There's a lot of path dependency in musical tastes.
Some friends were once trying to figure out what terrible musical cues would be used to indicate that bad movies were taking place in the zany, carefree '90s, back when history was over. (The way a crap "I was in the shit" montage sequence might feature, say, "White Rabbit".) "All Star", "Tonight, Tonight", and "I Wish" were all-too-plausible suggestions. And yet there are presumably people to this day who love those songs.
Hell, I'm even a little fond of "I Wish". "All Star" and "Tonight, Tonight" can go eat a bag of tacks, though.
Just now, the thought occurred to me: somewhere out in the world, there exists someone whose all-time favorite band to wonder about being someone's all-time favorite band is Smash Mouth. Which is just deeply strange, you know?
I can't even remember "I Wish."
Honestly, I don't think the 1990s will be remembered for its music, which was all over the place, genre-wise. (Although, "The Chronic" will likely appear). The flashback indicators will be The Rachel Haircut and a screenshot of a Geocities page.
"I Wish" is great. I think one should try to resist a No More Listening to x even after x has been "used up" in this way. But it does leave a mark; is "Fortunate Son" now ruined? Maybe, but I'd like to think not.
Oh, Skee-Lo's I Wish. That's a good song! I thought you were talking about whitey music.
Who hasn't wished that he or she were like six-foot-nine so he or she could get with a Yoshi?
I just approve of Skee-Lo's use of definitive articles before freeway numbers.
2: Something by Sugar Ray? Maybe that horrible Barkenaked Ladies song that makes me want to neutron-bomb Canada?
Maybe that horrible Barkenaked Ladies song that makes me want to neutron-bomb Canada?
Huh. That song inspires deep anti-Canadian feeling in me, as well. It doesn't just suck, but sucks somehow in a Canadian-specific way. (And I like a lot of things about Canada).
7: Hmm, I was talking about Stevie Wonder's "I Wish", whitey that I am.
Old whitey, Stormcrow. I know that the 70s and the 90s blur together for your kind, but one had orgies and good music and the other had The Rachel and business casual.
(actually, the SW I wish is one of my favorite songs alltime.).
It doesn't just suck, but sucks somehow in a Canadian-specific way.
A previously-unexplored category! Other examples: Cory Doctorow, those episodes of the X-Files where they're supposed to be in North Carolina or Arkansas or somewhere but it's just the Vancouver suburbs, Alpha Flight.
Yes, but see '90s movies could use '70s songs. They're stored using quarks.
It sucks like milk sold in a plastic bag.
Some friends were once trying to figure out what terrible musical cues would be used to indicate that bad movies were taking place in the zany, carefree '90s, back when history was over. (The way a crap "I was in the shit" montage sequence might feature, say, "White Rabbit".) "All Star", "Tonight, Tonight", and "I Wish" were all-too-plausible suggestions. And yet there are presumably people to this day who love those songs.
- White Town, "Your Woman"
- Sugar Ray, "Every Morning"
- Eve 6, "Inside Out"
- Shawn Mullins, "Lullaby" (or possibly "Rockabye")
- The Macarena
- Positive K, "I Got a Man"
- En Vogue, "My Loving (Never Gonna Get It)" (may be called "(My Loving) Never Gonna Get It", "(Never Gonna Get It) My Loving", "My Lovin' (Never Gonna Get It)", or other variations)
As for favorite bands: I read a very memorable assessment of some compilation or other, in which The Toadies were singled out as a band that it would be inexplicable if they were anyone's favorite band.
But you never know. I knew someone whose favorite band was Lifehouse. And he didn't even like "Hanging By a Moment".
Guys. No Nirvana? No Wu-tang? Are we restricting the conversation to crappy music?
We need to granulate as well, between the early 90s, the days of "Set Adrift on Memory Bliss", and the late 90s, the days of all those Puff Daddy and Ma$e songs.
Who thinks that happiness is a mat on a doorway, besides maybe a housecat? That line always made me mad it was so dumb.
Cryptic Ned is knocking it out of the park. Maybe he's actually kryptonite Ned, pocket full of.
22: Philosophy is the talk on a cereal box. Religion is the smile on a dog. So happiness could definitely be the mat that sits in someone's doorway.
(The way a crap "I was in the shit" montage sequence might feature, say, "White Rabbit".)
I'm trying to think of what the "I was in the shit" montages from the Iraq war would have. "Down With the Sickness"? Papa Roach's "Last Resort"? "Seven Nation Army"?
I don't know what "White Rabbit" is, aside from Jefferson Airplane. I don't want to pull a Stormcrow.
I'm trying to think of what the "I was in the shit" montages from the Iraq war would have.
Bawitabata-bangity-bangy-bangy
I don't know what "White Rabbit" is, aside from Jefferson Airplane.
That's the one.
I'm trying to think of what the "I was in the shit" montages from the Iraq war would have.
Drowning Pool's "Bodies (Let The Bodies Hit The Floor)".
Drowning Pool's "Bodies (Let The Bodies Hit The Floor)".
Oooh, on the nose.
I love that damn parrot so much.
28, 30: Ha! We are all pulling Stormcrow now.
Ironically, "Bombs Over Baghdad" really wouldn't work very well.
Sugar Ray, "Every Morning"
Damn it, I've always liked that song.
The Toadies were singled out as a band that it would be inexplicable if they were anyone's favorite band.
I wouldn't call it one of my favorite songs, but the Toadies' "I Want Your Love" is, you know, simpatico at times.
The problem is that the most inexplicable song is "Don't Stop Believin'" and yet it seems to be everybody's favorite song.
38: Seriously, what is it with that song? I didn't like the early '80s when they were happening; I certainly don't like timewarping back to them through Steve Perry's miraculously immutable haircut.
2 et al: "Motown Philly", "Believe", and "Tubthumping"
8 is funny.
and yet it seems to be everybody's favorite song
Who's this "everybody," Kemosabe?
Maybe "Don't Stop Believin'" has achieved a status somewhat like that of "We are the Champions," which I think is favored among sports fans. The idea would be that you can't say you hate the song, because, like, are you saying you don't like being the champions (or, believin')? This is to say that both songs have become anthems of a sort. I speculate.
41: I wish sports fans would get some new songs. E.g., via Kenny Powers.
I wish I understood the OP.
It's a paean to Shrek.
During one of the hockey games I was watching just recently they played "Great Gate of Kiev" during a stoppage.
I just semantically sated on During.
Watching Detroit-San Jose and, no shit, they just played "Don't Stop Believin'"! (It was situationally appropriate, however; game at Detroit, and Red Wings scored with one minute left to win 4-3 to barely stay alive in the series.)
50: As in a "The sun never sets on Journey" kind of way?
So this thread hasn't gotten "Semi-Charmed Life" stuck in anyone else's head? I mean, before now.
You go to hell, Mr. Blandings. That was mean.
I wish you would step back from that ledge, Blandings.
I remember hearing an interview with Third Eye Blind and the lead singer was really put-out that everyone thought Semi-charmed life was a peppy song. He'd wanted it to be transgressive and edgy and about people doing meth. Now he was disillusioned that people hadn't been bothered to listen to his edgy lyrics about meth. Or maybe the meth is implied. At any rate, we all let him down.
The four right chords could make me cry.
Where was that place where we fell asleep inside you?
The Cracker Barrel on the highway. Right by the window where the school bus parked. Stupid court date.
One of the minor benefits of treadmilling in the gym with Letterman on TV with captions is the captions describe or name the music,
and then sometimes I could get Paul Shaffer's jokes.
Tonight's guest: Gong Li.
Will anybody mention Nickelback in the first 100 posts ?
What is that Bawitabata-bangity-bangy-bangy song ?
Most songs I can discern some lyrics of, then google, but the bangity bangy flummoxed me with its poor elocution.
The last time I asked about a song here, I wrote 'Girl for Ipanema sings Joy Division (or Billy Idol)', and was instantly informed of Nouvelle Vague.
61, I was expecting a sudden burst of 40 comments about Matchbox 20 or Sum 41 or 'do the hellen keller and talk with your hips'.
62: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1OrNS2zbTZg
I will never ever grow tired of that song.
K. Rock has too many sounds recognizable as words in his lyrics. Youtube informs me the song is actually Teddybears' Cobrastyle
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mBTSG_Tryhc .
55: Apparently, the strangely conservative pop radio station in the town where I grew up had someone on staff who paid attention. A couple of lines in that song were bleeped. The same station also refused to play "Your Woman," on account of teh gay.
I remember hearing an interview with Third Eye Blind and the lead singer was really put-out that everyone thought Semi-charmed life was a peppy song. He'd wanted it to be transgressive and edgy and about people doing meth. Now he was disillusioned that people hadn't been bothered to listen to his edgy lyrics about meth. Or maybe the meth is implied. At any rate, we all let him down.
He shouldn't have written such a peppy song then. That's like Mick Jagger complaining that not everyone who hears "Brown Sugar" ends up thinking Mick Jagger is a psychopath.
From a UKanian point of view, the answer would be either Oasis or the Prodigy. (Or perhaps "Setting Son", which is after all a Chemical Brothers/Oasis mashup and therefore the most 1990s artefact possible.)
I suppose I can throw this in here.
Just in time for Mother's Day, a bunch of music you probably don't want to play in front of your mom*. Maternal-themed cover art, though, so that's something. Anyhow, this is more or less volume 2 of Sleazy Greasy Cheap & Easy, so should be taken while sitting on the hood of your Camaro, drinking Wild Turkey and smoking Winstons with your underaged girlfriend. It is most definitely NOT a violation of Federal law to use this product in a manner inconsistent with its labeling, but we assume no responsibility or liability for unforeseen consequences of off-label use. In the rare event of an erection lasting more than 4 hours, seek immediate medical help to avoid long-term injury. Do not open near face.
*Or your kids, unless they already think you're sorta degenerate. In which case, Katy unbar the door!
I think the canonical late-90s end-of-history moment is the prom dance sequence in 'She's all that', where Usher gives out dance cues as Rockefeller Skank plays. There's a nice discussion of all this in an Onion Av club review of one of the 'that's what i call music' albums, but i'm too lazy to find it with my nonqwerty dumbphone.
Zero Google hits for "nonqwerty dumbphone". You win!
And re Semi Charmed Life, I seem to recall the standard radio version, in addition to silencing a key word or two, cut out an entire stanza. (I owned the cd single.)
24: "Two Princes" would definitely be in this over saturated mix, as per 2.
Now what would be the Jerry Maguireesque fortitous radio song of celebration for the 1990s.
re: 69
Yeah, Oasis were used very cleverly, if I recall, on the end of Our Friends in the North in a high-90s moment.
re: 69
With Oasis one of those bands who I never really liked [even at the time] but who indisputably turned out a couple of real defining moment-in-time tracks. Good call on the Prodigy, too.
Other very 90s tracks -- Blur, 'Country House' (rather than one of their actually good songs) and definitely Pulp (Common People, maybe?). Pulp, and Blur both bands who were writing songs that were both critical of, and simultaneously nostalgic for, the way it felt to be in the 90s Britain, in the middle of actually being in 90s Britain.
Where was that place where we fell asleep inside you?
Dunno, we should check our foursquare histories.
My ass has changed mayors five times in the past month.
80: You should elect Rahm next. I hear he can be a real asshole.
I love that Who Let the Dogs Out song!
WHO! WHO! WHO! WHO!
Yeah, Blur (Parklife, obviously), Oasis (Cigarettes and Alcohol or Life Forever, presumably) and Pulp would be the obvious ones in the UK. Although I'd like to think they'd pick something like Razzmatazz or even Sorted For Es and Whizz rather than Common People for Pulp.
And on the subject of Britpop as lazy metonymy for the 90s, I highly recommend Kieron Gillen and Jamie McKelvie's Phonogram, specfically the first volume. Doubly so if you're a fan of either The Long Blondes or The Pipettes.
re: 83
'Sorted for Es and Whizz' was one of the nostalgic for a period one is actually living through tunes I had in mind. It's a great tune, but I'm not sure if it has the public resonance of something like 'Wonderwall', or 'Don't Look Back in Anger'. Even though I personally much prefer the Sheffield bunch.
Phonogram looks interesting. Not particularly knowledgeable about either band, although I really like Rose Elinor Dougall's post-Pipettes stuff.
In the movie of my life, either this song or this one (recognizable for its role in a slackertastic Budweiser ad campaign) stand in for the the 90s; both from 1995-96 just after I had finish college, natch.
It certainly doesn't have the public resonance of those songs (or Common People), but it's one of those songs that was nostalgic when it was written, and hence would work well as a nostalgia shortcut without being overly obvious.
Phonogram looks interesting. Not particularly knowledgeable about either band, although I really like Rose Elinor Dougall's post-Pipettes stuff.
Phonogram is really, really good. Not just the first volume either, but that's where it's relevant to this thread. I've only heard Dougall's post-Pipettes stuff once (weirdly, before a British Sea Power soundtracked Man of Aran), and it was pretty good. But I have a serious soft spot for The Pipettes of her era. Basically sixties girl groups rock, so I'm all in favour of bands reviving that sound and look.
I like both the Long Blondes *AND* the Pipettes!!
Then read Phonogram. You'll love it.
re: 86
I think Rose Elinor Dougall's Stop-Start-Synchro is a near perfect piece of pop.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fFqIRZY36WI
If you like 60s girl group stuff you might like Gemma Ray [if you don't already know her]. I'm not quite as big a fan of her most recent album, but the previous one, Lights Out Zoltar is like some great mashup of Ronettes/Shadow Morton style stuff with rockabilly and prog.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q9ft3S10Euw
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2lwLzVA-W70
She's a fine guitar player, too. She's the one responsible for all the atmospheric slide/spy-movie guitar.
And on the subject of Britpop as lazy metonymy for the 90s,
I will, again, recommend Live Forever which, from an outsider's point of view, did an interesting job of showing intersections between britpop and the larger cultural and political moment.
I like [...] the Long Blondes
I think this may be the first instance of overlap between our musical tastes.
I just thought of this as a song that could signal "mid-90s" on a movie soundtrack.
This is quibbling, but I associate Oasis/Blur/Pulp/The Prodigy with the mid-1990s, although I first encountered these bands primarily secondhand via Brits in China.
For the early nineties, when I was actually in the UK, the montage would include the Stone Roses, Happy Mondays, Charlatans, James, and, unfortunately, the singles "Move Any Mountain" by the Shaman and "We are Each Other" by the Beautiful South.
One of the most commendable aspects of Smash Mouth was their realistic portrayal of body types.
re: 93
Yeah, 94 - 97'ish. I had a flatmate who was a really early Oasis evangelist so I heard, I think Cigarettes and Alcohol via an NME cassette and then the other first few singles from their first album via him. But definitely mid rather than early 90s.
He was also crazy for the Boo Radleys, a band now largely written out of that period. Although Giant Steps was a cracking album.
93,95:Oasis, Blur, bleh
Death by Irony!
Anyhow, this is more or less volume 2 of Sleazy Greasy Cheap & Easy, so should be taken while sitting on the hood of your Camaro, drinking Wild Turkey and smoking Winstons with your underaged girlfriend.
I am so excited.
97: Or so the mullahs would have you believe.
To add to the "unfortunately" list, I'm pretty sure the Verve's "Bitter Sweet Symphony" is required by law to appear on any 90s compilation. Also, the Cranberries.
Also, We Were Merely Freshman. She fell in love in the first place and then DIED.
The very short interval between the two events was the unusual part.
Also, the Cranberries.
Future civilisations will point to their inexplicable success as one of the great mysteries of the late 20th century. One of my instant 'take that fucking shit off' bands.
Freshman year isn't very long, Mobes.
104: I took honors Calc and it seemed to last forever.
For the life of me, I cannot remember what made you think that you were wise enough to take honors Calculus.
I got an A. It just took much more effort that the A I got for remembering how a bill becomes a law.
You know who turns out to be a Smashmouth fan? Newt. I have no idea how that happened -- obviously he didn't get it from me, or his father.
I'm not sure if this is better or worse than Train.
Their album 'Astro Lounge' is just perfect. Always reminds me to a great time I was having back then in late nineties.
Train has that special something that makes me really hate their catchy melodies, which are still quite catchy and get stuck in my head.
that special something that makes me really hate their catchy melodies
Blisteringly stupid lyrics?
112: I had never bothered to actually read the lyrics to that "Hey Soul Sister" song. The greatest/worst thing there is, "I'm so obsessed. My heart is bound to beat right out my untrimmed chest."
Until researching some thoughts for this thread, I had not realized that there were 2 popular songs called "Creep" in 1993 (partly because the Radiohead was released in 1992, but you know, still). And that doesn't even include the TLC track. Go figure.
Anyhow, what I was going to say is that if you look at what was big in '90, '91 and '92, you see that indeed, the 90s as a cultural epoch really didn't start until Bill Clinton was inaugurated in 1993. But then, man, then they started.
If we're talking specifically about crap songs that sound like the early 90s, here's my list:
The Sign -- Ace of Bass
Mr. Jones -- Counting Crows
Mmm Mmm Mmm Mmm -- Crash Test Dummies
Come To My Window -- Melissa Etheridge
Crazy -- Aerosmith
Man on the Moon -- REM
and of course, one of the most irritating and pernicious earworms of all time...
Breakfast at Tiffany's -- Deep Blue Something
I have (deep blue) affection for that song because of the sweet as honey everydamntime jangletone guitar line. Still, they could just edit it down to the 30 seconds they keep repeating, and that would be enough.
The Sign -- Ace of Bass
Surely "All That She Wants". Which, embarrassingly, was the first CD I ever bought.