Welcome back to Q97.3’s pop culture throwback, where we look through the decades to see what came out in entertainment this week in 1989, 1999, and 2009, respectively.
In 1989…
On June 25th, the final episode of NBC’s “Day by Day” aired. While a traditional family sitcom, it does contain one very notable actress: Julia Louis-Dreyfus in a pre-Seinfeld role that screams “Proto-Elaine”. The characters even have similar names!
June 27th brings us “Cosmic Thing,” the 5th album by the B-52’s. It contains the classic earworm “Love Shack.” I remember it being a very popular song on those “make your own music video” things that toured college campuses around the early 2000’s. How’s that for some staying power?
On June 30th, you could head down to your local cinema to check out The Karate Kid Part III. Alternatively, you could have just stayed home and rewatched I and II on VHS to get the same effect.
In 1999…
On June 29th, Santana and Rob Thomas release Smooth, the first single from Santana’s “Supernatural” album. The song would go on to completely dominate the world…for at least twelve weeks on the Billboard music charts.
On the very next day, June 30th, the film version of the raunchy comedy classic South Park: Bigger, Longer, & Uncut made its debut. I knew a bunch of the show’s fans that were taken aback upon their first viewing of this. Why? Because it’s a full-on musical! It even got nominated for an academy award for best song! It ended up losing in the end though. Who’s responsible for that? Blame Canada.
This one gets me right in the childhood. On June 26, we get the final episode of the Saturday morning cartoon Doug. It was groundbreaking for a show meant for kids in that it wasn’t over the top or zany like Looney Tunes or Animaniacs. It was just a nice little slice-of-life show about this kid named Doug Funnie trying to get through the awkward years of middle school. In the end, Doug didn’t get the girl he pined for all those years. Why? We’ll let Patti Mayonnaise explain it.
In 2009…
For Michael Bay fans, June 24th brought you the second film in his Transformers franchise, Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen. I honestly have nothing nice to say about this movie, because all I can remember about it is these two Autobots who each have an extremely cringeworthy “accent.”
On June 29th, MSNBC launches a high definition version of their channel, falling behind CNN and Fox News in doing so. Goodbye standard definition. I absolutely do not miss you.
And on June 30th, oh hey, it’s Rob Thomas again! 10 years after breaking out with his solo career, Thomas releases the album Cradlesong. The track Her Diamonds has a pretty fantastic music video that I can’t recommend enough.
