
Show Notes
We are officially 6 months into our quest to catalog our opinions on every major album release from the 1990s, one month at a time. This week we’re listening to some killer stuff from June 1990. Sonic Youth’s now-classic album Goo sees Kim Gordon take the reins as the band’s lead vocalist, with Thurston Moore refining his ecstatic electric guitar chaos; Uncle Tupelo’s first studio album No Depression has Jay Farrar and Jeff Tweedy developing their singular “hillbilly thrash” sound while delivering some of the era’s most compelling songwriting; former Misfits frontman Glenn Danzig channels Jim Morrison on the vampire blues rock album Danzig II: The Lucifuge; and the debut album from the Scottish band Teenage Fanclub, A Catholic Education, lays down some of the main ideas and sounds that would dominate alternative rock in the decade ahead. Check out this episode’s playlist:
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More from 120 Months Podcast
A storm of classic rock albums dropped in September 1992: Alice in Chains with their bracing, nightmarish grunge masterpiece Dirt; Stone Temple Pilots with their hit machine debut, Core; Blind Melon's sunny, Southern rock-infused self-titled debut; and Nine Inch Nails introducing their scary, deeply influential new sound on the EP Broken.
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Here’s video of this week’s episode, in which we discuss album releases from August 1992: Gin Blossoms’ New Miserable Experience, Uncle Tupelo’s March 16-20, 1992, Lucinda Williams’ Sweet Old World, The Wallflowers’ self-titled debut, INXS’ Welcome to Wherever You Are, and The Flaming Lips’ Hit to Death in the Future Head.
The legacy of Bob Dylan hangs heavily over the essential album releases from August 1992: Gin Blossoms with a brilliant, nostalgic collection of songs on New Miserable Experience; Uncle Tupelo's ode to ragged politically-charged folk music, March 16-20, 1992; Lucinda Williams showing off incredible songwriting chops on Sweet Old World; The Wallflowers with an impressive self-titled debut; INXS attempting to bridge their sound into the '90s on Welcome to Wherever You Are; The Flaming Lips gearing up for massive tonal changes on Hit to Death in the Future Head.
July 1992 is a month packed with new album releases. On this episode we talk about Sonic Youth's monumental Dirty; Megadeth's crossover classic Countdown to Extinction; Morrissey's harder sound on Your Arsenal; and Gordon, the debut album from Canada's hardest rocking nerds, Barenaked Ladies.