My last Top Songs article was about the three top songs of June 18th 1983. This piece is about the top trio from the week of June 19 ten years later. The 1990s was obviously a different decade than the 1980s. Tastes in music and pop culture changed, almost drastically. Black music (Hip-Hop and R&B) became the most dominant genre in terms of sales and radio play, followed closely by alternative Rock. The three songs on my list below are all by African American artists.
Also, check out my thoughts about these songs from back in the day, and what I think of them now in 2023.
1. That’s The Way Love Goes. Janet Jackson. Me in 1993: This song was fantastic, and the hit Janet needed. The sound and the vibe of music changed from Jackson’s 80s heyday, and she needed to show that she could hang in a new funky era. She did, and then some, as That’s The Way Love Goes took over the nation. The single became a mega-smash, and many Janet fans consider it to be the best single she’s ever released. This sexy and slammin’ cut got played at every party, nightclub, and cookout in the Summer of 93.
2. Me in 2023: This song is one of the best of the 90’s and the best of all time when it comes to R&B and pop music. It’s impossibly and simultaneously sexy and fonky. It’s one of (the song’s producers) Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis’s best compositions and arguably Jackson’s best performed song of her career. I thought this song was amazing 30 years ago, and my opinion hasn’t changed since then.
2. Weak. SWV. Me in 1993: “It’s a nice song. Girls really like it. Hey man, play that new LL Cool J tape!”
Me in 2023: Weak is a beautiful song. It’s one of the best ballads of the 90s and of the last few decades. If this comes on (anywhere), and you don’t sing the hook out loud…you’re a cadaver.
3. Knockin’ Da Boots. H-Town. Me in 1993: I thought the song was silly, but it was great to slow dance to at college parties and nightclubs.
Me in 2023: I’ve mellowed on the song since 1993. It’s actually a fun slow song (you could call this a ballad, but it’s a little too funky and hard hitting to call it that. So, as we like to classify songs like Knockin’ Da Boots at the Black Delegation, I’ll describe it as a slow song) to listen to. It was meant to be entertaining, and it is. It’s a song I now listen to with a smirk; I don’t take it seriously, it was great to dance to in the 90s, and I’d sing along to it at a cookout.
