Best Decade Tournament - 90s - Numbers wins!

[LetMeSleep]

Hope is quite heavenly.

[Heathen]

ok I think I got this

[Heathen]

Sorry guys, I went with C

Built to Spill - Carry the Zero



I sent a pm to PryTo

[Birds in Hell]

Good one.

[LetMeSleep]

Some nice teams forming.

[PryTo]

Wu Tang Clan’s 1993 debut is considered a classic, but people forget how completely radical it was when it was first released. This was the pinnacle of the Snoop/Dre “g-funk” era, which featured million-dollar production that sounded like it actually cost a million dollars: thick drums, massive, rumbling (live) basslines, moaning female backup singers, and glossy keys. By contrast, Wu Tang’s debut sounded like it was recorded in a trash bag submerged fifty feet under water. It was murky, it was grimy, it was just plain weird sounding. The fact that it sounded so totally out of left field was one thing that made people listen over and over again. Were these cats serious? Was this for real? Was it good or horrible?

The Wu sprung seemingly out of nowhere and invited listeners to step into a fully formed but totally new world. For rap fans, it was like discovering a new planet, one that was not only inhabited but seemed a lot more interesting than home. It was the sonic equivalent of the bar scene in the first Star Wars movie. Dialogue snippets from obscure Kung Fu flicks smashed up against herky jerky beats. Nothing sounded right, nothing sounded in place. It was impenetrable and it was fantastic. Undeniable – and this was key – was that the group’s nine (!) rappers were supremely gifted lyricists with distinct styles, flows, cadences, and subject matters. Those brick thick New Yawk accents, which sounded straight out of central casting from a Scorsese flick, made everything that much more fun.

Although you could make a case for “C.R.E.A.M.” (the most famous song, but one that sounds like nothing else here) there’s no single track that really represents the Wu debut. The group had too many ideas, too many rappers, too many samples to summarize it in a single track. But for sheer weirdness, I always liked the second tune, which features three of the Clan’s most compelling MCs: Ol’ Dirty Basterd, the group’s crazy-eyed complete nut job; Method Man, a hot-flowing stoner; and Raekwan, the Clan’s most rugged and in-your-face lyricist. Listen to those jagged horn samples. Listen to that beat that you can’t quite tap your feet to. Listen to the rhymes that don’t quite connect, skipping words that you expect to be there. What are these guys even saying? I have no idea. Through the grime and murk, one thing was crystal clear – whatever this was, it was awesome.



Wu Tang Clan – “Shame on a Nigga”

[Birds in Hell]

The Breeders - 'Safari'

[epilogue]

Radiohead - Just (and this song has my all time favorite video, btw)

[epilogue]

Neutral Milk Hotel - Holland, 1945

[ABNorman]

Now we're cooking with gas. Great picks all.

[numbers]

Radiohead - Just (and this song has my all time favorite video, btw)

awesome pick, was considering it for next.

[Birds in Hell]

Swervedriver - 'Last Train to Satansville'

[PryTo]

One glance at the cover of the Geto Boys 1991 sophomore opus “We Can’t Be Stopped” made it clear that whatever music was inside was not for the meek of heart.



From wiki:

“The album cover is a graphic picture of member Bushwick Bill in the hospital. Bill was shot in the eye as he and his girlfriend tussled over the gun. Bushwick Bill wanted her to kill him and during the altercation he was shot as both hands were on the gun. The other two Geto Boys members and the group's management team took Bill out of the hospital room in order to take the picture, removing his eyepatch and intravenous drip in the process.”

Few songs in rap manage to capture a mood quite like the album’s standout single. It’s easily the finest song the Get Boys ever served up. A sense of paranoia and stress runs through every second of the song. The first three verses (by Scarface, Willie D, and then Scarface again) offer a laundry list of woes, set to a perfectly chosen Isaac Hayes sample that solidifies the creepy vibe.

But the song doesn’t really give you chills until the third verse, spit by Bushwick Bill, the trio’s de facto leader (and likely the only midget rapper to ever go Platinum). While Scarface and D tell tales of peeping out of windows and seeing enemies in the everyday, Bill takes it a step further. It’s Halloween and he and the crew are out trick or treating, hilariously “robbing little kids for bags.” They gets into a fistfight with a frightening adversary, so tall that they must “triple team” him.

The more I swung the more blood flew
Then he disappeared and my boys disappeared, too
Then I felt just like a fiend
It wasn't even close to Halloween
It was dark as fuck on the streets
My hands were all bloody from punching on the concrete

It’s all been a hallucination. It’s not Halloween, there was no adversary, or even a crew. There is just Bill, alone in the dark, punching his fists to bloody pulps as he rains down blows upon on the concrete.

That’s pretty brilliant storytelling, folks, at least for a set of song lyrics. And this really was one of the first gangsta rap tunes that didn’t either brag about how great it was to be a gangsta or describe in clichéd terms the struggles of thug life. Rather, it recounted in blunt, knowing prose the mental anguish of the streets -- the paranoia, the feeling of constantly looking over one’s shoulder, of assuming the worse about those closest to you, and eventually slipping into dementia. Lots of songs have copied this blueprint, but none have topped the original.



Geto Boys – Mind Playing Tricks on Me

[epilogue]

Dude, Spenno, that Breeders song?

[Heathen]

Swans - Helpless Child

[epilogue]

Radiohead - Just (and this song has my all time favorite video, btw)

awesome pick, was considering it for next.

Glad I took it, then.

I was torn and considered waiting until next round. But then I listened to it again and just... I mean, just listen to it.

[ABNorman]

Radiohead - Just (and this song has my all time favorite video, btw)

awesome pick, was considering it for next.

Glad I took it, then.

I was torn and considered waiting until next round. But then I listened to it again and just... I mean, just listen to it.

I was also going to go for this next. Good grab.

[numbers]

Radiohead - Just (and this song has my all time favorite video, btw)

awesome pick, was considering it for next.

Glad I took it, then.

I was torn and considered waiting until next round. But then I listened to it again and just... I mean, just listen to it.

It was one of like 6 Radiohead songs I'm going back and forth with.

[ABNorman]

Is it Ted Bundy or BRL now?

[numbers]

bundy, I think.