Modern Rock #1 Hits of 1994

one of my long unrealized poll ideas is 'biggest post-Nevermind US rock radio hit by various '80s college rock staples' with stuff like "The More You Ignore Me" and the Violent Femmes' "Breakin' Up" on it

Don't forget to include stuff like Cracker and Sugar.

"Friday I'm in Love"

http://open.spotify.com/user/sp10000/playlist/26QaeVL1NN2F8n8V36Y3Bx

11-year-old me votes Basket Case.

The only thing with the Cure is, they'd already had American hits in the '80s; with the other bands, it felt different. (Not that some dude's poll idea says you couldn't have had a hit in the '80s to qualify.)

"Friday I'm in Love"

b-b-but "Lovesong" hit #2 well before this "phenomenon"!

xpost

yeah for some of them it was a belated breakthrough, for others it was the last gasp of a longer period of commercial success (xpost)

ftr i did mean "biggest of their hits after Nevermind," not necessarily "their biggest hit came after Nevermind"

also let's not forget the landscape of pre-grunge explosion "Modern Rock Radio": http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Number_one_modern_rock_hits_of_1988

Backwater" is so good.

― Exile in lolville (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, May 21, 2012 2:16 PM (3 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I disliked Backwater when it came out. I was in my early teens and Meat Puppets were one of those bands I had found "on my own" by randomly ordering records from Black Flag cassette inserts and I thought the newer stuff was too commercial or whatever. But I became a huge fan of the song when I saw them play it live at RFK Stadium at the HFStival. OMG, they came on in the late morning/early afternoon, but there wasn't a stronger riff played for the rest of the day.

I loved it years after the fact – pretty much when I bought Up in the Sun in the late nineties.

Crash Test Dummies have been a punchline for far too long. time to reclaim the throne

I mean when even the Counting Crows have a reasonably listenable and decent song here, this was a pretty good year! Even the Live song is not completely atrocious!

longview, loser, or all apologies

gonna go with longview i think

btw biggest recurrent hits from 1994 that didn't hit #1:
The Offspring "Self Esteem"
Stone Temple Pilots "Interstate Love Song"
Soundgarden "Black Hole Sun"
Green Day "When I Come Around"
Nine Inch Nails "Closer"
Weezer "Undone (The Sweater Song)"
Weezer "Buddy Holly"
Stone Temple Pilots "Big Empty"
Green Day "Welcome To Paradise"
Soundgarden "Fell On Black Days"
Live "I Alone"
Stone Temple Pilots "Vasoline"
Soundgarden "Spoonman"
Bush "Everything Zen"
Beastie Boys "Sabotage"
Alice In Chains "I Stay Away"

nice list, some dude... if anything, that is more 1994 to me than the #1's.

^^ I am now convinced this was the greatest year in the history of music.

"I Alone" and "Lightning Crashes" certainly seemed like bigger hits in LA than "Selling the Drama".

xxxpost

That list is just about equally good. If not better.

I was a sophomore in college so it def wasn't.

xxpost

"Lightning Crashes" hit in '95

Every single one of these 1994 songs is in my '90s alt' iTunes playlist. Which gets some healthy rotation, lemmetellya.

1994 was a horrible year personally and yet thanks to music my nostalgia for it knows no bounds

The Offspring "Self Esteem"

oh man, I love this song so much

Voting "Fall Down" because I heard it the other day and it was much better than I remember.

"God" is probably the song here that suffers most in comparison to the real biggest hit from its parent album, "Cornflake Girl," but it's still pretty fantastic, deserves more love itt

i think think five of my ten fave 90s albums dropped that year

When Scott Woods was running Top 5 lists on rockcritics.com, I named 1994 as one of my five favourite years for music ever--lots of great hip-hop and Top 40 R&B, too.

Ever do the relative-time thing? I do it all the time, and the older you get, the weirder it gets. I have a hard time getting my head around the idea that we're now farther from '94 than '94 was from the Sex Pistols.

between the stuff in this thread and the fact that '94 was also the year of "Gin And Juice" and "Cream" and "Regular" and "Flava In Ya Ear" i think yeah good candidate for best year of the '90s

Regular=Regulate

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/f/fe/Tonybennettunplugged.jpg

I have a hard time getting my head around the idea that we're now farther from '94 than '94 was from the Sex Pistols.

Scary...

Even this lame Counting Crows song has a good hook in the chorus.

a related thread: 'indie' modern rock radio hits of 1994

Beck, Beasties, Bedtime Stories, R.E.M., "Regulate," and Brit stuff like Suede kept me sane. The pop songs were okay but I have a hard time remembering anything from that summer beyond "I Swear" and Lisa Loeb.

haha yeah this might be the only cc song i begrudgingly like

1994 is probably the all-time low point for capital p Pop music -- the only enduring song i can think of is "All I Want For Christmas Is You"

Basket Case is still the catchiest shit ever. In retrospect it's not hard to see how a band that could put tracks like that together would still be around, but who would have foreseen five more top 10 albums and two #1's in the 2000s...

Compare the Modern Rock top ten with the pop one:

http://books.google.com/books?id=XQgEAAAAMBAJ&printsec=frontcover&rview=1&source=gbs_ge_summary_r&cad=0#v=onepage&q&f=false

another good point, some dude... for children of the mid and late '90s pop music was Hanson, Spice Girls, boy bands and that's about it.

The Offspring "Self Esteem"

oh man, I love this song so much

― I'M THAT POSTA, AAAAAAAAAH (DJP), Monday, May 21, 2012 10:33 AM (8 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Haha, YES, I heard it when I was getting my hair cut a couple weeks ago and it was like instant nostalgia.

or children of the mid and late '90s pop music was Hanson, Spice Girls, boy bands and that's about it.

much better acts than the ones on '94's chart

There's a couple here that I really like: "Basket Case", "Come Out and Play", & "Einstein on the Beach". Voted for "Einstein on the Beach", which is my favorite Counting Crows song by a pretty good margin.

"Regulate" is still awesome though.

Basket Case is still the catchiest shit ever. In retrospect it's not hard to see how a band that could put tracks like that together would still be around, but who would have foreseen five more top 10 albums and two #1's in the 2000s...

At the time I thought Green Day was going to be another catchy pop-punk band that was going to flare up on the radar and then go away a la K's Choice. I do like them but in the back of my mind I still feel that way, so it's perpetually mind-boggling to me to see (for example) posters for the American Idiot touring show all over major marquees in town.

I looked up my Top 10 for '94, and I don't think there's anything I don't still like a lot:

1. "Fantastic Voyage," Coolio
2. "Miss World," Hole
3. "Cut Your Hair," Pavement
4. "Gin and Juice," Snoop Doggy Dogg (later changed his name)
5. "At Your Best (You Are Love)," Aaliyah
6. "Self Esteem," Offspring
7. "Do You Wanna Get Funky," C&C Music Factory (nostalgia for 1991)
8. "Flashlight," Fuzzy
9. "Worker Man," Patra
10. "Pay No Mind," Beck

I was a little tired of "Loser" at that point, so--pursuant to something that came up on the Beastie Boys countdown--sometimes I do fall in love with songs all over again.

damn great list, you were cool in 94

The Billboard to which I linked has the following horrors on the top ten:

Big Mountain - Baby I Love Your Way (from "Reality Bites")
Jon Secada - If You Go
Elton John - Can You Feel The Love Tonight?
All 4 One - I Swear

mixed with:

Beck - Loser
Aaliyah - Back and Forth
Janet - Any Time, Any Place
Warren G- Regulate
John Mellencamp-Me'shell Mdegeocello - Wild Night

good list, clemenza. I often wonder whether that's my favorite Aaliyah song too.

You're asking for it.

I couldn't believe that "Fall Down" was a hit until I realized that I was remembering "Hold Her Down" instead.

Crash Test Dummies first few albums are actually really solid. They do a nifty cover of The Replacements "Androgynous"! And a song about Superman!

And that song about Superman was actually a bigger hit in Canada than Mmmmm Mmmmm Mmmmm was.

I'm still a bit baffled as to how "Mmmmm Mmmmm Mmmmm" managed to be a number one hit.

You don't remember how "About a Girl" goes? That is their most Beatleseque song (and rendition).

"About a Girl" is great but the Unplugged version less so. "Loser" and "Kenneth" obv also classics but I get nostalgic for the Lemonheads on hot days like today so here's a vote for "Into Your Arms".

Although Gin Blossoms were terrible, "Found out about you" was a pretty fine song. But it's gotta be "All Apologies." Great song, great recording by Albeenee

This poll was so long ago (my first one... screwed up the date) that I can't remember who I voted for. But I think it was also "All Apologies."

Like I'm not going to vote for the grudge-bearing stalker.

you have a restraining order out on Ed Kowalczyk too?

Well done

Although Gin Blossoms were terrible

does not compute

Boringly voting All Apologies.

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

voted for Toad.

The only things here I'm really sick of are the Offspring and maybe Bang & Blame.

I kind of don't mind any of these songs but I'm not excited by any of them.

can't remember if I voted for "Kenneth" or Counting Crows' "Einstein on the Beach' which I seem to remember liking when I was 12 but maybe I don't anymore. Recall it being quite jaunty.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

guess i voted for Kenneth

wait NOBODY likes philip glass?

well in theory everybody does, i think

y'know "All Apologies" is maybe the one Nirvana song i wouldn't mind never hearing again

it's kind of awesome imo; I'm like the dude that things the chorus of "Bullet with Butterfly Wings" is a turd in a punchbowl, so the "in the sun" part of AA should really piss me off, it has no real right to work, and it works magnificently

like I see how lots of it (the q&a verses, that overinvoluted endchant) can come across as horrifically trite upon overexposure, but I think it sounds even more original than it did back then

i just don't really fuck with slow/midtempo Nirvana i think, am almost as weary of "Come As You Are" and "Dumb" and "Pennyroyal Tea"