Previously: My top 200 tracks 1990-99 Pt.01a: 200 to 181
Previously: My top 200 tracks 1990-99 Pt.01b: 180 to 161
Previously: My top 200 tracks 1990-99 Pt.02a: 160 to 141
Previously: My top 200 tracks 1990-99 Pt.02b: 140 to 121
Previously: My top 200 tracks 1990-99 Pt.03a: 120 to 101
Previously: My top 200 tracks 1990-99 Pt.03b: 100 to 81
Previously: My top 200 tracks 1990-99 Pt.04a: 80 to 61
Previously: My top 200 tracks 1990-99 Pt.04b: 60 to 41
Previously: My top 200 tracks 1990-99 Pt.05a: 40 to 21
20
Godspeed You! Black Emperor
The Dead Flag Blues
F# A# (Infinity)
1996
The sound of a world slowly decaying and descending into the apocalypse, this was like some kind of future prophecy recorded to tape, as the three-part, sixteen minute epic took in bleak spoken word, cinematic soundscapes, quasi-orchestral movements, and the sound of the world rushing past in slow motion. This wasn't post-rock, it was post-apocalypse rock. It needs a description of it's own as, simply, no-one else sounds like this.
19
Massive Attack
Inertia Creeps
Mezzanine
1998
This Massive Attack album was more than a bit of a change from the mellow electronics of the previous albums - a suffocating darkness took hold of the whole album, of paranoia and fear, of which one of the few deviations from that was this - a track of after-dark, sultry tones that was clearly about sweat-drenched sex. I'm not sure I want to know how many, er, liasons this has soundtracked over the years, but I bet it's a lot.
18
Rico
Smokescreen
Sanctuary Medicines
1999
As the air-raid siren heralds the slow, trudging beats, and the track hauls itself into life as Rico details another song of fear and loathing, all the memories of the time around it that I went through come flooding back. This first album was one of those that became seriously personal to me, and the intense claustrophobic feel of this track more than any other.
17
Whale
Hobo Humpin' Slobo Babe
We Care
1995
Formed by a couple of TV presenters, as I recall, and I'm not exactly sure how serious they were, but whatever happened, this track blew up in a big way, although we in the UK were later to the party than everyone else (this was being played wall-to-wall on MTV Europe a long time before it was a hit in the UK). What they were on about, none of us ever had any idea, really, but the track ruled. Female-fronted, psuedo-rap rock with a massive, massive chaotic chorus - and a fun video - was always going to be a hit in the days when music channels actually realised that alternative music was popular. Incredibly, footage exists on Youtube of the
performance of this on TOTP, although what the comedy outfits are for, I have no idea.
16
VAST
Here
Visual Audio Sensory Theater
1998
A song so radically different to anything that came before it that it still, eleven years hence, sounds unique, it serves as a reminder that small artists can still break through to wider success, even for a short while, with actual talent. This track, the opening track to the striking debut album by Jon Crosby (for he is VAST), introduced itself on the back of string sample that continued to weave it's magic for longer than you'd perhaps expect, before the track proper kicked in - pounding, skyscraping rock that should really have been sung back by stadium crowds, such was it's magnificence. That it never quite worked out like that is a testament to how short-sighted that the music industry can be.
15
Emperor
Ye Entrancemperium
Anthems to the Welkin at Dusk
1997
For me Emperor's finest single track, this is a technically astonishing whirlwind of sound that is somehow surprisingly accessible at the same time (and is also reasonably melodic, too, something you don't always expect from Black Metal). It's still satisfyingly extreme, though, don't worry about that...
14
Machine Head
Davidian
Burn My Eyes
1994
Has metal, really, ever got much better than this? It may be endlessly overplayed nowadays, but there is a good reason for that - it's awesome. From the lengthy tease of the riffing opening, the bellowed chorus, the solos, and that breakdown to close...this is all but metal perfection.
13
Girls Against Boys
Bulletproof Cupid
Venus Luxure No. 1 Baby
1993
Unconnected to the Placebo track of the same name (other than that the Placebo one could be suggested to be a nod to this band), one of the greatest (and unheralded) alt.rock tracks of the early nineties. But then, GVSB never did adhere to fashions, instead preferring to go for a melodic, hardcore-esque sound with Scott McCloud's distinctive, smoky vocals and of course the twin-bass sounds. This track is from their revered Venus Luxure No.1 Baby album, a long-time live favourite and probably featuring Alexis Fleisig's best-ever drumming, too...
12
Front 242
Happiness
Re.Boot. Live
1998
The only live track I even considered for entry into this listing, this was the track that, when released on Re:boot, reminded us that 242 were indeed still very, very vital and very much alive. Much changed from the slightly-dull album version, the way this builds is a textbook lesson in how to do so and raise the tension of the crowd. Perhaps this is why a studio version of this track never materialised in this form: let's be honest, it works best in the live arena, even if this has become a rare live track that DJs are willing to use!
11
White Zombie
Super-Charger Heaven
Astro-Creep: 2000
1995
My girlfriend and I reckon a graph showing number of "Yeeeaaah"s uttered by
Rob Zombie in each song compared to how popular/great they are would show a pretty strong correlation. And here's proof. The skull-crushing, rampaging second track on the last White Zombie album, they never got better than this. You know the song by now, right? Surely I need say no more...
10
The Breeders
Cannonball
Last Splash
1993
Who could have predicted that it would be Kim Deal that got the big success post-Pixies? It took a few years, and the albums never were that consistent, but when her new band got it right, the results were astonishing. And exhibit A? This immortal track, that starts slowly, before blossoming into a garage-surf-punk-sixties revival track that still brings a smile to my face every time I hear it...
9
Spiritualized
Ladies And Gentlemen We Are Floating in Space
Ladies and Gentlemen We Are Floating in Space
1997
The beautiful, aching lullaby that opens
Jason Pierce's
tour de force of drug-infused/related space rock, this is music that really had a soul. And soul, as it turned out. A lament to lost love, or drug addiction, it's difficult to separate them in this context, let's be honest, but either way this is gorgeous. The "proper" version, including the
Elvis Presley lyrics so cruelly removed the first time around, has been played live this year at least (and was even better than the original at the RFH gigs), and is finally released properly on the new release of the album next week.
8
Swans
Failure
White Light From the Mouth of Infinity
1991
Probably the bleakest song about human nature that I will ever include in any list, ever, I'm not sure what this says about me that it's in my top ten songs of the 90s. When
Michael Gira reined in the extremities of the sound of Swans as the 90s dawned, he didn't rein in the lyrical themes of darkness, despair and hate one bit. Here's proof - this track is little more than Gira and a guitar, but emotionally is heavier and more draining than just about anything else he did, an extraordinary musing on the titular subject. Just recently, too,
the astonishing power of the track has been harnessed by My Dying Bride, whose cover is equally brilliant.
7
Misery Loves Co.
Kiss Your Boots
Misery Loves Co.
1995
The first Misery Loves Co. album was, to put it mildly, somewhat unsubtle. For the most part, it was rampaging industrial metal, with more of an emotional core than the machine-orientated themes of the like-minded
Fear Factory, but it didn't come up short on heaviness, either. Kiss Your Boots was a perfect example, made to sound all the heavier by the whispered intro before the chorus bursts into contention. Oh, and that breakdown in the middle was immense, too...
6
Garbage
Vow
Garbage
1995
The song that started Garbage on the way to being big, big stars, and it remains their peak (and that's not to say that the first two albums, at least, weren't brilliant). Channeling elements from various sources (not least Curve, whose earlier style they purloined somewhat), this was a thrilling, chilling track with
Shirley Manson delivering a devastating vocal performance that suggested it was, to say the least, best to stay on her good side. And that phased guitar intro still gives me the shivers.
5
Machines of Loving Grace
Butterfly Wings
Concentration
1993
A band that only ever gained real recognition thanks to their musical inclusion in The Crow, their material otherwise really did merit further listening - one of the many bands experimenting with industrial rock during the decade, their dark, seedy take on the genre resulted in some really interesting and unusual songs, and in particular this one - a track that I first heard thanks to the wonders of 120 Minutes on MTV Europe (oh for the days when MTV still covered real alternative music). A strange, dark but poppy(ish) track with lyrics referencing chaos theory, and something of a contempt for humanity, this was as about as commercial as the band ever got...
4
Alice in Chains
Would?
Dirt
1992
The final track on Dirt, and by some considerable distance the greatest song of the grunge era, I'm not really sure what else to say about this. For one, it always struck me lyrically as
Layne Staley exorcising his demons in song, a plea for those criticising his lifestyle to look at things from his perspective for once. Musically, it's chorus is chillingly moving, but it's the sudden key shift at the end, as the track changes tack entirely, that always leaves a lump in my throat.
3
Dark Star
Vertigo
Twenty Twenty Sound
1998
An album that has been far, far, too precious to me for over ten years now, there was something about Dark Star's spaced-out and taut alt.rock that got me from the off - it may well, frankly, have "Bic" Haye's confessional lyrics that really got their claws in. The slightly messy, confused state-of-mind that the lyrics hinted out certainly resonated with my head at the time, but in particularly the scratchy, muscular beats of Vertigo dug their claws in that little bit deeper than the rest - a track about dusting yourself down, and moving on. The final refrain, of course, became my website domain (and my username here, too).
2
Underworld
Cowgirl
Dubnobasswithmyheadman
1994
The single greatest electronic track ever from probably the greatest of all of the electronic acts, this is eight of the most thrilling minutes to listen to. It doesn't initially sound like a lot - the whirling vortex of the electronics start things off, before
Karl Hyde's stream of conciousness helps the track to get going, and then the beats kick in and we're off on a ride to the stratosphere. Even more astonishing is the live version of this - I saw them close with it late into Sunday evening at V98 and it remains one of the greatest live "moments" of my life.
1
Brainiac
I Am a Cracked Machine
Hissing Prigs in Static Couture
1996
The sheer oddness of this band really cannot be overstated. So far ahead of their time they were in space before most of their so-called peers were rubbing sticks to make fire, their ascent to the top of the pile was cut short by
Tim Taylor's death - and it's tempting to wonder exactly how much further they could have pushed the envelope. While the last EP was a curious, electronic beast, this mighty track was the robotic snarl that closed their last full-length album, with a sound somewhere in the realms of Nine Inch Nails, if they had instead been armed with a Moog and a sonic template closer to new-wave - and where Tim Taylor admits he is flawed, but frankly couldn't give a fuck, as he was a rock star in waiting. A shame that latter bit was never realised.
Coming Soon: My top 100 albums 1990-99
Elvis Presley
