Was Mariah Carey’s 1995 the Start of the Peak Era of ’90s Pop?

This week, Mariah Carey makes unprecedented history on the Billboard charts with a 20th combined week atop the Billboard Hot 100 for her signature seasonal staple “All I Want for Christmas Is You.” The song is now the all-time longest-reigning Hot 100 No. 1 on the chart, a mark that should only increase not just in the coming weeks but in subsequent holiday seasons. However, it’s not the first time Mariah’s held the mark: She first set it with a 1995 single that served as a linchpin for her Daydream era, and the climax of perhaps the greatest pop stardom run of the entire decade.

On this week’s Vintage Pop Stardom episode of the Greatest Pop Stars podcast, host Andrew Unterberger is joined by Chris Hine, writer for the Minnesota Star Tribune and a 30-year member of the Lambily, to talk all about Mariah Carey’s historic 1995. We go over the half-decade-long run of superstardom that led up to Carey’s mid-’90s peak, and how she managed to hit yet another new level of mega-success in ’95, thanks to her most accomplished album to that point and a pair of absolutely gargantuan smash hit singles.

Along the way, we also answer all the most pressing questions about Mimi’s 1995: Was Mariah already the greatest pop star of the 1990s by its midway point — and did she still have a lot left to prove anyway? When did “All I Want for Christmas Is You” go from being considered great for a Christmas song to simply being considered one of the greatest pop songs ever? Is the “Fantasy” remix really better than the original? How did “One Sweet Day” go from being one of the biggest events in pop music history to sometimes being disregarded within her catalog of hits? Are we ever gonna hear Alt-Rock Mariah in full? And perhaps most importantly: Is Daydream-era MC as good as it gets for ’90s pop stardom in general?