50 Memorable Songs Of The Late 1990s That Apparently Only You Remember, Even Though They Were Totally On The Radio And Stuff

rev, after the beginning of that video, i couldn't get the idea of the whole video happening inside that woman's tit out of my head.

You know what's better than "808"? The "808" REMIX with the "Going Back to Cali" beat! (Not on youtube, unfortunately)

Whoah, the beat on that 112 track is super hot.

"Whisper Song", meet your daddy.

Magnapop-Open The Door

21. Salt-n-Pepa - "Champagne" Have only very faint memories of this and Youtube is not helping. "I'm the big kahuna!"

yesssss from the Bulletproof soundtrack. "I got the whole shebang / I got the champagne / and the HA HA!!" "R U Ready" was also the hotness.

25. Playa - "Cheers 2 U" (so underrated)
26. Boyz II Men - "I Can't Let Her Go"
27. 98 Degrees - "Invisible Man"
28. Tracy Lee - "The Theme (It's Party Time)"
29. Westside Connection - "Bow Down"

30? That Gandharvas track about spring that I still hear every now and then.

31. Az Yet's cover of "Hard to Say I'm Sorry"

nice one, wasn't till years later I knew it was a Chicago cover. "Last Night" too

32. The Offspring - "All I Want" (the last alt-rock semi-hit to clock less than 2:00?)
33. Blink-182 - "Josie"

28. Tracy Lee - "The Theme (It's Party Time)"
29. Westside Connection - "Bow Down"

these are still in regular rotation round my place

I am so pissed off to be reminded of "Mungo City"

I downloaded Boyz II Men's "4 Seasons Of Loneliness" the other day, even weirder than I remembered.

Dr. Bill - good call on "All I Want." I always liked that one pretty well, much more than their later spree as a band alternating novelty singles with po-faced gnashing about death and bad neighborhoods. Actually, it makes a nice pair with "Josie" that way, since Blink-182 also started dipping overmuch into "mature" songs.....

"All I Want," however, was unfortunately chosen as theme music in the arcade game "Crazy Taxi" - I had a friend who nearly went insane trying to play some other game at the arcade and having his train of thought constantly drowned out by "YA YA YA YA YA!" I had a related problem trying to play the Elvis pinball machine, which was sort of music-themed and equally overpowered by the Offspring.

Good to know I'm not the only person in the world to remember the existence of Az Yet.

34. Mista, "Blackberry Molasses" (f/ a v. young Bobby Valentino)

35. DJ Taz "That's Right" (Not on u-toob, unfort.)

Soul Decision -- Faded

Dr. Bill's dead-on with "All I Want."

Local H's "All the Kids are Right"
Cowboy Mouth's wild "Jenny Says"
White Town's "Your Woman"
anything by that dog...I'll say "Never Say Never"
Imperial Teen's "You're One"
Jamie Blake's "Runaway"

and Bic Runga's "Sway"

43. Better Than Ezra - "At the Stars"
44. Brian McKnight - "The Only One for Me"
45. Fastball - "Fire Escape" (great video too, not on YouTube for some reason)
46. Tatyana Ali - "Daydreamin'"

47. Splender - I Think God Can Explain

48. Lauryn Hill, "The Sweetest Thing"

49. Monifah "Touch It"

Wow - I totally forgot "All The Kids Are Right." I didn't like it at all at the time, but I don't think I "got" it either. It's actually pretty funny!

"All the kids, they hold a grudge
Their minds are logged onto the Net
And all the kids, they hold a grudge
You failed them and they won't forget it
All your cred won't save you from the kids" - great stuff!

Oh, and just to finish off the list -

50. (tie) Green Day, "Walking Contradiction" and "Hitchin' A Ride." This band went through a really weird period, career-wise, between Dookie and American Idiot - aside from the ridiculously huge hit in "Time of Your Life," they basically put out a small string of singles that I don't think most people remember at all, although almost all of them are pretty interesting and/or catchy. "Warning" is the best of these (but it's solidly 2000's); the worst is probably "Nice Guys Finish Last"; and "Brain Stew" is pretty good but also pretty well-remembered (start singing the guitar line at parties and see how many people jump right on board). So I pick out these two, which got moderate radio/video play at the time and then completely disappeared. They're pretty decent.

51. Dave Matthews Band, "Don't Drink The Water." This band's career really didn't require them to get a social-consciousness thing going on, but it plays way better than the Paul Simon Lite of "Stay (Wasting Time)" and is commendably weird and long for a first single of an unstoppable hit band. Plus you get Alanis Morissette on guest wailing, which she's good at, and also it makes the song serve as a nice time capsule of 1998. Plus I kinda like it when Dave does his boogey man voice. DON'T DRINK TEH WATERRRRRR!

52. Andreas Johnson: Glorious
(it still is)

I heard "Don't Drink the Water" on the radio recently and was blown away by how fucked up it still sounds...seriously, how creepy is that outro ("THERE'S BLOOD IN THE WATER!!!")? Scared the hell out of me as a kid, especially with that similarly unsettling vid (remember that kid holding DM's decapitated, singing head? Some pretty sick shit)

53. Forest For The Trees, "Dream" - I remember thinking this was really amazing and futuristic at the time. It hasn't held up quite so well.

54. David Garza, "Disco Ball World - This was really pretty good though. I eventually got the album from the cheapo bins and it has some other good cuts on it, although I can't remember any of them now.

I still fly the flag for Garza.

This got some play on Live 105 in SF back in '97 but it didn't chart nationally:

OMD, Walking on the Milky Way

i am a huge forest for the trees guy and it totally holds up for me. the album is not bad actually.

sun 60 c'mon kiss me

scarce "all sideways"

Everything, "Hooch," or possibly "Who Got The Hooch?" (Link to not the real video.) A very pleasant tune. It'd be nice to hear it without the gratuitous 90s-isms: fake telephone filter over background interjections... purty guitar mixed unfortunately high Uncle Kracker/Everlast style... ill-advised "funkiness"...and well, the phrase "Who got the <blank>," which has a "Got Milk?" quality that's really hard to get past.

They also had a song on a radio station promo CD I had - "St Lucia" I think. That one was really nice too. These guys would never be my favorite band, but I can imagine having nice memories to an outdoor evening party with this going on in the background.

Chris Cornell - Preaching The End Of The World

"consolation prize" by amateur lovers

dreadful

The Braids - Bohemian Rhapsody

Westerberg – Love Untold

Public Announcement - Body Bumpin' (Yippie-Yi-Yo)

^^^best song title of the decade

I am so pissed off to be reminded of "Mungo City"

― da croupier, Thursday, September 13, 2007 4:58 PM Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

I feel like this video is some kind of time capsule that could perfectly represent, but remain totally incomprehensible to future generations, the state of the late 90s in rock as far as I was concerned. Oh, for the days when I really could consume over-the-topness like this without a single note of irony! This shit seemed so cool.

Everything, "Hooch," or possibly "Who Got The Hooch?" (Link to not the real video.) A very pleasant tune. It'd be nice to hear it without the gratuitous 90s-isms: fake telephone filter over background interjections... purty guitar mixed unfortunately high Uncle Kracker/Everlast style... ill-advised "funkiness"...and well, the phrase "Who got the <blank>," which has a "Got Milk?" quality that's really hard to get past.

Oh god that was bad. A friend of mine from college was their tour manager so went to see them at Bowery Ballroom for free around 1997 ish. I had completely forgotten about them until just now.

wow i don't recognize a single song (and most of the groups) discussed on this thread.

They're all pretty good!

702 - steelo

i'm sad i don't remember more of these (i probably do but i'm at the library and can't listen to clips on youtube)

uh except for "hooch" which i'm pretty sure i never want to hear again

mr. president - coco jambo (dutch i think? got mild US radio play, LOVED it at the time)

ok i will go back to writing my paper after this post honest:

merril bainbridge - mouth
qkumba zoo - the child inside
loreena mckennitt - the mummer's dance
changing faces - g.h.e.t.t.o.u.t.

So here's me trying to catch the differences between Canada and the United States in that time period. Particularly where I remember stuff getting a bit of airplay in Canada, but apparently not enough to have a charting position listed on the single's Wikipedia page, but also nothing listed for the United States either:

Did the Spice Girls solo material get any airplay in the United States? I particularly remember seeing Melanie C's "Going Down" and "Never Be The Same Again" getting some play on MuchMusic, and a little bit of play of Melanie B's "I Want You Back" and her cover of "Word Up". Geri Halliwell's singles seemed to fair a lot better, particularly "Look at Me", "Mi Chico Latino", and her cover of "It's Raining Men". Zero recollection of Emma Bunton or Victoria Beckham's solo stuff making any bit of dent over here though.

I dug all three of "Stop the Rock," "Going Out Of My Head," and especially "Dirt." The video of that one really impressed/freaked me:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0QWJm5cY60c

I don't think I saw it on TV much, maybe on some early realplayer-type online streaming service like Launch.com... not sure when that would have been though.

"Stop the Rock" I think I saw on MTV2 circa fall 2000. A tasty big-beat obscurity in the USA, a top 10 hit in the UK.

And yeah, meme references checks out for "Stop the Rock" -- someone made a video of it attached to the rolling boulder scene from Raiders of the Lost Ark, which was worth a giggle iirc.

I particularly remember seeing Melanie C's "Going Down" and "Never Be The Same Again" getting some play on MuchMusic, and a little bit of play of Melanie B's "I Want You Back" and her cover of "Word Up". Geri Halliwell's singles seemed to fair a lot better, particularly "Look at Me", "Mi Chico Latino", and her cover of "It's Raining Men".

I remember some modest controversy over the double entendre of "Going Down", and "Look At Me" got some TRL action, but I think that was it. When America was done with the Spice Girls, they were _done_.

Mr Icon mentioned them up the page, but Sugar Ray's "Every Morning" seemed to be on the radio all the time when it came out. It got to number ten in the UK. I'm not going to link to the video because I hated that song, everything about it. The smugness. I hated the smugness. It embodies a certain time and place and it can't exist outside that context.

My memory also throws Barenaked Ladies' "One Week" at me. That got to number five. The two songs came out within a few months of each other in early 1999. I think of it as the "something something something samurai" song.

I remember Mel C's "Northern Star" getting a lot of airplay. I've always associated it with darkness, rain, and the cold. I realise now that must be because it came out in November 1999, which probably explains why. Pre-millennial tension and all that. Bad weather. It got to number 5. Didn't chart in the US at all. The parent album got good reviews and sold a couple of million, but only reached 108 in the US. My recollection is that Geri Halliwell's solo singles were inexplicably popular, despite being naff, but she was likeable enough so it was hard to be annoyed with her.

Looking at the "Goin' Down" video and realizing it could have been where Miley Cyrus got all of her edgy schtick from...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jn7OS2K-hwI

Dirt, Going Out of My Head, Stop the Rock... All very much in my territory, these. STR is great but along with Lost in Space marks a point where they kept peddling novelties, soundtrack remixes etc. - not a criticism, and after all they beat Scooter to Quo-rave territory by a decade, but it ended up spelling a commercial dead end for them here in the UK after 2000.

Both the Geri and Mel C albums try a bit of everything but they come across in different ways. Mel C was I think going the 'Robbie route'* and trying a lot of 'credible' (in a Radio 1 way) things hoping certain ones will stick (influences incl. Garbage, noise pop, Britpop, TLC, Ray of Light), plus there was her V99 performance and NME being relentlessly ruthless to her throughout 99-00 for Daring To Touch Their Music. But after an infamous false start (Goin' Down), the album took off here in 2000 after some of its less typical tracks - the gorgeous Left Eye collab, a noisy Ibiza trance remix of the title track - really took off. She had a good year. Geri's album other hand is eclectic in the way Spiceworld was. A general variety show feel, brash and all quite pastichey and lighthearted-seeming in hindsight (although still careful enough to ensure all its diversions - Shirley Bassey-ishness, Latin pop, the big disco golden ring - were going to make her a success. And there's also the matter of the former of those, Look at Me, being intended as a total Event single).

*maybe before Robbie himself even had. His most realised Big Tent-ish move isn't until Sing When You're Winning (summer 2000).

Geri is a terrible singer but a great pop star. "Look At Me" is an incredible piece of provocation, it's her doubling down on everything that she was hated for and embracing it whole-heartedly.

Mel C's solo stuff made me think there was literally something wrong with me because she was supposedly "the good singer" in the Spice Girls, and I found her yowling unbearable. and I like yowling!

Yeah can't stand Mel C's voice either, Emma was the best singer and had imo the best solo single ("Maybe") but that didn't seem to equate to much chart success on either side of the Atlantic.

here's the forgotten big beat hit (though not much of a hit) missing from the list above.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3IWl77o3l50

Going back to MarkoP's post-Beck/Cake/Sublime Spirit of 96 playlist: could the transition from the verse to the chorus of Kid Rock "Cowboy" be marked as some kind of end point for the genre? The moment the big (sampled?) drum fill kicks in, Kid lapses from chilled-out woozy summer vibes into sub-Aerosmith rawkin' and the spell is broken.

(I guess "All Summer Long" could be sort of a belated return back to this sound/style.)

Also, Kid-adjacent, I'd also consider ICP's "Another Love Song," which actually samples Beck's "Jack-Ass" to cast a backyard-party haze over their misogynistic murder fantasies.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ABBPdf5SwJA

Linda Perry: "Fill Me Up"

#onethread

Huh! Never knew that existed. It's... Huh. I don't hate the performance and I kinda like the sound, but the song itself isn't landing with me tbh.

Earned some modest airplay late summer/early fall '96. Kind of interesting in how it tries to sell that it's the "What's Up" lady, but with every edge softened, which kind of misses the point of what people who like that song like about it.

I didn't know until I heard Pink talking about it on Howard Stern a couple days ago, but she's the reason Linda Perry came out of semi-retirement. Pink was a huge fan and went looking for her to do some writing/producing. And now she won't go away lol

My daughter used the expression "I'm living a lie" this morning and it inexplicably thrust this song into my head that seems to have left very little lasting footprint

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hk0aiREnTsc

"What do you do when you feel like you're living a lie?"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k67uejNr9FA

Courtesy of Lithium Deep Cuts:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SqeT9ooYKnM

Jimmie's Chicken Shack: "High", a Godsmack-y Hard Rock song preparing absolutely no one for their next album's Blink-182/Lit-move lead single "Do Right":

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dsttsAHkZvw

^Mentioned upthread by some dude. The video is...something else (as you can see, MTV2 actually aired it with the intro interview bit w/the ex-girlfriend, which was eventually edited out for regular MTV after an airing or two)

def remember "Do Right." "High" is tickling some memory bone but nothing specific. I guess they were early Korn adopters? Kind of an awkward fit with the bright colorful video. Not sure they should have agreed to the "actual chicken shack" video concept.

Apparently they are still active and released their most recent album in 2022??

Early Korn Adopters is my new band name, thanks doc

The Soundtrack To Our Lives - Instant Repeater '99

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bI6tk-3ADdg