Most Influential Artists of 1996 in 2021

Sheryl Crow

tho they hadn’t really done of their influential work by 1996, don’t mind me

Failure

I feel these three singles wouldn’t sound out of place in 2021:

Jamiroquai - virtual insanity
Sublime - doin time
D’angelo - lady

bjork
chemical brothers
orbital and other electronic acts at glastonbury

After thinking about this for 5 minutes I have realised I have no firm grip on what music sounds like in 2021.

daft punk

^Not until ‘97, no? Honestly, 1997 would be an easier year for this exercise… ‘96 was kind of transitional.

After thinking about this for 5 minutes I have realised I have no firm grip on what music sounds like in 2021.

― edited to reflect developments which occurred (Camaraderie at Arms Length)

It’s either music to dance to or music to uglycry to in tiktok iirc.

xp some singles came out in '96 so i'm stickin to it

someone from the world of dancehall. maybe shabba? was bounty killer around yet?

If we're talking influencial over the entire period 1996-2021 and not just in this year 2021, then I guess something like:

LTJ Bukem
Daft Punk/Dimitri From Paris/Cassius
Diamanda Galás
Fishmans
Nick Cave (in as much as he can be a "1996 artist", he did release his three biggest albums in the 1994-1997 period)
Tortoise
Current 93
Windy & Carl (in the sense of, drony ambient-meets-shoegaze?)
early emo bands like Jimmy Eat World/The Promise Ring
in metal, yeah definitely Burzum (although by 1996 he had already been incarcerated for two years, the influential stuff was all recorded earlier)
also Opeth, Neurosis/Eyehategod/Tool, Immolation
Apoptygma Berzerk/Covenant
Astral Projection/Hallucinogen
Paul van Dyk/Tiesto/MIKE

Astral Projection/Hallucinogen

― Siegbran, Thursday, 14 October 2021 08:13 (one hour ago)

Jesus mate, what is it with the psytrance revival. PVD/Mike I can understand even if I think they suck, but the same people making the biggest hoo-ha about cultural appropriation are also fans of goa crud. The script just keeps going on and on...

are fishmans really that influential

like i know they've been critical favourites in japan for a while but i have no idea how much their influence has actually been felt, did they actually inspire a wave of dubby dream pop acts there or anything

obviously in the west they just have a minor music nerd cult following as of the last 5 years or so but that hasn't at all translated to any sort of influence outside japan

It certainly seems to me that their psychedelic dreampop thing was the blueprint of the whole chillwave thing that kind or permeated the 2010s, although yeah, maybe not directly?

xpost @ RobbiePires I keep reading that comment in a Jerry Seinfeld voice

Fishmans have definitely influenced RYM users, lol

although yeah, maybe not directly?

absolutely not at all directly, their western cult fanbase on rym etc. only really developed around 2016 or so? & before that they were pretty much completely unknown - i stumbled across them maybe a year before the rym following really developed by digging through some rolling stone japan list. i don't think there's that much of a stylistic similarity either with chillwave either - the dub part of their sound isn't found in that at all.

the fishmans cult is also weird because they really overrate long season! uchuu nippon setagaya is their real classic

nobody’s said weezer yet lol

After thinking about this for 5 minutes I have realised I have no firm grip on what music sounds like in 2021.

This. But if I had to guess I'd say TLC would be high on the list.

What did TLC do in 1996? Crazy Sexy Cool was earlier and Fanmail was later.

The way I see it "influential 1996 artist" doesn't necessarily mean they released an album that year

yea idk what "2021 music" really sounds like either but a lotta new indie electronic stuff kinda sounds like Mouse on Mars to me

I would take it to mean artist for whom 1996 was def their year, like Jamiroquai (of everyone mentioned so far), who are associated with that particular year, not equally a couple of years before or after- but that may be way too pedantic.

Some dance music artists not yet mentioned:

Herbert
DJ Harvey
Kerri Chandler
Porter Ricks (though really Basic Channel if we're not being strict about release dates)
Oval
Motorbass

also Endtroducing was released in 96

I love Herbert. What music in 2021 do you hear that was influenced by Herbert's music?

Bone Thugs
Mariah Carey
Shania Twain

Oval definitely, Thrill Jockey released Systemisch and 94diskont in the US in 1996 and the influence of those albums has been a constant throughout the following two decades, arguably among the most influential electronic music of the 90s

Theo Parrish and Moodymann both had records out in '96 and their influence has also been a p constant presence, particularly throughout the 10s

I Care Because You Do came out in '96 and I'm guessing has a degree of influence wrt recent breakcore revival stuff (though according to RYM the foundational album there is Christoph de Babalon's If You're Into It, I'm Out of It which came out the following year)

Not necessarily influential in 2021, so veering off topic here I guess - These albums were released in 1996 and are considered one of the best of their career:

Belle & Sebastian - if your feeling sinister
Stereolab - emperor tomato ketchup
Dj shadow - endtroducing
UGK - ridin dirty
Ground Zero - 革命京劇 (Revolutionary Pekinese Opera) Ver.1.28
Tortoise - millions now living will never die
Aphex Twin - Richard D James
Ras Kass - soul on ice
Burzum - filosofem
Ryoji Ikeda - +/-
Current 93 - all the pretty little horses
2pac - all eyez on me
Dr Octagon - s/t
Beck - Odelay
Everything but the Girl - walking wounded
Cibo Matto - Viva La Woman
Fugees - The Score
Fiona Apple - Tidal

And that’s all that I can think of right now

Oh wait

Cardigans - first band on the moon
red house painters - songs for a blue guitar
Sun city girls - dantes inferno
Busta Rhymes - the coming
Cat power - what would the community think? (It’s one of her best albums and I wont hear otherwise)

"Crossroads" is the first triplet rapping I can remember.

i mean "Tha Crossroads"

Arto Lindsay - mundo civilizado
Fountains of Wayne - s/t
Jamiroquai - traveling without moving
Cake - fashion nugget
Lamb - s/t
Tricky - nearly god and pre-millenium tension
Tool - Aenima
Aaliyah - one in a million
Sublime - s/t

Actually a pretty busy year now that I think about it… I haven’t started looking into singles yet.

Donna Lewis - I love you always forever was massive this year iirc

Sneaker Pimps - 6 underground also released this year

Maxwell’s Urban Hang Suite

Are these all artists who are influential in 2021 or is this just a list of stuff from 1996?

I think the latter at this point

Foxy Brown

I hear Z100 play way too many piano ballads lately so... Jewel "Foolish Games"

Jordan was wondering about 'artists in 1996 that shaped the next 25 years of music' which is a more interesting question than who in 96 is influential specifically right now in anno 2021 which probably hardly anyone tbh

Ok well I still think the 5 I listed satisfy both questions.

I actually do think Maxwell’s debut was influential (and continues to be?), fwiw

(it def. influenced my roommate Matt to smoke out and hook up)

Bone Thugs otm

We could also start listing 2021 artists that owe an influence to 1996 specifically and it doesn't sound like it'd make the question any easier. Nobody has dated to pair artists or releases yet.
Or maybe just mid/late 90s trends that can be still be heard now ?

Tricky is a really interesting one in that he's one prominent, successful and critically acclaimed artist who virtually no one tried to consciously copy, and who initially seemed like an outlier but whose influence (particularly his approach to vocals) has filtered through into contemporary music in a really diffuse and interesting way. When Billie Eilish cited something off Nearly God as an influence there was a real penny drop moment but I think it had been quietly rumbling on for a few years.

Maybe slightly later in his career but the influence of someone like Elliot Smith is directly audible in the music of people like Phoebe Bridgers. That's a significantly less diffuse one.

In terms of the original thread premise the person who most immediately comes to mind is someone like Todd Edwards, who was turning heads in very specific circles by the mid-90s but whose sound and techniques have impacted right across the contemporary gene pool including artists who would never directly vote him as an influence.

good call on Todd Edwards, similar to Oval insofar as both popularised production techniques that are widely used (ubiquitous in the case of Edwards) by contemporary producers who may be unaware of their exact genesis

Billie Eilish is influenced by trip hop… artists like Tricky, Esthero can be heard in her sound.

She makes a case for trip hop from around this period to be influential to a big artist in 2021.

I also hear Jamiroquai in the thousand of “funky” indiepop acts that have been sort of “boutique” music in the past couple of years.

I get that some of the artists mentioned here may have echoes in current artists, but it's hard to say that a lot of them shaped the last 25 years

Does an influence have to be direct, with no intermediary artists in the chain?

Billie Eilish fell in love with trip-hop after she heard it the place where the true heads get their fix: in the lobby of a hotel

i.e. where I've heard Massive Attack for 20 years

she does literally sing about a hotel lobby in one of her new songs!

Tricky has mentioned Billie Eilish in a few interviews but is skeptical that she is directly influenced by him:

Recently, someone posted a picture of me from 25 years ago, and the guy said, “Wow it’s funny, Tricky looked like this 25 years ago and all rappers look like that now.” Another person posted a Billie Eilish song and said, “Basically Tricky.” And I thought, “What the fuck does that mean?” So, I heard the song, and I thought it was quite funny, because she might not even know who I am. Some people are influenced by me through other people. The guy from The xx said that he’d been influenced by me, and Billie Eilish could have been influenced by them and not even know who I am. It’s quite weird.

but see, if she was influenced by the xx in that scenario, that's still Tricky "shaping the next 25 years," right?

(also, who knows what kind of dusty crate-digger shit her bro is into; but he counts here, as well...)

i don't know if i've ever heard Tricky in my life

i don't think it's that difficult to draw a line from billie's newest album to everything but the girl. it's not a 1:1 crossover but a lot of similar qualities imo in terms of mood and tone if not quite the production. even some of her earlier music i.e. "ocean eyes" ... like you could put them on a playlist together and it wouldn't sound of place. there is other stuff of hers that is more directly similar to contemporary music but it's not exactly some sort of revelatory point to say that billie herself is directly influenced by xxxtentacion as opposed to music that is 25 years old

Moka’s list from 4 days ago was great

the best of trip hop was some of the best music of the mid 90s. There were so many dumbed down versions of it in the late 90s though that it lost currency

drum and bass from the mid 90s is still influential, even if the influence has been attenuated

some records from 1996 that I still admire

Sleater-Kinney - Call the Doctor
Tricky - Pre-Millenium Tension / Nearly God
Belle & Sebastian - If You’re Feeling Sinister
Tortoise - Millions Now Living Will Never Die
DJ Shadow - Endtroducing

also less mainstream

Current 93 - All The Pretty Little Horses
Ryoji Ikeda - +/-
Photek - The Hidden Camera
Sheila Chandra - ABoneCroneDrone
Plug - Drum ’n’ Bass for Papa
Ground Zero - Revolutionary Pekinese Opera
Derek Bailey - Guitar, Drums’N’Bass

One of my faves is Harry Pussy - Ride a Dove (but I don't think that influenced bupkis)

FKA Twigs also sounds influenced by Aaliyah and Massive Attack. I think she has actually confirmed those as major influences for her?

I’ll count her as being active in 2021

Although she sounds influenced by Mezzanine specifically and that one is 1998…

I adore Everything But The Girl in every phase and don't hear the similarities yet. What songs did you have in mind?

Broadcast released “The Book Lovers” in 1996 and that run until their abrupt end is pretty unimpeachable/influential. I remember being thrilled when Hayley from Paramore covered “Colour Me In.”

One of my faves is Harry Pussy - Ride a Dove (but I don't think that influenced bupkis)

was gonna mention missy—if not musically, the ultramodern chrome blobject fisheye lens aesthetic exhibited in her 90s music videos is one of the principle influences on recent neo-y2k revivalism—but i just checked and ofc supa dupa fly came out in 97

XP

first thought was similar - Royal Trux but I honestly have no idea (or probably anyone tbh) have a clear “influence” trajectory wrt them.

Timbaland a great cornerstone for that year, even while being behind the board.

lil kim definitely

― 100 flacs (noz), Wednesday, October 13, 2021 5:23 AM (six days ago) bookmarkflaglink

With Cardi B and Megan thee Stallion being so huge this feels pretty hard to argue with

Can we count Smashing Pumpkins’ Mellon Collie as 1996? All of its singles with the exception of “bullet with butterfly wings” were released 1996.

Wolf Alice sound super influenced by SP. Munya, Mø have covered them recently. Fruit Bats released a full covers album this year. I’ve been hearing their influence here and there but can’t think of more atm. Wolf Alice were the ones that sprung to mind first.

Now with the “90’s sound” making a full comeback I wouldn’t be surprised if there’s a Corganaissance of sorts in the following years.

If grunge makes a comeback or has an influence in the following years I’d bet heavily on Smashing Pumpkins being one of the main inspirations given that they had a slight psychedelic, more melancholic and most importantly less testosterone-fueled than other bands from the era.

yeah, I would agree to that. To me, who was never a huge Smashing Pumpkins fan but enjoyed some of their music, it seems like a lot of their stuff has aged way better than that of other big rock bands of the same era (Soundgarden, Alice in Chains, Pearl Jam). This mostly goes for their more subdued stuff, I heard "bullet with butterfly wings" and that song does not sound good to me in 2021.

ehhhh aic is low key majorly influential on almost every dimension of metal but they had kinda started falling apart by '96 anyway

first Pearl Jam album has aged well imo

Aic ruled

Soundgarden ruled

I know, this thread is not about “ruling”

things just rule and most are never understood

Well I guess what Eddie Vedder has over his contemporaries in Nirvana, Soundgarden and Alice In Chains in terms of legacy is that he is still alive.

He even (prophetically) sang that!

Mark Arm is pretty good at dodging Vedder's assassins

This is King Buzzo erasure

I wish smashing pumpkins seemed more influential esp adore era but I don’t feel like they are really? I think the music has aged pretty well but idk about influential

I love AIC but to me they're mostly a throwback to 70s rock/Sabbath and not so much a blueprint for alt rock the 25 years afterwards? Of the major grunge bands I'd probably say they were the best but musically the least "influential".

idk i think they can lay claim to sludge metal

baroness, mastodon, they love aic and you can tell

At thirty years old, the impact and influence of Facelift shows no sign of slowing. Its trademark sound is indelible — traces of it can be found in the DNA of sludge metal and nu metal. The latter would also pick up distortion techniques to add extra grit and texture to their sound.

The combination of hard rock dirge and drawn out vocals is evident in music by Godsmack (who took their name directly from an AIC song title) Dilly Dally, Windhand, and Deftones. The same blend of ethereal vocals and guitar distortion layered over oppressive bass can also be found in dark, folky music by Emma Ruth Rundle and Chelsea Wolfe.

The angst-ridden, brutally honest lyrical themes made accessible in Facelift have become so hardwired into certain genres of metal that it’s hard to imagine what that music might be like without them.

I always associate Sludge Metal mostly with the Melvins/Eyehategod bloodline more than AIC but yeah now you mention it, there's definitely an influence there.

back when i worked in a club's booking office, they used to call sludge metal "butt rock"