Songoftheday 11/5/21 - I feel like I've been locked in tight for a century of lonely nights, waiting for someone to release me...
"Genie In A Bottle" - Christina Aguilera
from the album Christina Aguilera (1999)
Billboard Hot 100 peak: #1 (five weeks)
Weeks in the Top-40: 20
Today's song comes from Christina Aguilera, who grew up in a fractured household before settling with her mother at her grandmother's house near Pittsburgh, where she started singing as a child. Appearing at many local events as well as a very short stint on the TV competition show Star Search, she got cast on Disney's New Mickey Mouse Club television show in 1993 alongside other future stars Britney Spears and Justin Timberlake. After that show was cancelled not too long after, Christina originally struggled to get a record deal, before going back to Disney and winning the chance to record the "pop studio" version of the theme song from their latest animated movie Mulan. "Reflection", a big power-ballad that spotlighted her voice, wasn't released as a single, but made it to #19 on Billboard magazine's Adult Contemporary (or "easy listening") radio chart, and with the soundtrack album reaching the top-40 on the Billboard 200 sales chart at #24, selling over a half million copies, Christina was subsequently signed by RCA Records. Trying to capitalize on both of the hottest trends at the end of the millenium, the "hot young girl" market like Britney, and the Latin Explosion from the likes of Jennifer Lopez, Aguilera's debut single wasn't another vocal showcase but a slinky midtempo dance-pop song, "Genie In A Bottle". Written by producers David Frank from the System (or "Don't Disturb This Groove" fame), Steve Kipner (who wrote Olivia Newton-John's "Physical", along with newcomer Pamela Sheyne, the song has Aguilera singing very sexual lyrics (I mean, "I'm a genie in a bottle you gotta rub me the right way"?) that seem like the mean average between "Baby Hit Me One More Time" and "If You Had My Love" in the production from Frank and Kipner that percolates and like a level 2 of "Latin flavor" in the beat. Instead of belting, Christina is resorted to cooing the lyrics and throwing in enough "babys" with the bathwater to perk up all the boys (and unfortunately older men). Yet it did seem fun, and it was a fresh enough sound on the airwaves to catch on immediately. The music video had Christina rolling around in the dunes along with a Britney-style dance that featured her exposed midriff and Rachel-from-Friends-like hair...
"Genie In A Bottle" was Aguilera's first hit on Billboard's Hot 100 pop chart, spending five weeks at #1 starting in July of 1999. The song also popped on to the older-skewing Adult Top-40 radio format list at #31. Internationally, the single went to #1 in the UK, Italy, Spain, Austria, Belgium, Denmark, and Norway, and reached the top ten in Germany (#2), Australia (#2), Canada (#2), Ireland (#2), New Zealand (#2), Switzerland (#2), France (#3), the Netherlands (#3), Greece (#4), Sweden (#5), Hungary (#5), and Finland (#6). The Christina Aguilera album, released in August of that year, topped the Billboard 200 sales tally for a week, spending 97 weeks on the chart and selling over eight million copies. At the Grammy Awards in 2000, Aguilera won the trophy for Best New Artist; "Genie In A Bottle" was also up for Best Pop Female Vocal Performance, which Sarah McLachlan took home for her live version of "I Will Remember You". Both Christina and the album will be back to the series.
(6/10)
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Here's Christina appearing a live televised concert show in 1999...
Next up, with a live band on Letterman on the album's release, with a much stronger vocal than on the record...
Here's Christina on her Reflections tour...
and lastly, in the UK for the Party In The Park in 2000...
Up tomorrow: Jersey rap trio throw a scouting party, perhaps?
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