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Anybody who knows my affinity for Philly Soul knows that the Spinners got the highest grade of these four songs. I SHOULD like "Your Mama Don't Dance" a lot more than I do, but I found the damn thing so irritating after awhile. I did bump its grade up a notch, though, for the "Outta the car, long hair!" line.

The Stylistics coming in LAST? Say it aint so!

"to be clear, this is better than ANY Bryan Adams Number One of the nineties, just sayin')." Sadly, Chris, this is true.

I thought the real predecessor to the Friends theme was "Pleasant Valley Sunday" by the Monkees (penned by Carole King).

"Donnelly Rhodes was the doctor on the Battlestar Galactica reboot." Donnelly Rhodes had portrayed "Dutch," the escaped convict who fell in love with one of the Tate daughters in the all-time great late-'70s sitcom Soap (seek it out if you've never seen it, it's one of the funniest series ever made). He was hilarious in that. I've never seen The Heights, though. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=noHyHQy--ec

"57 Channels" is not a song radio was ever going to embrace, and it should have never been released as a single. It's a deep cut that should've stayed that way. There were plenty of better options to follow-up the Double-A side single. "Darlington County," on the other hand, is one of my favorite tracks on Born in the U.S.A., and should have been released as a single (instead of "Cover Me," perhaps).

Upvoted for your Ray, Goodman & Brown shout-out. "Special Lady" towers above almost every song we've ever discussed as one of my all-time favorites.

"That he was robbed of a deserving #1 is but one reason." WARDLOW!!

She had a triumvirate of tremendous songs in the '90s. The third one came along in 1995. Perhaps we'll discuss that one when we get to that year.

"The two are connected lyrically, btw: Bono sings "you're an accident waiting to happen/you're a piece of glass left there on a beach." Of course! How could that have eluded me??

"the exquisite Trying To Throw Your Arms Around the World ..." That one IS exquisite, and I have never heard it on any radio station.

Roy turns this one into a rout.

Fresh Off The Boat was an overlooked gem on ABC's primetime schedule for half a decade. It produced this Bonus Beat: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qegObusxnpQ

“End of the Road” works as a metaphor for my regular participation in the thrice weekly discussion of that day’s #1 song. It serves as a dividing line between my knowledge of and enthusiasm (either positive or negative) for the charttopper of the day, and the point when that knowledge and enthusiasm all but vanishes. 1993 is radically different than any year that has gone before it in terms of #1 songs. From this point forward, these just aren’t my #1s anymore. But that’s not to say there wasn’t a lot of good—even great music—being produced and released at this time. It’s just that this great music wasn’t headed anywhere near the top of the charts, and it wasn’t being marketed to the demographic that made songs #1 hits. So before we wrap up 1992, I wanted to mention two songs in particular from the latter part of this year that I consider two of the greatest songs of the entire decade. I had been duly astonished before by Annie Lennox’ vocal range and treatment of everything from raging rockers (“Would I Lie to You”) to devastatingly moving ballads (“Why”). But her best of all, for me, was “Walking on Broken Glass.” Somehow, this almost uncategorizable song manages to be moving, rousing and stately all at the same time. It might be the greatest use of orchestral strings ever in a rock song. Annie’s best songs are never about happy subjects, but “Walking on Broken Glass” managed to balance its grim relationship subject matter with an incredibly upbeat sound as masterfully as ABBA used to do it. The part of the bridge where she sings “If you want to hurt me, you’re doin’ really well my dear …” followed by the crescendo of strings is one of my favorite moments in popular music, like, ever. “Walking on Broken Glass” would very likely qualify as my favorite song of the ‘90s, if it weren’t for the fact that it might only be one of my top two favorite songs of 1992. “Who’s Gonna Ride Your Wild Horses” was only the fifth single released from U2’s Achtung Baby, and it only managed to creep up to #35 on the Hot 100. Rock radio has pretty much ignored it since its brief heyday almost 30 years ago, but I count it as probably the most remarkably affecting song that U2 ever recorded. There are definitely people who passed in and out of my life who are perfectly described by the lyrics of this song (“You’re dangerous, ‘cause you’re honest; you’re dangerous, you don’t know what you want …”). U2 was responsible for one of the few #1 songs of the 1980s that I gave a 10/10 to, and damned if this one isn’t even better than that one (“I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For”). “Who’s Gonna Ride Your Wild Horses” sounds like it’s a song addressing someone who hasn’t found what she (or he) is looking for. Its greatness has never dimmed in my ears. It still amazes me, but it’s specifically the “Temple Bar Remix” that I love, not the longer, noisier album remix. There was some great music out there in 1992, but it wasn’t reaching the top, even as it was reaching my ears and absolutely striking a chord with me.

Last week we had a #1 song that rhymed "moon" with "June"--the most cliched lyrical rhyme in music--and I gave the song a 10 anyway.

My Stevie Wonder 10s begin with "Living For the City."

Actually, I never need to hear "Light My Fire" again.

Classic Hits and Classic Rock formats hate the '90s the way Breihan hates Steely Dan.

"the nineties was arguably her most fulfilling decade from a creative standpoint." No question about it. But other superstar artists (U2, Mellencamp, Springsteen) have also had their '90s catalogs largely deleted from radio playlists at the expense of their '80s stuff.

Is "Paradise By The Dashboard Light" the most universally well-known #39 hit of all time?

I like "Playground" more than you do, but I like the truly underrated "Rain" a lot more than I like "Playground," and I'd go along with your 10 for that and for "I'll Remember."

I had completely forgotten "Drowning in Your Eyes," and had forgotten what an exquisitely nice song it is.

"I'll Remember" is a great song. I loved "Rain," too.

Co-signed on "Not Enough Time." "Make time stop ...three words I think of uttering almost every day."

This is one of Celine's less objectionable efforts. But Stevie Wonder shouldn't be grouped anywhere near these three inferior offerings. "Higher Ground" is far and away the winner here.

As a rule, I’ve always liked Madonna’s ballads more than her upbeat stuff–with a few notable exceptions. In fact, I’ve generally preferred Madonna’s ballads to those of Whitney Houston and Mariah Carey. I am also, by nature, a person who gravitates towards nostalgia. So “This Used to be My Playground” ought to be right in my wheelhouse. Well, it sort of is, but I should love it more than I do. Maybe if it weren’t so closely associated with A League of Their Own, I would embrace it more as a standalone gem. Actually, as a sports parent whose two baseball-playing sons have: 1) completely aged out of the sport as a young adult now, or, 2) will soon be hanging up the glove and cleats for the last time, this is a song whose wistful theme hits almost too close to home for me to freely listen to, like “Cat’s In The Cradle.” Not that I have to worry about ever hearing the song on the radio again. Every playlist in America seemingly abandoned this neglected Madonna charttopper decades ago. This is, for what it’s worth, Madonna’s second #1 ballad that was NOT a love song (along with the remarkable "Live to Tell"). How many artists had two #1 ballads that were not love songs? All of this adds up to an 8/10, but it’s an 8/10--for the aforementioned reasons--that I don’t choose to seek out very often.

I've seen Tom refer to a song he doesn't like by saying "This song is ass." Well, today's song really IS.

Thank you for posting these. I had completely forgotten "Pretend That We're Dead" ever existed until today. Now I remember, and I remember that it was, indeed, a 9.

This would be the second '36-24-36' reference in a top 10 reference, 15 years after "Brick House."

The summer of 1992 saw the release of a past-Imperial-phase Wilson Phillips release their absolute best single: "Give it Up."

"Why" is beautiful. It is a 10. That is all.

"it's arguably the best thing he ever released." "Should've Known Better" meekly raises its hand.

Spoiler alert: Vicki Lawrence was the murderer in "The Night The Lights Went Out in Georgia" ("little sister don't miss when she aims her gun ...").

Part of my comment here got garbled. The "Damn right it is" was in response to "Great Balls of Fire" becoming the highest-rated pre-Hot 100 song polled. But I think its title will be short-lived, based on how "Jailhouse Rock" is polling today.

Today's songs are 9-9-10-8. The first three are 20th-century rock & roll classics of the first order ("Jailhouse Rock" might set ratings records in these polls).

Damn right it is.

I loved "Life is a Highway." Unfortunately, the stellar Tom Cochrane original (which almost struck me as an orphaned Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers song) was somewhat superseded 14 years later when the Rascal Flatts remake was included in the "Cars I" movie, but Cochrane's 1992 tune is all kinds of joyful and infectious. It's a 10/10. (I am noticing that I have quite a few of my own 10s from 1992 that were not charttoppers. This is one, Sophie B. Hawkins was another. And maybe I'll discuss another on Friday of nobody mentions it in today's comments.)

It is rare that an early '90s entry would outrate three mid '70s entries with me, but that's the case today. The Sophie B. Hawkins song helped soundtrack that summer of '92 and is incredibly good. A 10/10. I have mentioned before that in 1973, Chicago sang, "You are the love of my life, you are the inspiration," and then, 12 years later, they sang, "You're the meaning in my life, you're the inspiration." In case there was any doubt the band was bereft of ideas by 1985. Anyway, they were still good in 1973, and "Just You 'n Me" is an 8/10. "Space Race" was one of Billy Preston's two badass instrumental smashes from that period. "Out-A-Space" was just a little better, but "Space Race" is still an 8/10. I gave Marie a 5/10.

I'll give it this: "Baby Got Back" IS a lot funnier than the painfully unfunny "I'm Too Sexy." Hard to believe Rick Rubin dealt so extensively in this genre of music and then, two years later, went on to produce Tom Petty's semi-confessional album Wildflowers.

This is such a different place now than it was in 1970 that I wish, at the end of our journey, Tom would go back and re-post (and maybe rewrite) those early #1s all over again now that we have an entire TNOCS family that didn't exist then. And, by the way, I'm with you. I never loved the original Jackson 5 version of "I'll Be There," but "I Want You Back," "The Love You Save" and "ABC" are some of the most perfect records ever put down on vinyl.