Your Horoscope According to Your Birth Year's #1 Single: 1996

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Your Horoscope According to Your Birth Year's #1 Single: 1996

If you were born in 1996, your Pop Star is "Macarena" by Los Del Rio and it's literally the only reason why you are obsessive, misunderstood, and a trailblazer.

Well here we are. Another instalment of my very scientifically sound column Pop Stars (get it? That's an astrologer's gag), where I google a Wikipedia page called "List of Billboard Year-End number ones" and choose whichever year has a song I think I could listen to on repeat for the next two hours, and then I write about what that song means about anybody born in that specific year.

It's deeply flawed for many reasons, perhaps least of all (strangely) because at the rate I'm going (one of these frickers a week) it's going to take me years to get around to everyone alive. But it's only week two and I'm feeling determined and full of naivety and hope so let's not get bogged down in "reality" and "common sense", okay? Great.

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Today, I'm writing about everyone born in the year 1996. All of you, get ready to learn how that year's #1 pop single, "Macarena"—the Bayside Boys remix, obviously—explains you.

Now. I'm going to be predictably 30-ish-years-old and say that anyone born in 1996 should probably not be allowed on the internet. What are you, 22? That's too young. In 1996 I was planning my wedding (to Taylor Hanson. It didn't work out. Don't want to talk about it) so it makes literally no sense to me that you're all growing up this fast. But that's not really any of my business, is it? You're here, I'm here, and your birth song is an absolute fucking banger.

"Macarena," a single by Spanish pop duo Los Del Rio, and was originally released in 1993 on the album A mi me gusta. The Bayside Boys (very cool name) who are relatively unknown in every other way, remixed the track in 1996 adding English verses, catapulting the song into elementary school discos and faulty as fuck Discmans literally everywhere. ONLY 90S KIDS WILL REMEMBER THIS.

So, 1996 babies… What does "Macarena" say about you?

First of all—you're misunderstood. A bit of an enigma, really. People tend to stare at you with equal parts confusion and adoration, and why shouldn't they? Your birth song is an utter anomaly. "Macarena" is a song sung in two languages at once. Its dance is hard to recall while pissed. Is it "Macarena" or "The Macarena"? Or is "The Macarena" the dance? How in God's name was a song so fucking relatable and palatable that the Democrats danced to it at their 1996 convention???

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Honestly? I don't care. I've listened to it non-stop for the last twenty minutes and I'm showing no signs of slowing down. It really is that good.

Something people should know about you Macarena babies is that you're incredibly determined. You people just don't quit. You're enduring and persistent and nobody gets in your way!!! Except maybe Adele. In 1996, "Macarena" spent a freakish fourteen weeks at #1, and 60 weeks in total on the Billboard chart—a record only quashed fifteen years later by Adele's "Rolling in the Deep." Rude.

Another cool thing about you? People tend to do basically whatever you say. You say sit? They'll sit. You tell 'em to jump? They'll jump. You say "if everyone could just dance in unison like a group of unfeeling early android prototypes at a gravely under-attended office christmas party whenever this one song plays for the next like 100 years possibly longer literally like it would mean the world to me thanks so much," they'll do it. THEY'LL DO IT. Use that influence. Make some demands. Call the White House!! Enslave the world!!!!!!!!

When it comes to love, you guys are a messed up bunch. Always fixating and obsessing and taking things too far. Much like the very effect of the song you were born under, you can't help but take interest in something (usually some poor unsuspecting bartender at your local that has legitimately never even acknowledged you let alone appeared remotely interested in a romantic relationship) and have it consume you until it drives you completely crazy. All you can think about is them! They're like oxygen to you! Their name is scribbled on all bits of spare paper! One regrettable night has you carving their initials into your thigh after a few too many swigs of Moonshine! But hey, don't worry. Some people are into that.

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Career-wise, you're a leader. You take charge and you show people who's boss. This is why you're probably gonna be a CEO. Having said that, people below you and possibly all around you will forever question the legitimacy of your success. Wanna know how to thank Los Del Rio for that? Billboard ranked "Macarena" as the number ONE dance song on a list they made of the best dance songs ever. Which is like… okay, sure. It's good. It's fun. But number ONE??? Wow… Ever heard of "The Hamsterdance Song"? (Yes that is—unbelievably—how it's stylised.)

Well that's it for another week. Good luck, Macarenas. You won't need it, but I'll wish it anyway. Why? I have no idea. I've basically lost my mind from listening to this song over and over. Someone please call my mum.

Update: the author had listened to "Macarena" another forty or so times at the time of publishing.

Read more in the Pop Stars series here.

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