Hits of Australia and NZ: Hits of the 90's Australia VII

I've decided to rank the songs of the 90's based on how long they charted here in Australia, this is to give an idea of which songs became a success despite being pulled from shelves and which ones persisted with no resistance from our music scene. I've also included a few new entries from post 1992 given how I covered the lower half of the charts from the pre-Oz music charts era already on this site and thus wanted to give these entries some representation on my site. I’ll also spare my return readers commentary for songs that appeared on my other Australian list for the 90’s on this site and only include commentary from entries that are either new to this list or marked their debut on my Oz music charts list or the 1980-1992 list.

Also to note, I’m using the chart run from the AMR charts for this list as I feel that’s a better representation of how long these songs stuck around for back in the day as opposed to the ARIA charts. As such, many songs that refused to die on the latter charts will be appearing much lower on this list due to them going away much quicker on the former charts (particularly from late 1997 and early 1998.) The exception of course being from 1999 as David Kent ceased publication the final week of 1998 and has only reproduced top twenty charts from that point on, meaning I had to use ARIA charts for songs that charted in 1999. That said, I’ll bring up how long a song from 1998 charted on the AMR charts before it ceased publication as a bit of a fun fact even though I’ll be using its ARIA run to determine its placement on this list.

#56 for 1996

#57 for 1996

#56 for 1994

#72 for 1999

#65 for 2000

#65 for 1990

#64 for 1993

#64 for 1997

#55 for 1995

#58 for 1996

#59 for 1996

#56 for 1995

#65 for 1993

#66 for 1990

#48 for 1992

#73 for 1999

#60 for 1996

#74 for 1999

#52 for 1991

#49 for 1992

#75 for 1999

#61 for 1996

#65 for 1997

#57 for 1995

#58 for 1995

#62 for 1996

#50 for 1992

#66 for 1997

#51 for 1992

#53 for 1991

#54 for 1991

#67 for 1990

#76 for 1999

#59 for 1995

#60 for 1995

#68 for 1990

#52 for 1992

#55 for 1991

#56 for 1991

#67 for 1997

#68 for 1997

#57 for 1994

#69 for 1998

(18 weeks on AMR)

#66 for 1993

You didn't think the two girls who were responsible for "This is how we party" from earlier were a one hit wonder did you? Well history might have relegated them as such; however, they did in fact have a second hit in the southern hemisphere back in the day with this gem albeit a sleeper one here in Australia and as a fan single over in NZ.

This took a while to take off here in Australia, likely because this came out a year after the Use your illusion albums were released and thus had its success eaten up by strong album sales. We Aussies eventually made this a success largely due to its refusal to die on our charts much like the other singles that the band released from the album.

#58 for 1994

#77 for 1999

#67 for 2000

Although "Girl's life" was a modest success here for Girlfriend, it was too modest to make an appearance on this site which is something that wasn't the case for their third single which stuck around for quite some time despite it being a departure from their brand of new jack swing and teen pop. I guess this is proof that there's always a market for slower ballads from teen idols no matter the time period.

#78 for 1999

#69 for 1990

If this woman's voice sounds familiar to you, that's because she's the vocalist from Arrested development's debut album and a big component to that album's success given how she quit the group during the production of their critically panned follow up. Here she it with her one and only solo hit which was guaranteed success in her native America and even did quite well here as a sleeper hit.

#57 for 1991

This was a little late to the party here in Australia as were all the singles from TLC's second album, although it did eventually become a sleeper hit for the girls likely due to how well it did throughout the rest of the world. For what it's worth, there was a remix of this track from 1996 that did briefly chart here and nowhere else in the world, sort of to make up for our tardiness to making the girls a success here.

#58 for 1991

#61 for 1995

#63 for 1996

This is an E.P from the Australian pop rock band the Sharp, I'm guessing these guys were destined for great things that didn't come to fruition as this came out right when the music scene started to become hostile towards local music.

#59 for 1994

File this in the increasing category of songs that I thought were way bigger than they actually were back in the day, this time it's the one and only hit that British EDM group Moloko had even in their homeland. I think this is a victim of heavy airplay as I distinctly remember this more so than many of the entries that made it on my official lists, that or illegal downloading has been around longer than I thought.

#60 for 1994

This was sandwiched between "Sorrento moon" and "Wasn't it good" during the album cycle of Don't ask, as such I have to wonder why we Aussies largely passed up on this track from Tina Arena but came around for the latter song given how all three of these songs plus the big hit off the album were ballads that would fit in nicely with the adult contemporary seen of the day.

20 weeks

#70 for 1998

#79 for 1999

(5 weeks on AMR)

#61 for 1994

#64 for 1996

#69 for 1997

#70 for 1997

#71 for 1997

#71 for 1998

#59 for 1991

#60 for 1991

#62 for 1995

#72 for 1997

#80 for 1999

#61 for 1991

#53 for 1992

#54 for 1992

#67 for 1993

#62 for 1991

#63 for 1991

#55 for 1992

#63 for 1995

#56 for 1992

#72 for 1998

#57 for 1992

#68 for 1993

Given how the original version was one of the bigger hits of the 70's here in Australia, it makes sense that this remix from Ben Liebrand would be a decent success here at the start of the 90's even if it didn't quite reach the dizzying heights of success it achieved over in NZ.