Madonna’s “Vogue” Turns 25: Here Are 10 Other Songs That Were Hits In Spring 1990

Robbie Daw | March 20, 2015 11:08 am

Mariah Carey, “Vision Of Love” The vocal range. That whistle register! Skinny young thing Mariah stepped onto the world stage in May 1990 with debut single “Vision Of Love,” blew us all away with her old-school soul sensibility and never looked back. The song kicked off a whopping consecutive string of five chart-topping singles for Mimi.

Electronic, “Getting Away With It” One of the more underrated supergroups in pop history, Electronic was comprised of New Order frontman Bernard Sumner, The Smiths’ guitarist Johnny Marr and, occasionally, Neil Tennant of Pet Shop Boys. Though they were far more successful in the UK, the outfit did manage to crack the Top 40 when their first, Italo disco-incluenced single was released stateside in May 1990.

Depeche Mode, “Enjoy The Silence” There was nothing quiet about Depeche Mode’s biggest Hot 100 hit, “Enjoy The Silence.” While previous album Music For The Masses helped break the band in America, it was 1990’s Violator that catapulted them to becoming full-fledged, arena-filling icons. The beautiful video for “Enjoy The Silence,” shot by Anton Corbijn and featuring vocalist Dave Gahan as a lonely, wandering royal, never gets old.

New Kids On The Block, “Step By Step” By 1990, you couldn’t escape boy band New Kids On The Block. Their third album Step By Step might have marked the beginning of the end of their chart fortunes, but at least it kicked off on a high note, with the Platinum success of the album’s disco-infused title track — the third of three #1 singles for the quintet.

Roxette, “It Must Have Been Love” The Swedepop crossover didn’t begin with Robyn, folks. Before her, there was Ace Of Base, and before them, there was ABBA — and smack in the middle of the whole lot of them were Marie Fredricksson and Per Gessle, aka pop-rock duo Roxette. “It Must Have Been Love” was the third of four chart-topping singles the pair released in the States between 1989 and 1991, and it featured prominently on the soundtrack of Julia Roberts’ career-making film Pretty Woman. Underscoring the enduring nature of the wistful ballad, it was performed in a January episode of Glee.

What were some of your favorite songs from the year 1990?

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