Songoftheday 3/29/17 - Hey girl in your eyes I see your picture of me all the time, and girl when you smile you got to know that you drive me wild...
from the album Step By Step (1990)
Billboard Hot 100 peak: #1 (three weeks)
Weeks in the Top-40: 11
The song of the day from this hump-day comes from the New Kids on the Block, who had dominated the pop market with their legion of tween girls (and a sprinkle of boys) at the end of the 1980's. Their second album Hangin' Tough had spun off five top ten pop hits, and with that momentum they scored two more with a recycled track from their debut album as well as "This One's From The Children" from their Christmas album. After a grueling five months, in the spring of 1990 the guys came back with a new single, "Step By Step". Written and produced by their svengali Maurice Starr, the frenetic disco-style number tried to straddle the line between kiddie-pop innocence and gruffier posturing...
"Step By Step" became the New Kids' third and so-far final #1 pop hit in June of 1990. The single also climbed to #48 on Billboard's R&B chart. Internationally, the song topped the chart in Canada, hit #2 in the UK, and reached the top ten in New Zealand (#3), Norway (#3), Ireland (#5), Belgium (#6), Finland (#7), Germany (#8), Australia (#8), and France (#10).
(Click below to see the rest of the post)
Here's the boys performing live in concert in 1990...
...and then again, all grown up in 2012..
And finally, a little more intimately in 2009 for AOL...
Up tomorrow: A little quiet time for these new-wave veterans.
Comments