#R And B

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Celebrities 1998–2001 peak

98 Degrees

The boy band that built itself—assembled independently by four guys chasing the dream in Los Angeles, without a Lou Pearlman or corporate svengali telling them who to be. They cracked the charts with 1997's "Invisible Man," then spent 1998–2000 as Motown Records' R&B-leaning answer to the Backstreet Boys and NSYNC, delivering a handful of genuine hits including one number-one collaboration with Mariah Carey, then watched their moment fade when Nick Lachey married Jessica Simpson in 2002 and reality TV captured his afterlife.

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Celebrities 1994–2001 peak

Aaliyah

The Detroit teenager who whispered where everyone else belted, and with Timbaland and Missy Elliott bent R&B toward the future. Aaliyah went from "Back & Forth" at 15 to "Try Again," the first song to top the Hot 100 on airplay alone, and died in a plane crash in August 2001 at 22, five weeks after her third album came out.

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Celebrities 2004–2010 peak

Akon

The voice on half of late-2000s radio. Akon went from "Locked Up" to "Lonely" to "Smack That" — and guested on 23 Hot 100 hits for other artists while his labels signed Lady Gaga and T-Pain.

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Celebrities 2001–2004 peak

B2K

Omarion, Lil' Fizz, Raz-B and J-Boog: four Los Angeles teenagers in matching outfits, a Y2K-era name, and "Bump, Bump, Bump" at number one. B2K owned the teen-magazine wall for about three years, made a hit dance movie with You Got Served, and then broke up right around its release.

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Celebrities 2003–2008 peak

Beyoncé

The girl-group superstar who bet on herself and became simply the biggest star in music. From "Crazy in Love" in the summer of 2003 to "Single Ladies" closing out 2008, Beyoncé's solo run WAS the sound of the decade.

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Celebrities 1991–1997 peak

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.

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Celebrities 1994–2001 peak

Brandy

The braids, the UPN sitcom, the glass slipper, and the duet that spent thirteen weeks at number one. Brandy was a star at 15 with "I Wanna Be Down," carried Moesha for six seasons, played television's first Black Cinderella in 1997, and with Monica turned a made-up rivalry into "The Boy Is Mine," the best-selling single of 1998.

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Celebrities 1998–2005 peak

Destiny's Child

One of the best-selling girl groups of all time and the defining R&B girl group of the late 1990s and early 2000s, famous for the powerhouse lineup of Beyoncé Knowles, Kelly Rowland, and Michelle Williams. With hits like 'Say My Name,' 'Bills, Bills, Bills,' 'Independent Women,' 'Survivor,' and 'Bootylicious,' they defined an era of confident, sexually liberated pop music while launching Beyoncé toward her eventual superstardom.

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Celebrities 1996–2002 peak

Dru Hill

Baltimore's harmony-stacked R&B quartet — Sisqó, Nokio, Jazz, and Woody — behind late-'90s slow jams like "In My Bed" and "Never Make a Promise." Named after the city's Druid Hill Park, they were one of the defining male R&B groups of the era, right up until Sisqó's platinum-blond "Thong Song" solo fame both lifted the group and splintered it.

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Celebrities 1990–1997 peak

En Vogue

The Oakland quartet that brought four-part girl-group harmony into '90s R&B: "Hold On," "My Lovin' (You're Never Gonna Get It)," "Free Your Mind," and three #2 pop hits. A 2010 Billboard ranking put them third among female R&B groups of the previous 25 years, behind only TLC and Destiny's Child.

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Music 1997–1998

Wyclef Jean — "Gone till November"

A drug runner's goodbye letter set to strings performed by the New York Philharmonic — the tenderness wrapped around an unsentimental story is the whole song. Released in late 1997 from The Carnival, it hit #7 on the Hot 100 and proved a solo Wyclef could carry a hit without the Fugees.

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Music 1990–1991

"Iesha" — Another Bad Creation

Six boys between seven and twelve rapping about a playground crush over a Dallas Austin beat, the 1990 single that made Another Bad Creation the kid act of the New Jack Swing era. Michael Bivins found them, Motown signed them, and it went top ten.

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Celebrities 1990–2000 peak

Mariah Carey

The voice: a five-octave range and that signature whistle register that became the sound of 1990s radio dominance. Columbia executive Tommy Mottola heard her demo tape at a party in December 1988, signed her, and launched a decade-long reign that would see her become the first artist whose first five singles all reached number one, and close the 1990s with fourteen #1 hits and Billboard's Artist of the Decade award.

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Music 1998–1999

Lauryn Hill — The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill

Lauryn Hill's solo debut album, a genre-blending masterpiece that merged hip-hop, neo-soul, and R&B into a landmark release. Released in August 1998, it featured the hit singles "Doo Wop (That Thing)" and "Ex-Factor," establishing Hill as a solo artist of remarkable range and depth.

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Music 2004–2005

"Move Ya Body" by Nina Sky

Twin sisters from Astoria, Queens, singing over the Coolie Dance riddim's bongo loop, with a bridge lifted from Lisa Lisa and Cult Jam, in the summer when every block party in America was running on dancehall. It went to No. 4 on the Hot 100 in 2004 and remains the only single of their own to crack the top 40.

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Celebrities 2004–2010 peak

Ne-Yo

The guy who wrote some of the biggest R&B songs of the mid-2000s before his own voice became equally unavoidable. Ne-Yo went from invisible hitmaker to chart-dominating artist in one album cycle — and never stopped being both at once.

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Music 2006

"Promiscuous" by Nelly Furtado

Nelly Furtado flirting with Timbaland over crisp club production was the sound of a total reinvention: out with the earnest folk-pop, in with sleek and urgent. Released in April 2006, it spent six weeks at #1, became her first American chart-topper, and owned that summer outright.

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Music 1996–1997

No Diggity

That piano loop, that Bill Withers sample, Dr. Dre's shoulder-brushing opening rap — 'No Diggity' was instant cool in 1996 and has never once stopped being cool since. Blackstreet's smooth-with-an-edge chart-topper is the 90s R&B song everybody still knows every word to.

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Music 1999–2000

Destiny's Child — Say My Name

The call-and-response hook that defined an era of R&B, and the most dramatic lineup announcement in pop memory — disguised as a music video premiere. 'Say My Name' introduced the world to Destiny's Child in their most iconic form — and to the concept that your favorite song's original singers might not be the ones who got famous for it.

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Music 2005–2006

Ne-Yo — "So Sick"

The heartbreak ballad that made Ne-Yo a star, 'So Sick' hit number one the very week his debut album did. The premise is pure heartbreak: a guy can't escape love songs on the radio because every one reminds him of his ex.

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Music 1995

"Tell Me" — Groove Theory

Amel Larrieux's honeyed 1995 plea over Bryce Wilson's spare beat, the R&B single that went to number five on the Hot 100 and outlived the duo that made it. Still the sound of a summer night in 1995.

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Music 1995

"This Is How We Do It"

Friday night, and the party's here: Montell Jordan's debut single rode a Slick Rick sample to seven straight weeks at number one in the spring of 1995. A South Central kid with a Pepperdine degree who had been making TV infomercials, he wrote an anthem that has followed him from halftime shows to The Masked Singer.

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Music 2000

Thong Song (Sisqó)

The platinum-blond Dru Hill frontman's solo signature — a 2000 smash so ubiquitous you couldn't escape it. 'She had dumps like a truck, truck, truck...' Sisqó turned a string section, a booming beat, and one very specific ode into the sound of that summer.

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Celebrities 1992–1999 peak

TLC

The best-selling American girl group since the Supremes. T-Boz, Left Eye, and Chilli fused hip-hop, R&B, and a playful safe-sex message into era-defining hits — "Waterfalls," "No Scrubs," "Creep" — in baggy streetwear that a generation copied.

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Celebrities 1993–2000 peak

Toni Braxton

The husky contralto behind "Another Sad Love Song," "Breathe Again" and "Un-Break My Heart," two eight-times-platinum albums in a row, and the ballad Billboard named, in 1998, the most successful solo song in Hot 100 history — one she didn't want to record.

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Music 1997–1998

Next — "Too Close"

The greatest innuendo-hiding-in-plain-sight of 90s radio: a bouncy R&B smash unmistakably about dancing too close ("you're making it hard for me") that daytime radio played all year without blinking. It spent five weeks at #1 and finished as Billboard's #1 single of 1998.

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Celebrities 1985–1998 peak

Whitney Houston

The Voice, no qualifier needed. Whitney Houston arrived in 1985 with a record-breaking debut and never slowed down: seven consecutive #1 singles — still unmatched — and, with The Bodyguard, the best-selling soundtrack of all time. For a stretch of the '90s, she simply was the pop ballad.

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Music 1997–1998

Usher — "You Make Me Wanna..."

The love-triangle confession that made 18-year-old Usher a star: seven straight weeks at #2 on the Hot 100, held off the top the whole time by Elton John's "Candle in the Wind 1997." The video — five Ushers dancing in perfect sync inside a white-and-purple circular room — became his visual signature.