Today’s opening gambit that will probably cause the knees of many Idolator readers to jerk violently comes via Ian Cohen’s review of Lemuria’s Get Better, an album that apparently sounds like it’s been beamed here from 1993: “We have a lot of fun rappin’ with ya here at Pitchfork, but let’s get serious for a moment: were the 1990s really that bad? Maybe it’s a sign I need to spend less time talking with other music writers, because the consensus appears to be an overwhelming, ‘dear fucking god, TOTALLY.’ ” Eh? Even if we’re just talking about music, and not the increasing laughingstock nature of American-led culture, I say: Eh? A few examples of why Mr. Cohen should maybe start widening his social circle after the jump.
• The ’90s had zines, e-mail lists, and people writing letters. The ’00s have music blogs and, uh…
• This video:
Look! A sense of humor! Something that is sorely missing from so many of the “hey my pal has Flash from an old job of his want to borrow it” clips of today.
• When it comes to shitty omnipresent mainstream rap songs, I’ll take the “Superfreak”-sampling “U Can’t Touch This” over Flo Rida any day.
• Helium. Slant 6. Unrest. Pavement. Classic Stereolab. In The Aeroplane Over The Sea. Green Mind. Different Class. Pre-Hilary-Duffed Liz Phair. New Jack Swing. Heavenly. Female-fronted groups on commercial rock radio. That New Radicals song. “Female Of The Species.” Beavis And Butt-Head. I’ll give you that scripted TV has probably improved overall (although Law & Order is nowhere near its Briscoe-Logan-McCoy-Kincaid heights), and that the Mets are much better now, but those are kind of different debates, no?
Anyway, feel free to make your case for your favorite decade here. This is gonna get bloody, I suspect.
Lemuria: Get Better [Pitchfork]
People always hate on the previous decade’s music, until nostalgia kicks in. Throughout most of the 90’s, 80’s music was dismissed as soulless, synth nothingness or cheesey overblown hair metal. Seventies disco was a laughingstock in the 80’s. I don’t know how 60s music was viewed in the 70s because I was born in the mid-70s.
(Hear that 80’s babies? You don’t REMEMBER the 80s. Get that through your skulls)
objectively, i think the 90’s and 00’s are about equal; subjectively it probably depends on your age - i think that generally people end up being most nostalgic for the era when they were kids, while the period when they were in the late teens-early 20’s totally sucks (which is why i am most fond of the seventies - and luckily, with the current gas crisis and various other factors i’m starting to feel like they’re coming back with a vengence)
New Jack Swing.
Where have you gone Teddy Riley? A nation turns its lonely eyes to you.
/Seriously, I love New Jack Swing.
@Jasonbob7: I mostly agree with you (NSYNC over Jonas Bros. anyday), although I have to say, stuff like “See You Again” has lyrics that sound far more like what a teenager would/should be singing about, as opposed to “Baby One More Time.” (Not that “Baby One More Time” isn’t awesome, but nowadays I can see exactly why everyone’s parents weren’t all that comfortable with it.)
@Superawesomerad: Is Leona Lewis really teen-pop, though? I always thought her reach was little broader. (
Also, since people keep bringing up Different Class, I thought I should mention This Is Hardcore came out in the 90s, too.
And on behalf of the Foxboro Hot Tubs CD I can’t stop playing, Green Day in the 90s wasn’t exactly terrible, either.
I find that records today are not internally very diverse. That may sound like a weird statement, and it’s a little hard for me to explain. But big-time records like OK Computer have all types of songs, and so do Alien Lanes and Wowee Zowee etc. etc. Compare that to something like, say, Panda Bear, which I adore, but is pretty much one thing over and over. So many of the records today are very focused, and someone like Santogold is dinged for tackling different genres. I’m not doing a good job here explaining, but I just feel like albums are kinda same-y within themselves these days.
the rock scene of the mid 90s was the promise of indie rock from the 80s. Weird bands came up, got on the radio and MTV and made some money. With the fractured media landscape, that shit doesn’t exist any more, and the hyper speed of the internet ensures that for better or for worse there are not any surprises or scenes that stay local for too long. Its something that won’t be duplicated
plus you had Ska punk, Reservoir Dogs, OK Soda, Generation X (the book), Clinton’s First term, the ‘93 Phillies, Teenage Fanclub and De La Soul on the soundtrack of an Ice-T movie, and swinging on the flipply-flop, and people discussing the import of Liz Phair’s lyrics (for good). Not a bad haul.
“although Law & Order is nowhere near its Briscoe-Logan-McCoy-Kincaid heights”
So much truth here.
@righteousmaelstrom: Right? It’s getting better, though–I’m not too keen on Anthony Anderson’s character yet but Jeremy Sisto and Linus Roache are definite improvements over Farina/the beauty queen/Rohm/Thompson, and the writing has improved by leaps and bounds.
You’re right about Anthony Anderson. I thought I was going to hate Sisto, but his character is well written and Jeremy Sisto is a good actor. I’m starting to cotton to Roache. Hated his character at the beginning. Did they really think they needed to make a character more self-righteous than McCoy, just because he’s DA now? Please. I think they softened his edges later in the season. But yeah, glad Thompson ran for president. And I hope SVU borrows some of the writers from this season’s L&O for their next season.
@righteousmaelstrom: And yes, I could go on for days about Ride, Swervedriver, Loop, Archers, Polvo, Superchunk, Velocity Girl, Tiger Trap etc., ad nauseum, but then I’d start bleating on about how back in my day gas was a $1/gallon.
God, I actually thought the 90s sucked pretty hard by the middle of the decade… but then the 00s came along and it all just got so much worse. I’m beginning to think that Devo was right all along.
What about TV? Simpsons & Seinfeld vs. The Wire and Chappelle’s Show? Dharma & Greg vs. According to Jim?
Of course we’re going to look back on the ’90s with fond nostalgia and stick up for it. That’s what time will do for pop culture from the past. I’m sure this time next decade we’ll be pining for the heady days of Sufjan Stevens and Kanye West.
Eek, most of my favorite albums probably came out right at the in between. Relationship of Command, The Shape of Punk to Come, We Are the Romans… Wait, let me check the We Are the Romans publish date. brb… …
O MY FUCKING GOD: From wikipedia: “It was released by Hydra Head Records on January 1, 2000″
How fucking close can you get?!?! I’m sorry, 90s, but Botch has decided this one for me.
I’ll take the Pepsi Challenge with the Soft Bulletin and pretty much any record released in the 2000s that was a consensus favorite (are you listening, The Knife?) How about Jim O’Rourke’s Eureka or a lot of the Chicago indie output of that decade?
Deserters Songs?
OK Computer?
The Chronic?
I will stop.
Man, going off hip hop alone the ’90s win, no matter how many Counting Crows and Wallflowers songs we had to deal with in the interim. Throw in the heady days of early jungle, the Basement Jaxx/Daft Punk-led resurgence in house at the decade’s tail end and the aforementioned boom in really good indie rock (again: Stereolab!), and it’s even more of a cakewalk.
That said, I recently managed to download every music video ever shown on Beavis and Butt-Head on YouTube, and while the ’90s weren’t necessarily bad, they were mighty fucking weird.
Even the ubiquitous teen-pop was better. “Oops I Did It Again” and “I Want It That Way” sure brought the cheese, but they did it with a glorious over-the-top-ness and undeniable hooks & beats. Compare “Blackout” with Britney’s first two albums and you can hear the sound of everyone involved (producers, songwriters, the star herself) ceasing to care anymore. Even better, compare 90’s-era Britney with The Clique Girlz and you’ll see what I mean.
@Jasonbob7: Exactly. If one of those melismatic American Idol clones (Leona Lewis, I’m looking at you!) put out a single half as fun as “Genie in a Bottle” or “Come On Over” I’d be all over it.
Celebrity Deathmatch, on the other hand, was REALLY bad and I hope there isn’t any genuine nostalgia for it. I don’t think I cracked a smile once while watching that show, and my stoned ’90s self was usually very easy to please.
The 90’s were pretty brilliant if you listened to the right things, much as this decade is. It just depends on what you’re exposed to the most. Sure, you could base 90’s music on what was in the charts (or was produced by Lou Pearlman) and say it was a shitty decade…people said that 80’s music sucked too but that was also based on the “bubblegum- stock-aikman-waterman” aspects.
90’s awesomeness:
Loveless
Nevermind
Different Class
Modern Life Is Rubbish
Parklife
O.K Computer
I should Coco
Vapour Trail…..
This is a very silly discussion. Old people will always like the previous decade better! Particularly if it was the decade right before they turned 30.
Anyway, I’m sure I’ll hate the 2010s.