At first glance, the group appeared to be a fad, a one-hit wonder, but TLC would go to change the course of Black pop history. “These three women have been the catalytic center of a thriving Atlanta R&B scene that would never have been quite the same without them,” veteran music writer Carol Cooper, who interviewed them for Rolling Stone in 1995 for her piece “Pretty Young Things.” Seventeen years later Cooper was still a fan. “Not only do the songs and the production on their first album still measure up. I think I appreciate their sound and attitude even more now than back then. A lot of the stuff that people have done since like Rihanna and Nicki Minaj, and even Katy Perry and Lady Gaga, owe a lot to the original sound and image of TLC.”