"Coming up...The Nineties at Noon with _________!"
Huh? I went from disbelief to denial to disappointment in about two seconds flat. Is this what defines old? Fuck me, I'm only thirty-four! How can my generation already have its own radio show? Did they run out of music from eighties, seventies and previous decades already? The nineties weren't even that good... Wait, I take that back, they were good for me and my fellow Gen Xers but I'm not sure anybody else appreciated them. Distorted guitars while moaning and whining into a microphone may not be considered talent to my parents but I ate that shit up. It went well with my dark flannel shirt and knotty, greasy hair. Smashing Pumpkins' Rhinoceros was the make out song to end all make out songs dammit!
As I listened to this program in it's entirety, I was forced back into the angst that defined my formative years. Pining over the boy with the chin length locks and perma-scowl, morbid paintings that screamed "nobody understands!" in art class and the drug/alcohol induced comas every weekend. Friday nights spent watching Tarantino movies and eating mushrooms, Saturdays at Lynn Canyon and Wreck Beach and then parking lot sex in the evening. Yup, we had it made...
When we started our descent into the late nineties and Britney and Backstreet started to dominate, we were forced to grow up and start sounding like our parents; "What is the crap?" "Kids don't know what good music is these days." Secretly though, we were singing along with Wannabe and Baby One More Time. How could you not? That was some catchy shit! These boy/girl bands seemed to bring a little bit of hope back to music. Teens no longer felt the need to self-mutilate and overdose on heroin. Go figure..
Don't get me wrong, I'm still a devout fan of distortion and moaning but at some point you gotta grow up. In celebration of the years that made my generation who we are, I give you the list! My top albums of the nineties:
- Smashing Pumpkins - Gish
- Radiohead - OK Computer
- Mudhoney - Every Good Boy Deserves Fudge
- Dead Milkmen - Soul Rotation
- Jane's Addiction - Nothing Shocking (technically not nineties but way better than Ritual)
- Nine Inch Nails - Broken/Fixed
- Pearl Jam - Ten
- Fugazi - Steady Diet of Nothing
- My Life With The Thrill Kill Kult - Confessions of a Knife
- Soundgarden - Badmotorfinger
- Candlebox - Candlebox
- Ministry - The Mind is a Terrible Thing to Taste
- Front 242 - Tyranny (For You)
- Rage Against the Machine - Rage Against the Machine
- Beastie Boys - Check Your Head
- N.W.A - Niggaz4Life
- Public Enemy - Fear of a Black Planet
- The Replacements - All Shook Down
- Butthole Surfers - Independent Worm Saloon
- Eminem - Slim Shady LP
- Depeche Mode - Violator
- Metallica - Metallica
- Skinny Puppy - Too Dark Park
- Legendary Pink Dots - The Maria Dimension
- Mad Season - Above
- Social Distortion - Social Distortion
- Greenday - Dookie (shut up, I LOVED this album)
Yeah I missed a few... Anything Nirvana and Alice in Chains. Just because they defined the generation, doesn't mean the music was good (to me). Don't get me wrong, I listened to Nevermind and In Utero a bagillion times but I was high and didn't know any better.
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