NOW Yearbook '97 and EXTRA '97 [2025]

As I remember it, life was pretty sweet in 1997. The kids were growing, married life was blissful, while work was both challenging and rewarding. What do I remember about the music I was listening to in 1997? Sadly, nothing sprang to mind immediately. I pulled up Now That's What I Call The Hideaway*, the ever-growing collection of favorites that gets played daily 'round these parts and serves as the basis for our monthly feature, The Hideaway 20. In 1997, we (probably) listened to a lot of Top 40 music on the radio that the kids enjoyed, or, if I was alone, I enjoyed listening to my growing collection of compact discs, both at home and in the car. Sometimes, I'd share the music on those discs with my little captive audience.

NOW Yearbook '97 was released on June 27, 2025, in the three usual formats of the NOW Yearbook series, pictured above. The CD sets feature 78 tracks across four discs, while the vinyl has 43 tracks on three albums pressed on clear bubblegum green vinyl. I can see several unfamiliar songs listed among those 78 tracks, as well as maybe two dozen or so tracks I enjoy, so it might be a decent listen over the next couple of days.

On CD1, I enjoyed seven of the twenty tracks, earning the disc a score of 35.00

On CD2, five of the nineteen tracks made my list, giving the second disc a score of 26.31

On CD3, I count eight out of nineteen songs as "good", for a third disc score of 42.11

On CD4, there are only four songs out of twenty I'd ever want to hear again, scoring the final disc a 20.00

In the U.K. in 1997, the songs that charted had very little crossover with the music I was enjoying Stateside. According to the Now That's What I Call Music Wiki, 23 songs on NOW Yearbook '97 made Billboard's Hot 100 chart here in the U.S. Still, much of that may have been due to record label shenanigans (driving up CD sales in the States by withholding singles that were readily available elsewhere in the world). Billboard only counted physical singles for the Hot 100 since the chart's inception in 1958. Billboard blinked first and changed its rules for the first chart in December 1998, when a record 62 singles debuted on the Hot 100, including 17 new songs in the Top 40. Another fun fact: I enjoyed the tracks numbered two and fifteen on all four discs. After two days of listening, NOW Yearbook '97 rates a 30.77.

NOW Yearbook EXTRA '97 was released on August 8, 2025. There are sixty songs spread across its three discs. Nearly all of the songs were unfamiliar to me. According to the Now That's What I Call Music Wiki, just five tracks on NOW Yearbook EXTRA '97 crossed over to the U.S. Hot 100. Listening to the set was easy, as most of the songs passed through my noggin with almost none of them leaving any lasting impression.

I liked two songs on the first disc, one on the second, and none on the third. I did not grow up listening to these songs. None of this music soundtracked my life. I'm not the demographic for this collection. NOW Yearbook EXTRA '97 scores a 5.00. Your mileage may vary, but I could save myself time and money by not going near any of the NOW Yearbooks from the Nineties.

* This highly curated collection of lossless music is also known as The Everything Bagel, The Hideaway House Blend, and The Whole Dang Shebang