originally posted August 8, 2008
I recently sat down and decided to make a mix of my favorite tracks of the 90s. I've been feeling that the 2000s era of music generally has been disappointing when it comes to discovering new artists, or just really great songs that I'll fondly look back on a decade later.
At first, I thought the 90s were the same so I challenged myself to see if I could name 90 songs of the 90s. I was partially inspired by an article that did just that, but I only agreed with about 4 or 5 choices. I was pleasantly surprised to find out it wasn't that hard, and even ran out of slots pretty quickly.
So here's my subjective list. The only rule is only one song per artist, and the song doesn't even have to represent an amazing album counterpart, just be a good song on its own (although I can highly recommend most of the albums these songs come from).
Lee's Top 90 of the 90s: (in alphabetical order)
1. Ace of Base - The Sign
2. Air - Kelly Watch the Stars (Moog Cookbook remix)
3. Tori Amos - Black Swan
4. Tasmin Archer - Sleeping Satellite
5. Beck - The New Pollution
6. Belly - Now They'll Sleep
7. Ben Folds Five - Alice Childress (live @ KCRW)
8. Birdie - Let Her Go
9. Jonatha Brooke - Nothing Sacred
10. Rosanne Cash - Sleeping in Paris
11. Cocteau Twins - Bluebeard
12. Shawn Colvin - Round of Blues
13. Elvis Costello - 13 Steps Lead Down
14. Crash Vegas - Old Enough
15. Marshall Crenshaw - Fantastic Planet of Love
16. Cathy Dennis - Too Many Walls
17. Desree - You Gotta Be
18. Dodgy - Good enough
19. Thomas Dolby - Cruel (feat. Eddi Reader)
20. Francis Dunnery - Too Much Saturn
21. E - The Only Thing I Care About
22. Even As We Speak - Falling Down the Stairs
23. Jason Falkner - My Lucky day
24. Dionne Farris - I Know
25. Stephen Fearing - The Station
26. Five Guys Named Moe - Selfish Days
27. Fountains of Wayne - Red Dragon Tattoo
28. Frazier Chorus - Bye Bye Little Bird
29. Lennie Gallant - Somebody Like you
30. Eliza Gilkyson - All That You Want
31. Gin Blossoms - Til I Hear It From You
32. Gowan - Dancing On My Own Ground
33. Amy Grant - How Can We See That Far
34. The Grays - Very Best Years
35. Guided By Voices - Motor Away (single version)
36. Emmylou Harris - Wrecking Ball
37. Juliana Hatfield - Perfection
38. Heavenly - Tool
39. The High Llamas - Doo-wop Property
40. Veda Hille - Precious Heart
41. Peter Himmelman - Always in Disguise (live @ KCRW)
42. Nicky Holland - Independence Days
43. Joe Jackson - Sea Of Secrets
44. Jale - To Be Your Friend
45. Jamiroquai - Too Young To Die
46. Jellyfish - Ghost at Number One
47. Katydids - Girl in a Jigsaw Puzzle
48. Lava Hay - Here and Nowhere
49. Donna Lewis - Falling
50. Lightening Seeds - My Best Day
51. Nick Lowe - I Live on a Battlefield
52. Kirsty MacColl - All I Ever Wanted
53. Mike Flowers Pops - A Groovy Place
54. Joni Mitchell - Yvette in English
55. Mae Moore - Evolution (the same way)
56. New Radicals - You Get What You Give
57. The Nines - Ghost Town Sunday
58. Ocean Colour Scene - You've Got It Bad
59. One2One - Memory Lane
60. The Orchids - A Kind of Eden
61. Pineforest Crunch - Cup Noodle Song
62. Pizzicato 5 - Happy sad
63. Plumtree - Effin'
64. Pursuit of Happiness - Pressing Lips
65. The Rheostatics - Claire
66. Spookey Ruben - These Days Are Old
67. Bic Runga - Sway
68. September 67 - Don't Break
69. Ron Sexsmith - Secret heart
70. Jane Siberry - Love is Everything
71. Sloan - Worried Now
72. Son - Go Along With It
73. St. Etienne - Who Do You Think You Are
74. Sugar - Believe What You're Saying
75. The Sugarplastic - Polly Brown
76. The Sundays - Here's Where the Story Ends
77. Sunzet - You To Me Are Everything
78. Matthew Sweet - Sick of Myself
79. They Might Be Giants - Birdhouse In Your Soul
80. Toad the Wet Sprocket - All I Want
81. Toy Matinee - Ballad of Jenny Ledge
82. Trash Can Sinatras - Only Tongue Can Tell
83. Jen Trynin - Getaway (February)
84. Veruca Salt - With David Bowie
85. Was (Not Was) - Elvis's Rolls Royce (feat. Leonard Cohen)
86. Weezer - I Just Threw Out the Love of My Dreams
87. Wendy and Lisa - Skeleton Key
88. Dar Williams - What do you hear?
89. The Wonders - That Thing You Do
90. XTC - Then She Appeared
An archive of Lee's posts from his Early Edition blogpage.
