badalamenti*
― Week of Wonders (Ross), Friday, 3 November 2017 04:13 (six years ago) link
Vol. II: 1990 - A New Decade
― geoffreyess, Friday, 3 November 2017 04:25 (six years ago) link
Is Turrican an AI created by feeding Rate Your Music mailing lists into a neural net? 1990 was an amazing year for music and I don't know who'd say otherwise― shackling the masses with plastic-wrapped snack picks (sic), Friday, November 3, 2017 3:39 AM (two hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
― shackling the masses with plastic-wrapped snack picks (sic), Friday, November 3, 2017 3:39 AM (two hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
Well, hardly anyone seems to bring up 1990 as some sort of gold standard year for music, hence the thread, which isn't designed to criticise the year, but to discuss the music that came out that year.
Great attempt to try and derail the thread by trying to provide me with something to negatively react to, though.
― Gholdfish Killah (Turrican), Friday, 3 November 2017 06:25 (six years ago) link
There definitely seems to have been better singles than individual albums in 1990.
Yeah, this is the kind of stance that I'm leaning towards, although I really like Odysseus' list.
'Nothing Compares 2 U' remains a great single, but how often do folks listen to the album these days? Does anyone here still really listen to World Party in 2017?
― Gholdfish Killah (Turrican), Friday, 3 November 2017 06:57 (six years ago) link
Anyway, great posts dorsalstop & Custard Cream :)
― Gholdfish Killah (Turrican), Friday, 3 November 2017 06:58 (six years ago) link
1990.... time for the gooroooo
― mfktz (Camaraderie at Arms Length), Friday, 3 November 2017 10:17 (six years ago) link
1990 / Time For The Souffle
― illegal economic migration (Tracer Hand), Friday, 3 November 2017 10:20 (six years ago) link
1990 was the year I discovered pop music. I was only 9 years old but receiving a radio and listening to it almost constantly opened up a world back from which I'd never come back. Lots of (in retrospect) bad dance-pop music, but I loved it. I wasn't old enough for albums, other than the two Now comps that came out that year. My big hits of that year:Dub Be Good To Me, The Power, U Can't Touch This, Ghetto Heaven, Tricky Disco, LFO (loads of great ravey stuff), Birdhouse In Your Soul. I especially liked the rave stuff because it sounded nothing like my parents' music.
― Shat Parp (dog latin), Friday, 3 November 2017 10:41 (six years ago) link
this is what i got:
Codeine - Frigid StarsGalaxie 500 - This Is Our MusicBabes In Toyland - Spanking MachineThe Blue Aeroplanes - SwaggerCocteau Twins - Heaven Or Las VegasMazzy Star - She Hangs Brightly A Tribe Called Quest - People's Instinctive Travels And The Paths Of RhythmPrefab Sprout - Jordan: The Comeback Fugazi - Repeater Crime And The City Solution - Paradise Discotheque Soul II Soul - Volume II 1990: A New DecadeThe KLF - Chill Out The Jesus Lizard - HeadGang Starr - Step In The ArenaWolfhounds - AttitudeRevolting Cocks – Beers, Steers & QueersShut Up And Dance - Dance Before The Police Come!Unrest - Kustom Karnal BlackxploitationThin White Rope - Sack Full Of SilverNice Strong Arm - Stress CityElectribe 101 - Electribal MemoriesPale Saints - The Comforts Of MadnessBongwater - The Power Of PussyPaul Simon - The Rhythm Of The SaintsThe Clean - VehicleHalf Japanese - We Are They Who Ache With Amorous Love
― plp will eat itself (NickB), Friday, 3 November 2017 10:42 (six years ago) link
one of my favourite 1990-ish things now though is watching old dance energy clips w/ normski
― plp will eat itself (NickB), Friday, 3 November 2017 10:49 (six years ago) link
back from which I'd never come back
this ever changing world in which we live in
― Shat Parp (dog latin), Friday, 3 November 2017 10:50 (six years ago) link
1990 definitely has its very own aesthetic that seems quite apart from 89 and 91. You had those sort of festival-goth people with velvet stovepipe hats and tinted Lennon specs; and the music videos were either shot in a city in black and white or in a studio with the most lurid, frenzied superimposed backdrops ever seen. Bring back the ITV Chart Show
― Shat Parp (dog latin), Friday, 3 November 2017 10:54 (six years ago) link
that reminds me, i think that both the best Fields of The Nephilim album and maybe the worst Sisters of Mercy album were from 1990
― plp will eat itself (NickB), Friday, 3 November 2017 10:57 (six years ago) link
The only 1990 album in my entire iTunes library is Neil Young's Ragged Glory. I guess there has to be a couple more that I'm forgetting.
― Dinsdale, Friday, 3 November 2017 11:27 (six years ago) link
Let's not forget The La's.
― Jazzbo, Friday, 3 November 2017 12:02 (six years ago) link
Never understood why people rate that Black Box single over any of their others from the same album.
― nashwan, Friday, 3 November 2017 12:23 (six years ago) link
1990 was an amazing year for music and I don't know who'd say otherwise
Seriously, genuinely not aware of any particular consensus otherwise (other than maybe based on some pathetic idea that Nevermind was more important than anything from the previous eighteen months) but the question is more why pay attention to that nonsense rather than where is it even coming from.
― nashwan, Friday, 3 November 2017 12:26 (six years ago) link
1990 was a transition year for me - in the fall I moved to Boston and finally had access to 'alternative' radio stations like WFNX, WBCN and all the great college stations. Not to mention all the record stores a quick T ride away. It really opened up my musical world. Shoegaze was big for me - Lush, Ride, Pale Saints, etc. And the whole Flying Nun stable was off the charts great - The Chills, Straitjacket Fits, Able Tasmans, etc all released great albums in 1990. Looking at the Rate Your Music lists, I'd guess a retroactive top ten / most listened to in 1990 would be:
The Chills - Submarine BellsRobyn Hitchcock - EyePrefab Sprout - Jordan: The ComebackThe Blue Aeroplanes - SwaggerThe Jazz Butcher - Cult Of The BasementThe La's - The La'sRide - NowhereKilling Joke - Extremities, Dirt And Various Repressed EmotionsLloyd Cole - Lloyd ColeThe Fatima Mansions - Viva Dead Ponies
It's pretty easy to come up with a handful of great albums for any particular year. I think the original question asks if it was memorable, impactful or otherwise felt like music was consistently engaging. And to all of those it's clearly 'yes' for me.
― Gerald McBoing-Boing, Friday, 3 November 2017 12:38 (six years ago) link
yeah I think the good year/bad year stuff is totally bogus, there's always great and good and mediocre and bad music being made in quantities that would be impossible to even listen to it allso any judging of a year as good or better is just some amalgamation of received wisdom/press narratives, your own life circumstances and age at that time, etc
― Universal LULU Nation (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Friday, 3 November 2017 13:34 (six years ago) link
come on, man. Just for the Hip Hop releases:
Amerikkka's Most WantedOne For AllThe Devil Made Me Do ItTo the East, BlackwardWanted: Dead Or AliveFunky Technician
ANd then there was
Daniel Johnston- 1990The Clean- VehicleSuperchunk- s/tDwight Yoakum- If there Was a WayBlue Rodeo- Casino
― President Keyes, Friday, 3 November 2017 13:38 (six years ago) link
I don't think it's so much that people talk about 1990 as a 'bad year', it just doesn't get brought up so much in the same way a lot of people will wax nostalgic about, say 1994, 1991, 1977, 1968 etc. It's an overlooked year really.
― Shat Parp (dog latin), Friday, 3 November 2017 14:11 (six years ago) link
'Nothing Compares 2 U' remains a great single, but how often do folks listen to the album these days?
A few times a year at least. A perfect album if such a thing exists.
― geoffreyess, Friday, 3 November 2017 14:15 (six years ago) link
I don't think it's so much that people talk about 1990 as a 'bad year', it just doesn't get brought up so much in the same way a lot of people will wax nostalgic about, say 1994, 1991, 1977, 1968 etc. It's an overlooked year really.― Shat Parp (dog latin), Friday, November 3, 2017 2:11 PM (fifteen minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
― Shat Parp (dog latin), Friday, November 3, 2017 2:11 PM (fifteen minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
Yup, precisely!
― Gholdfish Killah (Turrican), Friday, 3 November 2017 14:36 (six years ago) link
Musically, 1990 in many ways feels more like the very tail end of the '80s to me than the beginning of the '90s.
Anyway, there's some great stuff coming up un this thread... some obvious classics, but also quite a few things that seldom get talked about.
― Gholdfish Killah (Turrican), Friday, 3 November 2017 14:42 (six years ago) link
*in
― Gholdfish Killah (Turrican), Friday, 3 November 2017 14:44 (six years ago) link
https://www.fantasiescometrue.com/images/medium/fct_28cfc991c0fcf04.jpg
― Shat Parp (dog latin), Friday, 3 November 2017 14:55 (six years ago) link
It may partly be because it was pretty ubiquitous at the time, in a way the others weren't (at least in my corner of the world). I very strongly associate that particular moment with that song.
― _Rudipherous_, Friday, 3 November 2017 14:57 (six years ago) link
Surely Ride on Time is the most celebrated / overplayed Black Box single?
― Shat Parp (dog latin), Friday, 3 November 2017 14:59 (six years ago) link
Yeah, the moment anyone mentions Black Box, I think "WHOOOOOOOA HO! WHOOOOOAAAA HO! WA WHOOOOOOA HO! WA WA WA WHOOOOOOOAAAA HO!"
― Gholdfish Killah (Turrican), Friday, 3 November 2017 15:03 (six years ago) link
The premise of this thread is pretty dumb, it's not like we're talking about 1975 or 1986 or 1998 or another one of those weird in-between years, 1990 had several huge and pivotal scenes absolutely booming, I don't think anyone seriously makes the case for it being a bad year.
― Matt DC, Friday, 3 November 2017 15:04 (six years ago) link
x-post to dog latin
It may be a difference between UK and US. US chart for
Everybody Everybody:
UK Singles (The Official Charts Company)[10] 16US Billboard Hot 100[11] 8US Billboard R&B Singles [11] 2US Billboard Hot Dance Club Play[11] 1
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Everybody_Everybody_(song)#Charts
UK Singles (Official Charts Company)[5] 1US Billboard Hot Dance Club Play[29] 39US Billboard Hot Dance Music/Maxi-Singles Sales[29] 44
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ride_on_Time#Charts_and_certifications
I do like Everybody Everybody better though, for whatever reason.
― _Rudipherous_, Friday, 3 November 2017 15:09 (six years ago) link
(x-post)
Okay, then maybe instead of being snarky, you could come up with some theory as to why it remains one of the lesser talked about years? Even '75, '86 and '98 get talked about more. I can't actually think of a year more overlooked post 1962. If so many scenes were indeed booming, why isn't the year spoken about to the same degree as other years where the same thing was happening?
― Gholdfish Killah (Turrican), Friday, 3 November 2017 15:10 (six years ago) link
Personally, I cluster 1989-1991 together, when it comes to what I was listening to. It seems like trends shifted in 1992 (and at the very least my listening habits shifted). New music in 1989-1991 for me was mostly hip-hop, some R&B, the occasional house crossover hit in the US, and Psychic TV (and to some extent Coil).
― _Rudipherous_, Friday, 3 November 2017 15:13 (six years ago) link
xp transitional year. better known for singles than albums maybe? Do people think of 2000, 1980, 1970, 2010 as particularly remarkable years for music? Yes, blah blah, no such thing as a bad year etc, but is there a psychological effect at play where the first year of a decade feels like the closing of one door and the opening of another, therefore making that period harder to define as typically 'of its time'? Like you were saying, rather than feeling like the beginning of a new era, 1990 could be seen as more of a victory lap of the eighties. Sometimes it takes a few years into a decade to really get what it's all about and what defines it. Like the idea that there were 'two eighties' the one that spanned 1978-1985 and the one that lasted 1986-1992). This is all very conjectural and subjective of course, and buys into the idea that people are subliminally affected by the idea of years and decades..
― Fox Mulder, FYI (dog latin), Friday, 3 November 2017 15:19 (six years ago) link
Because unless it's the Summer of Love or coinciding with some huge moment in history, most people don't really talk about years when they talk about music? They talk about things that were happening at the time, and 1990 was hip-hop getting bigger and bigger, plus acid house and baggy and Pacific NW rock and a load of other stuff. Maybe because it's a plateau year rather than a pivotal year?
1987-94 is a bit of a mini-era in itself really.
― Matt DC, Friday, 3 November 2017 15:20 (six years ago) link
I think Rudipherous and Matt are OTM; 1990 and 1991 feel like extensions of 1989 to me so whenever I wax nostalgic about '89, I'm really talking about a 3-year period of awesome music.
― the Hannah Montana of the Korean War (DJP), Friday, 3 November 2017 15:22 (six years ago) link
xp for dance music definitely.
― Fox Mulder, FYI (dog latin), Friday, 3 November 2017 15:24 (six years ago) link
1989-1992 ... about as good as it got for pop-house dance music
― Anne of the Thousand Gays (Eric H.), Friday, 3 November 2017 15:25 (six years ago) link
I think it's interesting, the distinction between musical years that you can say empirically were good or bad and years that you were either too young or not yet alive to appreciate.1990 was an exciting year for me musically but can I really say that 1975 was a good year or not?
For one, I was 3 years old and who knows if I would have bought Hissing Of Summer Lawns or Another Green World and nerded out on them if I had been old enough to.But if I had done, it would have made my musical year for sure.
― MaresNest, Friday, 3 November 2017 15:26 (six years ago) link
goes without saying that this all depends on your age, where you were living and what interests you kept. I have a real blind-spot for late-80s music because I came to pop right at the beginning of 1990, so from my POV it's a year zero in terms of developing a taste for music. To this day, music from the years prior feel like warming-up.
― Fox Mulder, FYI (dog latin), Friday, 3 November 2017 15:26 (six years ago) link
Yep, I was 11 in 1990. Everything sounded so good.
― Anne of the Thousand Gays (Eric H.), Friday, 3 November 2017 15:28 (six years ago) link
Well, hardly anyone seems to bring up 1990 as some sort of gold standard year for music, hence the thread, which isn't designed to criticise the year, but to discuss the music that came out that year.Many people aren't saying that 1990 was some sort of gold standard year for music. That's what I'm not hearing. Sad! DO SOMETHING
― shackling the masses with plastic-wrapped snack picks (sic), Friday, 3 November 2017 15:31 (six years ago) link
yeah this 'a lot of people' thing...what exactly is she source for this?
― nashwan, Friday, 3 November 2017 15:34 (six years ago) link
Seems like it's just based on the dullest possible rock canon consensus of pre-Grunge myopia. Why dignify it? Worth it for reading the 1990 / Time For The Souffle linked upthread tho with the same immediate 'why this again?!' responses ha.
― nashwan, Friday, 3 November 2017 15:44 (six years ago) link
My favorite house track ever was released in 1990 - Earth People (aka Pal Joey) - "Dance"
― Spencer Chow, Friday, 3 November 2017 16:12 (six years ago) link
also RON TRENT - ALTERED STATES
― brimstead, Friday, 3 November 2017 16:20 (six years ago) link
Joey Beltram - “Energy Flash”Bobby Konders - “The Poem”Eon - “Spice”808 State - “Cubik” and U.S. LP ‘Utd. State 90’49-ers “Touch Me” “Don’t You Love Me”Double Dee feat. Dany - “found Love”Psychotropic - HypnosisTechnotronic - “Pump Up the Jam”
― Spencer Chow, Friday, 3 November 2017 16:40 (six years ago) link
Touch Me and Pump Up The Jam were 1989 /pedant
― Colonel Poo, Friday, 3 November 2017 16:48 (six years ago) link
Logic - "The Warning"The Underground Solution (aka Roger Sanchez) - "Luv Dancin'"
― Spencer Chow, Friday, 3 November 2017 16:48 (six years ago) link
xpost, my bad - I respect pedantry
― Spencer Chow, Friday, 3 November 2017 16:50 (six years ago) link
Seems like an early victim of 'must fill every available minute of time on this new CD format!' bloat.
The CD has half a bonus track over the LP; the cassette has four.
― Dollarmite Is My Name (sic), Wednesday, 25 March 2020 20:28 (four years ago) link
Orbital Top 20 singles artist. Oh yeah.
― kraudive, Thursday, 26 March 2020 11:42 (four years ago) link
Again, for me - something I find common in this period - is the “indie” stuff stinks the chart up more than anything else (not a big Madchester/baggy person so there is that); the chart looks more interesting without it
― Master of Treacle, Thursday, 26 March 2020 12:28 (four years ago) link
Goddamn, I had thought 'This is Ponderous' (1991)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6gYIbMwswKM
was some sort of unfortunate outlier from this era, but there are tracks exactly like it on the Was (Not Was) and Will to Power albums from '90. WTF was happening.
― Unparalleled Elegance (Old Lunch), Thursday, 26 March 2020 12:39 (four years ago) link
From a purely anecdotal standpoint, listening to albums from this particular year feels incredibly schizophrenic to me inasmuch as, between the summer of '90 and the fall of '91 (when singles from some of these albums were still charting), I lived in four different cities (we moved at the end of my seventh grade year, then again in the middle of eighth grade, and then again just before my freshman year). So I have an array of geographical associations with these songs, and then also the thing where a song hits big in one part of the country long before another catches up, etc. The fact that 'U Can't Touch This' and 'Gonna Make You Sweat (Everybody Move)' were released in the same year seems to strain all temporal credulity.
― Unparalleled Elegance (Old Lunch), Thursday, 26 March 2020 13:24 (four years ago) link
Defining the Poppy Bush Interzone.
― TikTok to the (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Thursday, 26 March 2020 13:29 (four years ago) link
Yes, I always forget but, upon remembering, greatly appreciate your coinage of the PBI. It is an extremely resonant era of pop for me.
― Unparalleled Elegance (Old Lunch), Thursday, 26 March 2020 13:46 (four years ago) link
Phenomenal year.
― Matt DC, Thursday, 26 March 2020 13:58 (four years ago) link
The slate from yesterday and this morning...
Was (Not Was) - Are You Okay?Vanessa Williams - The Right StuffWill to Power - Journey HomeWilson Phillips - s/t
...has been fine I guess, fair-to-middlin', not many album tracks exceeding the better singles that I already knew, occasionally real bad (about half of that WNW album...sheesh), mostly making me wonder how inclined I am to continue with this project.
But hey whattayaknow, listening to Salt-N-Pepa's Black's Magic rn and it's real effing good. Which may be news to precisely no one but me.
― Unparalleled Elegance (Old Lunch), Thursday, 26 March 2020 15:20 (four years ago) link
Bands just felt really compelled to do an updated 90s take on Eric Burdon and War's "Spill The Wine".
― MarkoP, Thursday, 26 March 2020 15:33 (four years ago) link
These songs are a much different animal (no pun intended). It makes me wonder if Joe Frank just started to blow up around then.
― Unparalleled Elegance (Old Lunch), Thursday, 26 March 2020 15:36 (four years ago) link
I heard punk broke, not sure if anybody fixed it.
― Stevolende, Thursday, 26 March 2020 15:37 (four years ago) link
A corporation did
― Muswell Hillbilly Elegy (President Keyes), Thursday, 26 March 2020 19:29 (four years ago) link
I'm sorry to have to report that it died
― Wuhan!! Got You All in Check (Camaraderie at Arms Length), Thursday, 26 March 2020 19:42 (four years ago) link