I think Zooropa is the first album I ever bought on the day of release, and it's still one of the best. In fact, I think it just overtakes Achtung Baby as my favorite U2 album, partly because its best songs never got overplayed.
LOL at "painfully eclectic." You know that's a quality review because the critic misspells the name of Bjork's previous group throughout; no matter what he thinks, they're not the "Sugar Cubes."
I understand where you're coming from--if a "vibe" song like this doesn't connect with you, it's just aural wallpaper. But I think this is "vibe" music actually done right, with a sensuality to the samples and the vocals, plus a memorable melodic hook. Like a moth to the flame burned by the fire, I agree with Tom and give it an 8.
And Now For Something Completely Different: “You caaaan’t do a thing to stop me,” Chris Isaak croons, but with that gorgeous voice (and that gorgeous face and that gorgeous body) who would want to? The video perfectly matches the song’s mood, of languid lovemaking in a tropical paradise. By the way, when people make the argument that grunge changed everything, you might point to fact that this song made #7 on the Modern Rock charts (ahead of Stone Temple Pilots’ seemingly ubiquitous “Plush,” which only made #9).
https://youtu.be/YkETYa_LCV8
And Now For Something Completely Different: Midnight Oil titled one of their early singles “The Power and the Passion,” and those two nouns do a pretty good job of encapsulating the band’s appeal. On “Truganini,” when Peter Garrett sings “The backbone of this country’s broken,” I believe him, and the song’s lyrics are so weighted with references to traumatic events in Australia’s history that I can grasp some of their import even if I’m not well-educated on the details.
https://youtu.be/LcxdbZ5chcc
And Now For Something Completely Different: Possibly the most glam song ever released by Canadians, Pure’s “Spiritual Pollution” deserved to be a bigger hit. A pretty convincing attempt to update the T Rex sound for the 1990s, “Spiritual Pollution” is the kind of song that makes me want to stomp and strut. We’ll catch up with Pure in about three more virtual years, when this Vancouver band tackles a different kind of pollution.
https://youtu.be/q3v9ERMJZ98
And Now For Something Completely Different from May 1968: Born Michael Clifford Nichols, Nicky James was one of the great also-rans of 1960s British pop. He released a lot of strong singles on major labels, but none of them charted, while bandmates like John Bonham and Roy Wood went on to great success. The song that really should have been his breakthrough hit is his great Hollies cover, "Would You Believe." He ups the tempo and the drama of the original, turning it into a big Walker Brothers-style ballad:
https://youtu.be/f3Bi41vFHKc
I don't hate this now as much as I did at the time, but I find the gospel-style oversinging immensely unsexy on a song like this, and I don't think the group's voices blend together very pleasantly. The Another Level cover is a couple of levels better, in my book. 4/10.
And Now For Something More Metaphysically Freaky: When I was in high school, I liked nearly any songs whose lyrics sounded erudite (and yes, I classed things like the Crash Test Dummies’ “Afternoons and Coffeespoons” in that category). Combine that with being an atheist growing up in the middle of the bible belt, and it was natural that I fell hard for the theological musings of World Party’s “Is It Like Today.” The song feels like the spiritual successor of XTC’s “Dear God,” only less angry, more sad and contemplative.
https://youtu.be/0tyLGi2LtlU
And Now For Something Slightly Less Freaky: Commercially, Irish band Hothouse Flowers probably peaked with their 1988 debut album. But artistically, I think they never topped 1993’s “Thing of Beauty.” It reminds me a bit of the Alarm’s “Rain in the Summertime,” another euphoric rock song about surrendering to the wonder of nature. Also, I’m pretty sure that by the last couple of minutes, you get both a saxophone and a digeridoo, which is awesome.
https://youtu.be/UcOAT9U3MMo
What makes me feel old is that I wrote an article in my college newspaper about current acts most likely to be one hit wonders, and Beck was Exhibit A.
And Now For Something Completely Different from April 1968: Jeff Beck might have had the hit version of "Hi Ho Silver Lining," but The Attack did it first. Then they slid headlong into Sgt. Pepper's-style psychedelia with "Neville Thumbcatch," which has some of the most fun lyrics of any 1960s song I know: "Poor Mrs. Thumbcatch meanwhile waited back at home. Her only comfort was an alabaster gnome" and the immortal, "She said at last her future now was free from doubt. With George the milkman she'd have kids, not brussels sprouts." (And who can forget, "So I've no wife. At least I've got a window box").
https://youtu.be/ziiqYOQoIe4
And Now For Something Completely Different from March 1968: You might remember Golden Earring for 1974's classic rock hit "Radar Love" or for 1983's AOR/new wave "Twilight Zone." But you might not know their 1960s period as a psychedelic pop group, with song titles like "Dong-Dong-Di-Ki-Di-Gi-Dong" (a well-deserved #1 hit in the Netherlands!) My favorite Golden Earrings song is "Together We Live, Together We Love." I just love the whispery "think of me" bits.
https://youtu.be/wp3oC6nW3YA
I love "I Feel You"! I had been a little too young for Violator, but this song hit me hard. I bought the cassingle, which was just enough to tide me over until Songs of Faith and Devotion came out a few weeks later.
We haven't even gotten into the "no single available" period yet. It starts creeping up on us in 1994, then hits hard in 1995. This is just Soundscan (and Billboard's sales-heavy formula) making the charts boring.
"Regret" is one of the few songs that can make tears well up in my eyes when I hear it. When I was a teenager, it seemed to perfectly encapsulate my yearning for love, although that may have involved some misinterpretation and projection on my part. But I'm still moved by the closing line, "Just wait till tomorrow, I guess that's what they all say, just before they fall apart."
I actually think of 1992's "Real Cool World" as his comeback single, since it was a return to melodic pop after three years of often misguided attempts to "rock out" with Tin Machine.
Thanks so much for featuring these, Maadlus! I'm trying to limit my "Something Completely Different" posts, so these are two of the many awesome 1993 songs I've had to skip over. That harmonica riff in "Dogs of Lust" is so great!
Yes, I love The Auteurs! (And I love Black Box Recorder even more). Right before Christmas 2019, I saw Luke Haines do a set at a vintage shop in Hackney. Watching him snarl out "Light Aircraft on Fire" less than an hour after a Christmas choir left the stage was one of the most wonderfully surreal experiences of my life.
10 years ago, I got to see School of Seven Bells live, and some of their songs actually reminded me a lot of Sunscreem. "The Night," for instance, sounds like the Sunscreem/Belly team-up we never knew we needed back in 1993:
https://youtu.be/Y3mPLnx-oNE
"Are You Gonna Go My Way" SHOULD have gone to #1, as it's objectively a lot more exciting than the late 1990s Lenny Kravitz songs that did come close to topping the charts. Honestly, though, it probably would have stalled out around #81 instead, as all of its airplay came from rock stations, with little to no pop crossover.
This will be a weird favorites list:
Week 1: Depeche Mode, "I Feel You"
Week 2: Positive K, "I Got a Man"
Week 3: Rapination f Kym Mazelle, "Love You the Right Way"
Week 4: Faith No More, "Easy"
Week 5: INXS, "Beautiful Girl"
Week 6: Go West, "What You Won't Do for Love"
Week 7: Sunscreem, "Love U More"
And because you can never get enough Rapination in your diet...
https://youtu.be/m8Bx2gVX-yA
And Now For Something Completely Different: Shoegazers Adorable were only around for a short time, but they burned brightly enough that they had one hell of a Best-Of album. Their best known song is probably “Sunshine Smile,” but I always preferred the heavier follow-up “Homeboy.” It sort of feels like a more nihilistic House of Love; when singer Pete Fijalkowski murmurs, “I want to cut you up, I want to watch you bleed… ever so slowly,” you believe him.
https://youtu.be/l3vWbGr-EUk
And Now For Something Completely Different: I have a feeling that if it had come out just a couple of years earlier, Robyn Hitchcock’s “Driving Aloud (Radio Storm)” would have been a big hit on the Modern Rock charts, just like “So You Think You’re in Love” and “Madonna of the Wasps.” I actually like it better than both of those songs, because it seems like the pinnacle of what Hitchcock does so well: gorgeous melodies paired with quirky lyrics (my favorite is “And everything I say is like iron, it smashes me up but it’s brittle inside”).
https://youtu.be/xVMRUdnMTaA
And Now For Something Completely Different: David Bowie had such an incredible, varied career that it’s hard to pick a favorite Bowie song. But pick I shall, and I pick 1993’s “Jump They Say.” It’s a dark song, made darker by the stunning Mark Romanek video, apparently inspired by the suicide of Bowie’s brother, who was a paranoid schizophrenic. That certainly comes across in the smoothly insinuating refrain of “They say…” and even the freaked out horns at the end.
https://youtu.be/xPZWgCLMsW8
And Now For Something Completely Different: One album I was completely obsessed with in 1993 was Ned’s Atomic Dustbin’s Are You Normal? Their heavy sound, the result of having two bass players in the band, was the perfect expression of my teenage feelings. My favorite from the album has always been “Intact,” partly because I love the percussion and also because I like the imagery of lines like “You’;ll fry the contents of my head, pretend and bend the words I said, kill me some day… stone dead.”
https://youtu.be/98Wn0YH4icE
I also had a bunch, which I somehow managed to tack onto cinder block walls. The ones I remember the best were that Suede poster, a New Order Technique poster, and a Morrissey Your Arsenal poster.
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