Whatever Happened To These '90s One-Hit Wonders?

The 1990s was a dynamic and inventive decade for music. Led by acts such as Nirvana, Soundgarden, and Pearl Jam, the explosion of grunge shaped both music and fashion, as flannel shirts and long hair became all the rage, and Seattle suddenly became the musical epicenter of the planet. On the flip side, the pop charts began filling up with a glut of singing, dancing boy bands, with the likes of Backstreet Boys, *NSYNC, and New Kids on the Block selling zillions of CDs while their handsome young faces appeared on t-shirts, lunchboxes, and Barbie-style dolls.

The '90s also introduced a crop of one-hit wonders, artists who instantly skyrocketed to superstardom on the strength of a massively popular hit single, only to fade away into obscurity just as quickly. These artists spanned various genres, from rock to pop to novelty numbers — remember when "The Macarena" became a thing, or when a pair of balding brothers calling themselves Right Said Fred chanting "I'm Too Sexy" got everybody singing and dancing along?

There were no shortage of these short-lived stars during that era, so read on for a look at whatever happened to these '90s one-hit wonders.

By the late 1980s and early 1990s, the rise of adult-oriented radio (AOR) could not be ignored, dominated by the likes of Michael Bolton, Wilson Phillips, Bruce Hornsby, and their ilk. In 1991, Marc Cohn crashed the party with "Walking in Memphis," which soared to No. 13 and led him to win the best new artist Grammy in 1992. The song had legs, subsequently covered by artists ranging from Cher to Paul Anka, its success branding him a one-hit wonder when subsequent musical offerings failed to chart. 

Still, the singer-songwriter got a lot of mileage out of that song, and he continued recording and touring in the years after that. In 2005, Cohn was driving to his hotel after a concert in Denver when he was carjacked and shot in the head at point-blank range. Luckily, the bullet didn't penetrate his skull, and he suffered only minor injuries. The carjacker was ultimately sentenced to 36 years behind bars. 

Cohn made headlines again in 2022, when performed at the wedding of Jennifer Lopez and Ben Affleck. "Ben and I talked about Marc Cohn's 'True Companion' as the perfect wedding love song in this very house more than 20 years ago. Though Ben didn't know, I asked Marc to surprise him by singing it at our wedding and he was lovely and generous to come," Lopez told People. As Cohn wrote on Instagram, "It was truly a magical celebration and I was thrilled to be there."

In 1991, NYC-based jam band Spin Doctors released their first album, "Pocketful of Kryptonite," initially selling a respectable 60,000 copies, predominantly to their neo-hippie, jam-band fan base. A grassroots effort, started on Vermont radio, they began playing the single "Little Miss Can't Be Wrong," sparking an unexpected movement that resulted in the song, at one point, becoming America's most asked-for radio request. By the latter part of 1992, the track had hit No. 17 on Billboard's Top 100, where it remained for 20 weeks. 

The second single, "Two Princes," was released in early 1993, and did even better by hitting No. 7, staying on the charts for 29 weeks while earning a Grammy nomination while the album went triple platinum. Their follow-up album sold well — but not as well as the first — while infighting within the band escalated. 

When their third album, released in 1996, sold a paltry 75,000 copies, they were dropped by their label. The band continued, but when frontman Chris Barron was hit by a rare paralysis of the vocal cords in 1999, Spin Doctors went on a hiatus that lasted until 2005, continuing sporadically after that. In a 2022 interview with Creem, Barron opened up about his relationship with the band's biggest hit. "People are like, do you ever get tired of playing 'Two Princes?' Let me rephrase that for you: Do I get tired of watching people go nuts when I play a song I wrote? No, I don't," he declared.

Arguably one of the 1990s' unlikeliest hits, "Mmm Mmm Mmm Mmm" propelled Canadian quintet Crash Test Dummies to international stardom. Despite its slow, haunting melody, offbeat lyrics (about children with various physical abnormalities), and the deep baritone of frontman Brad Roberts, the song spent an impressive 24 weeks on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, hitting a high of No. 4 after its release in 1994. While the band maintained its popularity in their native Canada, at least for awhile, that wasn't the case in the U.S., with "Mmm Mmm Mmm Mmm" remaining the high point. When subsequent releases failed to make an impact on listeners, the band broke up in 2001.

In 2018, in celebration of the 25th anniversary of their first album, "God Shuffled His Feet," Crash Test Dummies reunited for a tour. Looking back at the band's brief sojourn at the top, singer Ellen Reid credited the success of that one song for providing some extraordinary experiences. "Some of the highlights were when Weird Al covered one of our songs. That was like ok, we've made it! Going to interesting places like Shanghai and South Africa. Those were really great opportunities. Some of the other musicians that we've played with were awe-inspiring. Very few people get to do and see what we did," she shared. "Basically, we've had horseshoes up our butts for 30 years! It's all been pretty great!"

Pop-music earworms don't get more earworm-y than "MMMBop," the 1997 single that spent three weeks at No. 1 and announced the arrival of Hanson. The group — composed of brothers Isaac Hanson, Taylor Hanson, and Zac Hanson — invited comparisons to TV sitcom rockers The Partridge Family, given their ages at the time (16, 13, and 11, respectively). As Isaac told Songfacts, the origins of "MMMBop" were inauspicious. "That song started out as the background part for another song," he explained. "It was something we almost stumbled upon."

Their follow-up single, "I Will Come to You," was a modest hit, not even in the same league as "MMMBop." While Hanson subsequently vanished from the charts, the group continued to put out albums throughout the ensuing decades, forming their own independent label in 2003. The brothers also dipped their collective toe into the craft beer biz, launching Hanson Brothers Beer.

In 2023, Hanson re-emerged with a new version of their signature hit, "MMMBop 2.0," a collaboration with British pop-punk band Busted, grafting a heavier sound onto the oh-so-familiar melody. "It's been a thrill to reimagine 'MMMBop' with Busted and to see how a song with such history comes to life in a new way," Taylor Hanson said in a statement posted on the Hanson website. "This is a true fusion of Hanson and Busted, we can't wait to share it." Meanwhile, music wasn't the only thing the brothers were prolific at producing; between the three of them, they have a combined 15 children.

Before launching her music career, Natalie Imbruglia was already famous in her native Australia — not as a singer but as star of hit Aussie soap opera "Neighbours." As a result, she already had a built-in audience — Down Under, at least — when she released her debut album in 1997, "Left of the Middle." The album's first single, "Torn," hit No. 2 in Australia and became a worldwide smash. Imbruglia released numerous albums and singles after that, but nothing that had the impact of "Torn." 

She also continued to act, but at a certain point the inability to connect with listeners the way she had with "Torn" proved to be frustrating — so much so that she decided to walk away from music. "Oh yeah, I quit. Effectively, in my head, I wasn't going back to music," she told The Guardian. Ultimately, however, she refused to let herself be defined by success — or lack thereof. "I realized [music] is my first love," she explained. "I might not be the best songwriter, but what I am is a communicator of emotion and I think it's valid."

Having released her sixth studio album, "Firebird," in 2021, Imbruglia told The Guardian that she'd come to appreciate both the low and high points of her career, which the success of "Torn" certainly represented. "I think that the ups and downs that I've been through have landed me where I am now," she explained. 

While 2023's "Barbie" movie proved to be a massive hit at the box office, it's easy to forget that 25 years before the Margot Robbie-starring film made its debut, Danish-Norwegian pop group Aqua set the tone with the 1997 hit "Barbie Girl." Featuring the now-iconic lyrics "I'm a Barbie girl in the Barbie world / Life in plastic, it's fantastic," the song became a hit, while also heaped with scorn by music critics (a Rolling Stone readers' poll, for example, ranked "Barbie Girl" as the worst song of the 1990s). Rolling Stone readers weren't the only ones who hated the song; Mattel, producer of the plastic doll, sued Aqua's label, MCA Records, alleging the song infringed on the toy company's patent. The label insisted the song was a parody, protected under the First Amendment. Mattel ultimately lost. 

In an interview with Rolling Stone, "Barbie" star/executive producer Margot Robbie detailed the discussions she had with director Greta Gerwig about including "Barbie Girl" in the movie. "I was like, 'Greta, how are we going to incorporate this song? We can't do a Barbie movie and not have a nod to Aqua's 'Barbie Girl.' It has to be in there.' And [Greta] was like, 'Don't worry, we're going to find a cool way to incorporate it,'" Robbie recalled.

While the song doesn't appear in the "Barbie" movie, the film does feature "Barbie World," the Nicki Minaj-Ice Spice collab that features the two rapping over the original Aqua tune.

British rock band The Verve had already put out two dud albums when they released their third, 1997's "Urban Hymns." The lead single, "Bitter Sweet Symphony," was a catchy homage to 1960s psychedelia that sounded both familiar and fresh (not surprising, when considering the melody is taken from a sample of The Rolling Stones' "The Last Time"). After shooting up the U.K. charts, "Bitter Sweet Symphony" eventually hit No. 12 on the Billboard Hot 100. 

The band didn't put out another album for a decade, with their fourth album — "Forth" — arriving DOA in 2008. The reason for the delay was the protracted 20-year legal battle the band faced over the Stones sample in "Bitter Sweet Symphony." As it turned out, the band had licensed an orchestral arrangement of "The Last Time" recorded by Andrew Loog Oldham, who had been the Stones' manager in the '60s. However, Allen Klein, the litigious music-industry figure who took over the Stones' affairs after their split from Oldham (and who also played a major role in the breakup of The Beatles), sued The Verve and their label, accusing them of plagiarism for using more of the song than they'd licensed.

The Verve ultimately settled, granting songwriting credits to Mick Jagger and Keith Richards, who reaped the royalties from "Bittersweet Symphony." In 2019, however, The Verve's Richard Ashcroft — who wrote and sang the song — tweeted that Richards and Jagger had graciously handed over their share of the royalties to him.