Boyz II Men
Four Philly harmonies that owned the 90s Billboard chart like nobody before them. Boyz II Men didn't just top the Hot 100 — they kept breaking the record for how long a song could stay there, soundtracking every slow dance of the decade along the way.
They began in 1985 as Unique Attraction, a vocal group at the Philadelphia High School for the Creative and Performing Arts that rehearsed in a school bathroom for the acoustics. Inspired by New Edition, they renamed themselves Boyz II Men after that group's song 'Boys to Men' — and got their break in storybook fashion: in 1989 they snuck backstage at a Philadelphia radio concert and sang an a cappella New Edition cover for Michael Bivins on the spot. Bivins signed on to manage them, and their 1991 Motown debut Cooleyhighharmony — the 'hip hop doo-wop' record — sold over nine million copies and won the Grammy for Best R&B Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocals.
Then came the chart records. 'End of the Road' hit number one on the Billboard Hot 100 in August 1992 and stayed there a record-setting 13 weeks. Their 1994 album II sold more than 12 million copies in the US and won the Best R&B Album Grammy, while its single 'I'll Make Love to You' broke their own record with 14 weeks at number one. Then 'One Sweet Day,' their 1995 duet with Mariah Carey, spent 16 consecutive weeks on top — a record for the longest-running number-one song in Hot 100 history that stood for 23 years. Nobody else spent the mid-90s lapping their own chart records.
The 1997 album Evolution still produced a number one in 'Four Seasons of Loneliness,' but sold a fraction of II, and the group's imperial phase wound down. They won four Grammys in the 1990s and never stopped touring — the harmonies that soundtracked a decade of school dances still fill arenas on nostalgia bills today.
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