60 Songs That Explain the '90s

October 2, 2023
The Ringer staff writer Harvilla debuts with a fun and freewheeling look back at the music of the 1990s. Expanding on his podcast of the same name (and here covering more than 100 songs), Harvilla mixes musical analysis, cultural history, and “whimsical personal digressions” to celebrate musical “chaos agents,” including Madonna and her “provocateur euphoria”; “sellouts (or not) (or maybe)” such as Metallica drummer Lars Uhlrich (“Lars is a god, an all-timer, a Hall of Famer, whatever. But he’s also a crazy overrated drummer. He’s flash over competence. He’s ostentatious,” the author good-naturedly complains); and post-hardcore band Fugazi, who “refused to do a cash-grab reunion tour” after their 2001 breakup and exemplify “the precise opposite of selling out.” An especially excellent chapter teases out the condescending implications of reflexively calling female rockers “badasses” (“You feel compelled to praise female artists by clumsily asserting they’re tougher than men”) before giving props to Alanis Morissette and Sinéad O’Connor. Making no attempt to frame the ’90s as a “halcyon era,” Harvilla renders the decade as an ordinary time made “spectacular” by the music that enlivened it. Among his most memorable musings are his reflections on Tom Petty’s 1994 song “It’s Good to Be King,” a “reverie that has always made me shut my eyes and gaze out of my car window... even if I wasn’t in a car.” It adds up to a funny and poignant love letter to a decade that’s “far enough away to feel like the past, but close enough to still be hounding the present.”

October 15, 2023
Like his hit podcast of the same name, The Ringer writer Harvilla's debut book chronicles the musical landscape of the 1990s. Recounting the era's pop music as well as the contemporary alternative hits that took over the world, Harvilla jumps across years and trends within each chapter, which makes for an easygoing and multilayered account of the decade. Harvilla leans into nostalgia, with the memories of how certain artists impacted him as a youth proving just as crucial as his analyses of industry trends. As such, the book functions as an accessible and entertaining bit of music criticism. While Harvilla has spent over two decades as a rock critic, here, he prioritizes feeling and humor over theory, with storytelling that occasionally veers into sentimentalism. Overall, this is a solid introduction to the music of the 1990s that will be useful both to readers unfamiliar with the era's pop culture and to those seeking to immerse themselves in old favorites.

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November 1, 2023
An oddly entertaining collection of essays that covers more than 100 songs but doesn't really explain the decade that created them--which may be beside the point. A senior staff writer at the Ringer, Harvilla adapts this book from his podcast of the same name, in which he outlines the importance of a song from the 1990s and then discusses it with a guest. The adaptation can be clunky, as the author looks for writing conventions to group often disparate songs and artists together under themes like "Chaos Agents," "Villains + Adversaries," and "Romance + Sex + Immaturity." The way he switches gears from rapturous praise of Celine Dion to the misheard lyrics of Hole's "Doll Parts" is as jarring as riding with a teenager driving a stick shift for the first time. Harvilla deftly moves from explaining a song's backstory to how it connects to him or the music of the time. However, he rarely connects a song to the outside world, which may be by design. He purposefully removes Whitney Houston's "I Will Always Love You" from everything that came after its stunning success. "What I'm saying is that sometimes you gotta let the singer be the singer and let the song be the song, and not hold its former culture-throttling ubiquity against it, nor hold its long-term unbearable biographical baggage against it," he writes. "Empty your mind of all unpleasant and unnecessary context." That approach doesn't help to explain the '90s--musically or historically--despite what the title promises. It can be forgiven, though, because Harvilla successfully captures what the '90s felt like through his personal stories' intriguing observations--e.g., "paging through somebody's CD book was...like drinking beer out of someone else's mouth." A personal '90s music overview that is far from definitive, but nevertheless instructive and often poignant.

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October 27, 2023

This light and humorous collision of 1990s musical genres will undoubtedly appeal to lots of readers. The Ringer senior staff writer Harvilla has created this companion to his podcast of the same name, though both the podcast and book cover far more than 60 songs. Written with the ultracasual and conversational style of his podcast, his book's personal anecdotes and thoughts on the origins and values of '90s music are consistently engaging; some readers might even be reminded of Chuck Klosterman's prose style. The book's main appeal is the breadth of music covered. Lauryn Hill, Pantera, the Dave Matthews Band, Erykah Badu, Shania Twain, Third Eye Blind, and more all receive equal and admiring consideration. He moves quickly between songs and styles, and while this rapid-fire approach undoubtedly works in a podcast, in print it may leave some readers wanting more. VERDICT A fun diversion for music fans that feels like a conversation one would love to have with a friend on a late-night car ride.--Peter Thornell

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