The Most Popular Hottest 100 Of All Time Is Being Replayed This Month

Triple j‘s 1997 Hottest 100 countdown — considered the most popular Hottest 100 of all time — is about to be revisited.

Double J has announced it will be replaying the 1997 Hottest 100 on Sunday, 28th January (a day after the 2017 Hottest 100 drops on triple j), continuing a tradition which saw the station replay the 1996 Hottest 100 last year.

1997 is usually considered the most popular Hottest 100, as it was the year which had the most songs featured in the 2009 Hottest 100 Of All Time. 12 songs from 1997 were included in that countdown, including hits from the likes of Radiohead, Tool and The Verve.

1997 was also the second time an Australian act topped the countdown, with The Whitlams’ ‘No Aphrodisiac’ claiming first place after Spiderbait’s ‘Buy Me A Pony’ did the same thing in 1996.

In second place (fittingly) was Blur’s ‘Song 2’, with Chumbawamba’s ‘Tubthumping’ at number three, The Verve’s ‘Bitter Sweet Symphony’ in fourth place and Pauline Pantsdown’s ‘Backdoor Man’ at five.

“There’s an argument to say this is the most significant Top 5 in Hottest 100 history,” Hottest 100 expert and triple j‘s occasional guest Patrick Avenell tells Music Feeds.

The 1997 Hottest 100 also includes the only song to have ever been voted into the countdown but omitted from its broadcast (well, aside from the whole Taylor Swift thing), after Pauline Pantsdown’s satirical song ‘Back Door Man’ (ridiculing politician Pauline Hanson) was banned by a Queensland court after triple j played it a bunch of times over the course of 11 days.

“Another oddity towards the start of the countdown is ‘Did It Again’ by Kylie Minogue,” says Avenell.

“Yes, triple j played Kylie Minogue for a brief period in the mid-’90s. But not many other female singers: amazingly, only four solo women artists made the countdown, with Kylie joined by Diana Ah Naid, Imani Coppola and Robyn Loau in her company. Compare that to the plethora of fantastic solo female artists triple j now champions and you can see some progress, slow though it may be, is happening.”

To vote in the 1997 Hottest 100, listeners had to ring a special 0055 phone number and say their votes down the line for around 50 cents — with the bill payer’s permission of course.

“Because there wasn’t a voting list per se, nor streaming services providing 24/7 access to every song ever, votes were highly concentrated on singles,” Avenell says.

“That is a contributing reason to 1997 having the most different artists in the countdown — 88 — and no artists had more than two tracks in the 100. 34 of the 100 tracks were Australians — that’s around half the norm these days — meaning that an American or English person could peruse the list and obligingly nod their head and agree that it is an accurate representation of music, or at least English-language western music, for the year.”

Caz Tran will host Double J‘s rebroadcast of the 1997 Hottest 100, which will kick off at midday on Sunday, 28th January.

Check out the full list of songs from triple j‘s Hottest 100 of 1997, below.

Triple j’s Hottest 100 Of 1997

01. The Whitlams – No Aphrodisiac

02. Blur – Song 2

03. Chumbawamba – Tubthumping

04. The Verve – Bitter Sweet Symphony

05. Pauline Pantsdown – Backdoor Man

06. Blink-182 – Dammit (Growing Up)

07. Radiohead – Paranoid Android

08. Marilyn Manson – The Beautiful People

09. Radiohead – Karma Police

10. Jebediah – Leaving Home

11. Smash Mouth – Walkin’ on the Sun

12. Ben Folds Five – One Angry Dwarf And 200 Solemn Faces

13. Silverchair – Freak

14. The Superjesus – Down Again

15. The Living End – Prisoner Of Society

16. Quindon Tarver/Lee Perry – Everybody’s Free (To Wear Sunscreen)

17. Cordrazine – Crazy

18. Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds – Into My Arms

19. Regurgitator – Every Day Formula

20. Cake – I Will Survive

21. Foo Fighters – Monkey Wrench

22. The Verve – The Drugs Don’t Work

23. Spiderbait – Calypso

24. Korn – A.D.I.D.A.S.

25. Green Day – Hitchin’ a Ride

26. Nine Inch Nails – The Perfect Drug

27. Silverchair – The Door

28. Dana Lyons – Cows With Guns

29. Third Eye Blind – Semi-Charmed Life

30. Tool – Forty-Six & 2

31. Faith No More – Ashes To Ashes

32. Pendulum – Coma

33. Jebediah – Military Strongmen

34. Grinspoon – Dcx3

35. The Sundays – Summertime

36. Ween – Mutilated Lips

37. The Mavis’s – Naughty Boy

38. Metallica – The Memory Remains

39. Something for Kate – Captain (Million Miles)

40. The Bloodhound Gang – Why’s Everybody Always Pickin’ On Me?

41. Beck – Deadweight

42. Cornershop – Brimful of Asha

43. Ammonia – You’re Not The Only One

44. The Tea Party – Temptation

45. The Cure – Wrong Number

46. The Bloodhound Gang – Fire Water Burn

47. Filter And The Crystal Method – (Can’t You) Trip Like I Do

48. Custard – Anatomically Correct

49. The Living End – From Here On In

50. Arkarna – Eat Me

51. Everclear – So Much For The Afterglow

52. Garbage – #1 Crush

53. The Whitlams – You Sound Like Louis Burdett

54. Everclear – Everything To Everyone

55. Red Hot Chili Peppers – Love Rollercoaster

56. The Prodigy – Funky Shit

57. My Drug Hell – Girl At The Bus Stop

58. Diana Ah Naid – I Go Off

59. White Town – Your Woman

60. They Might Be Giants – New York City

61. Chemical Brothers – Block Rockin’ Beats

62. The Smashing Pumpkins – The End Is the Beginning Is the End

63. Grinspoon – Repeat

64. Faith No More – Stripsearch

65. The Lemonheads – Outdoor Type

66. Powderfinger – JC

67. The Offspring – I Choose

68. Jamiroquai – Cosmic Girl

69. Ween – Waving My Dick In The Wind

70. Reef – Place Your Hands

71. Robyn Loau – Sick With Love

72. Front End Loader – Pulse

73. Live – Lakini’s Juice

74. Rage Against the Machine – The Ghost of Tom Joad

75. Space – Female of the Species

76. Imani Coppola – Legend Of A Cowgirl

77. The Cardigans – Lovefool

78. The Mark of Cain – Degenerate Boy

79. Portishead – All Mine

80. Ben Harper – Faded

81. Kylie Minogue – Did It Again

82. Primus – Shake Hands with Beef

83. Lard – I Wanna Be A Drug-Sniffing Dog

84. Dave Graney – Feelin’ Kinda Sporty

85. Brainbug – Nightmare

86. Blackeyed Susans – Smokin’ Johnny Cash

87. Sneaker Pimps – 6 Underground

88. Beaverloop – Nothing

89. Dandy Warhols – Last Junkie on Earth

90. Pennywise – Society

91. Blue Boy – Remember Me

92. Sidewinder – Titanic Days

93. Skunkhour – Weightlessness

94. Rebecca’s Empire – Way Of All Things

95. Faithless – Don’t Leave

96. Local H – Bound for the Floor

97. Arkarna – Futures Overrated

98. Daft Punk – Da Funk

99. Luscious Jackson – Naked Eye

100. Effigy – I Give In

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