Mmmboptastic – The Ultimate Hanson Fan Site since 2000
Hanson has grown up. At least a little. Band members Isaac, Taylor and Zac Hanson – 16, 14 and 11 years old when the three brothers from Tulsa hit it big with MMMBop – are now 22, 20 and 17.
Taylor is married.
He’s a dad.
The boy-band era has come and gone.
And they’re back on the road, unplugged.
I can’t help it, and apparently no one else can either. Every time I say the name Hanson, it conjures up the brothers’ 1997 monster pop hit MMMBop.
I ask 19-year-old drummer Zac Hanson, who started singing with Issac, 23, and Taylor, 21, when he was just six, how the group feels about this seven long and transformative years later.
“It doesn’t bother me,” says a laid-back Hanson, speaking over the phone as he’s waking up from a nap in pre-gig Connecticut this week.”It’s really awesome, I think, that you can have that much recognition, that when you say the name of the band people can immediately associate you with a song or music.”
When Hanson scored a 1997 hit with its indelible single “MMMBop,” it was easy to mistake the trio of young Oklahomans for yet another contrived boy band, albeit one that could actually play its instruments and which favored a bouncy bubblegum take on ’60s rock, pop and soul to lip-synced modern R&B.
At that point, guitarist Isaac, keyboardist Taylor and drummer Zac had already written 100 songs and been recording on their own since 1992. Now, after two albums for Island, the brothers are once again on their own. They became some of the rare independent artists to land in the Billboard Top 40 — their third studio release, “Underneath,” debuted at No. 25 — and they’re striving with some success to position themselves as a credible indie power-pop band, as well as “musicians for life,” as Taylor says.
The decision to go it alone is never an easy one to make, particularly in the high-stakes world of the music industry.
But going it alone is exactly what the three young brothers who make up Hanson decided to do for their new album, Underneath. And the good news is that it’s a strategy that seems to be working.
“What’s cool about being independent is that you have the opportunity to evolve and grow and change with the times in a way you may not have otherwise had,” says oldest brother Isaac. “You have the opportunity to make your own decisions about how to release your own records.”
Seven years, two albums and several inches off their trademark golden locks later, Hanson is back and rocking the upper strata of the Billboard charts with their latest album, “Underneath,” which ups the volume with an evolved, mature sound like you’ve never heard from them. Even their fans have changed over the years, with the likes of their contemporaries Avril Lavigne and Michelle Branch professing to be Hanson fans.
“MmmBop!”
Remember that catchy pop ditty from the late ’90s sung by those cuddly, long-haired Midwestern kids who played their own instruments?
Well, those kids aren’t so young anymore (making me feel really old).
Nightcap recently caught up with Hanson elder statesman, Isaac, a sagelike 23 years old, to discuss the trio’s new album, the state of pop music, and the band’s summer tour, which kicks off Monday with a gig at the House of Blues in North Myrtle Beach.
Hanson, which also includes brothers Zac (drums) and Taylor (vocals and keyboards), will always be known for the bubblegummy “MMMBop,” and “Where’s the Love,” but if you delve a bit deeper you discover classic pop, R&B, soul and rock ‘n’ roll roots, best exemplified by the songs they cover in concert, including stuff by Little Richard; Crosby, Stills and Nash’s “Teach Your Children Well”; and Cream’s “Sunshine of Your Love.”
Since their major-label debut album “Middle of Nowhere” was released in 1997, they have had a No. 1 hit single with the chirpy pop song “MMMBop,” sold more than 10 million copies of their music worldwide and performed all over the globe. And, much to the chagrin of many fans, Taylor got married.
Since their major label debut album “Middle of Nowhere” was released in 1997, they have had a No. 1 hit single with the chirpy pop song “MMMBop,” sold more than 10 million copies of their music worldwide and performed all over the globe. And, much to the chagrin of many fans, Taylor got married.
Now there’s “Underneath,” Hanson’s first full studio effort of new songs since 2000’s “This Time Around” and the first release on the group’s very own record label, 3CG, named for “3 Car Garage,” an early independent release. The band of brothers has come full circle, leaving the major label shuffle behind to do for themselves.
Hansons Back In Seoul to Promote Album By Han Eun-jung Staff Reporter 06 June 2004 The MMM Boppers that captured hearts and charts around the world seven years ago are back in Seoul to promote their latest album, ‘Underneath.’ Seoul being the first stop in their promotional tour, Hanson could not look more excited at […]
In 1997, the impossibly young, impossibly cute boy band Hanson chirped their way into our brains with the impossibly catchy hit MmmBop and multi-million-selling album, Middle Of Nowhere. It’s the kind of story — a band of siblings who experience massive popularity at a young age — that usually ends in a rapid slide to obscurity, if not worse. I mean, what’s the likelihood that these boys could grow up without at least one DUI charge or rehab stint?
And yet, here they are seven years later, with a brand new Hanson album, Underneath, released on the brothers’ own record label, and no signs of family dysfunction. In fact, it seems that Hanson have earned the right to be taken seriously as pop songwriters — no mean feat for a grownup boy band.