Confession: I can’t hear what makes 90s music dated. I’m a child of the 80s and 90s and to me the 90s just sound like good music. A couple of nights ago, I was hanging out with some girlfriends, one of them is super obsessed with the 90s and just a couple years younger than me.
She gets it. She’s heard it all – except for some of the more obscure 90s bands like Belly and Hum. I made her this Spotify 90s Grunge Playlist full of B-sides, obscure tracks, and some of the best songs from the 90s that we all know like Feel the Pain by Dinosaur Jr.
It was fun to make and I haven’t been able to stop listening to it since!
It includes a little bit of everything – Sonic Youth, Mudhoney, Beck, and Mazzy Star. It’s really going to bring you back!
As for me, I think I’m starting to hear what sounds dated to other people. That crazy amount of distortion – that’s actually pretty clear since everyone had switched to CD’s and recording to CD quality. The distortion is less warm than previous generations that we’re recording to vinyl. There’s also a lot of reverb on these vocals. But since that’s used so often if new indie music, it’s hard for me to hear the difference.
This Dinosaur Jr. video is awesome. Don’t miss it.
Another thing that separates 90s grunge are the lyrics. They are sometimes disturbing, sometimes violent, and more aggressive that what people write today. Take this line from the Belly song included in the 90s grunge mix
“This little squirrel I used to be slammed her bike down the stairs. They put silver where her teeth had been. Baby silvertooth she grins and grins.”
Pretty dark, right? I hope you enjoy this playlist and don’t miss all our other Spotify mixes that you can find below and here in this link.
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Hi Brittany! Thanks for the list! I actually have tapes and CDs of 90’s songs. I can’t stop listening to them. I even have the LSS whenever I listen to them. Yes, music was changing, there’s so much songs appearing as time goes by, but, I still love the 90’s songs.