Daveportivo's Cultural Evaluation Facility

Okay before I get to my two respective champions, lets have a run down of the top ten, the albums are up first so here we go.

So yes the greatest album of the 90s is not OK Computer actually it probably is but on my list and for today the greatest album is the one and only The Soft Bulletin. So why is this album number one, it's less influencial than OK Computer, it's slightly less important, and many would argue it's not quite as good (but let's face it that's just splitting hairs. The reasons that The Soft Bulletin is number one is that it's a joyous celebration of sound and music itself. While this album if far from all smiles, even the album artworkd is ominous and depressing you can't help but feel uplifted. Not nessicarily by the message because the themes are often maccabre and down beat but by the beautitful arrangements and the richness of the sound. It's simply devine. The Soft Bulletin was the run away winner of the 1999 album of the year polls, according to Wikipedia it won over sixty such polls. Everyone was swept away with it and almost taken completely by surprise by this albums genius and won over instantly.

The Soft Bulletin marked a shift for the Flaming Lips not just in sheer commercial and critical acclaim but it marked the second half of their careers, a new awakening. After years of hit and miss pysch rocking they'd somehow ended up this Generation's Pink Floyd. Except they weren't from this generation. They were old, Wayne Coyne gets his disticntive look from his whispy gray hair, this was a bunch of old guys who had spent most of their lives off their faces on drugs, behaving badly and singing these glorious rich super songs, and we couldn't help but smile. Honestly could you imagine Thom Yorke on stage with dancing cuddly toys and then running accross the entire crowd in a plastic bubble? You can't can you because ultra credible bands aren't supposed to do silly stuff like that, that's for Mika not for Radiohead. And cool bands aren't supposed do it either, let alone write huge epics with science fiction themes, getting bitten by a spider or about putting the groceries in the cabinet. Yet when it's three middle aged men you can't help but smile, and there's that word again, smile, you just can't help it, hell I can't help it.

The Soft Bulletin is litered with so many joyous moments; the glorious chorus to the sublime Spark That Bled where Coyne in near falsetto belts out "I stood up and I said, yeah / I stood up and I said hell yeah" it's such a raptuous feeling. The album is just full of those almost indefinible feelings it's seen again at the devine conclusion of A Spoonful Weighs A Ton "Yelling as hard as they can the doubters all were stunned / sounding louder than a gun / The sound they made was love". Or the moment when the big sweeping euphoric instrumental arrangement kicks in at the end of Race For The Prize it's beautiful. However even though you some how end with a smile on your face this is far from a happy album after the aforementioned high in The Spark That Bled Coyne goes into this glorious sequence of cuplets but it all goes wrong (in story terms) as all those feelings are flipped on their head with sombre revelation "In reality there was no reaction...I accidently touched my head / And noticed I had been bleeding / For how long I didn't know". It's not a comedown it's just the dip on the rollercoaster and a fascinating end to an epic a self contained story.

If I had to boil the brilliance of this album down to just two factors, and that's a tough task I can assure you, the first is the arrangements. I strong recommend listening to this album through headphones because there are so many beautiful little florishes that contribute to the whole that would be missed otherwise, a charming horn arrangement, a quick florish of violin or a crafty squelsh oober bass. The album continually suprises and excites and it's not a cliche to say no two tracks sound alike, these are incredibly complex and subtly crafted epics. The second factor is a remarkable turn of phrase that Wayne Coyne has discovered, he comes up with this remarkable punch lines (for a lack of a better expression) that are incredibly thought provoking, and isn't that what psychedellia is really all about? Incredible imagery. That rises up above everything else and occupy your mind "A Spoonful weighs a Ton", "What kinds of weapons have they got? / The softest bullet ever shot" and hell every single line in Waiting For A Superman a moment of staggering song writting genius.

So The Soft Bulletin is never going to be a big as OK Computer or as cool as Loveless or as culturally relevant as Different Class yet while the world music would be unrecognizable without those three albums, without The Soft Bulletin the world would be a less beautiful place. The Soft Bulletin is self contained genius, it doesn't insisted upon you, it won't be a reference point for bands for the next twenty years, it will never be played on documentaries, it probably won't be on any of those annoying channel four lists but that's okay. The Soft Bulletin that is simply there to be discovered, an album that hopefully everyone at one time or another will stumble accross, and it will enrich their lives, alter their moods, and make them think hard and smile at the same time, and what could be more important than that?

Okay so on with the show: Let's remind ourselves of the top ten singles shall we.

"Oh Baby Baby" I did just name ...Baby One More Time by Britney Spears the greatest single of the 1990s, and just incase you were wondering this is not a joke, I'm 100% deadly serious. But more importanly I'm absolutely stunned! Shocked! I feel like my entire world has been turned on it's head. Until approximately thirty seconds ago I had absolutely no idea this song was called ...Baby One More Time seriously? Dot, dot, dot, One More Time? My entire life I thought this song was called Hit Me Baby One More Time I don't know what to believe in anymore. Well no wonder I could never find it in itunes.

So I'm sure somebody reading this much be scratching their heads thinking how on earth is this ahead of Paranoid Android that can't be right can it? Well it can and if you are thinking that you are dead wrong. When it comes to ninities singles, this song is bigger than life, when it comes to music throughout history this song is as big and as good as anything else, and yes I'm serious. I garentee you every single band that you love whether it be Radiohead or Arctic Monkeys or even *shudder* Travis have at one time or another goofed off and messed around playing this song. What's more I reckon everyone reading this has at one time or another has sung this song out loud, most likely in public, and I bet you put on a silly voice for the "Still believe" bit. You did, didn't you? It's inescapible, it's totally irresistable it's absolutely everything a pop song should be.

...Baby One More Time toes that perfect line for a pop song between being just cheesey enough and just brilliant enough, and remarkably in this case it leans towards the later more than the former. Every part of this song, the way it is crafted is perfect. Every part is spot on, and the undoubted highlights are the cleverly thrown in high parts ("What Becuase", "And I", "Still Believe") there completely irresistable, they are perfectly designed to force your brain to sing along it's so fucking subversive. Not forgeting the "Oh Baby Baby"s Britney's cadence is perfect, it's so innane, I'm still not sure to this day if that silly tone in her voice is actually her singing tone or whether it's one of the most remarkable brilliant bits of subversive production ever. The way she sings is just daring you to hate it, it's playing to the macaroons who are going to start ranting about the evils of pre produced pop music, yet it's sung in such a tongue in cheek/goofy arsed way you'll never know if they joke is on you or not.

So it was the eighth biggest selling single of the 90s in this country and the only single in the top 10 that wasn't total arse or a shameless cover. Complete and utter genius, the best song of the decade hands down, there really was no competition this was the one and only plausible choice (yes and this time I actually went with the obvious choice, hooray for me).

Loveless quite simply is a work of art. There's no other way to put it. The thing is, I have to admit this is the first time I've listened to this record in almost five years. It's an odd one, while I know friends and constantly bump into people who say they love My Bloody Valentine but this is an album that no one really actually listens to it. Now I'm sure someone does, but it's not exactly an album you stick in your ipod and have on loop all week. Equally check face book I'm sure at least half the men on there have My Bloody Valentine listed in a huge list of favorite bands (probably with the Misfits) but I wonder when the last time theyactually listened to Loveless was. This isn't meant to be a cobbled together list of insults it's meant to illustrate a point.

Loveless is an album you listen to once or twice, and that's it. It's a record that when you listen, it completely blows you away you become involved with every little thing that's going on, on the way the harmonies work against the musical arrangements, you analysis it, you think about it for a while afterwards, you really take it in but then it's over. Loveless doesn't really fit, nor does shoe gaze, you wouldn't put this album on while your writting an essay, or on your blog, you wouldn't listen to it at the gym and try dropping Only Shallow in a Dj set and see what happens. This sounds like another bunch of poorly considered insults but it's not. Loveless is not an album for situations, it's not an album for moods, it's an album to be admired, to contemplated, to listen to and reassess what you think about music, how it should be structured, how it should be arranged, it makes you think about other bands you like and their approach. Listening back now I feel at great ease, but I feel lost in the record, and yet I'm not sure exactly what I feel. Ultimately Loveless is an album you sit back and admire. Everyone at one point in their lives should give this album a spin from start to finish, to experience it. You won't think about music in the same way again. It's wonderfully unique, incredibly influencial, unbelievably important, yet you'll probably only need to listen to it once, funny that.

When that big crunching riff from Devil's Haircut, Beck's best single, kicks in you know business is about to pick up, then Beck unleashes his most poignant lyrics to date "Something's wrong because my mind is fading / Everywhere I look there's a dead end waiting". From then on in Odelay is beast unto itself, it shows Beck the albatross floating around effortlessly, the only real constants other than the sheer suprising bursts of the samples are Beck's voice, this is Beck in full montone rap/croon his only variation is his manic scream. High 5 is a perfect example Beck raps, screams, starts a chant while the music switches from racous squark to Schubert Unfinished Syphomy 9 he even fades earlier track Novocaine into the mix. Ultimately however rather than talk about he excentricities, the crafty samples and the fascinating arrangements, the best compliment you can play to Odelay is that it's brilliant. It spawned five singles, a mamoth number by Alternative standards and every track on the album is exciting, thrilling and intriguing and almost all are classics. Beck's great talent is that while his music is often unexpected, you can rarely predict where a song will end up after the first minute it could metamorphaize in any which dirrection, the music is neither uncomfortable or inaccessible it's superbly crafted. A track that weeves and shape shifts like Hotwax is equally gorgeous as a big folk ballad like Jack-Ass. The album is stacked to rafters with great tunes, soulful ballads, amazing cool crunching riffs and Beck's absolute best quasi-rapping, seriously stick on Minus it's an absolute riot, Beck's flow is sharp, the guitars are perfect and the beat is a sensation. I haven't even mention New Pollution yet, there's simply too much to talk about when it comes to Odelay it has such depth, and unquestionable and unexepected triumph.

Rock 'n' Roll Star tells you everything you need to know about this album. It's fast, it's urgent, it's immediate, this is a bunch of lads who are not waiting around their sick of their lives, their sick of the mundane repetitive nature of everyday life they want to escape, they want to be free, they want their dreams to come true, they want to be rock stars. Definitely Maybe is all about aspirations and escapism, being free on stage and escaping the city for the country and the sunshine. "I'd like to be somebody else / And not know where I be / I'd like build myself a house / Out across the sea" its not big, it's not clever, it's rarely ever subtly but it is incredibly affecting and uplifting. It's the only Oasis album you'll ever need and pretty much the only one worth owning. It contains all their best singles Supersonic, Ciggarettes & Alcohol and of course Liver Forever. The latter being among the most important singles of modern times and seems to endlessly win rock polls for best song, it's not hard to see why the lyrics cut straight to heart of the human condition "I said maybe, I don't want to know how your garden grows cause I just want to fly...Maybe I just fly / Wanna Live I Don't wanna die...You and I were gonna live forever", hits the spot everytime. While musically it probably shouldn't be anywhere near the top ten, it apes the Beatles and the Stone Roses, it's rarely creative, but it is urgent, important and culturally powerful. Adverts still say "the best guitar album since Definitely Maybe" it's such a significaint cultural landmark. It's totally lost on American's who only see a bunch of thuggish retro lad rockers but for us over in the UK Oasis will always be inspirational heroes, albeit for just one album. Certainly the duff tracks aren't hard to spot but fewer records could be more important in shaping a nation culturally (arguably for the worse) than Definitely Maybe.

When WDPK 83.7 FM deejay declares his station "The Sound Tommorrow The Music Of Today" over and ice cold beat the words could not have been more apt. Daft Punk were about to take the biggest sound of the day, big beat, and mix it with the French underground dance scene to create a world wide dance revolution. Dance music ruled the waves in the late ninities as rock and pop were frankly pathetic, if it weren't for Daft Punk I'm not sure anyone would have made it to 2001. So huge huge thumping bass was in, looping scrathes and thudding percussion was coming back and dance would one again be about creating great sweeping movements, through the sheer force of repititions and subtly variation Daft Punk were to take control and own the dance floor. Obviously this album isn't as affective through the head phones as it is live, at a club or at a party but it's still mightly awesome and the beats are slick as fuck. Daft Punk however aren't just the sound of today, the sound of tommorrow, there also the sound of the eighties funk and pop. While it would come out more predominantly on Discovery, Homework was the dance super beast, it rose dance beyond repetitive sloganeering and proved that by creating a flowing evolving epic peice dance could be more than a cobbled together collection of singles, or goofy catchpharse and hooks, it was the sound of the superclub, with top quality mixing and beat development. Every track on this album would be mercilessly mixed and remixed, forming bridges, samples and inspiration for the club djs and dance acts of the next ten years. When it comes to genuine dance monsters records don't come bigger than Homework spawning Around The World, Da Funk, Teachers, Revolution 909, Daftendirekt, Burnin' and Alive. Undoubtably the least complete album in the top ten but you'd be hard pressed to find one more important than Homework.

I've always liked to say when describing Blur and in particular this album, that Blur did a Radiohead, before doing a Radiohead was cool. 13 was that departure, while comparing it to Kid A is a little on the silly side, the departure between OK Computer the international jugganaught and the icey unapproachably brilliant Kid A isn't an exact parrarell to Blur's departure from the pop heights to The Great Escape to the gorgeously artisitc 13 the reaction was the same. 13 was still in many was a conventional album, it had pop singles, beautiful melodies and sublime hooks, yet it was uncomfortable, broody, ominous haunting and abbrasive, this was not Country House. When 13 was released it was jumped upon it seemed like commercial suicide, the people who sent This Charming Man and Country House to the top spot weren't going to fall for Bugman and 1992. But honestly who cares, because Blur managed to find their creative high watermark and 13 certainly was the first real suggestion of the creative genius that was Damon Albarn (and to an extent Graham Coxon).

The songs are of such high quality; 1992 is a haunting ballad which gets steadily more ominous leading to it's deliciously creative conclusion. It's immediately followed by the mad punch of squelchy rocker B.L.U.R.E.M.I that kicks like an absolute mule and can be seen as a clear forerunner for the Crazy Beat and Music Is My Radar experimentation. The Seven minute Battle is beautiful lead by a haunting xylophone arrangement which is probably Coxon's guitar being morphed unrecognizably, while Damon sychotically drones on. Blur certainly give everything ago Trailer Park is a noble effort at a Trip-hop-rock track and elsewhere Coxon's guitar is mutilated to create these often scary intimidating soundscapes. Huge credit has to go to William Orbit on product who brings all this experimentation together in a cohesive work that sounds goregous. If this all sounds a bit scary for you fear not the obvious singles are here in the form of the brilliant Graham sung Coffee & TV, the silly-paro-balladlry of Tender, the lairy rock stomper Swamp Song and downbeat ballad No Distance Left To Run. All in all Blur showed us that they were more creative than their Brit Pop peers, that their true rivals would be Radiohead and that more than anything they were ready for the next decade and they were ready to change.

So how big is Deserter's Songs? The answer: It's utterly ginormous, it's beyond comprehension, it's a big as the grand canyon and as long as an endless highway and as wide as the Russia Steppe. This is a gorgeous and graceful album as widescreen as they come. The music soars epically high and beyond your headphones or your speakers, the arrangements are so grandious, yet their not prententious or over the top, they are in perfect harmony. It's all rooted around Jonathan Donahue's storytelling and his fragile croon, he tells glorious love stories, so intimate and so detialed, even if they are rooted around wide screen imagery of rail lines and high ways. The album starts sublimely with the epic Holes and the wonderfully affecting Tonite It Shows. The album then gets fully epic with the sweeping strings and the choiral arrangements Endlessly a song that was made for the big screen, it feels like a motion picture come to life, the arrangement is bigger than life, it's full of big board strokes, but equally balenced by subtly little touches of percussion here and there, amazingly at one point you feel as though your in the middle of a disney film the next you feel like you've been thrown into an underwater odssesy or 2001. You can hear the sound of The Band on this album and two of the members even help out on the glorious funk rock of Hudson Lines of course this song also includes the festival slayer Goddess On A Hiway. I don't want to go on an on about this album as it has so much scope and so much depth, it's better to simply say Deserter's Songs is as beautiful an album as has ever been created.

Raw power, no we're not talking about Iggy Pop, we're simply describing Rid Of Me by PJ Harvey. This is raw primal unadulterated raw primal power. This is a dirty gritty album, by design PJ has decided to make this album sound as earthy and real as possible, there is no studio sheen at work, this sounds like a band singing in your living room with tinny kick and scratchy guitar, even the jabbing and thrusting string arrangement on Man Sized Sextet sounds like it's being played right in front of you. In fact this is music that pins you in, you feel like you've been forced into the corner of the room by this evil ominous string orchestra while PJ Harvey sardonically screams or whispers in your ear. Lyrically this album is dark and destressing. It was written after a mental breakdown following the runaway (by indie standards) success of Dry. PJ's lyrics are maccabre and often about dark sex, your never quite sure if she wants to fuck or kill her boyfriends, hmmn...maybe both. The aforementioned Man Sized Sextet has some glorious insideious lyricism "I'm Coming Up Man Sized / Skinned Alive / I Want To Fit...Got My Girl And She's A Wow / I Cast My Iron Knickers Down / Man-sized No Need To Shout". Everything is delivered with a psychotic fragility whether it's a desperate howl or shredding scream. Music the album is reminiscant of The Pixies with crunching dark riffs which are suprisingly subversive combined with PJ Harvey's surpisingly accesibly hooks. So what we have is one of the most raw, most primal, raged filled, sex filled, sardonic albums of all time, PJ Harvey proved (as if she needed to) that's she's more hardcore than any metal band.

Having throughly proved that they were the greatest Thrash band in the universe it was time to makes sure everyone and their mother knew who Metallica were. Their self titled fifth, which would become dubbed The Black Album, was some kind of monster. It was huge in scope and ambition. Metallica wrote songs that would fill stadiums from now until the afterlife. The first and most obvious change was that big sweeping balladry was in. Unlike Guns and Roses this was not to be gloriously cheesey I love you baby balladry this was going to be deep dark occasionally serious and often quite silly meloncholy balladry. Two new superballads were created both with suitably epic riffs Nothing Else Matters and Unforgiven unfortunately the latter would spawn some hideously lame offsrpring. Nothing Else Matters will always be the better of the two, as the sentiment is more honest and straight forward rather than being wrapped in depressed metal moodiness. Of course this is also the album that had Metallica's biggest and most obvious pop songs to date, Enter Sandman which will always be the noobs anthem as will Sad But True. Elsewhere Metallica showed they could still trash Hollier Than Thou still kicks but it's all matched by huge sweeping stadium sized vocals. There is certainly a noticable decline in the amount of soloing going on, which is no bad thing as on balance most of the songs here are arranged excellently, however it would unfortunately lead us to Load and Reload. So Metallica had concured the mainstream with what seemed until recently to be their last great album, quite the achievement in deed.

It still makes me laugh that Dummy managed to beat Definitely Maybe to the 1994 Mercury Music Prize. Now not because Dummy didn't deserve it, it was by far and away the more interesting album musically, I just enjoy watching Oasis be put in their place. Now as good as Massive Attack were, and they were damn good, Dummy and Portishead will always been the definitive trip hop album and quite possible the decades most beautiful album, certainly it's most haunting. The minute Mysterions kicked in you knew you'd bought something very special indeed. There would be glorious big open arrangements, with somehow ominous creeping basslines, the ghostly tangs of guitar and some challenging scrathes and coos. The music was all centred around Beth Gibbons gorgeous voice, which steals the show on the sublime Sour Times a wonderous pieces of music that floats effortlessly from place to place before leading to Beth's gorgeously saddening endnote "Nobody Loves Me / It's True". Dummy is full of suprises, on the staggering Strangers Gibbons sings as if through an old sixties tv set faintly before a big wave of buzzing synths come swooping and Beth's voice powers through, the track meanders where it wishes before the big fuzzy bassline and the imposing beep beep beep come back, the track gets denser adding layer after layer with Beth as the one consistant anchor. Dummy is full of deep dense and glorious tracks each as rich as the last. An album that still manages to fascinate fourteen years after it's birth.

Hum the riff from Smells Like Teen Spirit practically anywhere where men are gathered and you can start some spontantious air guitar and goofy moshing. That is how engrained into popular culture that song and this album are. When I go out to a lame cheese club that play Take That and the Black Eyed Peas they will always at some stage in the evening wheel out Smells Like... normally after either Basket Case or Song 2. Not in Curt's wildest nightmares could he have ever imagined this kind of success. Nevermind was just so bloody successful it's still the Holy Bible to Kerrang readers. While many may know I have major gripes with this album and think it's wildly overated critically, I would never deny it's cultural impact or it's importance to music history. US music scene would be unfathomable with out this record. It's simply one of the finest pop records of any generation, it all fits together so well, after Smells...the thundering drum line of In Bloom kicks in before THE bassline of all baselines kicks in on Come As You Are. Of course other than being stacked with all the obvious singles the album has plenty of depth; Breed kicks like and mule and is a grate bouncy pop rocker, Polly is brilliant cynical sardonic balladry and of course Lounge Act is a hidden pop gem that could easily be a Foo Fighters single. So all in all you have eight A grade awesome tracks surrounded by solid cobbled together filler but it doesn't matter because this album has become more important than life itself.

Bjork can make a really really strong case for being the greatest artist of the 90s, sure Radiohead were amazing as were Blur, but few artist put out three albums as unique and mind blowingly brilliant as Debut, Homogenic and Post. Post is special in that not only is it gloriously beautiful, it was remarkably successful and actually gave Bjork a top ten hit. More staggering the UK absolutely fell in love with Bjork both critically and commercially because after Army Of Me reached number 10 in the charts, Oh So Quiet managed to force its way to number 4 and the gorgeous Hyperballad reached number 8. This was quite frankly Bjork's pop album, it sounds funny saying that because it's so not Bjork but this album spawn five top 25 singles! You couldn't imagine that today even with all our diversity. I don't mean to dwell on the singles but it makes the point that this album is darn likeable. Normally a Bjork album is beautiful, but you have to unravell it become aquainted before its secrets are revealed but Post hooked you from the opening stomp of Army Of Me. It was so glorious to hear Oh So Quiet because even though it was a novelty all singing all dancing show tune, practically caberet you couldn't help but fall in love with it's pure sentiment, it's the ultimate charm offensive, you try to roll your eyes but you can't because it's so much fucking fun. Don't worry this is no collection of singles, stand out tracks are oozing from every corner of the record The Modern Things is a beautiful ballad and it's every bit as excellent as the evil industrial crunch of Enjoy. Afterakk it's Bjork what did you expect even her pop album is endless creative reaching out in every which dirrection and effortless succeeding. By the end you'll have fallen in love ZING! BOOM!

The Pixies like their fellows eighties legends the Smiths just don't make bad albums. For that matter they don't make mediocre albums either, it's just straight up greatness. Bossanova was the Pixies first record of the ninities and firmly asserted that they would not be defined by thieir decade, The Pixies were an unstoppable cultural force. After Doolittle brought us the harmonies and big singles in a big way, Pixies decided that they'd get back to rocking on Bossanova ala Surfer Rosa but this time they were going to merge the killer hooks with the hard rock. This is the complete Pixies record. This is the Pixies showing off all their skills. The album is launched into action with Rock Music seeing Black in full alternative screamo mode it's visercal as fuck, then there's the sugar pop of Allison the two tracks clocking in at just over three minutes combined, it's electrifyingly fast and fresh. Of course this is the album that brought us the lovely Velouria which needs no introduction but its the gloriously freaky She Is Weird that screams out for attention with its smooth guitar and sex offender vocals. I have to stop myself becuase every track stands out in its own little way and I could fill ten paragraphs rolling through each one by one. While it may not have the quite reached the highs of Doolittle, Bossanova is a gloriously consistant record with the Pixies effortlessy stretching their creative muscles in whatever direction takes their fancy.

In Utero will always be my favorite Nirvana album and I could make an argument for it being their best but that would be beside the point, and spending a paragraph comparing it to Nevermind would be fruitless and petty. In Utero was the sound of a deeply confused and conflicted man, after all he had just released the biggest hard rock album ever, he had become a superstar, he had become cool, he'd even become an unlikely fashion icon. Curt clearly (as we all know) didn't exactly enjoy being a superstar and many thought prior to release that In Utero would be an intentionally inaccessible album to drive away the "posers", that it would be hardcore. This wasn't the case but in many ways it did suceed after all switch on MTV2 or Kerrang other than Heart Shaped Box you're more like to here Sliver than All Apologise or Rape Me. What In Utero did represent was a search for something new and different direction but not a rejection of the core sound. You got a look inside Curt's psyche and it was pretty destressing. "Teenage Agnst Has Paid Off Well / Now I'm Tired And Old...Go Away! Go Away" is Curt's feral cry on the bombastic Pixirific Scentless Aprentice then there's the genius line "I Miss The Comfort In Being Sad"on Frances Farmer... of course it's all sung over a suitably huge riffs. Aside from reading into Curt's lyrics the songs are astounding in their own right, Dumb is possible the best song Curt has ever written and the arrangement is sublime. In Utero is a fascinating look into Curt Cobain's mind as he searches for direction, satisfaction and happiness but at it's heart is a collection of thrilling songs.

Pavement are an a total paradox, it just doesn't make sense, they sound so definitively 90s the ultimate US alternative band of the period and yet they sound completely unique, no one sounds like Pavement and everyone sounds like Pavement. Some maybe raising and eyebrow not because the previous sentance made absolutely no sense but because this album is relatively low down, only 18th? How can that be, well frankly, it's because Pavement were and still are a US phenominon, and I live in Great Britain, as powerful and important as this record was, and it was bloody influencial, it ultimately never quite managed to penetrate the UK culturally. Anyway back to the music, and Its even more paradoxes, what makes Slanted And Enchanted so great is that every track is superb, so catchy, you love it with their delicious witicism, and of beat humour combined with the sleakest slugiest music, yet it's uncomfortable, Pavement never quite do what you except, the song structure is free form it's odd, it's alien. Ultimately there is one more big Pavement paradox, Slanted and Enchanted is beautiful and ugly at the same time. It's sounds like a true independent record, it feels like it was recorded in a skip and that your listening to the tracks through an old time radio, this is indie music at its purest and grimiest this is not pop, and yet it is, it's so irresitable, so immediate, and to darn catchy to resist. It's a contradiction, a glorious contradiction that can stand tall along side Doolittle and Daydream Nation as one of the all time great American underground records.

There's something so pleasent about listening to A Tribe Called Quest, you can't help but close your eyes and nod your head as you become lulled into these gorgeous baselines and the soft charming voices of Tribe. Okay so "charming" and "pleasent" aren't excatly music to hip hop officianardos ears, infact calling a hip hop act pleasent is flat out hip hop heresy. However that's what Low End Theory is, this is smooth as fuck, it's like taking a swig of a fine whisky, you take it down, it warms your throat and you breathe out this lovely smokey breath. Just like a fine whisky Low End Theory has a kick too, it's sharp lyricism, the quality of the rhymes is so strong, you don't pick out a line here, or a cuplet there, it's like listening to one long poem, you just sit back and enjoy and then applaude the performance. This isn't punch line rap, this is all about flow and swagger, and it's an unparrelled flow, because you roll with the words, hell you even feel like joining in. Musically the arrangements are staggering, the basslines are ice cold and the samples are spot on. The little twangs of Voodoo Chile over the top of Sly And The Family Stone on Rap Promoter are sheer genius, it's subtle however, it never distracts from the flow, your not sitting there going "oooh! that's Hendrix" the samples are their for a reason, they are a part of a whole not individuals calling out for attention. The samples and Tribes flow form one giant whole from track one it one continuous smooth jazz-rap odessy, that's sounds like the oposite of cool, but make no mistake this is sub zero shit.

Would the world be a better place with or without Pearl Jam? Your surely thinking what the hell kind of question is that to ask of the sixteenth best album of the nineties, but alas it must be asked. If there were no Ten there would be no Stone Temple Pilots, no Nickelback and best of all there would be no Creed. Now you wondering yourself aren't you, how much pain would we had been saved if this album had flopped under the radar? Because Ten wasn't just a great album, it was friggin huge, it redefined everything. Prior to Ten if you wanted to fill a stadium you had to be big and overblown, you had to be a huge stage show, you had to have endless solos, a front man who was a walking all singing all dancing freak who could hold notes for days, you also had to be coked up and rock primarily from your cock. With Grunge rapidly killing hair metal all that had to change but as big as Nevermind was it was still regular rock, it wasn't built for Stadiums it was built for moshing in pits with 8, 000 nutters. Ten had huge riffs like that of Evenflow but it was tight, it was widescreen but it wasn't a day glo wooly mamoth. At the heart was Eddie Vedder his voice would play far beyond row z but his lyrics were honest, personal and utterly believable. He explored is own torement, his in nuerosis and his childhood, he wasn't singing about fucking girls and snorting coke, this wasn't a show it was real life, it was 100% serious. So thanks to Ten we got the gritty honesty back in rock and roll, we exchanged pomposity for heartfelt sentiment, was it worth it? Of course it was, I can always change the channel when snooze rockers Nickelback are on the tv, but I'd never wish to lose the feeling eliscited when first listening to Ten.

There are certain bands that encapsulate the sound of an era perfectly. They aren't nessecarily the best band, or even the most creative or unique but they are the prototype. Garbage where that band. They were post grunge, they had the dillusionment of the US alternative scene, a pinch of Nine Inch Nails and one big dollop of pop writing genius. They had the look down perfectly, Shirley Manson can stand along side Marilyn Manson as the face of the late nineties American alternative music. Similar to Manson they had the knack of crafting gorgeous subversive pop songs, after all both acts rooted them selves in nineties culture astethically but musically they were far more interested in the brooding synth hit makers of the eighties. Garbage was a stylish album but it was far from shallow it had brooding arrangements with Shirley's croon sometimes blending into the track to create a suicidally seductive groove on As Wide As Heaven or drooling with sarcasm on hit singles on When it Rains, Stupid Girl and the superb Queer. Ultimately Garbage gave the 90s US movement a fiery Scottish Leading lady who women could look up to, after all Courtney Love had far to much baggage to be a real hero.

Yes I know technically they got a seperate release so you could buy them as individual albums but lets face facts this was a double album. It even had a two versions of the same track (Don't Cry) on both editions. Use Your Illusions will always serve as the finally moment in the sun for both Guns and Roses and the hair metal stadium rock movement

as a whole. Guns last album of original materiel ensured the band would go out with a creative bang it also summed up everything good and bad about the eighties. It was one big party! We had the complete excess the over the top epics November Rain and the pompous cover of Live And Let Die. Then there was the so cheesey but you love it, tear in the eye pulling a girl out of the audience brilliance of Don't Cry. Then there's the smoking red hot bluesy rock of You Could Be Mine, Don't Damn Me and Right Next Door To Hell. Then of course we get the OTT power of Civil War and the even more pompous than thou cover of Knocking On Heavens Door. Then there's the frankly ridiculousness of Estranged. This record was a glorious tribute to the hair metal of the eighties, it had everything, by the end you'd been fucked, fallen in love, got extremely drunk, cried, made up, got married, got divorced, and died from a million STDs. It was big stupid incredibly flawed but absolutely magnificient.

After Infinite hardly set the world of fire Eminem came out firing on The Slim Shady LP. He was a man with a point to prove and fire in his belly. That fire turned into absolute rage as Eminem pulled no punches, I'm not just saying that as a lame cliche, he really let everyone have it women, homosexuals, lesbians, his mother and his wife. This was the album when Eminem found his voice and it was an angry voice. This album was aptly named this was all the menical evil Slim Shady and very little of the torn fragile Marshall Mathers. Ultimately this album was about the anger and keeping it under control or letting it loose. There was the sychofrenic My Name Is, the inner psychotic ramblings of Brian Damage, and Em's first rage against celebrity in Role Model. The album's pinnacle was the superb Guilty Conscience which pits Eminem against Dre where Em internally debates mudering his cheating wife or whether to rob a grocery store or whether to fuck an underage girl. It's perfectly demonstrates Em's sublime lyricism, it's no gimmicks, no goofs, straight up genius. Overall the album is dark and maccabre throughout you feel like your inside the brain of a mad man, he has the tone of someone slowly loosing his sanity. Unfortunately the album features the pathetic sexism and homophobia that mars his work, but it's a minor flaw in a beautifully menicial album.

In metal circles Sepultura will always be God's among men but in the mainstream they've had there hits and misses.

No one has every doubted their guitar works and the superb frantic grooves that develope throughout their albums but the unconverted have always scoffed at their rather hackneyed lyrics and message. Down with the corperation,the government is evil etc... Coming from Latin America you'd expected them to be brimming with rage but some articulation would be nice. However while Chaos A.D still suffered from cliche it was simply too damn good to resist. Sepultura proved they deserved recognition beyond the confines of their genre. It always helps when an album comes flying out the gate and Sepeltura knew their strenghts and the monster singles and sloganeering of Refuse/Resist, Territory and Slave New World set the tone perfectly. Selptura occasionsly felt bloated Amen is a bit too much but a bit too much for Sepultura is four and a half minutes. The Brazillian sluggers are at their irrestiable best with the short shap bursts in the middle of album Propaganda and the insane Biotech Is Godzilla, are like quick bursts of machine gun fire slaying all those who get caught in the crossfire.

The Smashing Pumpkins will probably be remembered as the greatest hit makers of the post-grunge US alternative scene. Throughout their career they always had problems putting it together into one coherent album. You get flashes of brilliance here and there but it would be surrounded by filler or part of an overly bloated album. Siamese Daydream struck the balence perfectly, there was still the odd duff track but the consistancy was there and the quality was definitely there. It also happen to spawn their biggest hit Today and their most beautiful and powerful song writting moment Disarm with it's lush string arrangements and Billy Corgan desperate howl "I used To Be You Little Boy". It also seems to be the album of the great lost hits Geek U.S.A and Rocket didn't even manage to make the greatest hits LP which is a war crime. Of course in between the tender moments and the the rock out moments was the greatest riff the Pumpkins ever created on the album opener that Cherub Rock. So the Pumpkins had done it they had created an album with three mamoth singles and surrounded by equally rewarding tracks right up until the tender end note of Luna.

Music For The Jilted Generation saw the Prodigy bring together all the individual aspects of their music that made them great. They took the mental rave of Charly and toned it down and refined it. They took the rock edge that would be predominant on the thinly stretched Fat Of The Land and brought it together with mad drum loops and rave samples. They also brought their knack for crafting catchy hooks, slammed it all together and remarkably it didn't sound like a clusterfuck it sounded bloody brilliant. It had depth of sound and continues to suprise to this day. There's the crunch of Voodoo People but whereas Firestarter limps along in the same gear, Voodoo People is alive with mad African drum loops and rave sirens and beeps. It sounds like society has broken down and we're going to have one big looting party followed by an dark and dirty rave. Breaking And Entering was a track that started as a arcitypal raver but grew and grew gaining more depth until it's soaring conclusion. This is also the album that spawned Poison, No Good and Their Law it was absolutely loaded and best of all it didn't overstay it's welcome or float to an aimless conclusion. It's was a lightening bolt the last and only truely great Rave album before Daft Punk and the dance brigade took the batton and never gave it back.

I hadn't listen to this album until just last year, when my Metal mate Gaz suggested that I give it ago, granted I'd heard the mamoth singles Walk, Mouth Of War, Hollow and This Love before. Vulgar Display Of Power is an album that's influence becomes immediately apparent on a single listen. It has been mined creatively, copied, adapted by so many mental bands in the near twenty years since it's release. It truely is an album of staggering strenght and it is a suprisingly accessible album to boot. This isn't a great metal album, this is a geniunely great album, because at the heart of Pantera's music are these thick irresistable grooves, this isn't a band wanking off on guitar trying to show the world how fast or how technically they can play this is a band who carefully craft a groove and they lay on some lovely (yes lovely in metal review) guitar solos and some slick riffage. As a result this is an album that feel fresh, the songs don't blend into one they stand out on individual merit, they don't hit you over the head like the album artwork suggests this is an album that draws you in, lets you get comfortable, maybe even gets you dancing before it suddenly knocks your block off with a sharpuppercut.

So after the *yawn* house wives favorite The Joshua Tree U2 wanted to show the world a few things. First of all that they still rocked, second that every so often they liked to dance and third of all that they have something resembling a sense of humour. Achtung Baby would be both a rare dose of experimintation (but not too much) and some fun. This album was probably the first step on the road to the failure of Pop but back in 1991 they nailed it and created there best album. The Edge and the ridiculously underated Adam Clayton got to have some fun laying down some serious grooves. From the world go this was an album with life and vigour Zoo Station and Even Better Than The Real Thing had all the big hooks and pretentious

choruses you'd associate with Bono but they were irresistable and dammit U2 were dancable! Clayton would grab even more of the attention as he laid down the think gooey and utterly sexy baseline to Mysterious Ways and by the time you got to U2's best single The Fly it sounded like even Bono was getting in on the act and having a laugh. So yes U2 had made an album which almost be described as cool, oh and it had some song called One on it.

I almost feel begrudged to include Automatic For The People in my list because even though it's popularity is beyond doubt, and it's influence is equally mamoth there's just something unsatisfying about this album. Perhaps it's that it marks REM stepping down from alternative rock legends to dad rock specialists. However while there will always be a sense of regret when listening to this album it's overall quality cannot be denied, and in a way, sitting along side Achtung Baby is it's rightful place. While the big rock numbers were on the way out the huge sweeping emotional arrangements were in, and in in a big way. Listening to sublime album opener Drive it's irresistable, with it's wide open arrangement and the almost depressively nonchalant cander of Stipe's vocals. It's only matched by the beauty of Nightswimming there's a real sense of injustice that a song of such unquestionable calibre is doomed to play second fiddle to Everybody Hurts; a song with such little subtly, and even less depth. Of course the latter's immediacy is it's strenght but like alot of this album it drags. After so many ballads the genius of Ignoreland, The Sidewinder Sleeps Tonight and Man On The Moon come as welcome relief. All in all REM created a powerful album but an overated one, it's a downbeat slug at times but it's too big, too sweeping and too tender to ignore. Ultimately when you hear the sublime album closer Find The River you realize battling against this album is futile, the high points are so high, once you reach the peak you can't even see those tepid little foothiles you had to endure to get to the summit.