top 5 best albums of the 90's and the worst 5

namnoc16

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Ok I posted a thread the other day on how music nowadays is complete shit and I started thinking about the last great decade of music (heavy,grunge,rap/rock,industrial what the fuck ever) IMHO,the 1990's.While I was pondering this all important question I also realized this decade also was responsible for a lot of boy band,pop princess,rock/rap(faith no more only group to pull it off) grunge bullshit. Anyway here's my top 5 albums of the decade in no particular order

Beastie Boys Check Your Head- I love this album The Blue Nun,Jimmy James,Funky Boss,Professor Booty(I like Pauls Boutique better but it's a year to early)
Gin Blossoms- New Miserable Experience - This album is beautifully melodic from song 1-12 . They fired the guy who wrote most of these beautiful songs then he killed himself,alas next album blew.
Sound Garden Super Unknown- Can't beat Cornells pipes,wanted to put Bad Motorfinger but Super Unknown is just hit after hit after hit
Rage Against the Machine Evil Empire- If you want to let out some aggression 'Turn on the Radio Nah Fuck it turn that shit off" Blare this fucking album
Nirvana Nevermind- I didn't want to put his one because it's played but how can a list not include nirvana.The second half of the album is the secret treasure Drain You,Lounge Act,On a Plain,and Somethin in the way!
This was a tough list but the next 5 were just as tough because there is some really bad shit out there and these are mainly ones that have been hits in the mainsteam but that aint saying much!So heres my 5 worst of the decade

Hootie and the Blowfish Cracked Rearview Mirror- Every time I hear Just Want to be with You I want to punch Darius Rucker in the Fucking Face
Spice Girls Spice- All the incredible music Great Britain has put out and this is their best selling act of the late 90's WTF and to add insult to injury they release a movie
Spin Doctors Pocket full of Kryptonite- The songs 2 Princess and little miss can't be wrong,only thing I can cay about them is I'd rather impail my scrotum with a pencil then hear these songs again.
Moby Everything is Wrong- That title sums up this album! Used to date a gil who said I wasn't hip because I didn't get Moby,well I believe M and M said it best Moby can Blow me!
Limp Bizkit Significant other- Only in America can this album get airtime and Fred Durst be made a star.I heard Nookie and I really thought it was a joke and that's not even their worst song!


I'm not trying to offend anyone and I'm sure there are people out there that disagree with me(and they are wrong) so please let me see some of you lists and we will compare. I'm sure there is a gem or garbage out there I missed and I'm interested in some replys!
 
ritual de lo habitual - janes addiction(maybe the best rock album of the century )
gish - smashing pumpkins - way better than Siamese dream
everyday - widespread panic - not for everyone
loveless - my bloody valentine - this album was pretty popular among other musicians
 
Good call on the Janes Addiction I keep thinking it's an 80's album but it was released in 90 and I love pumpkins they had a single called Drown on the Singles soundtrack,fucking great!
 
gish isn't really a smashing pumpkins album it's basically the billy corgan and jimmy chamberlain recordings. it could be made up, but it's been documented that corgan played all the guitar and bass tracks on the album because they were in such a hurry to get the album out(same with siamese dream)

on gish the songs rhinoceros, siva, suffer, crush, snail and window paine are prime examples of nailing the quiet/loud sequence that became popular in the late 1980s. billy corgan plays awesome lead- rhythm guitar(check out suffer) bury me, I am one and tristessa are straight up punk rock songs that kick ass. that leaves us with daydream. the last track on gish. it's lame.



for smashing pumpkins fans here's an all acoustic show(7/4/93) with pretty much all of gish and siamese dream performed wonderfully and the sound quality is realllly good
01. Intro - 2:58
02. Rocket - 4:41
03. Cherub Rock - 5:18
04. Rhinoceros - 5:04
05. Today - 3:47
06. Spaceboy - 4:02
07. Siva - 6:32
08. Dancin' in the Moonlight [Thin Lizzy] - 4:09
09. Disarm - 4:36
10. Starla - 6:17
11. Outshined [Soundgarden] (tease) - 1:05
12. Suffer - 7:12
13. Hummer - 7:42
14. Drown - 4:35
15. banter - 1:27
16. Kooks [Bowie] - 3:18
17. Smiley - 4:10
18. Bye June - 1:17
19. banter - 4:00
20. Crush - 5:16
 
I love ritual de lo habitual but must disagree with you on album of the century I like their debut better,Mountain song has the coolest bass riff ever.
Faith No More had a great 90's album called Angel Dust but it wasn't a big seller.How can you go wrong with songs like Be Aggreessive and Crack Hitler( Northern Cali and Pac NW had best music in late 80's early 90's Metallicas best shit was 80's though once they stopped thrash they absolutely sucked)
 
I can't say what the worst albums were because I don't listen to shit. Here's my top five:

1. Alice in Chains - Facelift
2. Stone Temple Pilots - Core
3. Pantera - The Great Southern Trendkill
4. Faith No More - Angel Dust
5. Nirvana - In Utero
 
A lot of great albums here. I want to present two contenders very different from most of what's been mentioned before This may just be me and an idiosyncratic choice but I think Aimee Mann's Whatever (1994) deserves a spot there. She rocks out on some tracks and is much more reflective, singer-songwriter type in others. But it fits together as a perfect whole IMO. But this just show the difficulty of choosing top 5 albums, I definitely have a rockist perspective so would be nominating Nirvana, Jane'sAddiction, etc. some of you did but damn this is a hard question. Another contender if we expand in genre is The Fugees' The Score (1996), definitely the finest hip hop album of the 90s and maybe of all time (a bold statement and one that I can't really make as I'm not that into hip hop.) So many great albums in the 90s but I say that also because this was the music that I grew up with so all of it holds nostalgia for me too, especially alot of the grunge and harder rock type stuff that people have mentioned before ... but a true top 5, I dunno if I even can.
 
Ok I posted a thread the other day on how music nowadays is complete shit and I started thinking about the last great decade of music (heavy,grunge,rap/rock,industrial what the fuck ever) IMHO,the 1990's.

Popular music is always shit it's just a decade later it's easier to separate the wheat from the chaff because people aren't listening to it to be cool anymore but because they like listening to it.

What's funny is I really dislike 90's music since that's my generations popular music, I prefer listening to older stuff.
 
What's funny is I really dislike 90's music since that's my generations popular music, I prefer listening to older stuff.

So when you (we) were kids, were you all, no I'm not into Jane's Addiction/Nirvana/STP/whatever else or even less edgy stuff that got a lot of radio play (which in the 90s was way better that it is today even #1 on the pop charts has a bunch of decent pop songs), shit sucks, they stopped making good music in what, the 70s?
 
(Honorable mentions)
Dream Theater: Images and Words
Megadeth: Rust in Peace
Gravediggaz: Six Feet Deep
Spiritualized: Ladies and Gentleman We Are Floating in Space
Pantera: Cowboys from hell
 
After this statement I cannot take anything you say seriously.
Are you also 14 and think you were born in the wrong generation?
Btw sorry if I sounded harsh, buy all this "today's muzix sux !!!1!" thing that is almost 100% of the time uttered by teenagers/preteens with actually no knowledge whatsoever of modern music (except for what they hear on the radio or on MTV, because that's literally ALL of the music that's produced today right?) is a huge pet peeve of mine.

Maybe you do actually know a lot of recent music and you dislike ALL of it, but to say that all music that is done today objectively sucks is just wrong.
I can name at least 20-30 post-2000 artists that are great, and I'm sure there are dozens if not hundreds more that I don't know or listen to.
 
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indigo girls - the indigo girls
digable planets - reachin'
cowboy junkies - the caution horses
the orb's adventures beyond the ultraworld
peter gabriel's passion/last temptation of christ soundtrack
 
maybe not the best but my top 5 albums of the 90s:

primal scream - screamadelica
teenage fanclub - bandwagonesque
the chemical brothers - surrender
belle and sebastian - if you're feeling sinister
radiohead - ok computer

honorable mentions:

jeff buckley - grace
pulp - different class
air - moon safari
boards of canada - music has the right to children

alasdair
 
I would agree that the fugees album is a pretty stellar hip hop album. IMO chronic 2001 tops it but a year too late for this thread. Nas had some pretty good albums in the 90s and ive always thought it was written was pretty good. biggie, all eyez on me, mobb deep, scarface. Bone thugs was probably the most influential if I had to pick one. A lot of good hip hop from the 90s but dont indulge in the newer hip hop really.

Don't care for much of the alternative movement and kinda feel like a lot of that stuff inspired a lot of bad music in later decades, but I do kind of get into the beck, butthole surfers, and cake type of alternative if that counts.

cant pick just 5 but these are all pretty good

jeff buckley - grace
radiohead - ok computer
the flaming lips - the soft bulletin
pavement - terror twilight
beck - odelay
modest mouse - the lonesome crowded west
dj shadow - entroducing
daft punk - homework
nas - illmatic
outkast - aquemini
2pac- all eyez on me
biggie - ready to die
 
Almost every posts gives me at least one often 2 or 3 more albums to add to the list...not much of a top 5/10 lost then...
 
Ok I posted a thread the other day on how music nowadays is complete shit and I started thinking about the last great decade of music (heavy,grunge,rap/rock,industrial what the fuck ever) IMHO,the 1990's.While I was pondering this all important question I also realized this decade also was responsible for a lot of boy band,pop princess,rock/rap(faith no more only group to pull it off) grunge bullshit. Anyway here's my top 5 albums of the decade in no particular order

Beastie Boys Check Your Head- I love this album The Blue Nun,Jimmy James,Funky Boss,Professor Booty(I like Pauls Boutique better but it's a year to early)
Gin Blossoms- New Miserable Experience - This album is beautifully melodic from song 1-12 . They fired the guy who wrote most of these beautiful songs then he killed himself,alas next album blew.
Sound Garden Super Unknown- Can't beat Cornells pipes,wanted to put Bad Motorfinger but Super Unknown is just hit after hit after hit
Rage Against the Machine Evil Empire- If you want to let out some aggression 'Turn on the Radio Nah Fuck it turn that shit off" Blare this fucking album
Nirvana Nevermind- I didn't want to put his one because it's played but how can a list not include nirvana.The second half of the album is the secret treasure Drain You,Lounge Act,On a Plain,and Somethin in the way!
This was a tough list but the next 5 were just as tough because there is some really bad shit out there and these are mainly ones that have been hits in the mainsteam but that aint saying much!So heres my 5 worst of the decade

Hootie and the Blowfish Cracked Rearview Mirror- Every time I hear Just Want to be with You I want to punch Darius Rucker in the Fucking Face
Spice Girls Spice- All the incredible music Great Britain has put out and this is their best selling act of the late 90's WTF and to add insult to injury they release a movie
Spin Doctors Pocket full of Kryptonite- The songs 2 Princess and little miss can't be wrong,only thing I can cay about them is I'd rather impail my scrotum with a pencil then hear these songs again.
Moby Everything is Wrong- That title sums up this album! Used to date a gil who said I wasn't hip because I didn't get Moby,well I believe M and M said it best Moby can Blow me!
Limp Bizkit Significant other- Only in America can this album get airtime and Fred Durst be made a star.I heard Nookie and I really thought it was a joke and that's not even their worst song!


I'm not trying to offend anyone and I'm sure there are people out there that disagree with me(and they are wrong) so please let me see some of you lists and we will compare. I'm sure there is a gem or garbage out there I missed and I'm interested in some replys!


This is a very fair judgement. Great choices.
 
1. Nirvana - Nevermind - I have to include this.
2. TAD - 8 Way Santa - One of the greatest if not the greatest grunge album of all time
3. Janes Addiction - Ritual de lo Habitual - Nothing needs to be said. Awesome.
4. Neil Young - Raggged Glory - A masterpiece from a master
5. Poison Idea - Feel the Darkness - Just fucking awesome start to finish. Great hardcore punk
 
I don't like saying "5 favourite albums" or bands or songs...because i have such a wide ranging taste that it's entirely about my mood as to what i think is great.

I love Nirvana's Nevermind. It's a great record.

I also agree love Sonic Youth's Washing Machine. They made a lot of great records, but that one is my favourite of the 90s.

I spent years obsessed with Beck's Mellow Gold,

Ween...well, i love me some Ween, but The Mollusk is probably the album of theirs that changed how i listened to music.

I must say though, that there was somd amazing Australian music in the 90s, and a lot of my favourites are things most non-aussies (and probably most australians, haven't heard of.

One such is Black Milk by the legandary Beasts of Bourbon. This came out in 1990 - before the "grunge" explosion pushed all the underground rock music into the mainstream, which smoothed all the rough edges off, was safe and packaged neatly for the masses.

Actually, now that i mention, the Beasts of Bourbon - i'm reminded that guitarists and songwriters on that record, Kim Salmon, is credited for coining the term "grunge" to describe his own band (the Scientists) in something like 1982.

So, the Beasts are from the same lineage - a "supergroup" of Australian gritty rock'n'roll a bit ahead of the curve, with a few of its (many members) being part of the first waves of Australian punk rock (like Stu Spasm, who was a member at one point) that inspired and cross-pollinated with a lot of the bands that became associated with the term 'grunge' in the 90s.
But i digress.
Great album, i love it.

i don't even know the names of the music i hated in the 90s. Ricky Martin is one name that does spring to mind.
But at least boybands and pre-fab pop bands - overproduced as they were - didn't have auto-tune or that over-compressed, homogenous production that plagues contemporary pop.

But there was some very bad shit. So instead i'm going to break the rules and say some of the artists i think also made great records then; Tom Waits, Jesus and Mary Chain, Jon Spencer Blues Explosion, the Butthole Surfers, Nick Cave, Rowland S Howard, Half Japanese, the Flaming Lips, Bjork, REM, Blur, Yo la Tengo, the Pixies, and as ali said - Primal Scream and Teenage Fanclub.
Also, Beastie Boys, Run DMC...and so many others. Cypress Hill :)

Oh, but yeah - Limp Bizkit. Fuck they were awful. I hated that "nu-metal" era.
 
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