Best Decade Tournament - 90s - Numbers wins!

[koopee27]

stip
abnorman
kaius
numbers

kp

[Mike]

stip
platypus
durden
numbers

[ABNorman]

Stip - I think PryTo expected this. He's got some great tracks (Shame on a Nigga is one of my favourite 90's songs), but he obviously wasn't trying for the RM vote. I'm glad he didn't, though.

ABNorman - Didn't really expect to make it past the first round. There's a definite split between voters: the Lament crowd who want to hear new stuff and be wowed by obscure tracks, and others (like me) who want to draft some big songs. That said, Plat's team is really good, especially as a team. He and PryTo are the two teams in this thing that really stand out for their different approach.

DcT - Just too much on Kaius' list I don't care for: NMH is OK, don't like Tool, QotSA are middle of the road, and Hurt will forever be a Johnny Cash song for me now. All his other choices are great, but Joey's way more on my wavelength: Sliver, PJ, Just, Alanis, Waits, Tremor Christ and Elliott Smith - all top choices. This is a strong team.

numbers - The presence of I Got Shit really bugs me, but otherwise this is another group of great tracks that are on my side of voting criteria. BiH starts off strong (Only Shallow is a top 10 90's track, Dive is an inspired choice), but goes all over the place after track 4.

[William Bloke]

Loving these more wordy votes peeps.

As to the big name/obscure song trade off thing, I will always vote based on the whole selection of songs, but yeh, for sure I get more joy in finding something new that is cool than something I already knew. Doesn't mean the 'unusual' team is gonna get my vote though.

[ABNorman]

Loving these more wordy votes peeps.

As to the big name/obscure song trade off thing, I will always vote based on the whole selection of songs, but yeh, for sure I get more joy in finding something new that is cool than something I already knew. Doesn't mean the 'unusual' team is gonna get my vote though.

Yup, I love discovering cool new stuff as well - RM's really helped with that in the last few months. And I'm not just voting for "most classic songs" or anything. But say, for example, it came down to one song, and I had to choose between a stone cold 90's classic that I liked and a previously unheard song that I really liked. I'd swing toward the classic based on what I enjoy, and based on what a "best of" tournament entails for me.

[LetMeSleep]

Yep. And as Sarge mentioned, you may like a song on first listen now but some tracks have lived with you for 20 years. With all that that entails.

[PryTo]

Stip
ABNorman
DCT
Numbers

[William Bloke]

Stip
ABNorman
DCT
Numbers

The vote against self! That's not very fucking hip hop, my niggah!

[William Bloke]

Yep. And as Sarge mentioned, you may like a song on first listen now but some tracks have lived with you for 20 years. With all that that entails.

Yeah, looking at my "voting matrix" (I told y'all I got all fully scientific and shit this time around!) even the new songs that I really liked didn't get up to the old songs that I loved.

But the thing is it ain't about the voting regardless - like plat said that's just gravy. And you all know how I feel about "How to Make Gravy"! I'm just glad to have discovered some cool new stuff.

RM Song tourneys - serious business.

[William Bloke]

PryTo vs stip
I spoke of stip's team last round.

I listened through PryTo's team with the expectation of totally despising it but was for the most pleasantly surprised. I already knew the Tupac tune and love the line "even as a crack queen, Mama, you always were a black queen". Shame on a Nigga was great and get's bonus points for the line "And get funk like a shoe! What?". Mind Playing Tricks on Me was indeed a fucked up story, but OK, and Alive on Arrival was the usual classy Ice Cube. My fave though was the last track, Dig It, which I, uh, dug. Of the 10 tracks it was only The Hot Boys and Big Pun that I really didn't enjoy.

Theplatypus vs. Abnorman
I spoke of plat's team last round. It is one of my tourney faves.

ABNorman has the gold star 1979 and Teen Spirit, as well as an excellent tune in Loser and good stuff with Don't Look Back in Anger, Long December and Henry Lee. Bonus points for the local track Blue Eyes. Unfortuantely I can't stand Peaches which means this team was essentially out of only 9 songs for me.

Durdencommatyler vs. Kaius
team dct has a gold standard track in Just and excellent picks in Going Out West and Tremor Christ. Never Said is good and the Sexton and Smith tunes were nice. The rest is fairly middle of the road for me, although I do like Sliver more than most Nirvana tunes.

I spoke of Kaius' team last round.

Numbers vs. Birds In Hell
This was a close one. Numbers has the gold standard Bittersweet Symphony and the excellent Cannonball and I Got Shit. Radiohead, REM, Beck and Alanis were all good. Nothing to particularly dislike here.

I spoke of spenno's team last round.

[ABNorman]

See how you feel about Peaches after this:

[stip]

Pryto is pulling from areas I don't normally have or particularly want a relationship with, but I find myself always looking forward to his picks. I've occasionally found something that works for me, but I always learn why these songs are important and interesting and mean so much to others. For me, anyway, that's almost as good as finding something new for myself - and much more reliable

And echoing abnorman I like discovering new stuff, but it's tough to beat a song that's been in my life more than anything but my family and a few friends

[i got bugs]

Pry Norman Kaius numbers

First one was really close.. I'll give props to old school rap but it looks like he's in trouble regardless

[Kaius]

stip
plat
kaius
numbers

[Lament]

Just to make sure, you guys understand that those of us picking "obscure" songs have also lived with and loved these songs for 15+ years as well, right?

[ABNorman]

Just to make sure, you guys understand that those of us picking "obscure" songs have also lived with and loved these songs for 15+ years as well, right?

Oh, sure - I wasn't arguing against that. I was talking more about the voting process: there's two camps. And that's not a bad thing - just an observation about how we're drafting/voting.

I strongly suspect more than a few people drafting could've gone for a few popular/more obviously influential tracks they loved, but chose to draft less mainstream stuff instead (for whatever reason). Which is fine - I'm just pointing out that my criteria for a best-of includes at least a couple of tracks that had a large impact.

As long as people aren't selecting either without good reason.

[BigRedLedbetter]

Stip

Abnorman

Durdencommatyler

Birds in hell

[ABNorman]

Though I admit I also do get a little turned off by the music snobbery that sometimes pervades places like RM. For every song that people pan because they legitimately don't like it, there's another that they pan because they think they should. That's my perception, at least.

[Birds in Hell]

I strongly suspect more than a few people drafting could've gone for a few popular/more obviously influential tracks they loved, but chose to draft less mainstream stuff instead (for whatever reason).

This certainly wasn't the case with me. If anything, I felt like some of my choices were a little too obvious (for lack of a better term) but I'd decided to run with a selection of songs that held a lot of personal significance to me and, most importantly, worked as a complete team.

[ABNorman]

most importantly, worked as a complete team.

This is something I might think more about in the 2000's draw (though probably not, 'cuz I'm lazy). A couple of the more cohesive teams in this one are more than the sum of their parts for me.