Taking sides: the music of the 80s vs. the music of the 90s

the fuck does this even mean

this is impossible

voting "yes"

ridiculously easy. 80s.

not really ridiculously easy if you were at all into rave/UK breakbeat/jungle/drum n bass/trip-hop

and hip hop

I do prefer eighties "college" rock to nineties.

but that's where, as Christgau might say, distinctions become not very cost-effective.

Dan's answers OTM.

nope, still easy

and hip hop

boom

rave kind of peaked in the late '80s. the best trip hop was released by Soul II Soul in the late '80s (ok, not really but I chose a side and I'm sticking to it). ukbreakbeat/jungle/d&b is too small and narrow of a thing to tilt my feelings in favor of the '90s. Plus what about house, miami bass, and electro?

if you just look at hip hop it's a slight win for the '90s

yeah hip-hop was an obvious oversight

otoh I have burning 100% unironic love and adoration for "Let's Go All The Way"

xp: rave didn't peak in the late 80s! not unless you are strictly talking Belgian new beat, and even then that all transitioned into a ton of great early 90s tunes

rock was more interesting in the 80s, but hip hop in the 90s was amazing. so...

voting YES

"summer of love" was '88 right? I don't know that much about "rave" as a genre, but it seems like a lot of the major players at least had records out by the late '80s. shamen, 808 state, etc. Also the early '90s still felt really '80s

I think you guys are underrating '80s hip hop a little

this question is also very interesting from a metal standpoint imo because there was a lot of really groundbreaking intense shit going down in the 80s & no-one outside of the scene gave a shit, but the 90s is when the workers kinda seized the means of production & some titanic masterpieces got made - voting 90s is made harder for me by remembering that Don't Break the Oath came out in '84

The nineties never boasted a record as sublime as the Breakfast Club's "Right on Track."

not really ridiculously easy if you were at all into rave/UK breakbeat/jungle/drum n bass/trip-hop

I don't care about any of this stuff and it's still a hard decision. In my mind the 80s is a good deal broader in scope in terms of what I find interesting and the number of bands that had amazing streaks of records (Prince, the Cure, Camper Van Beethoven, the Smiths, too many others to count). But in the 90s I got to witness a relatively new genre reach full flower, and that feels like something particularly special.

xp

Don't Break the Oath came out in '84

love that record. kinda prefer 80s metal myself, grunge washed out a lot of shit in the 90s and I started to lose interest in the more underground metal stuff

But in the 90s I got to witness a relatively new genre reach full flower, and that feels like something particularly special.

I LOVED Backstreet Boys too.

NKOTB forever

Menudo motherfuckers

NINETEEN NINETIES O YEA

1780s

MUSIC OF THE 90s MUSIC OF THE 90s SOUNDS LIKE LOVE

lol i wonder how old most of the 90s voters are. it wasnt all the candy-coated wonderland dan's making it out to seem.

candy-raver wonderland

what happened in the 90s that made us all so sour?

the internet?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ira3LoZiTWc

NEVER FORGET

what happened in the 90s that made us all so sour?

having to endure all that shitty techno music imho

the eighties was prob the worst decade for music since the 40s.

^^^threw down

90s

the eighties was prob the worst decade for music since the 40s.

and then the '90s happened

there was a WAR on ffs

think there was one in the 40s too

the eighties was 00s were prob the worst decade for music since the 40s.

fixed

there's always a war

there were no wars in the 90s. not in any countries that mattered anyway.

war on drugs tho

that's a country that matters to me

as i said

every1 too busy jammin to amazing 90s music to fight

OK I have to ask: what was so awful about the forties?

lol i wonder how old most of the 90s voters are. it wasnt all the candy-coated wonderland dan's making it out to seem.

let me ask you a question man - which decade gave us born against? 80s punk has charm but 90s punk goes in imo

hitler iirc

80s punk has charm but 90s punk goes in imo

lol...?

"summer of love" was '88 right? I don't know that much about "rave" as a genre, but it seems like a lot of the major players at least had records out by the late '80s. shamen, 808 state, etc. Also the early '90s still felt really '80s

― the wheelie king (wk), Wednesday, 17 August 2011 23:06 (36 minutes ago)

where to begin.

TS

#1 Physical - Olivia Newton-John
#2 Bette Davis Eyes - Kim Carnes
#3 Endless Love - Diana Ross & Lionel Richie
#4 Every Breathe You Take - The Police
#5 I Love Rock & Roll - Joan Jett & The Blackhearts
#6 Ebony And Ivory - Paul McCartney & Stevie Wonder
#7 Billie Jean - Michael Jackson
#8 Eye Of The Tiger - Survivor
#9 Flashdance - What A Feeling - Irene Cara
#10 Lady - Kenny Rogers
#11 Say Say Say - Paul McCartney & Michael Jackson
#12 Centerfold - The J. Geils Band
#13 Call Me - Blondie
#14 Like A Virgin - Madonna
#15 (Just Like) Starting Over - John Lennon
#16 When Doves Cry - Prince
#17 Jump - Van Halen
#18 Upside Down - Diana Ross
#19 All Night Long (All Night) - Lionel Richie
#20 Maneater - Daryl Hall & John Oates
#21 Another Brick In The Wall (Part II) - Pink Floyd
#22 Crazy Little Thing Called Love - Queen
#23 Total Eclipse Of The Heart - Bonnie Tyler
#24 Down Under - Men At Work
#25 That's What Friends Are For - Dionne Warwick & Friends

vs

#1 One Sweet Day - Mariah Carey & Boyz II Men
#2 Macarena - Los Del Rio
#3 I'll Make Love To You - Elton John
#4 Candle In The Wind 1997/ Something About The Way You Look Tonight - Elton John
#5 I Will Always Love You - Whitney Houston
#6 End Of The Road - Boyz II Men
#7 The Boy Is Mine - Brandy & Monica
#8 Smooth - Santana w/ Rob Thomas
#9 Un-Break My Heart - Toni Braxton
#10 I Swear - All- 4- One
#11 I'll Be Missing You - Puff Daddy & Faith Evans w/ 112
#12 Fantasy - Mariah Carey
#13 Dream Lover - Mariah Carey
#14 That's The Way Love Goes - Janet Jackson
#15 Jump - Kris Kross
#16 Tha Crossroads - Bone Thugs- N- Harmony
#17 Waterfalls - TLC
#18 Take A Bow - Madonna
#19 Can't Help Falling In Love - UB40
#20 This Is How We Do It- Montell Jordan
#21 Informer - Snow
#22 (Everything I Do) I Do It For You - Bryan Adams
#23 Black or White - Michael Jackson
#24 The Sign - Ace of Base
#25 Because You Loved Me - Celine Dion

JUMP vs. JUMP

omfg brandy + monica the boy is mine

yeah...there's no way i'm even gonna stoop to trolling just to say "kris kross" here

exactly why no one should ever pay attention to charts

xp

I mean there's at least some good-to-great stuff on the 80s chart, the 90s chart is non-stop garbage

(Jump being the lone lolzy exception)

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/61GXTk23M8L._SL500_AA300_.jpg

lol, I don't even know what those lists are. I guess the songs that stayed at #1 the longest during each year? Looking at the bigger lists of #1 singles for each year is pretty interesting though. I don't think anyone should "pay attention to charts" but I do think top 40 radio was a lot more interesting in the '80s.

I mean there's at least some good-to-great stuff on the 80s chart, the 90s chart is non-stop garbage

the only thing thats non-stop garbage here is yr posts itt

dude shakes there aren't any 80s punk bands as good as born against & rorshach. like, period

^^ trollin

straight fyr

I don't know that much about "rave" as a genre, but it seems like a lot of the major players at least had records out by the late '80s. shamen, 808 state, etc.

we probably could have been spared the second part of that sentence

exactly why noevery one should ever pay attention to charts

#3 I'll Make Love To You - Elton John

wait what

^^ trollin

you know I'm right

Elton would NEVER make love to "you."

tipped me 75 bucks in 1986 iirc

i forget what a fucking scourge "one sweet day" was

Date Artist - Title Weeks
at #1
December 3 1995 – January 13 1996 Michael Jackson - Earth Song 6
January 14 – 20 1996 George Michael - Jesus To A Child 1
January 21 – February 24 1996 Babylon Zoo - Spaceman 5
February 25 – March 2 1996 Oasis - Don't Look Back In Anger 1
March 3 – 23 1996 Take That - How Deep Is Your Love 3
March 24 – April 13 1996 Prodigy - Firestarter 3
April 14 – 27 1996 Mark Morrison - Return Of The Mack 2
April 28 – May 18 1996 George Michael - Fastlove 3
May 19 – 25 1996 Gina G - Ooh Aah... Just A Little Bit 1
May 26 – June 1 1996 Baddiel, Skinner and Lightning Seeds - Three Lions 2 (1)
June 2 – 29 1996 Fugees - Killing Me Softly 5 (4)
June 30 – July 6 1996 Baddiel, Skinner and Lightning Seeds - Three Lions 2 (1)
July 7 – 13 1996 Fugees - Killing Me Softly 5 (1)
July 14 – 20 1996 Gary Barlow - Forever Love 1
July 21 – September 7 1996 Spice Girls - Wannabe 7
September 8 – 14 1996 Peter Andre - Flava 1
September 15 – 28 1996 Fugees - Ready Or Not 2
September 29 – October 5 1996 Deep Blue Something - Breakfast At Tiffany's 1
October 6 – 12 1996 Chemical Brothers - Setting Sun 1
October 13 – 19 1996 Boyzone - Words 1
October 20 – November 2 1996 Spice Girls - Say You'll Be There 2
November 3 – 16 1996 Robson and Jerome - What Becomes Of The Broken Hearted / Saturday Night At The Movies / You'll Never Walk Alone 2
November 17 – 30 1996 Prodigy - Breathe 2
December 1 – 7 1996 Peter Andre - I Feel You 1
December 8 – 14 1996 Boyzone - A Different Beat 1
December 15 – 21 1996 Dunblane - Knockin' On Heaven's Door / Throw These Guns Away 1
December 22 1996 – January 11 1997 Spice Girls - 2 Become 1 3

how can you argue against that

Take That - How Deep Is Your Love

my motherfuckin groove right there

The early eighties were an amazingly fecund time in pop music: hip-hop, New Wave, country, country going New Wave, R&B going New Wave, disco stealing from all of them and emerging as a vital permutation on its own. The rest of the eighties couldn't keep up.

Nineties pop attempted to be the All Things To All People "lifestyle choice" only hinted at in the eighties, for better or worse.

we probably could have been spared the second part of that sentence

but that was the meat of the lols

as much as i came of age as a music fan in the '90s and have intense firsthand experiences with the music of that decade, i feel like pound for pound i gotta go with the '80s

"Big Poppa" is the Grammy nominated and Billboard Award winning second single off The Notorious B.I.G.'s Ready to Die released in 1994 and the single was released in 1995. The song was his first Top 10 hit, peaking at number 6 in the US.

also

http://www.billboard.com/artist/2pac/chart-history/37157#/artist/2pac/chart-history/37157

The earnestness of pop in the nineties is the biggest drag, and it wasn't just a lyrical one -- the reluctance to fuck around.

given my location i'll probably be pelted with rocks next time i step outside for saying this but: i'd be totally okay with never hearing another boyz ii men song ever.

youre staying in the lex's guest room?

you wouldn't believe the sounds that come out of his bedroom at night

yeah uk funky totally sux

The early eighties were an amazingly fecund time in pop music: hip-hop, New Wave, country, country going New Wave, R&B going New Wave, disco stealing from all of them and emerging as a vital permutation on its own. The rest of the eighties couldn't keep up.

basically, this. tho rap, as it was known, was innovative and dope thru 1989. (but I never bought the Spin magazine hype on 1988-89 as rap's golden era.) I remember the heyday of "new traditional" country being later in the 80s, too. there was a point around 87-88 when i listened to commercial country radio every day, in between Marly Marl & DJ Red Alert.

voting 80s - sorry Ian

but my son tells me that the early 90s was a golden era for R&B. he's been dragging out my new jack swing CDs

the early 90s was a golden era

every era is a golden era, but only in some does the gold become popular

take it to the economics thread

The earnestness of pop in the nineties is the biggest drag was a fucking relief

http://worldsoforos.com/secondviews/wp-content/uploads/2010/10/aerosmith-pump-front.jpg

The earnestness of pop in the nineties is the biggest drag was a fucking relief

why?

have you ever met this guy?

I rep for a lotta shit that a lot of you probably hate i.e. Paula Cole/Natalie Merchant/Sarah M./Tori Amos - one thing I loved about the mid-nineties was also what made it so loltastic, the earnestness, the engagement, the naivete...Axl Rose appearing with Tom Petty to sing "Free Falling" at the VMAs...I love a lot of great 80s music don't get me wrong but...c'mon...Axl Rose, the VMAs, "Free Falling"

why?

because the self-seriousness of a lot of 80s shit & its pretentions - I use "pretentions" here with malice aforethought - renders even some of its best music a fucking chore. I like 80s Bryan Ferry albums precisely because I believe in their earnestness - the concluding verse of "Slave to Love" - give me that vibe over wit & 'tude all day

man i AM an earnest pussy. i don't want to listen to music made by ME.

TS
1. Talking Heads - Remain in Light
2. Public Enemy - It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back
3. Prince and the Revolution - Purple Rain
4. Kate Bush - Hounds of Love
5. Prince - Sign “O” the Times
6. R.E.M. - Murmur
7. Sonic Youth - Daydream Nation
8. Kraftwerk - Computer World
9. Michael Jackson - Thriller
10. Pixies – Doolittle

THE ILX 1980s ALBUM POLL

VS

1: MY BLOODY VALENTINE - Loveless
2: WU-TANG CLAN - Enter the 36 Chambers
3: MAGNETIC FIELDS - 69 Love Songs
4: PULP - Different Class
5: RADIOHEAD - OK Computer
6: DJ SHADOW - Entroducing
7: TRICKY - Maxinquaye
8: NAS - Illmatic
9: BELLE AND SEBASTIAN - If You're Feeling Sinister
10: BOARDS OF CANADA - Music Has the Right To Children

THE 1990s POLL RESULTS - THE ALBUMS

lol @ those lists

im sorry... but only 1 decade gave us U 2 ... i am voting for the 90's and zooropa.

i love EVERY album on the 80s list.

the 90s list has belle and sebastian.

holy shit @ that 90s list

b-b-b-but you're an earnest pussy! xp

can't wait for the decade that will taketh away
xpost

1. Talking Heads - Remain in Light
2. Public Enemy - It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back
3. Prince and the Revolution - Purple Rain

this is just like...please bend over and allow yourself to be spanked, 1990s.

a) wk shouldve used louis's alternate cannon 90s list if he was being fair
b) i havent heard most of those 80s records so i cant say but the 90s one has lots of p good albums
c) being a teenager in the 80s wouldve been terrible so the 80s cant have good music

I'm pretty sure being a teenager in the '80s was exactly like an awesome john hughes movie

canadian music of the 80s vs. the canadian music of the 90s

i am pretty sure being a teenager sucked a lot more in the 1880s than the 1980s

unless you really enjoyed working a plow

1. Talking Heads - Remain in Light

it's fine, don't care if I never hear it again

2. Public Enemy - It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back

A+

3. Prince and the Revolution - Purple Rain

A+

4. Kate Bush - Hounds of Love

hated it then, hate it now

5. Prince - Sign “O” the Times

A

6. R.E.M. - Murmur

don't care

7. Sonic Youth - Daydream Nation

a solid B+

8. Kraftwerk - Computer World

big up to the 5th best Kraftwerk album

9. Michael Jackson - Thriller

A+

10. Pixies – Doolittle

big up to the album that made everybody say "God, Surfer Rosa was awesome"

THE ILX 1980s ALBUM POLL

VS

1: MY BLOODY VALENTINE - Loveless

a grudging A+ from the fun-hater patrol

2: WU-TANG CLAN - Enter the 36 Chambers

A+

3: MAGNETIC FIELDS - 69 Love Songs

A

4: PULP - Different Class

A+

5: RADIOHEAD - OK Computer

don't wanna say A+ but that airbag saved my liiiiiife

6: DJ SHADOW - Entroducing

ok well this is good but there are other 90s records that belong here, where the fuck is the Fix

7: TRICKY - Maxinquaye

never heard it

8: NAS - Illmatic

A+

9: BELLE AND SEBASTIAN - If You're Feeling Sinister

misfiled, belongs in "80s"

10: BOARDS OF CANADA - Music Has the Right To Children

don't know it but am giving it an A+, what can you say, grade inflation

they didnt have teenagers in the 1880s

someone's in a trolling mood!

"it's fine, don't care if I never hear it again"

fuck you

being a teenager in the 80s wouldve been terrible so the 80s cant have good music

I shot coke in an airplane bathroom in the 80s, let me assure you that being a teenager in the 80s was awesome

im pretty sure being a teenager in the '80s was exactly like an awesome john hughes movie

yeah exactly it wouldve been terrible, like being a prison inside of disney world where you can only eat french fries so much despair

voted 80s b/c that 90s digital sheen doesn't yet sound good to me, plus I was there & I dunno, my fainter nostalgia for the 80s proffers more mystery & less RHCP

not really ridiculously easy if you were at all into rave/UK breakbeat/jungle/drum n bass/trip-hop

― DALEKS OF GOD (DJP), Wednesday, August 17, 2011 10:52 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark

someone's in a trolling mood!

you gotta get up pretty early in the morning if you wanna beat mookieproof :(

aero i dont know how to tell you this but teenagers did drugs in the 90s too

i know, i know

like being a prison inside of disney world where you can only eat french fries so much despair

I dunno, that sounds kind of appealing. Is Molly Ringwald there?

But 80s pop >>> 90s pop

i was a teenager in the 80s and there was neither coke nor john hughes ;_;

should prb lay off the molly ringwald joeks tbh

I shot coke in an airplane bathroom in the 80s, let me assure you that being a teenager in the 80s was awesome

this sounds sad and terrible, just like i imagine being an 80s teen would be

wow, I just realized that no good teen movies came out while I was in high school

should prb lay off the molly ringwald joeks tbh

aero i dont know how to tell you this but teenagers did drugs in the 90s too

I don't count E as a drug it's more like eating extra cookies

sadly i have no way of knowing if our coke was better or worse than in the 80s

i have a feeling our heroin was better

on IPad so not gonna link but we need some 90s Woodstock gifs to round the picture out

also thread should auto play "Pets"

this sounds sad and terrible, just like i imagine being an 80s teen would be

you are fronting, you know you picture me fixing in the direct flight from LA to PDX and you think "man that underrated aerosmith is one awesome teen"

I shot coke just to watch him die

mmm cookies

i have a feeling our heroin was better

wait which is "our"? in the mid-eighties the shift from brown powder to black tar took place and the strength skyrocketed, though whether this is "better" is kind of like "is weed better now" because the black tar just knocks you flat out and you get addicted about 5x faster, kinda like we have discussed re: weed here...it's stronger, but you kinda have to trade in your life to do it regularly now

here is a list of 90s albums i think are really good, probably better than r.e.m. at least:

nachtstrom - 17 songs after midnight (mego/1999)
the notorious b.i.g. - life after death (bad boy/1997)
the geto boys - s/t (def american/1990)
morcheeba - big calm (sire/1998)
sweet exorcist - spirit guide to low-tech (touch/1994)
plastikman - sheet one (novamute/1993)
the weakerthans - fallow (G7 welcoming committee/1997)
the throwing muses - the real ramona (4AD/1991)
pharcyde - bizarre ride II the pharycde (delicious vinyl/1992)
sonic youth - washing machine (dgc/1995)

because the self-seriousness of a lot of 80s shit & its pretentions - I use "pretentions" here with malice aforethought - renders even some of its best music a fucking chore. I like 80s Bryan Ferry albums precisely because I believe in their earnestness - the concluding verse of "Slave to Love" - give me that vibe over wit & 'tude all day

We're arguing from two different points of views -- especially since I'm a guy who likes eighties Ferry albums -- but let's talk about shooting coke.

80s

steve t can you do a letter grade rundown of those ten 90s albums i want to get yr take

anyways in the 90s i was taught that drugs were for losers

The eighties boasted GREAT anti-drug commercials, and this:

http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_llzq1pAJQm1qearaqo1_500.jpg

Mr T looks baked

he's concentrating on not getting a stiffy

gettin' high on the crack of Nancy's ass.

here is a list of 90s albums i have owned:

aqua - aquarium
merzbow - pulse demon
chris gaines - in the life of chris gaines
nurse with wound - thunder perfect mind
venga boys - up and down: the party album!
cryptopsy - none so vile

chris gaines - in the life of chris gaines

easily a better Bowie album than Tonight.

Alfred otm

for me '90s = Transient Random Noise Bursts, Chocolate Synthesizer, Dopesmoker

6. R.E.M. - Murmur

don't care

go to hell

"murble wurble when they ermmfuh drumfah drummm...I'm sorry! duh nuh nuh nuh...I'm sorry!"

oh wait that's Reckoning, OTOH who gives a shit

lool

Not a big fan of the 80s. I voted for the 80s.

voted 90s b/c I am in the middle of an intense tastemaking campaign to make the 90s the new 60s, and the 70s the new 80s

aqua - aquarium

good singles but too much filler 6/10

merzbow - pulse demon

i liked the anime better 4/10

chris gaines - in the life of chris gaines

never heard this

nurse with wound - thunder perfect mind

never heard this

venga boys - up and down: the party album!

up and down indeed v inconsistent but the highs are p incredible 8/10

cryptopsy - none so vile

used to play this at the gas station where i worked all the time 6/10

If this thread were TS: all of the music of the '90s vs. Hall and Oates I would honestly have to think long and hard about my answer.

(xpost to self) also because you can still hear a lot of 80s music from the 90s on [via sampling]

hall and oates

yeah, i guess r.e.m. never shot heroin on an airplane in the 80's, while having sex with a stewardess, who was also a prostitute, you're right, they suck.

Not a big fan of music, but I love music.

It's true that R.E.M. never covered "Say It Isn't So" or "Out of Touch," but Peter Buck did get high on pills on a plane.

i'm pretty sure everyone in America has gotten high on pills, we can't all be shooting coke and listening to radiohead like captain "Mile High" aero

mixing coke and Radiohead is like mixing gin and Dr. Pepper, fool.

alfred you can mix gin with ANYTHING

i've spent the last 15 years testing this theory so dont even

tbh I dread hard drugs now but if it were between listening to Murmur or trying to smuggle dope through the security checkpoint I'd have to flip a coin

I mean seriously y'all it's been twenty years we can admit that shit is bogus now right

alfred you can mix gin with ANYTHING

^^^ smoking too much Boyz II Men

you go mr que!

This poll comes down to whether we prefer nineties Tom Petty to eighties.

shit just got real

i still love Murmur and Reckoning, and Chronic Town what can i say

all i'm saying is that you could put gin in a glass of milk that had been left out overnight and i'd probably drink it

the 80s were so much better IMO. I mean the early 80s were still first wave punk bands in mid-streak, also reforming as new bands like fckn new order.

90s were lame. I mean there is indie and post- music, and some cool punk bands yeah, but I like way more 80s bands etc.

thank god we got post-music

stand up que

who is tom petty

^^ sub-markers

yes where would we be without punk

like djed? xps

well hold the phone I'm listening to Catastrophe Ballet now and the 80s are getting some late-innings relief

The eighties ended when followup singles from Hall & Oates' oooh yeah! record stiffed.

it was like October '29.

don't drag gene garber into this

thank god we got post-music

he was talking about post- music

no!

I'm not sure how and why, but the space seems somehow important

Also, it's easy enough to sit and blithely mock R.E.M. but let us not forget this thing from the '90s called Neutral Milk Hotel.

woah man—you can't just walk in here and score cheap cool points by taking down the sacred cows of meaningfulcore

lso, it's easy enough to sit and blithely mock R.E.M. but let us not forget this thing from the '90s called Neutral Milk Hotel.

i want nothing more than to forget the 1 or 2 times i listened to that hideous bunch of fucked up monsters and their shitty music

R.E.M. only made one album called Monster iirc

http://0.tqn.com/d/80music/1/0/_/3/-/-/heartbandphoto.jpg

look Jeff made two albums and split, REM have been inflicting their horrible music on the world reliably every sixteen months or so since I was a coke-shooting teen

6. "Alone"

Heart's singular marriage of pop and rock is carried off so seamlessly here that I'd have to include this one on a short list of the finest singles of the decade. Its breadth of appeal is immense, pulling in soft rock listeners with an elegant piano opening and lovely, quiet verses but then fully satisfying the rock contingency with the thumping, catchy chorus. Ann Wilson's voice has lost none of its effortless passion over the years, and the finished products of songs like this certainly deserved the attention they got. Some might accuse certain '80s artists of selling out to the decade's edgeless accessibility, but I just don't think such a charge sticks in the special case of the Wilsons.

http://www.esquire.com/cm/esquire/images/08-woodstock-99-fire-021610-lg-41294582.jpg

Four proud 90s voters.

^^^ the problem of the nineties right there: guys with no asses.

instead most guys were asses

yeah yeah R.E.M. should have broken up three thousand albums ago but that doesn't make their music any less enjoyable, i mean they are complete assholes for even existing at this point as humans

man my problem in the 90s was decidedly not "lack of ass"

tbf they should have changed their name to r.e. when berry split

lol

I proposed something similar when Bono left U2.

Dumb and Dumber: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack is the original soundtrack to the film; the soundtrack was released by RCA Records on November 22, 1994.

"The Ballad of Peter Pumpkinhead" by Crash Test Dummies (featuring Ellen Reid)
"New Age Girl (Mary Moon)" by Deadeye Dick
"Insomniac" by Echobelly
"If You Don't Love Me (I'll Kill Myself)" by Pete Droge
"Crash (The '95 Mix)" by The Primitives
"Whiney, Whiney (What Really Drives Me Crazy)" by Willi One Blood
"Where I Find My Heaven" by Gigolo Aunts
"Hurdy Gurdy Man" by Butthole Surfers
"Too Much of a Good Thing" by The Sons featuring Bret Reilly
"The Bear Song" by Green Jellÿ
"Take" by The Lupins
"You Sexy Thing" by Deee-Lite
"Get Ready" by The Proclaimers

When I was a teenager all I did was listen to REM and this movie and Road Movie. The only thing I listened to for years. Now I feel like no one likes them because they don't represent some single moment in time, they didn't self-destruct, they burst on the scene in dramatic fashion, all they did was consistently bring emotions out out people through pop music like no other band. They are not a HIP and predictable choice I guess. People are idiots.

people are idiots

"The Ballad of Peter Pumpkinhead" by Crash Test Dummies (featuring Ellen Reid)
"New Age Girl (Mary Moon)" by Deadeye Dick
"Insomniac" by Echobelly
"If You Don't Love Me (I'll Kill Myself)" by Pete Droge
"Crash (The '95 Mix)" by The Primitives
"Whiney, Whiney (What Really Drives Me Crazy)" by Willi One Blood
"Where I Find My Heaven" by Gigolo Aunts
"Hurdy Gurdy Man" by Butthole Surfers
"Too Much of a Good Thing" by The Sons featuring Bret Reilly
"The Bear Song" by Green Jellÿ
"Take" by The Lupins
"You Sexy Thing" by Deee-Lite
"Get Ready" by The Proclaimers

can we poll this

ofc ppl still listen r.e.m...you know what...

i hate all those coments about dislikes and what ather ppl do

if you dont want to judge you and your music

dont judge them either...peaple are not idiots just deferent to each ather

1 J. Nitzsche – Main Theme From "An Officer And A Gentleman" 1:41
2 Joe Cocker And Jennifer Warnes – Up Where We Belong 3:55
3 Van Morrison – Hungry For Your Love 3:40
4 ZZ Top – Tush 2:15
5 Pat Benatar – Treat Me Right 3:15
6 Sir Douglas Quintet, The – Be Real 2:35
7 Joe Cocker And Jennifer Warnes – Up Where We Belong 3:55
8 Lee Ritenour – Love Theme From "An Officer And A Gentleman" 5:19
9 Dire Straits – Tunnel Of Love 8:13
10 J. Nitzsche / Buffy Sainte-Marie – The Morning After Theme

tough to argue

Sorry if this has already been asked, the thread is quite long, but: does this mean "on balance, is the entirety of music released in the '80s or '90s better?" or is it more "which decade had the greatest highlights?"

"Which decade had the best Janet singles?"

"Which decade had the best airplanes?"

none of this is to be taken seriously, therefore you decide

the farrelly bros. secretly have pretty dope taste in music... one movie had a soundtrack of all steely dan covers and one featured jonathan richman as musical narrator/greek chorus. dumb & dumber sdtk not great supporting evidence for this claim, though.

Early nineties soundtracks were STRANGE creatures -- Frankenstein creations stitched from ideas inspired by eighties hangovers and "college rock."

I owned the Threesome sndtrk fer instance:

Tracklisting
1. New Star - Tears For Fears [4:28]
2. I'll Take You There - General Public [4:07]
3. Dancing Barefoot - U2 [4:45]
4. Like A Virgin - Teenage Fanclub [4:27]
5. Boom Shack-a-Lack - Apache Indian [4:32]
6. Is Your Love Strong Enough? - Bryan Ferry [4:45]
7. Bizarre Love Triangle - New Order [3:24]
8. Make Me Smile (Come Up And See Me) - Duran Duran [4:57]
9. He's My Best Friend - Jellyfish [3:45]
10. Buttercup - Brad [4:15]
11. What Does Sex Mean To Me? - Human Sexual Response [4:52]
12. That Was The Day - The The [3:57]

maybe it's time to revive the crow ost is the worst record i have ever heard

& "quirky" covers galore!

case in point xp!

it's always a good time to revive that thread

A few minutes ago I turned off OK Computer a third of the way through the fourth song and put on Mick Jagger's Wandering Spirit.

freejack.jpg

Voted 80s on basis of metallic records, I dunno

Uh that's Metallica that there

Either works tbf

And I say: HEY! yeah yeaaah, HEY yeah yea
I said hey, what's going on?

yo I had to go play rainbow 6 for a minute but umm

When I was a teenager all I did was listen to REM and this movie and Road Movie. The only thing I listened to for years. Now I feel like no one likes them because they don't represent some single moment in time, they didn't self-destruct, they burst on the scene in dramatic fashion, all they did was consistently bring emotions out out people through pop music like no other band. They are not a HIP and predictable choice I guess. People are idiots.

see we are different here because when I was a teenager there was this supposedly really great & interesting new band called r.e.m. and ppl were getting very into them & having emotional experiences at their shows at iirc music machine and/or anticlub or whatever and I was like "sounds cool let's hear it" and then I found out it was that awful hippie jangly shit they'd been playing on college radio and to me it was like "lol what are you fuckers on about, this music sucks"

I liked Green ok I guess, one point for the eighties

The thing is, REM isn't so much "lol '80s" as it's "lol ILM" for voting them as one of the top 10 of the '80s.

REM is the 80s, if you voted 80s it's a vote for REM

why u make the 80s cry?

"awful hippie jangly shit"

lol u like natalie merchant

'90s. So much of this question is tied into what was going on in your own life. I had a greater personal stake in paying close attention to music through the '90s, so I heard more, engaged more, and it seemed much better. Objectively, I sometimes think that except for the '60s, all decades are more or less equal musically.

REM really were ahead of their time though. soooo '90s in a lot of ways. plus Shiney Happy People

I should make it clear that I spent the '90s as a roadie for Sister Hazel.

'90s. So much of this question is tied into what was going on in your own life. I had a greater personal stake in paying close attention to music through the '90s, so I heard more, engaged more, and it seemed much better. Objectively, I sometimes think that except for the '60s, all decades are more or less equal musically.

Interesting. I came of age in the '90s and was paying close attention, heard more, etc. which is how I know that the '90s sucked.

And I know I've been joking around and trollin in this thread but I honestly do believe that all decades are more or less equal except the '90s, which were objectively worse due to stuff that was going on in the industry at the time. 1999 was like the pinnacle of this whole 30 year long corporatization of the record industry, consolidation and homogenization of radio, MTV started abandoning music, etc.

I'll take Canadian music of the 90's over the Canadian music of the 80's any day.

me too, apart from 'roll the bones'

(xx-post) Very surprised. Generally the decade you came of age in--which I assume means you were an adolescent/teenager in the '90s--is one you remember fondly. I know I get nostalgic about the '70s beyond all reason.

1999 was like the pinnacle of this whole 30 year long corporatization of the record industry, consolidation and homogenization of radio, MTV started abandoning music, etc.

Could be, but I'll take the radio of 1995 over the radio of now.

Generally the decade you came of age in--which I assume means you were an adolescent/teenager in the '90s--is one you remember fondly.

I suppose it depends heavily on whether or not you enjoyed your adolescence, how much you related to your peers, the dominant culture of the time, etc. vs. how much you were a strange nerd who only related to old stuff.

The 80s.

Took me a long time to get sick of 80s nostalgia, whereas I'm already sick of reliving the 90s.

i'll take 80s hip-hop over 90s hip-hop \o_o/

and will take the Dune pain box over 2011 hip-hop

i'll take 80s hip-hop over 90s hip-hop \o_o/

surprised but whiney otm

I think that maybe rapping got better in the '90s, but hip-hop as a whole? The music and everything? Probably not. There was probably a wider range and greater development of hip-hop throughout the '80s than there was in the '90s.

i don't like 80s rap for the most part

80s r&b & reggae are amazing though

but 90s still takes this.

from now on i will only assess the worth of an entire decade of music based on shitty comp tracklistings

Especially ones called "The Best ..... Album in the world"

(It's literally called that: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Best..._Album_in_the_World...Ever!#Disc_1)

Even prefer the 00s to the 90s whereas the 80s remains the best ever era for music.

1. 80s
2. 70s
3. 60s
4. 00s
5. 90s
6. 50s

I used to like those "Best ..... Albums In The World" compilations btw. Basically a combination of indie/britpop and "hip" crossover electronica from what I recall. As opposed to the "Shine" series which was all indie/britpop.

As a teenager in the '90s I used to scowl at eighties music - all Kylie and Jason and horrible slap-bass and ridiculous Spandex and tacky computer synths. Then the 00's rolled round and inevitably illuminated the dusty corners of the forgotten eighties. Then the '10ss rolled round and everyone's going Woo! Yeah! junglist-amen-Dino Jr!

So I'm very conflicted, but I think really to be true to my younger self I should vote '90s. But then there are whole swathes of 90s music that I hate - particularly in the latter part of the decade - Limp Bizkit, Macy Gray etc... Hrmmm...

Best Album In The World Ever Vol 1 is pretty solid IMHO.

It's not bad, actually, yes.

REM is the 80s, if you voted 80s it's a vote for REM

no! REM were the self-consciously "alternate" 80s. and contrary to rock-critic wisdom, it was possible to like Duran Duran in the 80s and not be a teenager or a Reagan/Thatcherite

'90s. So much of this question is tied into what was going on in your own life. I had a greater personal stake in paying close attention to music through the '90s, so I heard more, engaged more, and it seemed much better.

this is true, in my experience. i wrote about music thru the 80s until 1998 and can now see that my eventual and absolute burnout was a function of age not musical quality

i'll take 80s hip-hop over 90s hip-hop \o_o/

really? to me 1989 is when shit gets heated, I remember "Fight the Power" as a legit game-changing moment when things went widescreen and it felt like after that (i.e., the following year & the years that followed) is when the real sweetness set in.

epic thread

still not choosing, both are awesome

xp: I cannot and will not front on all of those early Def Jam releases

also, Straight Outta Compton and Eazy Duz It and All Hail The Queen were all released in '88-'89

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cugp1nWAmjo

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/c/c9/SlickRickTheGreatAdventuresofSlickRick.jpg
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/8/8a/Eazy-E_Eazy-Duz-It.jpg

^88

xpost!

This is the moment the eighties became the nineties for 9 y/o me.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xorxtOyiPII

when you first heard the inspiral carpets

no, that was "This Is How It Feels" on Now 17 a month or two before.

woah that 'ear protection' thing in the credits is very haçienda

it was a surprisingly hip show. They played St Etienne on their chart rundown. Beats International came on and told you about "indie" music. Clint Boon showed kids how to play the Hammond organ. There was even a rap competition featuring a song very similar to Rebecca Black's Friday. Think it was the first time kids TV had attempted to be self-consciously "cool" and therefore the start of the nineties.

Obviously, 80s. 90s kind of sucked for music, with a few exceptions.

I think in more recent years, I proabably find myself listening to more music from the 80's vs the 90's, but if I had the choce of having to hear an 80s hour on a radio station vs a 90s hour, I would pick the 90s hour. But again, this proabably has to do with living in Canada.

I also think for me that 80s pop > 90s pop, whereas 90s rock > 80s rock at least in terms of the more mainstream stuff. Whereas for hip hop, I'm most partial to the stuff from 87-92, so they are about even for me.

yeah I think the issue with hip-hop on this spectrum is that you basically have a 10-11 year golden age that starts in 1985, so it straddles both decades

OK I have to ask: what was so awful about the forties?

― a 'catch-all', almost humorous, 'Jeez' quality (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Wednesday, August 17, 2011 11:41 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark

swing killed jazz dead

the 40s was also a bad decade for the blues & blues-based music, not really getting revitalized til the chicago blues of the fifties & rock n roll imo.

itt Ian tries to convince us bebop never happened

what about bebop?

ha!

xpost

swing killed jazz dead

yeah it's a shame jazz never recovered, right?

i am just being snarky * pretending to be a crusty old creep, but i really do think that jazz in the 40s vs. jazz in the 20s, (early) 30s, 50s & 60s is kind of... the worst.

OK I have to ask: what was so awful about the forties?

Hitler?

I know when I think of Ella Fitzgerald, "the worst" instantly leaps to mind (as in "you are the worst if you don't like Ella Fitzgerald")

"Lemme play you one of the last real jazz bands, Joseph Robechaux and his New Orleans Rhythm Boys, recorded in New York City in 1933," he says of the record, "King Kong Stomp" on Vocalion. "You can hear it slip into the swing [he slurs this word as a ready-made profanity], but it's still good, one of the last really hot jazz songs. But that beautiful tone, that perfection, is starting to slide."

^^ wanna be this guy when i grow up tbh

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_5alylR2RlU

80s has innumerably greater number of great records. Most of this is due to sheer quality and inspiration and historical factors, but part is also due to this: 10-SONG 40-MINUTE ALBUMS. Seriously.

The 90s was a dim, dispiriting time for new music, but for me at least the few highlights were staggeringly high. Laughingstock, Tilt, Pop Tatari, 330,003 Crossdressers From Beyond The Rig Veda... the 90s sucked but half of my alltime top 10 records came from it. Hmm.

Nonetheless, I'm almost certainly voting 80s.

I rep for a lotta shit that a lot of you probably hate i.e. Paula Cole/Natalie Merchant/Sarah M./Tori Amos

lol for a minute there I thought you were going to slip up and include Natalie Imbruglia

the answer to this became crystal to me once I realized how many of the best Phish songs were written in the 80s.

Peace.

I think 87-94 kinda blows most other periods of music out of the water and really feels like its own separate era.

Please elaborate, cuz '87 is about where I stopped paying much attention to rock/pop music and started digging back to 50s New Orleans R&B, 60s soul/funk, and international music.

but no forties music, of course.

Ha!

The forties WAS a great decade for classical music, though.

I think 87-94 kinda blows most other periods of music out of the water and really feels like its own separate era.

― Matt DC, Thursday, August 18, 2011 6:09 PM (6 minutes ago) Bookmark

yeah i voted 90s but only out of tribal loyalty to the actually experienced. the stuff i liked was part of a... continuum.

Just feels like this explosion of creativity that was really distinct fron what preceded and succeeded it. Just this six year burst that transformed hip-hop, pop, dance music and rock. It's hard to think of an equivalent period of change, internet and technology notwithstanding.

"contrary to rock-critic wisdom, it was possible to like Duran Duran in the 80s and not be a teenager or a Reagan/Thatcherite"

i really do think sarah palin was into duran duran! way easier to picture palin with a madonna t-shirt getting excited over tickets to frankie goes to hollywood than say
rockin an NWA baseball cap, listening to eddie vedder write mash notes to gloria steinem. totally plausible palin had a creed phase though.

take it to the slash fiction thread, big guy

i think palin woulda repped for GNR, too.

omg palin totally loves creed otm

I think 87-94 kinda blows most other periods of music out of the water and really feels like its own separate era.

agree with it being a separate era (might even stretch it out to 97; lotsa great records released that year having nothing to do with OKC), and totally being kickass, but imo it's got nothing on 79-83 or 67-71...

i keep wanting to throw down and weigh in on this but then i realize i dont actually give a fuck one way or the other and i just want to argue

like really it goes down to my sorta growing resentment of 80s nostalgia vs that 5 year stretch where every band was named letters to cleo and sounded exactly the same

i dont actually give a fuck one way or the other and i just want to argue

perfect board description

hang a sign upon the door
that says DON'T DISTURB THIS GROOVE

also, Straight Outta Compton and Eazy Duz It and All Hail The Queen were all released in '88-'89

fuckin A, DJP playing hardball, those 3 are just unfuckwithable

early 90s gave us X-Clan & affiliated projects who I ride hard for tho

also stop frontin', you were also all about Redhead Kingpin

still waiting for my FYR aero

WITH A KEY
SISSY

(looks for release date of K9 posse cd)

also I love Fear of a Black Planet a lot but It Takes A Nation of Millions To Hold Us Back is just as good, or did you forget about "Night of the Living Baseheads" and "Bring The Noise" and "Black Steel In The Hour of Chaos" and "Don't Believe The Hype" and "Rebel Without A Pause" and "She Watch Channel Zero!?"

xp: lol I have been waiting for you to invoke the Posse

also stop frontin', you were also all about Redhead Kingpin

dude I am so caught here, I had that track on 7" of black wax spinning all summer

busted

xp to jjj: maybe it's next to your Fu-Schnickens CD

huh I just used xp in wholly contradictory ways

I don't wanna link to the blogspot I found looking for an easy place to look at rap albums from the 80s vs rap albums from the 90s but guys strictlyoldschoolhiphop is kind of a treasure trove and MOST of that shit is out of print probably forever

no idea what you are talking about dan

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bGGTvpc584E

did you ever have a copy of "What's Up, Doc?"

I know how much you loved Shaq Fu

I'll be OK giving up Biggie and hanging onto this on my 80s desert island:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eZtPZMbvBcg

(T-shirt free with six-month subscription.)

honing username, feeling good about it

and yes of course i had a copy of that

Shaq Fu, I'm wont to do what you tell me

I don't want to link to it because even though it's a sweet summey jam it's pretty offensive, but for the adventuresome, I'd like to thank this thread for eventually leading me to "My Dick Is Prejudice" by Tweedy Bird Loc

does somebody sing the chorus west coast style? ....yyyyyyup

summery, sorry

I didn't vote 'cause I think most 'decades' don't turn on 0/1 basis. Early 80's to me felt like a continuation of late 70's and late 80's bleed into early 90's.

"you are the worst if you don't like Ella Fitzgerald"

I'm less fond of Ella in the 40's than at any other time; tiskets and taskets and whatnot. Also, all swing isn't terrible, either, wtf?

Montell Jordan's "This Is How We Do It" >>> the entire decade of the 80s

did you focus your seminary work on hyperbole

No exaggeration, son.

If you were from the decade I'm from, then you would know.

i am, you're wrong.

jesus, rev

"this is how we do it" isn't even better than its source material ("chidren's story," 1989)

Maybe, but "Children's Story" doesn't mean nearly as much to me.

On a purely subjective level.

I mean, one of those was my favorite song when I was eight and one of those I didn't hear until well after the fact.

And I am p much guaranteed to start singing "This Is How We Do IT" at the top of my lungs at the mere mention of it.

"vivrant thing" is still shit btw

Oh no you didn't.

Look, there are certain songs that are among my very most formative and I will defend them to the death. Just know that and we will be on better terms, ok?

i had a childhood too and am not as irrational about the songs i remember from it, so nah why go easy

lol gotta love rev for one-upping me on the challops iit

You should be irrational about songs (or anything else) you love!

i don't really go for that lex mentality

Oh, fuck you.

i love george michael but i'm not about to consign the 70s to the dungheap of history just because "faith" came out when i was in second grade.

I vote for the 60s

Strongo: Obv. I was joking until Ship started being an ass. But it does seem very natural for me to vote for the 90s because that's where the core of my aesthetic values were formed. Nothing at all against the 80s.

were anybody's aesthetic values shaped by Amy Grant's "Every Heartbeat" like mine were?

Aero's?

all i'm saying is my core aesthetic values were absolutely shaped by the '90s too, my active interest in music basically dawned in late 1991, i just don't think that automatically dictates my answer to this question.

Sorry for derailing this thread btw. I didn't really expect anyone to take my earlier posts seriously.

eh you trolled and i trolled back, it's the way of the world we live in

xxp Yeah, I feel that. It's just that while I love a lot of music from the 80s, it isn't as personal to me as what I experienced firsthand.

And if looking at things more objectively is more your style, that's cool! But on a personal level, I don't see any point in acting dispassionate about things I am strongly passionate about. But if you do, I can dig that.

Haha, now that I think of it my initial reaction to "Children's Story" (probably about 97-98) was like...what's this weird rap song with the "This Is How We Do It" beat?

were anybody's aesthetic values shaped by Amy Grant's "Every Heartbeat" like mine were?

― a 'catch-all', almost humorous, 'Jeez' quality (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Friday, August 19, 2011 3:29 AM (13 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

Aero's?

― my brother's a basedgod (The Reverend), Friday, August 19, 2011 3:30 AM (12 minutes ago) Bookmark

naw I only got into Amy Grant about five years ago

Oh word?

yeah I was in a pretty deep personal crisis and just listening to whatever music I could think of to help me out literally all day every day and iTunes popped up with this AMY GRANT: THE STORYTELLERS COLLECTION and it was, like, all her albums (I later learned that a couple of really good ones had been left out) and I thought "fuck the world, I'm buying the complete Amy Grant" which I know is weird but I was in a weird dark place and then her music ministered to me, straight up, pulled me up from a very dark place and held my hand through some dark times that came over the next year

so that is the story of how I came to love Amy Grant and administer beatdowns to many people who were hating on her in church parking lots around the world

Awesome.

Every heartbeat belongs to you, aero.

wait wait

4. Kate Bush - Hounds of Love

hated it then, hate it now

― pathos of the unwarranted encore (underrated aerosmith bootlegs I have owned), Thursday, August 18, 2011 1:10 AM (Yesterday)

you terrible maniac and monster

yeah that made me go wtf too. i hope the implication of it is that he's more of a The Dreaming guy...

this feels like 80s easily to me, even though i grew up in the 90s. when i think of the 80s, its just like nuts-explodingly awesome hit after hit flying at your face, but with the 90s i just think of all this flimsy, sexless college rock. which of course existed in the 80s too, but the lollapaloozafication process just seemed to make everything worse.

the san andreas soundtrack is way better than vice city's though

TS
1. Talking Heads - Remain in Light
2. Public Enemy - It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back
3. Prince and the Revolution - Purple Rain
4. Kate Bush - Hounds of Love
5. Prince - Sign “O” the Times
6. R.E.M. - Murmur
7. Sonic Youth - Daydream Nation
8. Kraftwerk - Computer World
9. Michael Jackson - Thriller
10. Pixies – Doolittle

THE ILX 1980s ALBUM POLL

VS

1: MY BLOODY VALENTINE - Loveless
2: WU-TANG CLAN - Enter the 36 Chambers
3: MAGNETIC FIELDS - 69 Love Songs
4: PULP - Different Class
5: RADIOHEAD - OK Computer
6: DJ SHADOW - Entroducing
7: TRICKY - Maxinquaye
8: NAS - Illmatic
9: BELLE AND SEBASTIAN - If You're Feeling Sinister
10: BOARDS OF CANADA - Music Has the Right To Children

THE 1990s POLL RESULTS - THE ALBUMS

― the wheelie king (wk), Wednesday, August 17, 2011 9:04 PM (2 days ago) Bookmark

god this really says it all doesnt it

I feel bad for people who think of college rock when they think of the 90s. Or any era.

9: BELLE AND SEBASTIAN - If You're Feeling Sinister

fffffuuuuuuu

that poll 'says it all' about ilx, not the 80s or 90s

i have nvr heard magnetic fields

I feel bad for people who think of college rock when they think of the 90s. Or any era.

― Tim F, Friday, August 19, 2011 12:35 AM Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

^^^^^^

yeah all that poll says is that ILX has horrible taste

That 90s list is so terrible tho. Only two albums I care about as opposed to six from the 80s list.

MBV at #1 is the biggest joke to me tbh. it's a nice little novelty record but c'mon you cant seriously stack that up against thriller, or fuckin 200 other great 80s albums.

oh yes you can

haha yeah i'd take loveless over thriller, and *certainly* fuckin daydream nation

and i liked mj in the 80s

daydream nation is way better that loveless

than*

no

yeah it clearly is

and its not even my fave 80s sonic youth album

^^ top flight music criticism here, on both sides

(the answer is still no)

nah but it is tho

(we can keep doing this if you want)

i dropped LSD while listening to Loveless and it might be one of the best experiences of my life. it was if Bilinda Butcher was right on top of me breathing for me. than i was able to see them twice during the Loveless tour in Hollywood and they blew out my ears.

Sister > Loveless > Daydream Nation

(great thread)

btw, still voting for the 80's

loveless is a great album to listen to... on opposite day Ha ha.

anyway Isn't Anything is better than Loveless so 80s still wins

I can't stand a note of Daydream Nation and feel that Loveless missed an opportunity to be listenable. Haven't heard Sister or Isn't Anything.

Did you hear the Japancakes version/rendition of "Loveless" ?

I haven't!

Is there a transatlantic divide here? Seems to me like the US maybe did better in the 80s and the UK in the 90s.

It's on Spotify.

I have it in the car, thinking that the family might find the original a bit 'extreme'. now they like the tunes, I might well put the real version in...

They like the rendition, but it's kinda bit "musak" in places and can be irritating. ("Soon" is great though)...

This is silly. This debate ought not
be about which debate produced the best mushy peas guitar album.

Both records are great but srsly.

Equally it should not be about which decade produced the worst chestbeating major label walrus rock album.

Anyway as I've mentioned upthread breaking it up by decades feels very different to breaking it up by eras. 87-93 > 80-86 > 94-99

That is probably the most accurate assessment of the situation.

Actually, choosing between decades is a bit inaccurate. I consider 1980-1984 to be one of the best ever eras for music because of synthpop/new romantics, and 1994 to 1997 was also quite nice because of Britpop. On the other hand 1987-1991 was pretty awful, really and one of the worst eras for music ever. Too much hair metal, rap and... well... early house music is probably what I am more ready to accept now than before. The era was also generally dominated by synth sounds that I didn't like though, a short-lasting time when synths were supposed to sound like anything but synths. Thankfully analogue synths got back in fashion again around the mid 90s.

synths were supposed to sound like anything but synths

This is amazing logic.

I said 90s a couple days ago and then forgot to check back in on the this thread. Looking at the lists people have posted and having thought about it a bit, I think I have changed my mind. While several of my favorite records and bands came out in the 90s (which is what I was thinking of the other night) the stuff I really love, the stuff that really helped shape my tastes, and the stuff I listen to more often now, is all from the 80s. I still haven't voted yet though. This is a tough one for me!

To the East, Blackwards came out in '90 though Geir. You gotta admit that shit is nonstop jams front to back

Anyway as I've mentioned upthread breaking it up by decades feels very different to breaking it up by eras. 87-93 > 80-86 > 94-99

― Matt DC, Friday, 19 August 2011 10:38 (55 minutes ago) Bookmark

True, but that's not the question in hand really. I'm kind of lucky when it comes to the OG question as I was born in 1980 and started paying attention to the radio around Christmas 1989. So anything prior to 1990 was "then" (i.e. I was peripherally aware of pop music but had no prejudices or taste barriers - didn't know who was singing or their background or what genre it was, it was just "music") and anything from 1990 onwards is "now". And then there's all the stuff from the eighties which I discovered retrospectively, which would be a very different selection of music had I been there at the time.

I think my logic still tilts it in favour of the 80s, if only because the second half of the 90s feels a bit of a busted flush. Certainly 90s pop didn't have anything to match Prince, Jacko and Madonna at their peak (although Madge's arguably carried on into the early 90s).

Both decades had Soundgarden in them. fuck fuck fuck.

xpost

"Baby One More Time"
"Bills Bills Bills"
"One In A Million"
"Rewind"
"Flowers"

No massive pop stars but I don't think that's everything.

90s brought us the XFiles theme. your turn, 1980s.

Airwolf theme.

80s definitely had better film/tv themes - Axel F, Airwolf, A-Team etc.

Knight Rider trumps all.

THE EQUALIZER

here let me youtube that for you

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uB1NiNKwueE

I always loved the theme from Blockbusters:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kKhnVvHWJ3A

I guess you could judge this question by which version of the Grange Hill theme you like best?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qz4rkEA8eZg

anyway, enough with the obligatory TV nostalgia detour. I voted 90s as that's my era, and hell, someone's gotta stick up for it even if I do have the creping sense the eighties was more interesting.

And if looking at things more objectively is more your style, that's cool! But on a personal level, I don't see any point in acting dispassionate about things I am strongly passionate about. But if you do, I can dig that.

― my brother's a basedgod (The Reverend), Thursday, August 18, 2011 10:38 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark

not to like drag this on but fyi this thing about me being an emotionless music-appreciating robot who has tried to objectively calculate the superiority of '80s music is some bullshit, my opinion is based on subjective passion as much as anyone else's. i got that whole "you must be dead inside if you don't love a record enough to lose all perspective about it" nonsense enough from deej.

It's so difficult to be objective and leave nostalgia out of the equation, but I spent so much of the '80s (and a lot of '90 and '91) in front of the TV watching MTV or BET and I have fond memories of that time. Then, when I got older I was exposed to a wealth of great '80s music that I wasn't even aware existed. So, '80s for me.

And "Stone Cold Rhymin'" came out in '89, so there's that.

Damn, I wish I had kept some of my VHS tapes of Rap City.

Please/Actually/Introspective vs Behaviour/Very/Bilingual/Nightlife

It's a tie.

"Baby One More Time"
"Bills Bills Bills"
"One In A Million"
"Rewind"
"Flowers"

no way are any of these as good as Prince, Jacko, or Madonna at their peaks.

"Flowers" comes closest

Weirdly I've mentally grouped all those records with the 00s - they just don't *feel* like 90s records, mostly because they're either by pop stars at the start of big careers or in genres that feel more significant in terms of what came after than before.

Aaliyah's the exception there and also the only one not from 1999.

Yep, me too.

the 2000s started around 1999 for me anyway.

Several xposts yeah 80s film scores knock 90s film scores' dick in the dirt with extreme prejudice.

that Equalizer theme is awesome

I still vote 80s, but thinking about this more while reading this thread, I remembered just how much of my 90s was spent listening to the 80s, which only confuses things for me.

"no way are any of these as good as Prince, Jacko, or Madonna at their peak"

kriss kross 3-note sample of "want you back" eclipses all of these. just that 3-note sample.
if you had the choice of saving the bassline to "want you back" or the entirety of the 80s from
cultural destruction, Tito's gonna live, Reagan's gonna die. totally dessork

wouldn't that be a point in favor of the '60s, not the '90s?

if you believe in the power of sampling then the 90s absorbs all of the source's powers like when the bad guy in Tron says "all my powers are yours" and he turns into a glowing david warner giant.

Possibly, but the 90's did hae to deal with the aftermath of the whole Biz Markie vs Gilbert O Sullivan case.

once again the outcome of an ilx poll is decided by the supreme court! i bet scalia rules for 80s.

the 2000s started around 1999 for me anyway.

I consider the 2000s to have started around 2002, which was when R&B was being slowly replaced by powerpop influenced teen-punkpop (Avril Lavigne, Pink) and the beginning of the electro thing that was to dominate most of the following years.

How did Avril Lavigne replace R'n'B exactly? I don't even understand the correlation between these two things?? Also, electro revival properly kicked off early 2001 with electroclash etc. Earlier for some people.

oh wait, never mind.

it's really simple dl - first we had r&b, and then Avril Lavigne destroyed it with her music

in many respects i understand the impulse to vote for Wham!s "Club Tropicana" over the entire career of the Wu Tang Clan, but on a second consideration i have to go with the "what the fuck do you senile clowns think you're doing?" argument

At the risk of reducing myself to (even more of) a cartoon character....

http://youtu.be/x1U1Ue_5kq8

haaahahahaha

i always assumed that was a comedy goth diss of the 80s music scene?

I think it's about getting an apartment north of 79th iirc

^^ good point, was blinded by mostly hearing them grunting out of the speakers in provincial night clubs in northern pit villages

...whilst waiting for the DJ to drop "Club Tropicana"

The correct answer is 85-95

87 > 95 > 88 > 84 > 91 > 94 > 82 > 96> 99 > 80 > 89 > 93 > 86 > 81 > 85 > 97 > 98 > 83 > 90 > 92

Only a dead inside robot could calculate that.

beep boop bop boop

I like 82 and 94.

How did Avril Lavigne replace R'n'B exactly?

She replaced part of it. The first years of the 00s were more or less all about R&B. But I guess she also represented a shift in the boy/girl band style where the Max Martin style (which was more or less the only non-R&B/hip-hop style in early 00s hitlists) was being replaced by a slightly more rock oriented style.

yeah everyone's being "DURR DURR SHUT UP GEIR" but he has a point, rap and R&B ruled the top 10 much more before the white girl takeover of Avril and Pink and Kelly (and later Gaga and Katy etc)

the time-line feels a little distorted is all. also Pink is definitely a halfway point of rock/r'n'b crossover whereas Avril and Kelly etc take the r'n'b out altogether and it seems to me that Gaga belongs to a different lineage - Madonna-esque pop auteurs have been a thing since at least, um, Madonna - and maybe Katy Perry considers herself in this vein too but no, sorry.

well yeah it's all a bit fuzzy and generalized but there IS a nugget of truth to it is all i'm saying

If teen punk pop eclipsed anything in the 00s surely it was straight-up Baby One More Time dance-pop rather than R&B?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UjWddDI5_FA

this is so obviously the 80's, fools.

the time-line feels a little distorted is all. also Pink is definitely a halfway point of rock/r'n'b crossover whereas Avril and Kelly etc take the r'n'b out altogether and it seems to me that Gaga belongs to a different lineage - Madonna-esque pop auteurs have been a thing since at least, um, Madonna - and maybe Katy Perry considers herself in this vein too but no, sorry.

I am having a hard time associating Katy Perry with any particular musical style at all. She seems to just do whatever she (or the marketing people behind her) expects to sell at the time, regardless of genre or style.

agree w/geir on this. yet I'll add for all the calculation that ms. perry clearly enjoys herself which is her saving grace for some people tho I find her voice skin-crawlingly awful

I am sure she does. I think "California Gurls" was kind of nice, but that was due to brilliant production, not because of her (or Snoop for that matter).

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

a just and proper result.

the eighties was prob the worst decade for music since the 40s.

indie traitor!

yeah! I hope you end up as John Maus's roadie!

indie trators?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xUknsOvL-78

Dum Dum was top 10 on my 1980s albums ballot

when I heard that Vaselines tune last year I forgave its nonsense cuz it was so damn irresistable.

That dynamic is so weird to me! like when the pro-life song won the ILX "best sex pistols track" poll, because it rocks I guess.

it is ok to say the 80s suck when u were one of the bands that made the 80s rule geddit?

yah but johnny rotten didn't go around starting planned parenthood clinics... or did he? Planned Parenthood Ltd?

Been listening to a spotifly list of 1000 1980s songs in alphabetical order and let me tell you, Madonna made a lot of songs brought to you by the letter 'L'.

What about the music of the '90s as imagined by MAD Magazine in the '80s?

http://d1g4sq00ps2bp3.cloudfront.net/images/12130mad.jpg