Hey everyone, welcome to the ninth edition in a series of
reviews of a year in music. So far I have covered all the 2000s together as the
Noughtie series,
and so far 1999,
then 1998,
followed by 1997
and 1996,
1995,
1994, 1993 and 1992.
Just in case you’re not familiar with it, here’s the format.
It will be done in five parts. I'll do a brief history of what happened in that
year, followed by my five favourite albums of the year, then what I think the
five best videos are. I'll then do a Top 10 most impactful (still refraining
from using the word important) songs from that year. To wrap it up, I'll do my
favourite songs in a mixtape format. So now that you know where I'm going with
this, let's get to it!
Brief History of the
Year 1991 in Music
- Nirvana release "Nevermind", one of the, if not the biggest album released since, and the grunge genre movement explodes to the mainstream
- Lead singer of Queen, Freddie Mercury, dies of AIDS.
- Oasis form, becoming probably the biggest British band of the nineties.
- Metallica release their self titled album (also called The Black Album), their most successful album in their 31 year career.
- Rage Against the Machine form, starting the nu-metal era of metal, and become one of the most outspoken and controversial bands of the nineties.
- Talking Heads, one of the biggest post-punk and new wave bands of all time, disband. They would only play one more time together, in 2002, when they were inducted into the Rock 'n' Roll Hall of Fame.
My Top 5 Albums of
1991
#5 – “Blood Sugar Sex Magik” by the Red Hot Chili Peppers
Released: 24/9/91
Rating: ***3/4 stars
Stand-out tracks: “Breaking the Girl”, “Give it Away”,
“They’re Red Hot”
I
love the Chilis. They’re a great band. They make music like no other artist out
there. There are have been a few bands that have tried to put their spin on the
funk rock sound that the Chilis have perfected but none have had anywhere near
the success that the Red Hot Chili Peppers have. But my problem with the Chilis
is that their album material is usually a step down from their singles. Quite
consistently in their career. Now I’m sure there are many people who disagree
with me on that of course. It’s just me, I know. Blood Sugar Sex Magik is a
great album though, I thoroughly enjoy listening to it. I mean, it’s the same
pattern, the singles are by far the best songs on the album, but the
non-singles are fun too. If I were to recommend one Chilis album, it’d probably
be this.
#4 – “Out of Time” by R.E.M.
Released: 12/3/91
Rating: ***3/4 stars
Stand-out tracks: “Losing My Religion”, “Shiny Happy
People”, “Radio Song”
Why the Radio Song is not on any Greatest Hits album R.E.M.
have released is beyond me. What a cool track that is.
Anyway, “Out of Time” is an R.E.M. effort that I forgot
about, until I made this article for your pleasure. It surprised me a little
with how good it is. I mean I do prefer “Automatic for the People”, but I take nothing
away from this album, it’s a cracker. One of my favourite non-singles is
“Country Feedback” a song really pulls at the heartstrings, and was so good
that it was released on R.E.M.’s final release of compilation tracks. Michael
Stipe has also called that his favourite ever song, which is quite the
statement. There’s a lot of gold on “Out of Time”, and deserves a lot of
respect as one of R.E.M.’s finest albums.
#3 – “Look Mom, No Head!” by The Cramps
Released: November 1991
Rating: ****1/4 stars
Stand-out tracks: “Bend Over, I'll Drive”, “Dames, Booze,
Chains and Boots”, “I Wanna Get in Your Pants”
Look at Poison Ivy. Man, she was so hot.
#2 – “Metallica” by Metallica
Released: 12/8/91
Rating: ****1/2 stars
Stand-out tracks: “Enter Sandman”, “The Unforgiven”, “Sad
But True”
There are two albums from the year 1991 that probably get
more recognition and praise than any other. It doesn’t matter who you are, what
music you like, or anything else, there are two albums that trumped everything
else in terms of attention and longevity. These two albums are to put simply,
two of the greatest albums of all time.
#1 – “Nevermind” by Nirvana
Released: 24/9/91
Rating: ****1/2 stars
Stand-out tracks: “Endless Nameless”, “Breed”, “Territorial
Pissings”
It’s probably not a surprise that this is my favourite album
from 1991. But what you may find surprising is that I found it very hard to
give this a star rating of ****1/2 stars. It’s one of those albums that for me
is between ****1/4 and ****1/2, but because of the nostalgia, the impact and
the significance of the album, I gave it the latter rating.
This isn’t my favourite Nirvana album. In fact, a case can
be made that it’s my least favourite Nirvana album. But no one can dispute that
this album is great. It’s a fantastic album. It annoys me when a lot of people
talk about this album being crap. It’s not. It’s far from it. But… it was
overplayed. Nirvana as a band, we’re overplayed, overhyped. I wouldn’t say
overrated, but they got so much attention and it was shoved in everyone’s
throats for a long long time. Nevermind was played so much during the nineties,
especially “Smells Like Teen Spirit”. And as I say, rightfully so in a certain
way as it is a great album. But enough was enough.
My Top 5 Music Videos
of 1991
#5 – “Give it Away” by Red Hot Chili Peppers
I have to be honest 1991 wasn’t really that great for videos
but one that always stands out is “Give it Away” by the Chili’s. How can a
video where half naked men in shiny pants and make up in a black and while
video be considered so popular? It’s beyond me in some ways but no one can deny
how this video became iconic. You have to give credit to the director as the video
matches the song perfectly, it’s lively, it’s a little crazy and it actually
looks fun to direct. Just like the song “Give it Away” is all of those things
to a certain extent. “Give it Away” is just a video you have to see to
understand, and to experience.
#4 – “Smells Like Teen Spirit” by Nirvana
It may be an odd choice but this was a great music video.
It’s not the best music video in the world, and it doesn’t have much artistic
direction, but it’s so iconic. It’s a legendary music video. And yes, it is
purely because of the attention the song and the band got, but regardless, this
is a good music video. It shows what Nirvana do best, play music in a raw and
hostile environment. I love all the shots of the dirty gymnasium, the greasy
hair, the playing hard, the cheerleaders, everything. It’s just a music video
that does exactly what music videos are supposed to do, promote the song and
promote the band. And it does both of these things perfectly.
#3 – “Shiny Happy People” by R.E.M.
I forgot how hot Kate Pierson is in this video, and at the
age of 43 as well. What? What can I say? I love redheads! Anyway, I can’t help
but love this video. I think it’s just because band members are all trying
their hardest to look happy but all still look discretely despondent, with the
exception of Kate Pierson anyway, of the B52’s, whose smiles just gleam the
video camera lense. The video is just great, it’s just totally watchable
despite not much really happening apart from the above, in front of a large
painting of childrens drawings of ‘happy people’. It’s just an awesome video.
Oh and one more thing, Michael Stipe’s incredibly brown suit and cap turned
sideways is another amazing highlight of the video.
#2 – “Black or White” by Michael Jackson
If you’re wondering once again I’m including Michael Jackson
when I don’t include pop artists as a rule it’s because I think Michael Jackson
is above and beyond genre dividing. Michael Jackson is a member of an elite
elite ELITE set of musicians of probably 5 to 10 bands or performers that are
untouchable.
“Black or White” is possibly an odd choice for some of you.
There’s, of course, the debate about the message of the video anyway,
considering the weird change of skin colour of Michael Jackson throughout the
eighties and nineties. But take that situation out of the way for a moment and
you have a very cheesy, yet entertaining music video.
Macaulay Culkin plays as the kid who loves rock music and
pisses his father off, and when getting told off, retorts by cranking his electric
guitar volume to a ridiculous level, and the father gets blown away by the
noise to what looks like Africa, where Michael Jackson is dancing and singing
the song (so weird to say that sentence). It’s very cheesy but behind the
cheese is a very serious message about equality and diversity amongst the races
of humanity. At the end of the video was quite memorable and innovative at the
time, is loads of people’s faces of different skin colour and complexions
morphing from one person to another. This type of imagery and technology was
rarely used before Michael Jackson used it in this video, so it was pretty
cool. This video is pretty good but cheesy.
Just in case you were wondering, the original video was
quite controversial as it had racial graffiti all over it, but this isn’t the
version I’m placing at #2 in my list, but the revised version now found all
over music channels that cuts this section out.
#1 – “Enter Sandman” by Metallica
What can I say about “Enter Sandman”? It’s just one of the
best music videos of the early nineties. What it lacks in technological quality
it makes up in vivid imagery. The video pretty much follows the lyrics song,
and deals with a child who can’t sleep properly and dreams vividly of the
Sandman, who, in the video, is a very strange old man that is haunting the
little girl. The girl falls from the top of a building, gets covered in snakes,
gets chased by a truck and falls from a mountain while trying to escape the
truck, all the while the Sandman lurks in and around her dreams throughout the
video. And while all of these events are happening, the band is playing in
parts and throughout the entire time, the screen is flickering, only showing
you in parts what’s happening. It’s just a truly magnificent video, especially
when it aired in 1991, and one that really needs to be seen if not seen before.
The Top 10 Most
Impactful Songs of 1991
As I said, I'm NOT calling it the 'important' list, although
it's more than just popularity as well. Anyway, here are the 10 songs of the
year. It's an unbiased list.
#10 – “I’m Too Sexy” by Right Said Fred
By trade this is a pop song of course, but it’s status is
legendary as a one-hit wonder of a balanced feeling of cringe and awesomeness.
I mean that. This song is absolutely awesome, but it’s cringe-worthy at the
same time. It’s just a truly remarkable song of cheese, slime and facepalmingly
bad lyrics but I dare you not to like it. This track got to #2 in the UK
charts, but it’s never gone away. It’s too bad not to go away. Right Said Fred
has made a career from this song and you will like it, if you like it or not.
That didn’t make sense. In summary, you love this song so don’t deny it!
#9 – “You Could Be Mine” by Guns ‘n’ Roses
Getting to #3 in the UK charts, this GnR song was their highest
charting single in our country until they released “Knockin’ On Heavens Door” a
year later, and the video promoted the classic film “Terminator 2: Judgement
Day”, one of my favourite films ever. It’s tainted nowadays by arguably better
songs like “Paradise City”, “Welcome to the Jungle” and “November Rain”, but
for Guns ‘n’ Roses to get a #3 hit was quite a big deal, and kudos to them for
that. Sorry, I’m not a big fan of Guns ‘n’ Roses or this song! But yeah, you
can’t argue facts, and facts are that in 1991 this was a big hit. A very big
hit.
#8 – “The Fly” by U2
Probably by today’s standards this song isn’t that popular
in comparison to other U2 songs, but this song got to #1 in the UK and at the
time showed a very different side to the band, a slightly harder edge. The song
is probably more famous for being the song that knocked Bryan Adams’
“Everything I Do (I Do it for You)” off the #1 spot after a 16 week stay up
there. That being said it’s only U2’s second #1 single in the UK, and they’ve
had seven. It definitely showed that U2 are capable of branching their sound to
different genres so kudos to them for that.
#7 – “There’s No Other Way” by Blur
Before the days of “Girls and Boys”, “Parklife”, “Country
House”, “Song 2” and “Coffee and TV” came “There’s No Other Way”, only Blur’s
second single, and the single that brought them huge mainstream attention. The
rest of Blur’s career speaks for itself, but if it weren’t for this song, life
would have been a lot more difficult for the Britpop band that made such an
impact over the course of this decade. It’s one of Blur’s more simple songs,
but it’s still exceptionally catchy, and got to #8 in the UK.
#6 – “The Show Must Go On” by Queen
If there’s any song by Queen that’s tragic on a personal
level it’s probably this. The song got to #16, and was written primarily by
legendary guitarist Brian May, and speaks volumes of the pain that Freddie
Mercury was going through in the final year of his life. So much in fact, there
were many concerns whether or not Freddie Mercury could actually sing the song,
but in Brian May’s words, despite all his struggles, Freddie Mercury “he went
in and killed it, completely lacerated that vocal”. So strong is Freddie’s
performance in this song you’d be hard to believe he had any problems at all,
but that was the strength of the man. This was Queen’s last single in the life
of Freddie Mercury. He died six weeks later.
#5 – “Black or White” by Michael Jackson
It may have got to #1 in the UK (and in no fewer than
fourteen other countries) but this song has really tainted over time as a song
that is considered a great Michael Jackson song. It’s not bad don’t get me
wrong, but over his entire career his nineties work is really not taken in high
regard, and even when compared to his other songs of the nineties, this song
still doesn’t really shine ‘brilliance’. Maybe it’s due to the fact that
Michael Jackson is asking us all not to judge a man or woman by the colour of
their skin, yet the mysteries of his skin colour changing over time definitely
questions that logic. Regardless of is Michael Jackson had skin pigmentation
surgery or not, this song and its ethic and moral message, is still important,
and obviously the song had a fantastic impact in 1991.
#4 – “Under the Bridge” by Red Hot Chili Peppers
It was initially hard to choose between “Give it Away” and
“Under the Bridge” as the Chili’s song from the classic “Blood Sugar Sex Magik”
album but after a deeper thought it became very obvious that this song had to
be included in a list of songs that created the most impact. Sure, on a
commercial level, “Give it Away” is the cooler, funkier, more mainstream track,
but deeper down, on a personal level for Anthony Kiedis himself, and as a song
that has created more for the band long term, there’s barely no dispute that
this is one of the Chili Peppers’ finest moments in their illustrious career.
What a song this is. Getting to #13 in the UK, it’s only one of two songs in
the entire Chili’s discography to go platinum in the US (the other being the
far inferior “Dani California”). It’s just a beautifully sad song that deals
with loneliness and depression, and is one of Kiedis’ finest pieces of music.
#3 – “Losing My Religion” by R.E.M.
Once again, another song by another band has been more
successful (this time it’s “Shiny Happy People”) but is omitted for a song that
may not have charted as high, but has had a far larger impact on the career of
the band long term. “Losing My Religion” got to #19, their second biggest hit
in the UK at the time (“The One I Love” got to #16). The song’s lyrics deal
with pining for someone who doesn’t really feel the same way, a feeling I’m
sure we’re all very familiar with. But the song is much more famous for the
riff on the mandolin, an instrument Peter Buck, the guitarist was only starting
to learn at the time. It’s such a beautiful instrument and is the key to why
this song is so memorable. What a song.
#2 – “Enter Sandman” by Metallica
Getting to #5 in the UK is no easy feat for a metal artist,
but Metallica did just that with this blistering effort (they also did it a
second time with “Until it Sleeps”). It’s arguably one of, if not the biggest
Metallica song ever. The lyrics are infamous, the music video memorable, but
nothing can beat the opening intro of the song. It’s absolutely sublime; it’s
one of the best openings to a song ever. “Enter Sandman” is responsible for
turning heads to how good metal can sound, and then “The Black Album”
solidified that foundation. It’s such a huge track, such a brilliant song, and
it’ll forever go down in history as one of metal’s finest efforts.
#1 – “Smells Like Teen Spirit” by Nirvana
It’s not really a dispute about what was the most
“Impactful” song of 1991. You can easily make a case that this song made a bigger
impact than any song of the nineties. But that’s a conversation for another
day. For today, is the day we celebrate “Smells Like Teen Spirit”, THE song of
the year 1991.
My opening paragraph talks about how the old guard of the
eighties were losing their hold on the change in music. Something was needed to
shake music up, but nothing new was really coming. Until September. “Smells
Like Teen Spirit” changed music history forever.
I don’t even know how or why. It’s not as if it’s the most
amazing song. Nirvana have made much better songs than this. I mean, I really
like “Teen Spirit” but I prefer other songs. But something happened, something
clicked, a bond was made between audience and song, and it changed Nirvana
forever. It changed grunge forever, alternative rock and music changed.
Suddenly bands who were previously considered uncool became cool and it changed
the pop charts for a good amount of time. “Smells Like Teen Spirit” is
responsible for that change, and if you like the song or not, you have to
appreciate what impact this song had. It may have only got to #7 in the UK, but
it simply changed everything.
The Year 1991 Mixtape
Just in case you didn't know by now...
"A Mixtape is a playlist of a certain genre, band or
era. The list is generally 80 minutes long, the same length of a blank CD, with
further recommendations if some of the songs aren’t to your taste. Remember
kids, downloading is wrong!"
So here we go! My favourite songs from the year 1991. Yes,
this is a biased list.
You can now listen to this playlist on YouTube! Just click here!
You can now listen to this playlist on YouTube! Just click here!
- You Belong in Rock and Roll - David Bowie
- I'm Going Slightly Mad – Queen
- Losing My Religion - R.E.M.
- There's No Other Way – Blur
- Mistadobalina - Del the Funky Homosapien
- Gett Off – Prince
- Charly - The Prodigy
- Sheela-Na-Gig - PJ Harvey
- Love Your Money – Daisy Chainsaw
- Planet of Sound – The Pixies
- Rhinoceros - Smashing Pumpkins
- Give it Away - Red Hot Chili Peppers
- Smells Like Teen Spirit – Nirvana
- Eyeball in My Martini - The Cramps
- Hey Stoopid - Alice Cooper
- Jesus Built My Hotrod - Ministry
- Hangar 18 – Megadeth
- Enter Sandman - Metallica
And here are the five alternative songs if you don't like
some of the above...
- How I Could Just Kill a Man - Cypress Hill
- Black or White - Michael Jackson
- When You Don't See Me - Sisters of Mercy
- Well, Did You Evah! - Iggy Pop and Deborah Harry
- Kiss Them For Me - Siouxsie and the Banshees
And there we go! The year 1991 in review! Next month
naturally I’ll be covering the final year in the nineties, 1990, and continue
my descend into music history. What we your favourite songs and albums from
1991? Any other comments or queries? Raise them below. Thanks for your time.
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