other girls. i remember one time, we had the most gigantic game of manhunt EVAR. i was really sad when we moved away.
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i could go on and on forever with these. i’ve unearthed so many gems in the past few days. in fact, if anyone wants me to make them a giant early 90’s mix tape and send it to them, i’d be glad to.
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what are your favorite lame songs of the 90’s?
