Rob Harvilla's 60 Songs that Explain the 90s

I am digging this series of podcasts from Mr. Harvilla. Anyone else listening to them?

Thus far, he's done 45 - 60 minutes on the each of following songs:

You Oughta Know
Hey Jealousy
C.R.E.A.M.
The Rain (Supa Dupa Fly)
November Rain
Mind Playing Tricks On Me
All I Want For Christmas is You
Mayonaise
I Want It That Way
Make 'Em Say Uhh!
Cannonball
Enter Sandman
You Get What You Give
Gonna Make You Sweat
Nuthin' But a G-Thang
Just a Girl
No Scrubs
Hunger Strike
Juicy
Man! I Feel Like a Woman
Stinkfist
Common People
Dreaming of You
I Got 5 on It
Scenario
Hyperballad

I have enjoyed his writing in the past, and he's got some pretty good angles for most of these pods. The I Got 5 on It episode, in particular, was really enjoyable to me.

some nice couplings there:

The Rain (November Rain) (Supa Dupa Fly)
Mayonaise (I Want It That Way)
Gonna Make You Sweat (You Get What You Give)
Just a Girl (Nuthin' But a G-Thang)

Sounds interesting, but appears to be a Spotify thing, not available as a podcast.

It pulls up via PocketCasts, someone might have a bootleg RSS feed.

It is a Spotify thing - it's from The Ringer, and they're now owned by Spotify.

two terrible tastes that taste worse together

Loved the latest episode on Nothing Compares 2 U

Thank you for recommending this. I've been making my way through and have really been enjoying Harvilla's voice. Good, simple concept of using 60 songs to tell bigger stories of trends, artist trajectories, and different genre pockets.

So far my favorites have been "All I Want For Christmas is You" and "Make 'Em Say Uhh!" Had a good laugh in the latter when he said, "Mystikal had the same relation to the beat as the Kool Aid Man had to a brick wall."

From the episode on Third Eye Blind:

We're talking songs that make you want to smooch your also-married-to-someone-else high-school sweetheart in the back of your minivan in the parking lot at your 15-year high school reunion.

holy fucking shit @ young Rob's interpretation of "Take Me Home Tonight"

possibly the funniest thing I've ever heard (in the "My Heart Will Go On" ep)

Assume you mean Eddie Money's song? I was thinking how it and the PSB' "What Have I Done to Deserve This?" appeared within a year of each other, and the way each brings in this legendary female pop voice halfway through the record in a way that's so haunting. I'd do a poll if it wouldn't be so wildly lopsided. (I do like "Take Me Home Tonight.")

yes, Eddie Money's song. As a young boy, Rob thought the song was a cautionary tale about the possible results from a one night stand. The lover from that night, voiced by Ronnie Spector, shows up at Eddie's doorstep to plead "Feed my little baby. Feed my little baaaaabbbaaaaay." The idea that she's singing "feed my little baby" and like that is just too much.

Definitely an interesting/creative mishearing.

I knew who the Jerky Boys were through my older brother, but I never owned an album or saw the movie. I cannot believe Pablo, Honey is named after a Jerky Boys call. I even started listening to PH more after Turrican's thread (and blowout). How does a band survive this?

the "no scrubs" episode was the only one i've heard and it was pretty enjoyable

I wish they'd put all of the songs referenced in each episode in the playlist

I've listened to most of them. Highly recommend the "Wonderwall" episode.

These are really good. I started bingeing them which was a mistake because Rob's normally very satisfying vocal cadence starts to feel gimmicky, but as long as I don't listen to more than 2 in a row I find most of the episodes immensely enjoyable, and usually pretty insightful. He also has really good guests most of the time, who actually have specific knowledge about the artist or scene in question and aren't just the usual suspects on the podcast circuit. And the interviews never overstay their welcome.

Rob occasionally drops an oddly sensual "yeah" while the guest is talking.

^lol

yeah that's gonna do it for me and message boards pic.twitter.com/GxI1gKnaf9

— rob harvilla (@harvilla) June 16, 2022

I am a regular listener to the show and enjoy it and how much I enjoy it surprisingly does not correlate with my own enjoyment (or lack thereof) of the song being profiled. Some of my least favorite music has been some of my favorite shows which is not the norm, for me anyway.

lol none stuck out in these last two eps

This is a great podcast. Is there a thread on ilm for music podcast recommendations?

The Mary J. Blige episode was one of the best, really outstanding stuff. I immediately emailed a musicologist professor who taught "Women in Music" when I was school, to tell her she ought to give it a listen.

this podcast just illuminated - for me, for the first time - the potential double meaning of the title of Blink-182's second album Dude Ranch

both hilarious and horrifying

as soon as he mentioned the possibility, i was like oh, got it, say no more

yes, that was good insight

whoa

i wonder what internal spotify nonsense caused them to stop appending the song being discussed at the end of the episode. could it really be as dumb as the episodes being original content that they don't have to pay rights for but the songs being stuff they do have to pay for, so it helps their bottom line if not everyone who listens through the episode also plays the song?

i have no idea but it probably won’t be a case of them paying or not paying for the song it will be a victim of some larger agreement between spotify and a rights holder about whether or not “spotify original” podcast content can contain their music (and it might be different per territory)

yeah its weird bc the song was not actually embedded in the episode -- queueing up an ep would add the podcast followed by the song, separately. So that doesn't quite track. But can't really imagine what else the reason would be.

oh i see. hmm dunno.

maybe they just gave up on the "podcast+song" experiment? i've never heard of it outside of the mentions on this show.

I see these are available on non-Spotify feeds, will check it out

In today's episode re "Enjoy the Silence" by Depeche Mode, Rob refers to "the great critic Neg Raggett."

I can proudly say I once served the great Ned Raggett a drink at the Pasadena McCormick & Schmick's, nearly 16 years ago now.

I've listened to a ton of these now and it's great. Haven't listened to the last few because the songs weren't enticing (Hootie, Lisa Loeb, etc), but I know he goes way beyond the title artist and I probably should, huh?

xp Pretty sure I called up Ned while he was doing a radio show c. 1999, and we briefly chatted about the Dead C.

Hootie one was good. Makes a good case for the band's strengths and the underappreciated world-weariness or social commentary in their lyrics. It does open with a lot of 80s baseball card material and "my life as a sports fan" material; that didn't do as much for me, but many here might find it very sweet and charming!

i need to dig into this more, i listened to an episode ages ago & really liked it

Hootie and Lisa were both fantastic!

^seconded.

I’m up to episode 58 and there hasn’t been a dud episode so far. I could listen to this guy recite the phone book.

lol at the Enjoy the Silence episode being structured around the "For the Masses" tribute album, a mostly forgotten album I listened to a whole lot in the late-90s and which actually got me back into depeche mode at the time

Ok I'll eventually get around to those eps (even though sports talk is equally unenticing)

I like the way he tells stories and his eye for banal personal details, so even the sports talk wasn't a total deal-breaker for a sports-hater like myself. YMMV of course.

lol at his pronunciation of Basildon

you can find "sports talk" in the works of David Berman as well

Not to take anything away from the great Ned Raggett but I do like his subtle habit of always referring to critics as "the great music writer x" or "the great critic x", just bigging up his colleagues.

I've tried to get both my 90s music-obsessed friend and his 90s music-obsessed 14 year old stepson to listen, without success.

my partner likes 90s music and absolutely hates it.

so funny

i want a playlist of all the songs he played at open mic nights — when he said he did Hallelujah i screamed ROB NO

So Rob’s next project is hosting a BBC podcast series (i think) with Courtney Love! starting in April

https://www.bbc.com/mediacentre/2024/bbc-radio-6-music-and-bbc-sounds-announce-courtney-loves-women

Oh man - I had to stop halfway through the Smells Like Teen Spirit episode because I couldn't stand Love's ramblings. Rob basically just smiled and nodded while she jumped around all over the place and talked more about herself than Nirvana.

Hopefully he's got something better lined up after this.

i loved that episode so as always, mileage varies!

I'm in favor of this Odd Couple remake, but he strongly implied that he'll be doing another podcast for the same company with the same team, so I assume this is in addition to that.

yeah, my reax to that news was "ugh, that sucks, and it seems like it would be painful for Rob." (i'm sure he doesn't feel that way and is excited.)

his half of that episode is approximately 10 times better than listening to her ramble.

https://preview.redd.it/i-need-a-broom-to-clean-up-all-those-names-courtney-dropped-v0-0yu54zouej9a1.jpg?width=1080&crop=smart&auto=webp&s=0606713ad03d45ad5afb3d2323a5c22f7c12bacd

I enjoyed her rambling. Anyway it's not like he has to edit the podcast, that's whose doing the real work here.

I don’t fault anyone for loving the Courtney, but I couldn’t take it — she (who has done WONDERFUL work) didn’t talk about the work at all; it was who wanted to or did fuck whom and who was on what scene at which moment and all that social shit.

Now, this is ABSOLUTELY NECESSARY to the creation of a scene, probably as important as the music (or more), but her ep was just Not For Me.

omg

this is not directed at hardcore dilettante but to anyone else with something in the hopper re courtney

god forbid i be naive enough think that this would be a good thing to mention for Harvilla’s career bump and that geez might be an interesting series
…
and more fool me for forgettig that the very mention of Courtney’s name is like summoning a flock of winged monkeys who feel it is important to point out how bad & hated & idk insane she is or whatever

i ask you all please absolutely knock it the fuck off

it’s boring, depressing, and lame

hello friends, our newish podcast is called 60 SONGS THAT EXPLAIN THE '90S: THE 2000S and will cover rad jams from 2000 to 2009; here is a trailer where i say that title as many times as possible in 60 seconds https://t.co/dJ0Re8gAFl

— rob harvilla (@harvilla) September 25, 2024

interesting choice of name

I let out my own oddly sensual 'yeah' upon seeing this trailer in my subscriptions. I'm a bit worried that Rob was a mostly formed self-aware adult in the 2000s. Will he be able to deliver hits as good as "feed my little baby" and "Shaft" from this decade?

who cares BRING IT ON

the Bring It On soundtrack is eligible

An (accurate) ILX reference in the new ep - is Rob a member?

He has referenced ILX in a tweet previously - see July 7, 2022 upthread

afaict he posted here a couple of dozen times between 2005 and 2009

he did post here back in the day. Seems like his handle was "harvilla" or something like that.

I didn't find any posts under that display name. The ones I found were under the name "awful bliss" (he confirmed his identity in this thread). But maybe he posted under another name, too.

hmmm, must have been another writer back then that I am confusing him with.

Paper Planes YASSSSSS

lol my wife's listening to the Paper Planes episode and she just came in like, "Uh, he just mentioned I Love Music?"

I haven't felt compelled to dive into 00s nostalgia and haven't listened to any of the other new eps yet, but I did listen to the Paper Planned one and it was great.

Planned Paperhood

1:20:38

Linkin Park ep was quite good. My latest unsolicited small production note: add a few more clicks of the cassette sound or silence between Rob's final essay line and the pre-guest commercial.

yeah it was v good -loved Darnielle’s insight, added a good layer of sensitivity to the whole thing

i wonder what internal spotify nonsense caused them to stop appending the song being discussed at the end of the episode. could it really be as dumb as the episodes being original content that they don't have to pay rights for but the songs being stuff they do have to pay for, so it helps their bottom line if not everyone who listens through the episode also plays the song?

This didn't seem to be addressed but it also happened when The Ringer got Bandsplain and I think it's so the show works on non-Spotify podcast feeds.

Anyway I listened to like 50-60 of the 90s ones and the other day I was driving and threw on the "Shoop" one. I have no real interest or knowledge of Salt-n-Pepa but it was next up. Just wanted to shout out good Rob can be, as he starts with a long thing about awkward Junior High dances, goes into the history of the group (interesting, places them in context, gives me a deeper appreciation of their achievements in that space), and ends up with a scene of his wife dancing in the kitchen. Just A-1 podcasting.

Yeah from the ones I’ve listened to, it’s actually the songs I least care about the one that have the best episodes.

I really enjoy the content but whyyyy why does Rob Harvilla slip in and out of that fucking randomly emphatic slam poet ass cadence it drives me nuts. If I found out any of you talked like that I’d have to killfile

Worst

Rob is a multistate quantum being. you are listening to probability cloud overlapping Rob, Shaft, DJ Aloof, etc.

lol otm

I had to quit the Harvilla podcast as that slam poet schtick just wore me down. Find him much, much more palatable as a guest on other people's shows.

I've been listening to a history podcast for over a decade now despite not being able to stand the guys speaking voice. Life is suffering.

i enjoy rob's podcast but only in 1-2 episode increments. i need a break for a few weeks in between doses then he sounds fun and interesting again

I wonder if rob is still having fun, or if he ever feels like he knocked up the ringer in a (sixty)-night stand and must now "feed (Bill's) little baby"

I've been listening to a history podcast for over a decade now despite not being able to stand the guys speaking voice. Life is suffering.

― MJ Slenderman (Camaraderie at Arms Length), Tuesday, January 7, 2025 2:57 PM (thirty-six minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

is it the guy that sounds like wallace shawn

this makes me want to listen

xp no, this guy

https://www.thebritishhistorypodcast.com/

he does his research and is politically sound but his presenting style is " hey kids, listen, this stuff isn't boring like you thought!" and in this regard I am 1000 years old.

I ration these too but the thread prompted me to listen to the Johnny Cash one. I thought it was great. I bawled three or four times.

This 311 episode was good because it confirmed that I definitely and confidently do not like this band absolutely at all not one bit

I had thought recently, “well i used to hate them but that was a long time ago & i have changed my mind about a lot of stuff i hated back then and a lot of cool ppl i know really ride for them”

NOPE

every song snippet just made my skeleton leave my body more

I've never listened to the podcast, but I did buy the book that came out of it a few weeks ago.

nice! i do want to read the book one day

I only ever ambiently followed Rihanna’s career, so I didn’t realize she hadn’t released an album since 2016. Now that I think about it, maybe an important part of the cultural background for the Trump era for me is that we traded Rihanna on the radio for, uh, Morgan Wallen?

We didn't trade nothing. She has *denied us*!

amen

Kamala should have run on a platform of guaranteed Rhianna albums.

She'd have ended up striking a grand bargain where we got 5 new Fergie albums instead.