90's Guilty Pleasures #58: The New Radicals "You Get What You Give" (1998)

This band's similarities to Todd Rundgren have become almost a cliche from its defenders. However, Todd is amazing, and nothing else on the radio during the 90's or since sounded like him, so it stands an adequate defense.

I'm pretty sure the main reason why lots of people hate "You Get What You Give" is because of the section where Gregg Alexander sings that he wants to kick the asses of Beck, Hanson, Courtney Love, and Marilyn Manson, as a way to try and further convince the kids that they truly do have the music within themselves. Even with this context, the lyrical passage seems to arrive from nowhere. Also, the rhyming of "Hanson," "Manson," and "mansion" is definitely a cop-out of sorts.

There's almost nothing more to say about The New Radicals that hasn't already been stated by Chuck Klosterman in his "10 Most Accurately Rated Bands" feature (which can be found in Klosterman IV and in a 2005 edition of SPIN magazine). However, since I'm such a genius, I was able to think of 4 more things...

#1 Gregg Alexander was covered by Rivers Cuomo years before Weezer or The New Radicals existed. The cover was "The World We Love So Much," and it's been revered by many as one of the best tracks from the 2 Alone compilations. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RYNA-SKrYiY
#2 The follow-up to "You Get What You Give" was "Someday We'll Know," which wasn't nearly as good, but was covered by Mandy Moore on the A Walk To Remember soundtrack.
#3 He also wrote "The Game Of Love" by Michelle Branch and Santana.
#4 There's a part in the video for "You Get What You Give" where a kid opens his mouth under a soft-serve ice cream fountain, which I've always wanted to try.



Edit: It's kind of incredible how much worse this song gets while watching it along with the video... like Alex in Clockwork Orange being forced to watch death-camp footage to the sound of Ludwig Van.. This video is so unforgettably bad it becomes nearly impossible to disassociate it with the song it's promoting...

90's Guilty Pleasures #59: Soul Asylum "Somebody To Shove" (1992)

The roots of whiny, yearning, emo lyrics can be found in songs such as this and Foo Fighters' "Everlong." My first memory of "Somebody To Shove" was when Soul Asylum performed it at the MTV Inaugural Ball of Bill Clinton in January 1993. 99% of the crowd seemed to be enjoying the music and keeping to themselves. A minute or so into the song, a few slacker kids decided to take the lyrics literally, and this became one of the most inappropriate and awkward moshpits ever shown on TV.

90's Guilty Pleasures: #60 Jesus Jones "Right Here Right Now" (1991) / EMF "Unbelievable" (1991)

What subgenre was this again? Wait, don't tell me, I totally know this one... Oh yeah, I think it was called Mad-Chester or something. Because the bands were from Manchester, England, and they were "mad" for some reason.. "Mad" meaning "crazy," of course (as opposed to "angry"). The 2 most critically revered bands of this style were The Happy Mondays and The Stone Roses. I was never a fan of either of these bands, with the exception of their biggest songs ("Step On," "Fools Gold," "I Wanna Be Adored"). I'd say the same goes for Jesus Jones and EMF, the only 2 Madchester-related bands who had any impact at all in the US charts. Few music fans outside of the UK would care to debate that this was clearly a singles-based genre.

For either side of the Atlantic, "Right Here Right Now" seemed to sum up early 1991 fairly well. Somehow it seemed like cultural revolution was closeby, and by coincidence only months later, this turned out to be a correct assumption. Sonically, "Unbelievable" contained the same style and message, except fueled by far more ecstacy rolling.

"Right Here Right Now"


"Unbelievable"

60 Guiltiest Pleasure Singles Of The 90's

Hello friends........ After having this content stored on my laptop for over a year, I figure it's time we unleash the beast... And this is a risk, because I've decided upon a more spontaneous approach... (The 60 songs are being pulled from a list of 100... the content is for the most part only half finished... etc, etc... Nobody reads this.. It's gonna be a mess anyway..)

The title of this list should be self-explanatory.. But I'll try and establish some quick points anyway...

#1 The definition of "guilty pleasure" is that which is a consumer enjoys while being knowingly bad for him or her.

#2 The term itself has been given a bad name as of the past few years, and ever since 1999 until the present, the label "guilty pleasure" in specific relation to pop music has constantly been considered more and more unfashionable. This occurred in the aftermath of 2 major events...

a. Younger and less "rockist" music critics (armchair or otherwise) began arriving in droves at various publications.
b. From the late 90's until the present, pop has also increase in quality significantly. When the quality increase took place between 1999 and 2001, people were so shocked that they assumed these great songs must be "guilty pleasures," those which were likely only truly enjoyable within that particular moment, which would merely be remembered as nostalgia 10 or 20 years down the road. Attitudes such as these are now among the many to now be considered "rockist."

This attitude in itself will not come into play for the 60 songs in this list. For example, "Baby One More Time" will not be appearing, because it has proven itself to be a true obvious classic of the 1990's, just as much as "Nuthin' But A G Thing" or "Smells Like Teen Spirit."

Rather, the 60 songs on this list are those which are "widely considered" highly laughable or lame or mediocre, but we personally still like them anyway. While understanding these to be less-than-tremendous works of art, they are still enjoyable for one reason or another... albiet embarrassing. These will not be proudly OR ironically getting blasted from car stereos anytime soon.

(And yes, this is all just based upon personal opinion... Throughout the 00's, on the geocities version of Taste My Kids, we posted several "top 10 guilty pleasure singles of the year" lists, which normally all came with similar statements disclaiming these to be all based solely upon personal opinion, which is also the case for this top 60...)

Get ready for some shame..................