When Hanson celebrated their 21 anniversary as a band, they did a line of craft beers called "MmmmHops." This is the reason that I will always appreciate the band.
@@commentfreely5443 Thriller is the #1 studio album of all time, The Eagles Greatest Hits is the #1album only if you include compilations in the mix. But the Eagles album sold more. Edit: The Eagles Greatest Hits only sold more than Thriller in America i believe now, not total units overall. That still remains Thrillers title.
I used to have a boyfriend who lived directly behind a theatre that hosted lots of famous bands. One night we were walking home and the alley was PACKED with women, ranging from their teens to mid-thirties, clustered around something. As we approached to get in the front door, I saw it was the Hanson brothers, almost 20 years older than I remembered them, signing autographs and snapping selfies for their fans. I'm not into Hanson, but it was clear they were incredibly kind and generous to their fans, who loved them in return.
And the fact that they have not done some really big shady shit that got them plastered all over media is also rather amazing. They seem like cool people. And If Weird Al works with them I like em :D
I have a friend that has seen them over 20 times. She said their shows are mostly 30+ year old women and their children. She always takes her kids to go see them. She always comes back from a show with lots of pictures and autographs.
I hated Hanson when Mmmbob was a huge hit. But now when I saw this video I have to respect them. Too many celebrities from 1990's have become just drug addicts or died.
I agree with Todd, it's sad they got labeled as teen idols because they are legitimate musicians. Heck how many teen icons could write their own music and play their own instruments? Most teen idol bands are manufactured by some old fat CEO.
Katie Baily Well Ricky Nelson was always pegged as a teeny bopper,even up to the day he died and Ricky Nelson was a great musician and a great songwriter,a good example of that would be "Garden Party" !!!
5SOS counts I think since they started out independently, but they have a lot of outside songwriters backing them and got famous because of touring with 1D.
Hanson also made an appearance on Weird Al's saturday morning show, and on the commentary Al strongly defends them as a real band, 'cause apparently he got a lot of hate for having them on.
I really feel like there should be more OHW episodes on "technically had more than one hit but no one actually remembers anything except for the one" bands.
It’s really interesting to see where Hanson fits in the evolution of popular music. At the beginning of the 90s we’d reached the maximum tolerance for ultra-slick synth pop with Milli Vanilli, who were seen as the ultimate sign of how phony an insincere mainstream pop was. We then get six years of grunge and gangsta rap because they’re more “authentic”, but they end up being so dark that the figureheads of both genres (Cobain, Biggie, 2Pac) are dead by the middle of the decade, at which point we DESPERATELY need happy pop music again.
*20 years later* >"Man this Kanye, Drake, and Taylor pop stuff is so fake and insincere, this new wave/Soundcloud rap is RAW" >*X and Nipsey get shot, Mac Miller and Lil Peep OD* >..........yo where dat Lil Nas X song at?
That's a really good observation. The rise and fall of the mainstream popularity of genres usually fluctuates in cycles of dark/real and happy/inauthentic. And that is usually predicated on the state of the social climate. I'd actually say that as of 2019 we are at the tale end of a happy/inauthentic wave and the darkness is starting to creep back in. So, I guess that we are just waiting on that big "Nirvana" moment to hit.
Also in the early 90s we had a recession and people generally were feeling less hopeful etc. by the mid to late 90s we had recovered and as it got closer to the year 2000 people had hope for the future. Along with mass adoption of the internet people were generally excited for what the new millennium had to offer
MMMbop is about how quickly things can go away. That's the whole point. Things can change in an "mmmbop," which is admittedly kind of a silly 90s way to say it, but it's definitely about something.
Yep, and considering Taylor wrote the lyrics when he was 11, that's pretty dang deep for an 11 year old! As someone who attempted to start a band at 8 years old with my best friend and tried writing songs for a few years, I can tell you we were not writing thoughtful reflections on the human condition, and how fleeting life is/how important it is to hold on to the things that matter.
Yeah, I was thrown off by that comment of his. A "little kid" writing and singing about how you might end up old and alone, with the realisation that everyone you ever knew and cared about are gone forever? That's not nothing, dude.
Technically they wrote the chorus first as just a little piece of vocalizing, and then they wrote the verses around it, but yes, the song is definitely about this and a lot of their songs were more than just the manufactured love songs of the day (shout out to Man From Milwaukee!)
@@joshuacoleman8000 holy shit, I'm not the only one who remembers this? Please tell when you remember the Disney "Hey Mickey" by Toni Basil and Mickey Mouse
Awesomepotamus 84 idk about that they technically had other hits even if all of them were completely forgettable. Although it would be pretty interesting if it turns out they actually did stuff after that.
Alan YaKnow doesn't Todd only do Hot 100 hits? If so I don't think it counts. Teenage Dirtbag wasn't on the Hot 100 at all. But yeah it's their only song to be on any US chart.
Alan YaKnow I have no clue lol. It was in this one movie called Loser I think, so that maybe had something to do with it. it was also a big hit in other countries though
Rage Against the Machine? seriously? Todd, some of your Patreon backers have no idea what a one hit wonder is and should be forced to pick out of a bag of songs you want to review.
It's not that Rage Against The Machine are unknown in the UK, or only remembered for that one song, it's specifically because it reached Number 1 thanks to an internet campaign to prevent the Christmas Number 1 spot being the latest Simon Cowell-backed X-Factor winner for (I think) the fourth year in a row. It's like the one time in human history that the internet's ever done something funny...
Sorry, my mistake, the nuances of the English language like flippancy and sarcasm don't come across well in text to Americans, next time I'll put a "THIS IS A FACETIOUS COMMENT NOT MEANT TO BE TAKEN LITERALLY" disclaimer afterwards.
Here's the thing - like MMMBop or not, Hanson went on to become a solid group of people doing solidly good pop songs. Listen to anything they have done in recent years and they are not bad. Unlikely to ever become the same size they were but they are actually really good.
I think the hate for it is pretty unjustified, personally. It's not a "good" song, but it's fun and happy and it doesn't pretend to be anything bigger than a silly feel good song.
I unashamedly love this song. Not kidding. I have a "thing" for ironic songs, like "Hey Ya" by Outkast or "You and Whose Army" by Radiohead, where the tone of the melody doesn't match the tone of the lyrics. "Mmmbop" is the undisputed king of the ironic song genre. It's like the bouncy chorus only exists to make you forget how dark and reflective the lyrics of the verses are. And I freakin' love it. Also, who "hated" Hanson? I knew a guy who had a crush on "the middle Hanson sister" in school (I think everybody knew that guy, right?) but other than that, nobody seemed to have strong feelings about them one way or another.
@@ShadowSorel , *Actual* conspiracy posts or just "Maybe we should ask a few questions while shutting down the world economy and forcing pharmaceuticals on the masses?"
@@stick6969 , No. Just asking questions like "are we sure the vaccines are safe and aren't being rolled out too quickly, what is the constitutional mechanism for the authority to lock down millions of private citizens and restrict things such as religious observance, is there any undue conflict of interests involved in the various institutions involved, etc.?" are not conspiracies. They are actually just the normal kind of responsible critical thinking skills that any civilization requires to continue existing. Saying "X did Y because of Z" is a conspiracy. Just asking "Who is X, was Y a good idea, and what exactly is the Z of the situation?" is called being a responsible adult. Now, doing some minimal browsing, it seems Isaac Hanson has been accused of saying that the US government was intentionally using the opportunity of Covid lockdowns to suppress religious practice in the country, but that he then confessed to making an overly-emotional overreaction to the situation and apologized. I haven't seen the alleged posts, but assuming that's all correct, then that would qualify as accusing the US government of a nefarious conpiracy. However, just asking questions is most certainly *not* conspiratorialism. It's the safety net of a free society.
I love this series and I watched EVERY episode except this one. I put it off for the longest time. The reason was I was afraid I was going to be upset. You see I'm a Hanson fan. Not so much a fan of the little blonde kids singin Mmmbop (though lets face it, it's annoyingly catchy) But because I truly believe that grownup Hanson is one of the best kept secrets in music today. These dudes have serious talent and they put out great music. Each of them have great voices and they all play multiple instruments. And if you haven't heard them harmonize then do a RU-vid search for them singing 'Teach the Children' live. It's awesome. And also Underneath is a great album!I So I was afraid you were going to be one of the uninitiated and bash Hanson based on JUST Mmbop - I'm glad you gave them their due. And even more surprised that you're actually a fan! Thanks!
I remember one episode of VH1's 'I love the 90's', where they talked about Hanson. At the end of the segment they had one hard-rocker outright state he liked and respected them, because they played their own instruments and wrote their own songs.
Emmett Brosowsky Honestly I'm a bit of a FOW fan and I can't think of a single song of there's that was as big as Stacy's Mom. Maybe Hey Julie? But even then that's wasn't nearly as big as Stacy's Mom. Same boat for Somebody to Love. Nothing of there's ever really reached the same level at Stacy's Mom. They didn't exactly fade into obscurity, but surely fell out of the limelight.
I was a Hanson fan in the 90’s and openly admitting it tanked any chance I had at being respected by my peers the entirety of my high school career. People who didn’t know my first name knew me as “The Hanson Girl” (aka: you don’t want to hang out with her). I drew the cover of Middle of Nowhere in art class and it got ripped off the walls and never saw it again. I didn’t know what to expect watching this but this is one of the best videos I’ve seen giving Hanson their due from someone who didn’t start out as a fan, and I thank you sincerely for that.
Nail on the head. If "This Time Around" had been their first single, Hanson may well have been one of the biggest bands of the 2000s. Instead, they're just another very good band whose image was tarnished beyond repair by their first big hit...Hoobastank is another one, and Extreme, and.. Come to think of it, that subject could make for an excellent video.
@Harv72b I would love to see a Video about Extreme - While they are NOT One Hit Wonders by any definition... Here in the UK they had success with Get The Funk Out, More Than Words, Rest in Peace and Tragic Comic... Even here we only really reference them with the first TWO Songs!!! And really - Only one of them was a chart topper...
What? I had tons of stuff by Hoobastank in my old mp3 player. I don't know what you mean by tarnished image, I hadn't one. Is it some US thing? Yeah, they had a hit, but it was one that brought me to listen to them.
@@pavook The Reason got overplayed to hell on the radio and killed their career because people got sick of them. They did have a couple of prior hits with Crawling In the Dark and Running Away. They were sort of the Walmart version of Incubus.
Oh my gosh! THANK YOU for giving Hanson the respect they deserve. THIS BAND has been a staple in my music collection for the past 22 years. I was 30 when they released MmmBop and not ashamed to say I love it. As a true "Fanson", I could go off on a tangent here and talk about many other releases they have had (including an annual EP for "members only"), I could talk about their annual gathering of fans where they interact in activities and events (the greatest fandom ever), or I could focus on their business sense and talk about their brewing company. I realize though, that this post is about their "hits," which as an indie band, they don't have by world standards. Anyway, I appreciate your coverage and love that you decided to preface the entire episode with the fact that they are NOT a one hit wonder and your follow-up comment about them being an "actual band". THANKS.
MmmmmBop is the best bubblegum pop single since "Sugar Sugar" and that is a mountain I am willing to die on. I'm not a Hanson fan per se, but musically they were (and are) the real deal and did not deserve to be considered a "boy band". I'm glad to see they're still doing their thing, and I wish them success.
I was a huge Hanson fan and remember "I Will Come to You, " "Weird, " and "Where's the Love" having music videos and CD singles - I always knew that they were destined to become a musicians' kind of band and work with impressive names. Catching this channel in my suggestions has been a joy during this time of social distancing. Thanks, dude. (Also, it may just be Radio Voice, but you sound *exactly* like a good friend of mine!)
I definitely remember "Where's the Love" being the follow-up. It definitely reminded me of a 70s Osmonds hit, right down to the bridge that sounded almost like Merrill Osmond singing.
I love that the outro is still Hansen, just after their voices broke. Honestly, I LOVED "If Only" and was all set to become a Hansen fan in 2000...then I started living on my own, and lost all my music budget. By the time I reclaimed it, I forgot all about them except for "If Only" and of course..."MmmBop." Which, in fairness, I loathe. Still, it's never too late to dive in, apparently. :)
They seem to be doing ok to me. They're playing a sold out show in my city in a couple months. I'll be honest I'm surprised but it's a smaller venue and I'm sure if they've been going this long they must have maintained some sort of fan base.
This is a deeply personal confession, but in 95 I started to grow my hair despite nobody else in my area doing so because I thought Kurt Cobain had simultaneously invented and ended music. Upon entering high school amid the height of Hanson hysteria, I came to form a loathing for these 3 boys that would last two full decades. Not only did they represent the banal antithesis of "real music", they also caused me to live with the moniker "mmm bop" for the duration of secondary school. This stung even moreso given how unnaturally it rolls of the tongue, hence how eager everyone was to attach me to a piece of pop ephemera I despised. Thanks, you wankers. Then 6 months ago I found tits. Then I watched this. Then I watched it again...those first verse lyrics are remarkable for a teenager. Now I can't even hate them. Thanks Todd. You wanker.
This is my *literal* life story…down to the year… The only minor deviation is that I think I came to terms with Hanson a few years earlier than you did. But good god…junior high and freshman year, I was the “Hanson kid” with long hair and that was that. No matter how much STP, Alice or Meshuggah I listened to, there was no convincing anyone otherwise…
I kind of wish Todd would've gone ahead with a Rage episode -- but not as a OHW, but as an examination of what the football happened in 2009 in the UK. Where people were finally flat out tired of X-Factor's winner getting the automatic Christmas #1 and decided... yeah, let's make "Killing in the Name Of" the number one single in the kingdom almost twenty years after it dropped. AND IT *WORKED*.
ONly watching these vids now but what was even better about this story was coming up to xmas they were invited to play live on BBC radio in the morning (I'm guessing because of the time difference) and were asked to censor the lyrics cause you know breakfast radio in the UK. Well that went as well as you would expect for a song with the lyrics fuck you I won't do what you tell me. They had to cut the song early and the hosts had to apologise to the listeners.
Hanson was a band that despite having other hits, had one hit that so dwarfed their others it is impossible not to think of them being something akin to one hit wonders.
Enjoy the trip! :D You can get lost in hoooours upon hours of Hanson music floating around youtube haha. There's their 6 official full length albums, but there's also hundreds of other songs from EPs and demos floating around out there, and even those are amazing! I literally have a nearly 3-hour long playlist on my itunes of just the Hanson demos and EP songs that I love, and I honestly listen to that just as much as any of their awesome full length albums.
Thanks! Any recommendations for where to start are very welcome! I got distracted by asking my brother for hair metal recommendations after I watched The 'The Darkness' review last night.
Penny & Me is my favorite Hanson song by far. I wouldn’t say I’m a fan, but I saw them play on a rooftop bar in Denver in 2010 and they were phenomenal.
I remember when this was popular and I LOATHED it, but now seeing the kind of stuff that's been popular these last decade I honestly feel like I need to apologize to them for thinking they were anywhere near as bad as the stuff that came later. As for them looking like girls, well, when this was being played all the time on MTV I was hanging out with my cousin and he said, "That chick's pretty." I told him it was in fact a guy and he looked at me in silence for like 5 seconds before simply replying, "Well, I guess that dude's pretty, then."
Really? You're gonna do a Hanson episode and not mention the fact Taylor Hanson has a side project with Bun E. from Cheap Trick, the bass player from Fountains of Wayne, and JAMES FUCKING IHA FROM THE SMASHING PUMPKINS?! ...no, seriously. The band's called Tinted Windows and they're going for an 80's-style pop superband.
I said this when you first uploaded this episode and I'll say it again: Give a Little and Thinkin' 'Bout Something are the most underrated pop songs ever. I heard them back when VH1 used to air the videos during their morning music video block (may it RIP), and they've been on my "cheer up" playlist ever since. If listening to those songs doesn't make you smile, I don't know what will.
I love their string theory version of this song. Will always be one of my favorites. Idk maybe it is because I heard it after my mom passed away but I love the lyrics to MMMbop and the string theory version makes me smile so much.
True story: I'm a dude who's straight and when I was 10 I liked Hanson's music and my mom would tell people he likes Hanson but he's not gay he just likes they're Music! lol
@@TheSteve5154 "they've never done anything to embarrase themselves" didn't hold up to the pandemic they're crazy covid conspiracy trump nutters. Which like, they're from Oklahoma, the right wingness was gonna come out eventually
Thank you for having the clip of Thinking about Something. I never heard of it but love the Blues Brothers and had to go check it out for the video and its homage to Shake Your Tailfeather. What a great song and video!
It will never cease to amaze me that Taylor Hanson was in a supergroup featuring members of Fountains of Wayne, Cheap Trick, and The Smashing Pumpkins. Not a half-bad band, either; check out Tinted Windows. I didn't like Hanson back then, but man, they were fucking legit.
I'm not even joking...I did not know they were all boys. I thought one of them was a girl. Even in all those clips Todd shows one of them looks girlier than the other two. I have no idea which one it is. But there I learned something new today.
It’s Taylor and as a femme-attraction leaning bisexual who didn’t realize it at the time, he was the first guy I was ever attracted to and it made me finally feel normal, lol. Now I totally understand why. XD
Todd here. Incidentally, I was one of the people who always pointed out the turntable scratching on this track. Great video, as always. From one Todd to another, see you you at the Todd Meeting! Todd out.
I remember watching tv with my girlfriend around 98 or 99 and this Gap commercial comes on. This blond kid with a guitar walks in frame and just kills it with blues riffs. I mean real Erick Clapton/Stevie Ray Vaughn level skill. I honestly thought it was Johnny Lang since he was the only blond kid in the late 90's playing the blues as far as I knew. My girlfriend informed me it was, in fact, Isaac Hanson. "Like, MMMBop Hanson?" "Yep," she replied. My mind was blown! I had no idea he was that damn good at guitar.
I remember almost everyone in my junior high school hating Hanson. One year, for April Fool's, the morning announcements said Hanson's coming to visit us, and everyone in my math class screamed "NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!" I also remember Hanson fighting the Spice Girls on MTV's Celebrity Deathmatch's 1st episode ever, to win the title" MOst Annoying Band in the World". Neither side won, because Marilyn Manson killed both of them.
I was big into hanson since forever and penny and me still gives me goosebumps, that's how i measure good music definitely deserved better for sure. I still have a cassette of "middle of nowhere" and that last song is a symphony in my book. Rock on!
It's so nice that all these victims of bullshit copyright claims are coming back and staying. I also don't find it that surprising that Todd likes post-Mmmbop Hanson, his expression of his taste in music sounds like that middle-of the road, not-too-hot, not-too-cold nineties/early 2000s alt-rock that you find sold in bundles on used-CD racks at Barns and Noble, and post-Mmmbop Hanson fits that quite well to me.
I'm glad others are in agreement with me on Hanson actually being extremely underrated songwriters and singers/players. They're actually really sick, and I'm grateful to be able to say they were the first musicians I remember to listening to, and I still love them 20 years later. Also I can understand why people don't like them because of Mmmbop, but practically every album after that gets better and better exponentially. They always had the ability to write a pop hit, even as kids, but growing up just gave them more experience to flesh out their sound more, and the ability to write about more adult subjects. I don't like Mmmbop anymore myself lol But This Time Around and If Only are sick, if you wanna give them a chance, I think they're better entryways into Hanson than Mmmbop, as inevitable as it is to hear before those songs.
And I'm not saying they don't have bad songs either. They're not perfect, but Imo carry much more merit with their artistry than a lot of the other boy bands we've seen over the years.
I've always interpreted the chorus to mean something along the lines of: "You have to remain open-minded and optimistic even if there's no one there for you. If you are alone, there's no need to feel like the world is ending. Just try to be happy, and enjoy life to the best of your ability."
There is tremendous value with the pure joy contained in in a pop song such as this. This song always reminded me of The Jackson 5’s pop hits of the early 70’s.
I've never been down on Hanson, and I remember hearing "Middle of Nowhere" in the Tower Records store where I worked and being intrigued about how some of it sounded like the Jackson 5. My favorite song of theirs in "Thinking of You," but I admit I haven't kept up with them since the first album. BTW, they happened to be in the little British village where my relatives live while I was there for a visit in 1997. No, I didn't get to meet them. I think my cousin Sandra had mentioned that they'd been there that day, and then later that week they were the musical guest on a game show I was watching with my aunt and uncle. "Those are the guys who were in Lambourn a few days ago!," I probably exclaimed. One reason I think Hanson is alright is cause you can legitimately call them a boy band. They were indeed a band rather than a vocal group like the Backstreet Boys and NSYNC, and at least when they started out, they could certainly be called boys. Anyway, it was inevitable you were gonna have to do this one even though you're technically right about them having another hit that some of us still remember. Just gave you a chance to talk about what actually defines a one-hit wonder.
Just had to come back to this video because Hanson came to Maryland last week, and I got the chance to see them in concert. Hanson knows how to perform and their newer songs are amazing! Todd, I understand you now!
