Jonathan's 90s

My 90s: A decade not only important for some damn good music, but the decade in which I, for all intents and purposes, “grew up”. Admittedly I’m still just a big kid but when you consider that I entered this decade as a Lego brick loving, subbuteo playing eleven year old, I did leave the decade somewhat different. This was the decade when I discovered the joys of...



...wanking, women, alcohol and music. During the 80s I had been exposed to a mixture of my dad’s music taste (Cream, Beatles, Stones, Hendrix, Clapton, the Who) and my brothers’ music tastes (Iron Maiden, Sisters, the Cure, Metallica, Slayer, Faith No More). However, I was about to find my own path through the musical jungle of the 90s and many of my favourites stem from memories and experiences, rather than being a critic’s choice of the top 50. If it were a ‘what were the top 50 songs of the 90s’ blog, some of my choices would not be here and I expect criticism of these choices, but they are part of who I was or who I am. My brother Lucky Jim, has had an enormous influence on my tastes and he played the role of Little Bo Peep in guiding me towards the good stuff and away from the masses of shite out there. He always returned from uni with new bands, songs and albums, some of which are firmly engrained in my psyche. I distinctly remember the summer when Jim introduced me to Siamese Dream and it became the soundtrack of that year, the summer of ’93. It was the time when the only grandfather I ever knew, Granddad Bullivant, passed away and whenever I hear songs like Disarm or particularly the intro to Soma, it takes me back to a sombre time in the hazy sunshine of Rotherham. During the 90s, Nevermind was probably my favourite album up until the point that Kurt killed himself and whilst so many idiots jumped on the grunge bandwagon, a Hipster Cat in the making decided to sleek off to find pastures new, aka New Metal. Although the likes of Korn, Machine Head and Fear Factory haven’t made it to my list, they played a part in the development of my taste and deserve a mention at the very least. I regret having omitted Sepultura from my list in favour of some lightweight indie tracks that featured on the tens of thousands of compilation tapes (a true art, if there are any) I made for friends, prospective girlfriends or to listen to on the way to music festivals in the later 90s. I saw Max Cavalera’s Sepultura in Manchester on my 18th birthday, days before he played his last gig for them. I will never forget seeing over 20 people bang out drums to Kaiowas, or the explosion of the moshpit as Sepultura ripped into Roots Bloody Roots. I pretty much turned my back on metal when I went to uni and discovered a whole new world of music, most of which were bands from the three decades that predated this first blog.
All of the tracks that have made it onto my favourite 50, either have a special place for me, capturing a memory or an event, or are simply one of my many favourite songs. And by no means was I listening to all of this at the time, my era of Hipster Cat came much later when I began to understand and exploit the concept of pretentiousness.