Drinking In L.A. * Steal My Sunshine * In The Meantime * Get What You Give * Novocaine For The Soul

"Drinking In LA" never actually charted in the States, though I guess it was in the Buzz Bin maybe?

I knew it from 120 Minutes and it was def on the college stations in my area and my own mixtapes, but it feels like an outsider in this group. Def closer to "Brimful Of Asha" imo.

When I said "it was not on the radio" I meant like Alt-rock stations.

was big in uk, top 10 hit

Bran Van was big on MTV and/or VH1, as with the Len, Eels, and New Radicals singles (don't know how those did at radio).

Spacehog was huge at radio. I still don't get how that one relates to these others, tho

(...for purposes of this thread -- it's from a few years earlier, and is pretty much a straight-up rawk song)

EMF/Jesus Jones etc. have to be part of lineage here

Numb by U2 would be considered Pre-Beck, right?

the Len, Eels, and New Radicals singles (don't know how those did at radio).

Len: #9 Pop, #5 Mod. Rock
Eels: #39 Pop (!), #1 Mod. Rock
New Radicals: #36 Pop, #8 Mod. Rock

Surprised New Radicals wasn't bigger.

xpost
Yeah -- good pull on "Numb"

I'm surprised Eels charted that high at Modern Rock!

It's really hard not to vote for Drinking in L.A. That track is really all time.

Huh thought new radicals was a top 10 at least. It got a lot of airplay on mtv.

New Radicals is one of those tracks that was perfect for MTV/VH1 at that time, but didn't quite fit the mold of either Pop or Modern Rock radio (at least in the U.S.)

I will also mention again that it fuckin' sucks!!!

got a lot of radio play too and found its way to one of the NOWs. it's a song that everyone knows even if they don't necessarily know its name.

Beck reported that "I was in a grocery store and he (Alexander) came running up to me, so apologetic, and saying, 'I hope you weren't offended. It wasn't supposed to be personal.' I was kind of pleased, because he's a big guy."

Following the mass media's excitement about the celebrity insults, Alexander explained that the verse, along with the lines directly preceding it ("Health insurance rip off lying / FDA big bankers buying / Fake computer crashes dining / Cloning while they're multiplying") were an experiment to see if the media would focus on the real issues, or on the celebrity ridicule.

LOL

I will also mention again that it fuckin' sucks!!!

― i’m still stanning (morrisp), Thursday, June 28, 2018 1:22 PM (eight minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

did you need to

-_-

imagine thinking new radicals suck lol

otm

yeah that whole album is pretty good

I'm so bourgeois, not radical enuff!!

Apparently the guy co-wrote "The Game of Love" by Michelle Branch & Santana, which was a pretty good song.

Beck reported that "I was in a grocery store and he (Alexander) came running up to me

I wonder if it was the (former) Ralphs in Silver Lake, now a Whole Foods 365

Apparently the guy co-wrote "The Game of Love" by Michelle Branch & Santana, which was a pretty good song.

didn't know that, but this totally checks out.

you can even hear the 'new radicals' version of it:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7bJrHl4TeN0

i still cant understand why this didn't make the album

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gq9jzRWoMGY

xp
Actually both songs were written by the same two guys -- Gregg Alexander and songwriting partner Rick Nowels (...Nowels is huge -- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rick_Nowels)

All these songs got used on the soundtrack to late 90s football computer games.

new radicals fucking suck.

ban

wow, i really like "a love like that," reminds me of "advice for the young at heart."

I'm surprised Eels charted that high at Modern Rock!

Autumn '96 was a weird time maaaaaan...

Len ftw

"Drinking In L.A" is a song that benefits from not being heard on the radio constantly. My parents bought the album it came from (!) and I remember it being very diffuse and actually good in some places?

"Steal My Sunshine" would be a million times better if it was just a chorus and isntrumental verses.

"Get What You Give" is a great melody but the smugness of the lyrics and performance put me off, "Life Is A Rollercoaster" is probably a better song written by Alexander.

"In The Meantime" makes me think of the advert from the 90s that used only the good part of the song, and now discovering that the good part is a sample it feels a bit pointless. Good bassline but another terrible vocal.

I really liked that Eels album at the time but I dread to think how I would feel returning to it. Everything after "Electro-Shock Blues" has been disappointing and that's tainted my opinion.

I feel like in a parallel universe there would be room for the single mix of "Mmmbop" here and probably something from Garbage Version 2.0 album.

the scratchy voice verses on 'steal my sunshine' are essential to its appeal

'get what you give' is earnest not smug

len ftw x2

daisies of the galaxy was good tho, boxed. kinda feel like E has been writing the same song forever tho

Fun Fact: For a few months when it was new I thought the guy on "Steal My Sunshine" was Perry Farrell (didn't see the vid until way later).

kinder at 11:03 28 Jun 18

No no no no no
'get what you give' is an absolute travesty, should be a Ronan Keating song

"Get What You Give" is a great melody but the smugness of the lyrics and performance put me off, "Life Is A Rollercoaster" is probably a better song written by Alexander.

now I have no idea if i already knew that or not

One song that I feel kinda fits in this group, but is pretty much unknown outside of Canada is BTK's Peppyrock, though it did show up on some random soundtracks and compilations.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b2qEwePLQgI

If this is a genre, it's one I'd lost interest in by the time of Len and New Radicals, but I was very much there for Spacehog and Eels. The Spacehog guy wearing a skirt on Letterman was very cool to me as a kid. Mr. Narrator, this is David Bowie to me, and whatnot. Also The Chinese Album was a big deal for me and I still find it a good listen, esp. the Michael Stipe feature:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=asDJVXtb5ZA

That said, I have a friend "Alan" who seems to think Spacehog are the most soulless and opportunistic band of all time, he probably knows some stuff I don't know.

Come on now, where is 1000 Clowns? There's your post-Beck semi-ironic white boy hiphop.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mtoR-LXChIk

ha that's my fave part of the song and now that i'm aware of the source fuck spacehog.

― Hunt3r, Thursday, June 28, 2018 2:58 PM (four hours ago)

That's exactly how I felt about Len the first time I heard the instrumental break in "More, More, More".
Except in Len's case, the sample is basically the whole song.

At least Spacehog wrote that epic bassline... "In The Meantime" would have made a great Blur single. The rest of that album was terrible though.

^Re: Len -- uh, that's what makes it brilliant. It's best deployment of a sample in a pop song I can think of.

this earlyish Black Eyed Peas track definitely shares that same floaty, melty, telephone tone vibe as a lot of songs ITT

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VH8FctYMM80

Len is the definite winner out of a strong group here.
Better Days (And the Bottom Drops Out) by Citizen King deserves a mention also.

Something else great about "Steal My Sunshine" is how the verse w/the female vox sort of taps into that '90s lo-fi indie-pop vein -- K Records, Dub Narcotic, Land of the Loops, etc., etc. ...all of which has gone unmentioned in all the above talk about "pop songs w/beats" -- for good reason, as these were not hits! -- though Beck recorded One Foot in the Grave w/Calvin Johnson prior to Mellow Gold (so it all ties back together)!

Now I want a playlist titled Indulging in My Self-Defeat: Twee Vox & Breakbeats, 1994-1999

What the hell am I doing / Drinking an IPA in a kitchen in L.A. / At (almost) 42

Yeah i can't keep hating on 'in the meantime' i was trying to get my appreciation back to secret. fail. i still like it.