Your 90s nostalgia (Bar's open).

[P-Jay]

I had a pretty chaotic 90's. I spent the first half in secondary school painfully shy, wearing Splinter Jackets listening to Sonic Youth (my 'style' was a mix of the rave / grunge scene) first part time job in '94 turned me into a massive pisshead - but I went from zero to hero, and I've honestly no clue why - I started secondary school and people who spent 2 years sat next to me in Maths couldn't pick me out of a line-up, but at 16 I was Mr Popular, I used to sit in the corner of the local underage pub holding court.

By '97 my relationship with my folks was all but dead and I was booted unceremoniously into the big wild world so education was over for me - took a job in a call centre and moved into with some of the lads from the office - two psychotic Kiwi's using borrowed identities to work here and our live-in landlord who was a freelancer in the pills and powers industry - spent the rest of the 90's in a complete haze. Genuinely if I could edit all my memories of that period of me like into a one seamless film it would run for 2-3 hours at most. I went to Glastonbury 4 times, but the all seem to merge into one. Went to warehouse parties and stumbled into that whole elitist club night thing, but hated it. I was arrested twice, but again in my mind the 2 instances are 1 haphazard mix, some how managed to get to the end of the decade without serious injury or criminal record.

By the time the Millennium came about (the biggest non-event in the history of over-hyped events) I was a real mess, I was 23, but looked 33 - I've seen photos and I look older than I do now. Fell in love with a Girl who didn't love me, but kept me on the hook for a year until one day she dropped into conversation she was off to New Zealand for a year backpacking - I asked to go with her but she less than politely told me I'd be cramping her style - one of my best mates had, had enough of my self-destructive lifestyle and talked me into going to OZ for a year with him in 2000, came back clean and healthy 9 months later - I couldn't say it saved my life, but it certainly snapped be back to the straight and narrow.

[P-Jay]

zeb said:

Definate age related comment but........the music was soooo much better

It really wasn't - you just remember the 1% that was great, and have forgotten the rest - lest we forget whilst Oasis and Blur were the big mainstream names of the late 90's - Robson and Jerome, two actors of dubious singing talent spent more time in the charts, more time at No1 and sold more records than they did - combined.

[toon10]

Ned's Atomic Dustbin
Curtains haircut
Flared jeans
Nova GTE's
Judge Nutmeg
The Mary Whitehouse Experience
LCL lager and McEwans Best Scotch

That's what my brain returns when I search on 90's.

[Adenauer]

P-Jay said:

lest we forget whilst Oasis and Blur were the big mainstream names of the late 90's - Robson and Jerome, two actors of dubious singing talent spent more time in the charts, more time at No1 and sold more records than they did - combined.

You have to be kidding, really?

[PurpleTurtle]

goneape said:

Since Radio 2 has decided to reincarnate the Evening Session for the week, BBC 2 is showing Ian Hislop pondering the British obsession with the past, it's been a long day and the bar is open; I got to pondering fondly about the 1990s when I was in my formative years. I got my GCSEs and A Levels, went to University, made lots of lifelong friends (and met a few hate figures/comedy villains), passed a few woman related milestones etc....

Thought I'd ask, what do you remember fondly from that time? Here's some of mine to start:

The grunge scene
Big baggy grungy jumpers
DM boots
Indie music - obvious choices but also stuff like Gene, Ash, James, Supergrass, Lush, Elastica, Echobelly
No jeans, T-shirts or trainers to get into a club
Pulp Fiction / Reservoir Dogs
"Curtains" hairstyles
Ben Sherman shirts
Kickers
Late night rutting on parental sofas
Cheap as chips student PoS motoring
Drinking st beer with good mates in secluded places, beach/woods after dark etc
Ripping up deserted chalk pits etc on st early mountain bikes
Airfix
Superclubs
Spaced
Labatts Ice
TVR
X Files
Alicia Silverstone
Senna/Prost
Hill/Schumacher
Murray, obviously
Men Behaving Badly
Volvo 850 T5R (still would!)
The first internet chatrooms

I'm thinking mainly pre-www and pre-mobile phone 90s, good times or rose tinted specs?

I think On and Different Class in the car tomorrow.

Excellent post Sir, we seemed to have lived almost parallel lives! There's a Britpop show on BBC4 tomorrow night .. ironically I will need to record it as I am out seeing The Manic Street Preachers @Brixton Academy!

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p01tmt65

I dated an indie chick at the time, she loved her DM boots, I remember my brother saying he'd refuse to have anything to do with a girl who wore them! We also got into listening to cool British bands (I was more yer Simple Minds/U2/Depeche Mode end of the spectrum until then, all established acts, I wasn't listening to anything *new*).

They were such great times. I also passed my driving test, ran round in a VW Beetle (regularly bked by the grouchy old landlord of my local for having Primal Scream's Loaded blasting out of my old air-cooled shed .... Aiwa speakers on the back self, auto reverse tape deck!).

I too had the curtains haircut, the late night parental sofa rutting, all great parts of my yoof! I went to Uni '91-'94, so left as Britpop was just kicking off. I remember watching Pulp on TV at Glastonbury (June '94?) when BBC was first starting to dedicate some decent coverage to it, Jarvis was brilliant. I thought, "I *have* to go there" ... been going ever since! Incidentally it's 20yrs tomorrow since Oasis released Supersonic .... I had it turned up to 11 as I drove to work in my middle-ranking corporate suit job this morning!

I still listen to music of that era all the time. Martin Rossiter from Gene put out a great solo album not so long back. My only disappointment is that Louise Wener was my total indie pin-up, but I saw her interviewed on TV more recently in her guise of chick-lit author, she came across as massively pretentious, a real bubble burst!

Right ... time for a YuuTube Vortex!

[TheD]

Tudor Pickled Onion......mmmmmmmm

[toon10]

P-Jay said:

zeb said:

Definate age related comment but........the music was soooo much better

It really wasn't - you just remember the 1% that was great, and have forgotten the rest - lest we forget whilst Oasis and Blur were the big mainstream names of the late 90's - Robson and Jerome, two actors of dubious singing talent spent more time in the charts, more time at No1 and sold more records than they did - combined.

There's always been bad music and good music throughout the ages but from a popularity point of view, the majority of modern music is rap, mindless R&B or through away pop. In the 90's there was still a lot of that sort of thing but I'd wager more actual bands and good ones at that. The charts were awash with James, Stone Roses, Inspiral Carpets and now we have Dizzy Rascal, Rhianna, Pink and Lady Gaga. There's a lot of good music around these days but I'd say the the percentage of good bands being popular is a lot less now than it was then.

Nobody I went to college with in the 90's would listen to suburban white kids from from the outskirts of Kent rapping about gangsta life in the hood with their homies. Now the yoof seem to be proud that they listen to absolute garbage. I related more to the working class northern English bands as that was my upbringing. I've got no connection to gansta rap from the projects in Compton but a lot of the acts around seem to take their culture from uneducated American criminals.

Wow I sound like a real old git. I've already been called Victor Meldrew once today.

[ajprice]

Lots of things mentioned already for me.

Stuff

Mark & Lard
Playstation. Mainly Gran Turismo and Wipeout (with the Prodigy on the soundtrack when you were playing)
Radiohead when they were a guitar band
Max Power magazine

TV Stuff

TFI Friday
BTCC
WWF Wrestling
Bottom
Father Ted
Game On

[OllieC]

hate to be the 'music was better' brigade (we've all heard it from our elders) but I do believe it was.

Hip-Hop / rap was better, that's a fact
'Guitar' based bands, many more decent outfits, and lots of variety from the likes of Suede or Pulp at one end, through Oasis blur stereophonics etc to grunge and acts like RATM
Dance / Electronic - easily better imho.

/old git

[Rickyy]

JRewing said:

A different time. Also oft-seen in the '90s were really st bodykits encouraged by Max Power.

TSW venoms! Remember those?

[OllieC]

Rickyy said:

JRewing said:

A different time. Also oft-seen in the '90s were really st bodykits encouraged by Max Power.

TSW venoms! Remember those?

compliments a peco back box nicely

[P-Jay]

OllieC said:

hate to be the 'music was better' brigade (we've all heard it from our elders) but I do believe it was.

Hip-Hop / rap was better, that's a fact
'Guitar' based bands, many more decent outfits, and lots of variety from the likes of Suede or Pulp at one end, through Oasis blur stereophonics etc to grunge and acts like RATM
Dance / Electronic - easily better imho.

/old git

I'm still not convinced - dance music was especially appalling in the 90's - yes you had Voodoo Ray and Café Del Mar, but the charts were awash with terrible 'dance music' which was any old crap sample with a 'house beat' attached to it.

And the 90's really was the era of the Novelty record.

[ajprice]

P-Jay said:

And the 90's really was the era of the Novelty record.

[P-Jay]

One thing I do miss, is the mystery of life, the uncertainty of going to the pub and wondering if you'd bump into a mate there, or hearing about peoples adventures or just the anonymity of being out and about and not connected to the rest of the world.

Mobiles, the Internet, social media, 24 hour news - they all existed in the 90's but they were much 'smaller' (except the phones of course) and less woven into our lives, nothing is a mystery anymore, everything is known, documented with a visual record forever and for everyone.

But then I get all misty eyed remembering 'last orders' and Sunday drinking hours, when they were plainly crap.

[aka_kerrly]

Rickyy said:

JRewing said:

A different time. Also oft-seen in the '90s were really st bodykits encouraged by Max Power.

TSW venoms! Remember those?

Haha, I still have two sets of TSW venoms and a set of TSW Hockenhiem R just in case there is future demand ;-)

[Matt_N]

P-Jay said:

I'm still not convinced - dance music was especially appalling in the 90's - yes you had Voodoo Ray and Café Del Mar, but the charts were awash with terrible 'dance music' which was any old crap sample with a 'house beat' attached to it.

The 90s, inparticular the late 90s was a brilliant time for dance music?

The house and trance scenes went massive on the back of the baleric sound and many new genres really established themselves.

Some came and went but they layed the foundations to many of the genres heard today.

[melvster]

Max Power magazine
Playstation 1 and Granturismo
Nike Air Max
Vauxhall Nova's equipped with a "KENWOOD" sun strip
Nokia 3210

[ChemicalChaos]

Matt_N said:

The 90s, inparticular the late 90s was a brilliant time for dance music?

Sandstorm

Infinity

[vixen1700]

[bexVN]

Orbital, Chemical Brothers, Fat Boy Slim, they were all top of their game for the dance sscene (commercially and otherwise)

Not forgetting The Prodigy being brilliant in the 90'sI played that CD to death!!

Edited by bexVN on Thursday 10th April 13:12