Who did Limp Bizkit knock out of the No. 1 spot in 1999?

The answer is: Backstreet Boys

The Backstreet Boys and Limp Bizkit spent the summer of 1999 playing chart tag like two kids fighting over the aux cord at a house party. One week, you've got five guys in coordinated white suits making your little sister cry with "I Want It That Way." The next, Fred Durst is teaching suburban kids to break stuff, embrace the mosh pit dirt, and even a new way to crowd surf.

"Millennium" was a pop juggernaut, breaking first-week sales records and spawning the kind of songs that had teenagers slow-dancing at prom and their parents humming at the grocery store. Then came Limp Bizkit, storming the charts with all the subtlety of a monster truck at a tea party. "Significant Other" moved 634,000 copies in its first week, proving America's teens had room in their CD wallets for both frosted tips and wallet chains.

The album swap at #1 perfectly captured the sound of the millennium ending with every genre throwing a simultaneous party. MTV's Total Request Live would casually bounce from the Backstreet Boys' polished pop perfection to Durst's backwards-cap aggression like it was the most natural progression in the world. Carson Daly introduced both with the same enthusiasm, while teenagers saw no contradiction in loving both. The late 90s were maybe the last era when albums could capture such wildly different parts of the zeitgeist simultaneously.

The two acts bounced each other off Billboard's top spot all summer long like heavyweight champions trading title belts. Then in August, a former Mickey Mouse Club member crashed the boys' club. Christina Aguilera's self-titled debut only ruled for a week, but her four-octave knockout punch was enough to send both boys packing. While Durst and BSB were busy trying to out-muscle each other, they never saw the rookie with the whistle notes coming.