MMMBop – The Best of Hanson
“You have so many relationships in this life, only one or two will last,” goes the unexpectedly sombre opening line of 1997’s bouncy and inescapable teen smash MMMBop. “You go through all the pain and strife, then you turn your back and they’re gone so fast.”
In a post-grunge, post-Cobain era, maybe the world needed its existential angst repackaged in the form of saccharine-sweet plaid-clad doo-wop. Taylor Hanson even looked like a young Kurt.
Catchier than Yogi Berra, MMMBop was originally recorded in the garage of the Hanson brothers’ family home in Tulsa, Oklahoma. It rocketed to number one in twelve countries including the US, Canada, Australia and the UK.
But if you thought MMMBop was just a meaningless ditty by a bunch of bratty home-schooled kids for whom the phrase ‘bubblegum pop’ might have been invented, think again.
Close inspection – not something most teen-penned lyrics typically withstand – reveals the song to be a melancholy reflection on the transience of life and the importance of living in the moment.
An ‘mmmbop’ turns out to be a unit of time akin to an instant. Those relationships? In an mmmbop they’re gone. Not exactly Byron, but not bad for three lads of nine, eleven and fourteen, as the Hanson brothers were when they wrote the song.
There’s a demo version of the track floating around the internet which, though it lacks the pace or pop sheen of the Dust Brothers-produced commercial single, has that same Jacksons-esque soulful vocal that nineties radio listeners will remember.
MMMBop’s mortal preoccupations might also be the reason for all that going forth and multiplying. Zac, Taylor and Isaac are the oldest of seven siblings, and large families are clearly a thing in Hanson-world.
Estimates as to the size of Taylor’s brood range from seven to nine mini-Hansons at the time of writing, while Zac has five children and Isaac a modest three. Perhaps it’s only a matter of time – an mmmbop, you might say – before the next generation of Hansons comes to a chart near you!
