As someone who collects and rips CDs, the NOW series is a pretty great value for the price, especially if you find them secondhand. It's an easy way to add a lot of big radio hits of the past to my collection.
Absolutely true! Since I stopped listening to mainstream music a long time ago, it was easy and cheap to buy old chart music compilations from for me the 1990s and early 2000s. I stopped buying second hand CDs but not every single song is available on a streaming platform, so sometimes it makes sense to buy such a compilation.
I have a mentally disabled and legally blind 15 year old, and these CDs are GOLD to him. He understands how to work a CD player, he can learn who these songs he's heard are by, I would never hear any of this music, or know what to play for my son without these discs. I transfer a handful of songs onto his IPad whenever they come out, and I just check them out of the library and rip them, so Its a perfect system. Even at his advanced age, my son has come to tears over the anxiety of waiting for the new disc to arrive. There are always multiple holds, and it is a struggle to get a copy when they are released. I hope they never go away.
Hey man, I just wanted to reach out and say that I'm really thankful for the videos you make and the subject you cover. It's very insightful, educational and covers things in a way that's not judgemental but welcoming. Keep doing what you're doing. I'm glad I've subscribed to this channel. I've learned heaps and am looking forward to learning more. Also, a solid sense of humour.
@@MicTheSnare keep supporting Physical Media, MTS, because if we let it die out, we'll never be able to own our favorite media ever again! PS: Please use your voice to hundreds of thousands of people & support Physical Media actively!
@@MicTheSnareas someone who is… an older millennial, I remember when that first ‘98 mix came out, and my friends and I would bet which songs would be on the next compilation, even though we thought we were too good for pop music until poptimism happened around ‘05.
I've always had a deep fascination with how our cultural phases might come to be perceived in the future, and this is just what I needed. It's weird that a seemingly dated hits compilation series is a perfect window into what we may be showing our grandchildren or reminiscing on as a portrait of the zeitgeist
I don’t think I’ve ever once owed one of these CDs but they still have had enough of a mental impact on me that I named my Spotify Playlist “Now That’s What I Call Good Music”
Back in the day, my best friend had whichever NOW CD that had Blue on it and I kid you not, that was the only song off that CD we'd listen to. Proud to say that even as 8 year olds, we had impeccable taste. You have such a lovely way of finding these things that exist on the periphery for all of us and giving them the spotlight they deserve (for better or worse). I was grinning the whole time. Thank you for this much needed mood boster before my grad school classes start tomorrow! ❤
I'm from Germany and I grew up with Eiffel 65's epic classic "Blue" at age 12. Call it cheesy and yes, EDM productions even until the mid 2000s or so often sound dated and "cheap" today but this song is a massive classic. It's undeniable. 🐻🩵
Never thought i'd see a music critic doing a video on the NOW albums also the reason why a lot of rap is not on these albums for the most part is because rap is very hard to lisense
I threw away guessed Karma Police. My time has come, I'll see you all on the other side. It's been a fun ride enjoying music but now I'm no longer allowed.
Can't get away without mentioning that the Jaron of Jaron and the Long Road to Love is the same as Evan and Jaron of 2000 mall-rock staple "Crazy for this Girl" (which also appears on Now That's What I Call Music 6)
Yeah, some music critics have theorized that despite essentially being a solo project, it was called "Jaron and the Long Road to Love", because he didn't want to try to make country music under his full name: Jaron Lowenstein.
I work at a gym (NYSC in downtown Boston), and hearing you go through the track lists of Now(s) 85-87 was like a day at work at 5x speed. Each song plays somewhere around four or five times per shift (I work for 8 hours), and the music stays on overnight. I can only imagine that spread across all of the chain’s locations, we must be fluffing the synch numbers for these tracks by at least a couple percent… do I smell a conspiracy at play?
"Now" having a numbering system reminds me of Kidz Bop, since I can say "Kid me downloaded Kidz Bop 17 on iTunes". Now I want to go on a trip to see when was I born- and how that compares to Now. Sounds very fun.
Seems even back then, kid me was into retro music.. as retro as the Kidz Bop cover of "I Want Candy" and downloading a 2010 album in 2011 or 2012 may be.
Casually mentioning my adoration of your channel and work to a promoter sealed the deal for them booking me for a few sets on their October calendar. Thank you for that.
On the "big songs mysteriously missing front", it might be to do with difficulty licensing them. Madonna famously didn't let any of her music appear on the UK Now series, and most of Prince's big hits were on the "The Hits" series instead, so while the compilations provide a snapshot of music at the time, there will always be some unusual voids. Great video, though, and interesting to see a bit more of the US series!
i found the shrek spinoff album at a thrift store for 25 cents. i always wondered why it didnt work in any of my cd players until one day i noticed that instead of a cd it was actually disc one to a shrek dvd set. now i can watch one half of shrek for only 25 cents. best purchase i ever made.
Seriously, if you want to listen to "You Only Get What You Give" by the New Radicals, just listen to the whole LP. You don't need 98 Degrees to be involved.
I’m so happy you made this video! Now! That’s What I Call Music was huge part of my childhood and it was a really big thing in South Africa, where I’m from, I started collecting them back in 2008 with Now! 46 and I continued until 2015 with Now! 71, my first cd, I bought with my own money was a Now! CD! So it was awesome to see you make this video!
I collected a majority of the NOW CDs throughout the late 2000s to late 2010s. I would bring them to school and play them in class during chill days lol, or at the after school program I went to. My mom had NOW 5, and yeah it was probably the best one lol. Britney, Janet, NSYNC…can’t beat it. The NOW series was a big part of my childhood and how I learned to love pop music and mainstream music.
I had just recently been nostalgic for these, going back to listen. Some of my favorite memories are playing these in the car to band competitions with my friends. It really made me love the notion of compilations and made me think of what makes a good playlist and how to make it flow. Definitely not Now’s strongest suit but i still loved them.
Funny that this video popped up. I was literally just going through my Now That’s What I Call Music collection 😂. I live in South Africa and they recently discontinued the series because you just don’t see CD stores or them sell CDs here in general anymore.
I recently got a new used car, and while cutting expenses, I got rid of SiriusXM, and pulled out my old CDs from 20-25 years ago, and to my surprise, mostly they still worked great! So many NOW CDs in my collection, plus I’ve found more for quite cheap, such great nostalgia
Never actually had one of these CDs. Had a couple of the “So Fresh” ones which was basically the same but was based off Australia’s top 100. Absolute bangers.
i would imagine the now CDs have a lot of influence from top 40 radio which has been hesitant to play Rap/Country/Alternative so that probably explains the lack of those songs on the albums
And you only really see them play stuff if it either becomes so popular it's unavoidable (Heatwaves by Glass Animals), has a mainstream artist as a feature (Meant to Be by Bebe Rexha and FGL), or is a cover of a pop song (Fast Car by Luke Combs).
After binge-playing Bomb Rush Cyberfunk for 20+ hours over the last two days, hearing Get Enuf in the outro felt like an out-of-body experience and I legitimately wasn't sure if I was hallucinating it or not
I grew up with these CDs and I still collect them now. These last few releases have been pretty good in my opinion, it really wraps todays charts and radio. I think it’s a pretty good spot as it’s been around for the last 25 years. NOW 85 has been my favorite release of this year as it includes Mega Hits that everyone knows. These albums are also like Time Capsules are you listen to an older CD, you’ll be able to go back in time. My personal favorite NOW Album would be NOW 30 back in 2009 as it has Lady Gaga, Britney Spears, Ne-Yo, David Archuleta, Taylor Swift & Katy Perry, it just reminds me of early childhood for me! It was nice to see you video and I really enjoyed it!
after i stopped seeing TV ads for these CDs, i assumed they died out along with the majority of the CD industry once digital music and especially streaming became the primary way of consuming music. it is absolutely incredible that they are still releasing multiple albums A YEAR (including all the "mainline" albums, country albums, xmas albums, and other misc. "special" albums). i was a Kidz Bop kid myself and never really listened to the NOW albums, but seeing them still makes me incredibly nostalgic. even though it feels like an anachronistic dystopian nightmare to see them still being made (at least as someone who prefers to listen to artists' full albums instead of compilations).
I always love seeing your new videos pop up in my feed, you’ve become one of my top favorite content creators recently. Thank you for the hard work you put into these
I've been waiting for someone to make a video about NOW for the longest time now. I actually started a podcast series about the first 25 volumes but stopped after episode 3! XD Also yes I was highly anticipating you mentioning the Barbie Girl/Karma Police placement.
I still remember exactly which NOW CDs we had: 5, 6, 7, and 11, and 12. I remember being jealous of other kids who had the ones I was missing. They really did have a formative effect on my childhood. I still listen to pretty much every song on those albums.
in germany the most famous of these compilation hit album brands is "bravo hits" by teen magazine bravo. these had genuene value before streaming with 2 cds holding 22 songs each on them, but still were just around double the price from an normal album. as a kid i used to always get an album with the biggest hits of the year as a compilation for christmas, my mom would often also (of course verry much legal ahem) convert them into an mp3 file for me to hear on my mp3 player good times
Its funny because i was just thinking about that Kids Bop is up to. This video doesn't answer my question exactly but its very close and very interesting
In Australia, Sony Music started a Now competitor call "So Fresh". It started in Spring 2000, there are 4 cd's a year. AND EVERY CD HAS GONE TO NUMBER 1 in the ARIA (Australian Recording Industry Association) Top 20 Compilations Chart.
Yes yes yes! Having collected So Fresh & NOW as a kid, So Fresh is such a great capture of the Australian music charts at the release of each CD. Their 2-disc ‘Hits of Summer’ each year were always interesting as they overlapped into the next year, almost predicting & deciding what would be on the charts coming into the next year. The ‘Hit Machine’ series that predates So Fresh & the 100% Hits series is also a great capture of the 90’s Australian music landscape.
Reminds me of downloading MP3s from Kazaa and creating Now That’s What I Call Music for Nu Metal and one or two Beastie Boys tracks. Not that I ever did that.
I have been saying that to my friends lately! I can't tell if they sample music more frequently than when I was a kid or if it's just the fact that I'm older now so I can recognize samples easily because I was around for the original
Cheat’s playing something on a laserdisc has one of my very favorite basslines in any song, even among those longer than a few glorious seconds; absolute classic
Pretty sure Australia had these too. Australia also had some awesome compilation cds called So Fresh & you would get it every season & it would be like Spring of 2004 or Summer & best of 2002 My favourite was "So Fresh: The Hits Of Summer 2003 plus the biggest hits of 2002" I had that playing on my discman on repeat.
Hey, Mic! I'm a big NOW fan from the UK. I've been collecting since NOW 44 (December '99). I can help with some issues regarding licensing certain acts. -HipHop/Rap: If you look back at the early 2000s NOWs in the US, big HipHop artists like Eminem/D12, Jay-Z, Snoop Dogg, Ludacris, and many others. But as time goes by a lot of artists now control what gets put out on compilations. Drake and Cardi B never really license stuff in the US, except for the Grammy Nominees albums (R.I.P.). We also have the same issue here in the UK - we don't even Taylor Swift anymore. -K-Pop/Latin-Pop: It's probably due to a lot of those artists being under very protective contracts, labels, and copyright. Plus compilations are very European-centric idea. From what I've seen a lot of Asia doesn't do "chart hits" compilations - and focus more on studio albums, singles, and boxsets. So it could also be that no one knows how to license these songs that often. Missing 1998 hits: Shania doesn't really appear on US releases, Celine was on Sony Music Entertainment for 'My Heart Will Go On', and Sony didn't jump on the band wagon until NOW 4 (I think it's NOW 4) - Plus licensing a song that belongs to a soundtrack is very hard, because it's that soundtracks USP. Will Smith is also a Sony Music artist. You summed it up so well though, each Number defines a period of time and looking back on them can bring back total nostalgia! Which is very lucky, because it means the albums will never be "dated", the songs may do - but not the whole album. I love these albums - and thank you for making such a good video on these!
Looks like a lot of it is stuff that was popular on the pop radio chart. I'm Not Here To Make Friends, Lottery, Cinderella Snapped, I Know It Won't Work, Can't Tame Her, and Hearts Wants What It Wants all charted there.
3:06 guessing this right after watching previously and forgetting… this is a legacy that will last far longer then i as a frail shrill body could ever hope to see. Thank You Snare, Very Cool 👍
I'm starting to wonder which version we had here in Australia, the UK one, or the US one, but I'm gonna go with the UK one, because dance music was way more popular here than country music. The most "country" we ever got was through Shania Twain and Faith Hill (and that one song from Billy Ray which I won't speak of, lol). As an avid radio listener in the past, I did like compilations growing up, getting some great variety, and I didn't get into album diving until I was older. As for my thoughts on today's music? I try to be open-minded, but I keep going back to, let's say, the early Now That's What I Call Music compilations, lol.
i discovered radiohead thanks to my cousin's now cd lol. the thing is, it was just the cd without the track listing, so i didn't know who the band was for quite some time. when i finally heard "karma police" again, i was so happy.
Funnily enough, there are very similar cd series in germany, down to the 3D effect, but they have different names. I looked it up and 'NOW' seems to be in a bunch of countries but not germany. Wonder if its the copyright system we have.
oooo a surprising and wonderful topic, great video! today I learned that the US numbers don't line up to the EU numbers. I'm glad you mentioned it coz I was SO CONFUSED when you picked up NOW 87. My brain went "....hang on a sec that can't be right that had to have been like 10 years ago??" (it was)
That joke compilation at the end was unironically a great selection. I'd love to see a compilation like Now but with meme songs. Kind of like the YTMND soundtrack was back in the day.
I feel like people say this every year but this honestly might be the worst year ever for pop music. The songs that are hitting the top of the charts are awful and the pop songs that are good don't really chart that high.
I agree honestly. Sucks because honestly I think 2020-2021 were pretty strong years to the decade in pop music (despite Covid). 2023 in general seems to be a weak pop culture year
@@tylerhackner9731 I definitely agree. 2020 and 2021 were really great years imo, 2022 was kind of... meh. But 2023 is just pretty bad. Honestly, even worse than 2018 if you ask me
What is pop music is my first question? Is it only music from the pop genre or everything that is in the charts because even rap has a huge pop appeal. Then I am confused because who cares for the charts and the mainstream? It just showcases the tip of the iceberg. The commercial peak. There are millions of songs that don't chart and enough good music to find. Charts became pointless a long time ago. When I grew up there were no real alternatives. You had to buy compilations or you could download some stuff but youtube wasn't even born and the internet was relatively new and slow. Watching music TV was great, compilations were important, buying CDs essential. Of course I knew and liked a lot of songs that were pure mainstream also because I hadn't yet access to EDM or rock or other alternative genres. Now you can listen to whatever you want. You have to dig to find the gems if you're into other music than the pure mainstream stuff. It's time consuming. But it's possible. Even I who started to ignore the mainstream for the most part like around 2005 or so, have compiled a spotify playlist with "pop/r&b" and similiar stuff that fits into that category and now from 2010-2020 I have gathered I think 600 songs. Despite being disconnected from most of the songs from the charts.
@@SavedByGrace_CitizenEmperorユウthat's a common response to these kinds of things, and in other years I'd wholeheartedly agree with what you're saying. But this year, even the rap releases have been mostly trash (or, at the very best, 'mid'), and as alluded to in this video, so many of the biggest hits on the radio in rap, r&b, and pop are covers of old songs or shitty interpolations of old songs. Even for things way off the 'mainstream', there have been SEVERAL releases by some of my absolute favorite artists that have completely sucked or be extremely underwhelming (Janelle Monae, Jenny Lewis, Kim Petras, The New Pornographers are some of my personal examples). Don't get me wrong - there are some really good albums that have come out this year, but overall this is definitely one of the worst recent years in music
I cannot believe the NOW albums did Barbenheimer 2 and a half decades ago. Insane.
Underrated comment.
good comment
BarbiePolice
I hadn’t thought of that 😂
i swear one of those CDs being lost somewhere in your childhood atic in a dusty cardboard box is one of the few immediate guarantees in life
Don’t forget the kidzbop cd tucked in said dusty box
True.
I have volume 33 on my old ipod.
Not me, but my friend's mom always bought what seem like at least 1 NTWICM every year.
@@shonenjumpmagneto4 REPLIES
@@JadenGregg-su9no nuh uh
Bloody Mary, a song released 12 years ago, being on a 2023 compilation is wild.
Sure Thing too
Honestly the only times I've heard this song this year is when ipad babies are scrolling through TH-cam shorts.... :/// So uh yeah... :///
Cruel Summer by Taylor Swift will be in the next compilation
it's still so current too. gaga is a genius.
@@bailagringacoversit didn't last too long tho it's not current anymore
"That's the most surprising thing I've heard about Lizzo in recent memory!"
Mic's humour still as on point as ever I see
Glad that Mic is priming us for the inevitable Kidz Bop follow up to this video 😌
As much as I hate Kidz Bop, I’d love to see Mic cover their history and where they are now. Maybe even a DDD on them just for the shits and giggles.
There is even a Kidz Bop Germany. Our planet realls is doomed. 😢
@@AKawasakiAPRIL FOOLS' DAY DDD LET'S GOOOOO!!!!!
As someone who collects and rips CDs, the NOW series is a pretty great value for the price, especially if you find them secondhand. It's an easy way to add a lot of big radio hits of the past to my collection.
Absolutely true! Since I stopped listening to mainstream music a long time ago, it was easy and cheap to buy old chart music compilations from for me the 1990s and early 2000s. I stopped buying second hand CDs but not every single song is available on a streaming platform, so sometimes it makes sense to buy such a compilation.
Try not to rip when if possible. We gotta support physical media dude or will die out and we wont be able to actually own any media ever again
@@SavedByGrace_CitizenEmperorユウ physical media makes sense period!
(No one will be able to actually own media anymore if we let it die out!)
@@shonenjumpmagnetowho cares if they rip? As long as they buy the cd they are still creating as much demand as someone who doesn’t rip.
@@shonenjumpmagnetothey...already purchased the CD 😂😂😂
I have a mentally disabled and legally blind 15 year old, and these CDs are GOLD to him. He understands how to work a CD player, he can learn who these songs he's heard are by, I would never hear any of this music, or know what to play for my son without these discs. I transfer a handful of songs onto his IPad whenever they come out, and I just check them out of the library and rip them, so Its a perfect system. Even at his advanced age, my son has come to tears over the anxiety of waiting for the new disc to arrive. There are always multiple holds, and it is a struggle to get a copy when they are released. I hope they never go away.
Hey man, I just wanted to reach out and say that I'm really thankful for the videos you make and the subject you cover. It's very insightful, educational and covers things in a way that's not judgemental but welcoming. Keep doing what you're doing. I'm glad I've subscribed to this channel. I've learned heaps and am looking forward to learning more.
Also, a solid sense of humour.
Thank you so much!!!!
@@MicTheSnare keep supporting Physical Media, MTS, because if we let it die out, we'll never be able to own our favorite media ever again!
PS: Please use your voice to hundreds of thousands of people & support Physical Media actively!
@@MicTheSnareas someone who is… an older millennial, I remember when that first ‘98 mix came out, and my friends and I would bet which songs would be on the next compilation, even though we thought we were too good for pop music until poptimism happened around ‘05.
@@Uhohlisa4 REPLIES
@@MicTheSnare @10:51 'I'm Good' by Bebe Rexha interpelates ''I'm Blue' (Da Ba Dee') by Eiffel 65 👉 th-cam.com/video/9umBCXNudNM/w-d-xo.htmlsi=NmyZq4tWR-rjXAvG
I've always had a deep fascination with how our cultural phases might come to be perceived in the future, and this is just what I needed. It's weird that a seemingly dated hits compilation series is a perfect window into what we may be showing our grandchildren or reminiscing on as a portrait of the zeitgeist
Lol true! Whatever a “portrait of the zeitgeist” is, I agree with your point!
I don’t think I’ve ever once owed one of these CDs but they still have had enough of a mental impact on me that I named my Spotify Playlist “Now That’s What I Call Good Music”
Back in the day, my best friend had whichever NOW CD that had Blue on it and I kid you not, that was the only song off that CD we'd listen to. Proud to say that even as 8 year olds, we had impeccable taste. You have such a lovely way of finding these things that exist on the periphery for all of us and giving them the spotlight they deserve (for better or worse). I was grinning the whole time. Thank you for this much needed mood boster before my grad school classes start tomorrow! ❤
I'm from Germany and I grew up with Eiffel 65's epic classic "Blue" at age 12. Call it cheesy and yes, EDM productions even until the mid 2000s or so often sound dated and "cheap" today but this song is a massive classic. It's undeniable. 🐻🩵
@@SavedByGrace_CitizenEmperorユウ I love *'Blue' by Eiffel 65* because of *'Iron Man 3' (2013)* LOL.
7:23
Mic: "But do you honestly remember Impossible by Shontelle?"
Black millennials: "YES, WE DO."
🤣
I only remember James Arthur's version
I remembered all three of those songs. Then again, I am a total nerd
I remember it extremely well and I'm white af
I remember years ago someone told me I should take caution when it comes to love... but I forgot who it was until now 😂
Lol I'm white and I remember this song very clearly
Todd in the Shadow put it nicely with Last Night saying it's like a Maroon 5 songs but with country twang.
Never thought i'd see a music critic doing a video on the NOW albums also the reason why a lot of rap is not on these albums for the most part is because rap is very hard to lisense
I suspect it's also because they'd censor it, and after you censor rap songs there's not always a lot left to actually listen to
It could also be that most popular rap doesn't really qualify to be called music.
@@resolvegaming2263 e.g. We Cry Together by Kendrick Lamar, still traumatized from listening to the clean version
@@resolvegaming2263 A few big rap songs have made it on NOW albums but they are censored to hell like WAP for example
@@resolvegaming2263my favorite censored rap song has to be Kendrick Lamar’s ‘We cry together’ that shit’s fire
I remember burning a volume of NOW that’s what I call music on a CD at Dave and Busters. I think this adds nothing to the video but it’s cool
“We’re half broke. But hey we do it with style!”
Has been my mantra for over 20 years. God I love that song.
Great video!! New sub!!
I had the first NOW cd (US version) and it was my introduction to Radiohead. So NOW will always have a special place in my heart.
I threw away guessed Karma Police.
My time has come, I'll see you all on the other side. It's been a fun ride enjoying music but now I'm no longer allowed.
The Cheat's Playing Something on a Laserdisc is such a timeless jam. Taste recognizes taste
Everybody To The Limit, Trogdor, and The System Is Down are classic too
Never mess with the classics
@@thermitemound8754 And who can forget… the Strong Badian National Anthem
No The Cheat is Not Dead? For shame
@@mitkitty Oh, terribly sorry. How could I forget that?
Can't get away without mentioning that the Jaron of Jaron and the Long Road to Love is the same as Evan and Jaron of 2000 mall-rock staple "Crazy for this Girl" (which also appears on Now That's What I Call Music 6)
Yeah, some music critics have theorized that despite essentially being a solo project, it was called "Jaron and the Long Road to Love", because he didn't want to try to make country music under his full name: Jaron Lowenstein.
I work at a gym (NYSC in downtown Boston), and hearing you go through the track lists of Now(s) 85-87 was like a day at work at 5x speed.
Each song plays somewhere around four or five times per shift (I work for 8 hours), and the music stays on overnight.
I can only imagine that spread across all of the chain’s locations, we must be fluffing the synch numbers for these tracks by at least a couple percent… do I smell a conspiracy at play?
"Now" having a numbering system reminds me of Kidz Bop, since I can say "Kid me downloaded Kidz Bop 17 on iTunes". Now I want to go on a trip to see when was I born- and how that compares to Now. Sounds very fun.
Seems even back then, kid me was into retro music.. as retro as the Kidz Bop cover of "I Want Candy" and downloading a 2010 album in 2011 or 2012 may be.
Casually mentioning my adoration of your channel and work to a promoter sealed the deal for them booking me for a few sets on their October calendar. Thank you for that.
I actually do remember Shontelle’s Impossible from 2010 thank you very much 😂
On the "big songs mysteriously missing front", it might be to do with difficulty licensing them. Madonna famously didn't let any of her music appear on the UK Now series, and most of Prince's big hits were on the "The Hits" series instead, so while the compilations provide a snapshot of music at the time, there will always be some unusual voids. Great video, though, and interesting to see a bit more of the US series!
i found the shrek spinoff album at a thrift store for 25 cents. i always wondered why it didnt work in any of my cd players until one day i noticed that instead of a cd it was actually disc one to a shrek dvd set. now i can watch one half of shrek for only 25 cents.
best purchase i ever made.
Seriously, if you want to listen to "You Only Get What You Give" by the New Radicals, just listen to the whole LP. You don't need 98 Degrees to be involved.
IM THE ELDEST BOY!!! i need that on cd, maybe along with L to the OG
I can't believe this video is how I found out they still make NOW CDs 😂
I’m so happy you made this video! Now! That’s What I Call Music was huge part of my childhood and it was a really big thing in South Africa, where I’m from, I started collecting them back in 2008 with Now! 46 and I continued until 2015 with Now! 71, my first cd, I bought with my own money was a Now! CD! So it was awesome to see you make this video!
ZA Mentioned 🇿🇦
I collected a majority of the NOW CDs throughout the late 2000s to late 2010s. I would bring them to school and play them in class during chill days lol, or at the after school program I went to. My mom had NOW 5, and yeah it was probably the best one lol. Britney, Janet, NSYNC…can’t beat it. The NOW series was a big part of my childhood and how I learned to love pop music and mainstream music.
7:26 yes… I do remember Impossible by Shontelle, its on my “long commute karaoke” playlist
I had just recently been nostalgic for these, going back to listen. Some of my favorite memories are playing these in the car to band competitions with my friends. It really made me love the notion of compilations and made me think of what makes a good playlist and how to make it flow. Definitely not Now’s strongest suit but i still loved them.
shoutout to your local target for having a bunch of great kpop albums. and mega shoutout to mentioning muna and wolf alice aka music excellence
the ending reminded me of those old ringtone commercials with the dancing gummy bears and such lmao
The one time they got it right is when they got DWUW by Lady Gaga on that CD they asked for her solo version, such a woke queen if you ask me
In the UK album it has R Kelly on it
@@zaksharman in the us version he’s not on the song, I bought the whole f***ing thing on iTunes cuz the song is an “album only” track
@@xoxoryan5811 LOL
Funny that this video popped up. I was literally just going through my Now That’s What I Call Music collection 😂. I live in South Africa and they recently discontinued the series because you just don’t see CD stores or them sell CDs here in general anymore.
I recently got a new used car, and while cutting expenses, I got rid of SiriusXM, and pulled out my old CDs from 20-25 years ago, and to my surprise, mostly they still worked great! So many NOW CDs in my collection, plus I’ve found more for quite cheap, such great nostalgia
You are amazing simply for including Strong Bad at the end of the video - "whatever happened to the LASER disc? Laser disc!"
Never actually had one of these CDs. Had a couple of the “So Fresh” ones which was basically the same but was based off Australia’s top 100. Absolute bangers.
i would imagine the now CDs have a lot of influence from top 40 radio which has been hesitant to play Rap/Country/Alternative so that probably explains the lack of those songs on the albums
And you only really see them play stuff if it either becomes so popular it's unavoidable (Heatwaves by Glass Animals), has a mainstream artist as a feature (Meant to Be by Bebe Rexha and FGL), or is a cover of a pop song (Fast Car by Luke Combs).
After binge-playing Bomb Rush Cyberfunk for 20+ hours over the last two days, hearing Get Enuf in the outro felt like an out-of-body experience and I legitimately wasn't sure if I was hallucinating it or not
Now That’s What I Call Polka! by Weird Al justifies the existence of every single album
Came here for the Weird Al comment. Thank you! 😊
When I feel sad, I put on a MtheS video to cheer me up and get a chuckle out of me everytime I least expect it
I’m not kidding when I went on to say RADIOHEAD on a whim, guessing what came after “Barbie girl” 😂😂
I grew up with these CDs and I still collect them now. These last few releases have been pretty good in my opinion, it really wraps todays charts and radio. I think it’s a pretty good spot as it’s been around for the last 25 years. NOW 85 has been my favorite release of this year as it includes Mega Hits that everyone knows. These albums are also like Time Capsules are you listen to an older CD, you’ll be able to go back in time. My personal favorite NOW Album would be NOW 30 back in 2009 as it has Lady Gaga, Britney Spears, Ne-Yo, David Archuleta, Taylor Swift & Katy Perry, it just reminds me of early childhood for me! It was nice to see you video and I really enjoyed it!
I owned the Canadian Now 6 from 2001 (Yes Canada had their own as well) and that album had some bangers.
after i stopped seeing TV ads for these CDs, i assumed they died out along with the majority of the CD industry once digital music and especially streaming became the primary way of consuming music. it is absolutely incredible that they are still releasing multiple albums A YEAR (including all the "mainline" albums, country albums, xmas albums, and other misc. "special" albums). i was a Kidz Bop kid myself and never really listened to the NOW albums, but seeing them still makes me incredibly nostalgic. even though it feels like an anachronistic dystopian nightmare to see them still being made (at least as someone who prefers to listen to artists' full albums instead of compilations).
I always love seeing your new videos pop up in my feed, you’ve become one of my top favorite content creators recently. Thank you for the hard work you put into these
In Australia we have So Fresh: The Hits of [season].
I've been waiting for someone to make a video about NOW for the longest time now. I actually started a podcast series about the first 25 volumes but stopped after episode 3! XD
Also yes I was highly anticipating you mentioning the Barbie Girl/Karma Police placement.
I still remember exactly which NOW CDs we had: 5, 6, 7, and 11, and 12. I remember being jealous of other kids who had the ones I was missing. They really did have a formative effect on my childhood. I still listen to pretty much every song on those albums.
Genuinely, I would love to hear your take on Kids Bop. Also It is always a pleasure to see a new video of yours on my main page so thank you.
I also heard that at least in the UK, they just stick all the popular songs on CD1 numbers 1 - 15. Some of the best NOW songs were in the bottom half
Surprise Mic video drop is the best way to start the day
An amazing video! I got thoroughly surprised by the random appearance of Get Enuf by Hideki Naganuma in the end though! Wonderful taste
My very first cassette tape was now 44 (uk), takes me right back 😊
in germany the most famous of these compilation hit album brands is "bravo hits" by teen magazine bravo. these had genuene value before streaming with 2 cds holding 22 songs each on them, but still were just around double the price from an normal album.
as a kid i used to always get an album with the biggest hits of the year as a compilation for christmas, my mom would often also (of course verry much legal ahem) convert them into an mp3 file for me to hear on my mp3 player
good times
God I wish Number One Fan had become a bigger hit. Such a good song
Its funny because i was just thinking about that Kids Bop is up to. This video doesn't answer my question exactly but its very close and very interesting
Faded by SoulDecision still haunts me to this day because of Now 5.
I still remember when the first one came out seeing the commercial on tv lol
In Australia, Sony Music started a Now competitor call "So Fresh".
It started in Spring 2000, there are 4 cd's a year.
AND EVERY CD HAS GONE TO NUMBER 1 in the ARIA (Australian Recording Industry Association) Top 20 Compilations Chart.
Yes yes yes! Having collected So Fresh & NOW as a kid, So Fresh is such a great capture of the Australian music charts at the release of each CD. Their 2-disc ‘Hits of Summer’ each year were always interesting as they overlapped into the next year, almost predicting & deciding what would be on the charts coming into the next year. The ‘Hit Machine’ series that predates So Fresh & the 100% Hits series is also a great capture of the 90’s Australian music landscape.
Reminds me of downloading MP3s from Kazaa and creating Now That’s What I Call Music for Nu Metal and one or two Beastie Boys tracks. Not that I ever did that.
6:30 ‘I’m not here to make friends’ had a bit of a controversial moment on very alive blue bird app so it’s fair to say
yuh
i love how we've collectively agreed on not acknowledging the rebrand
I'm 31 and feel OLD afteer watching this - I remember getting the first American one so vividly when I was 6!!
I have been saying that to my friends lately! I can't tell if they sample music more frequently than when I was a kid or if it's just the fact that I'm older now so I can recognize samples easily because I was around for the original
Deep Discog Dive suggestions :
- XTC
- Silverchair/Daniel Johns
- Tears For Fears
- Soundgarden/Audioslave/Chris Cornell
- Lindsey Buckingham solo albums
Cheat’s playing something on a laserdisc has one of my very favorite basslines in any song, even among those longer than a few glorious seconds; absolute classic
Pretty sure Australia had these too. Australia also had some awesome compilation cds called So Fresh & you would get it every season & it would be like Spring of 2004 or Summer & best of 2002
My favourite was "So Fresh: The Hits Of Summer 2003 plus the biggest hits of 2002" I had that playing on my discman on repeat.
Hey, Mic! I'm a big NOW fan from the UK. I've been collecting since NOW 44 (December '99). I can help with some issues regarding licensing certain acts.
-HipHop/Rap: If you look back at the early 2000s NOWs in the US, big HipHop artists like Eminem/D12, Jay-Z, Snoop Dogg, Ludacris, and many others. But as time goes by a lot of artists now control what gets put out on compilations. Drake and Cardi B never really license stuff in the US, except for the Grammy Nominees albums (R.I.P.). We also have the same issue here in the UK - we don't even Taylor Swift anymore.
-K-Pop/Latin-Pop: It's probably due to a lot of those artists being under very protective contracts, labels, and copyright. Plus compilations are very European-centric idea. From what I've seen a lot of Asia doesn't do "chart hits" compilations - and focus more on studio albums, singles, and boxsets. So it could also be that no one knows how to license these songs that often.
Missing 1998 hits: Shania doesn't really appear on US releases, Celine was on Sony Music Entertainment for 'My Heart Will Go On', and Sony didn't jump on the band wagon until NOW 4 (I think it's NOW 4) - Plus licensing a song that belongs to a soundtrack is very hard, because it's that soundtracks USP. Will Smith is also a Sony Music artist.
You summed it up so well though, each Number defines a period of time and looking back on them can bring back total nostalgia! Which is very lucky, because it means the albums will never be "dated", the songs may do - but not the whole album. I love these albums - and thank you for making such a good video on these!
Looks like a lot of it is stuff that was popular on the pop radio chart. I'm Not Here To Make Friends, Lottery, Cinderella Snapped, I Know It Won't Work, Can't Tame Her, and Hearts Wants What It Wants all charted there.
3:06 guessing this right after watching previously and forgetting… this is a legacy that will last far longer then i as a frail shrill body could ever hope to see.
Thank You Snare, Very Cool 👍
We freaking love you Mic The Snare
The fact that Kendall's Logan rap wasn't on a now that's what I call music is all I need to know
always a great day when u upload. should do more of the decade videos
The double take I did when I saw METTE’s mamas eyes on a now cd before being explained the now next concept. Great video!!!
My favorite Now albums would be their Christmas ones on CD. They are nostalgic and have great selection of Holiday songs.
Hits having to be at least partly recognisable was mentioned in The Manual by the KLF guys. It's been a thing for quite a while.
Of course I remember "Pray for You" by Jason and the Long Road to Love. From the Todd in the Shadows video.
Love physical still. I actually listen to whole albums and never have to worry about being unable to listen to music
Flowers is the biggest global hit of the year by far, topping the Hot 100 for 8 weeks and many more countries Charts for a while. Not just a 1 weeker
yup. not a fan but it was quite the hit, even if it didn't continue as strong
New mic!!!
no bullshit, i sing The Cheat's Playing Something On A Laserdisc any time i think about obsolete media, thank you for giving it a shoutout
When get enuf started playing at the end i legit though i was hallucinating because spent the entire damn day playing brc
This thumbnail made me believe that this was a very persistent ad that I couldn't get rid of with refreshing lol
I'm starting to wonder which version we had here in Australia, the UK one, or the US one, but I'm gonna go with the UK one, because dance music was way more popular here than country music. The most "country" we ever got was through Shania Twain and Faith Hill (and that one song from Billy Ray which I won't speak of, lol). As an avid radio listener in the past, I did like compilations growing up, getting some great variety, and I didn't get into album diving until I was older. As for my thoughts on today's music? I try to be open-minded, but I keep going back to, let's say, the early Now That's What I Call Music compilations, lol.
i discovered radiohead thanks to my cousin's now cd lol. the thing is, it was just the cd without the track listing, so i didn't know who the band was for quite some time. when i finally heard "karma police" again, i was so happy.
Funnily enough, there are very similar cd series in germany, down to the 3D effect, but they have different names. I looked it up and 'NOW' seems to be in a bunch of countries but not germany. Wonder if its the copyright system we have.
My friend and i had a podcast and we started to do a segment with these and we only made it so far before we couldnt do it anymore.
"Do you honestly remember Impossible by Shontelle" I SURE DO!!!
oooo a surprising and wonderful topic, great video! today I learned that the US numbers don't line up to the EU numbers. I'm glad you mentioned it coz I was SO CONFUSED when you picked up NOW 87. My brain went "....hang on a sec that can't be right that had to have been like 10 years ago??" (it was)
6:49 hi Todd in the Shadows
That joke compilation at the end was unironically a great selection. I'd love to see a compilation like Now but with meme songs. Kind of like the YTMND soundtrack was back in the day.
I remember i had one of the now cds when i first started actively listening to music. I would pester my mom so she would put it on for me😭
I feel like people say this every year but this honestly might be the worst year ever for pop music. The songs that are hitting the top of the charts are awful and the pop songs that are good don't really chart that high.
I agree honestly. Sucks because honestly I think 2020-2021 were pretty strong years to the decade in pop music (despite Covid).
2023 in general seems to be a weak pop culture year
@@tylerhackner9731 I definitely agree. 2020 and 2021 were really great years imo, 2022 was kind of... meh. But 2023 is just pretty bad. Honestly, even worse than 2018 if you ask me
What is pop music is my first question? Is it only music from the pop genre or everything that is in the charts because even rap has a huge pop appeal.
Then I am confused because who cares for the charts and the mainstream? It just showcases the tip of the iceberg. The commercial peak. There are millions of songs that don't chart and enough good music to find. Charts became pointless a long time ago. When I grew up there were no real alternatives. You had to buy compilations or you could download some stuff but youtube wasn't even born and the internet was relatively new and slow. Watching music TV was great, compilations were important, buying CDs essential. Of course I knew and liked a lot of songs that were pure mainstream also because I hadn't yet access to EDM or rock or other alternative genres.
Now you can listen to whatever you want. You have to dig to find the gems if you're into other music than the pure mainstream stuff. It's time consuming. But it's possible. Even I who started to ignore the mainstream for the most part like around 2005 or so, have compiled a spotify playlist with "pop/r&b" and similiar stuff that fits into that category and now from 2010-2020 I have gathered I think 600 songs. Despite being disconnected from most of the songs from the charts.
I wanna know what pop youve been enjoying this year that isnt blowing up. Id agree but idk whats there
@@SavedByGrace_CitizenEmperorユウthat's a common response to these kinds of things, and in other years I'd wholeheartedly agree with what you're saying. But this year, even the rap releases have been mostly trash (or, at the very best, 'mid'), and as alluded to in this video, so many of the biggest hits on the radio in rap, r&b, and pop are covers of old songs or shitty interpolations of old songs. Even for things way off the 'mainstream', there have been SEVERAL releases by some of my absolute favorite artists that have completely sucked or be extremely underwhelming (Janelle Monae, Jenny Lewis, Kim Petras, The New Pornographers are some of my personal examples). Don't get me wrong - there are some really good albums that have come out this year, but overall this is definitely one of the worst recent years in music
I got Now 2 in 98. Got me into that New Radicals song. Also had Semisonic"closing time".
Such a great video-keep it up. Really fun insights.
I HAVEEEE to drag u for the shontelle slander bc that was a hit and remains one to this day
Do I remember Impossible by Shontelle? That was one of my go-tos when I was home alone as a tween and it was time to sing.