Why do people miss the '90s when 2012 is so similar still?

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1996 - Spice Girls, Backstreet Boys, Ace of Base, Aaron Carter, Vanilla Ice, Los del Río, Gina G, and Paradisio are all more popular than Oasis, Pantera, Nirvana, Soundgarden, and all the rock bands.
2014 - Nobody remembers the aforementioned pop artists, but at least we remember the 1990s rockbands.

When people remember this decade, Justin Bieber and Miley Cyrus will have faded into obscurity like Britney Spears and all of the boybands before them. Chris Brown will only be remembered for beating Rihanna, and everyone will talk about how the 2010's were the years of Taking Dawn, Bruce Dickinson's solo career, how power metal gained mainstream acceptance, and how all TV shows were good, like Game of Thrones and Spartacus.

I agree.
The music in the charts in 2014 isn't that different from that in the mid-late 90's.

So True!

What I also miss about the 90's is that people weren't constantly checking their mobile phone.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1bRdjmm_-5g[/youtube]

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The contrast between mainstream and underground has never been as gigantic as it is nowadays, purely because of the degradation (especially in terms of sound quality and production) of the former if you ask me.

Like one wonders WHY autotune vox sound so crap to the human ear.

Anyone remember pagers?


No?


Meh. They were crap anyway.

Nostalgia for past decades goes in a 20 year cycle, remember how the 80s was all big in the 2000s?

The reason for this 20 year cycle is because people who are in there 30s, i.e the majority of the popular culture population, yearn for their youth in their teens where everything seemed more relaxed, and more fun, its the realization that there not little kids anymore, but they can't help wanting to still be in High School and have no worries in the world where music seemed better and life in general was good.

I'll expect in the 2030's I, along with many other 30 year olds will be feeling nostalgia for their teen years in the 2010s.

When I think of the 1990's I mostly think about 1990-1997 or so and it was very different compared to today, back then their was little home computing and as a kid the early to mid/late 90's was the last decade where kids were free to live without all of the kid proofing, bubble wrapping and dumbing down of entertainment content that we have today. The philosophy of raising a kid now is so much different then when I was young and that's to the disadvantage of todays youth. As for popular culture I never have really followed it so I can't judge the decades on it other then to say that while the same cast may still be around it was fresher back then.

The thing about the 90ies was for me not about the music, but about the general mood that people in the 90ies had. Everywhere was economic raise, people were thinking positive of the future, and so politicians and companies could not scare them so easily to get what they want. People that are not afraid, cant be intimadet to give away natural ressources to companies, only because of them refering endlessly...."But if we are not allowed to pollute that area, then the whole economic will go down..." Environmental protection was because of that aware for many people. As well that rightwing politicians had lesser chances of causing people to feel afraid of the horrible bad foreigners taking their jobs...

It simply was a real happy time, when even normal people had no probs to stand up against companies, and whole europe did not care if the actual pop-song was from an muslimic artist.

I really miss the optimism of that time, and that people did not get that easily intimidated by the lies of consortiums and politicians, but dared to think for themselves.

I find myself in agreement with Kurgan's post, it's spot on. I listened to the Top 100 most popular songs (from the Dutch music chart) of 1992, and it was infested with Eurodance (stuff like 2Unlimited, Snap!, Technotronic and the like), interspersed with boybands here and there, and the odd Stock-Aitken-Waterman type pop ballads. No big mainstream exposure for Living Colour, Faith No More, Stone Temple Pilots, Ugly Kid Joe, or other acts with merit.

Now, like then, there actually is some quality mainstream music as well. Adele is fine and hugely popular, can carry a live performance and has a careful production backing her albums; Bruno Mars is an excellent entertainer and a great songwriter; Lorde is okay; Gaga is Gaga; and say what you want about Kanye West's personality, but he keeps his sound fresh and updated with every album he releases.

Between all the One Directions and 2Chainzes and Katy Perry's, people are actually making music as well, and are able to get large segments of the audience to listen to them.

But yeah. 20 years from now, people will be saying that music in the 2010s was dominated by Black Keys, Arcade Fire, and Florence + The Machine.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u_ppF2yK4NM[/youtube]
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[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u3ltZmI5LQw[/youtube]
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dyx4v1QFzhQ[/youtube]

"But yeah. 20 years from now, people will be saying that music in the 2010s was dominated by Black Keys, Arcade Fire, and Florence + The Machine."

No, they wont, nor will they remember Bieber, Katy Perry or Pitbull. Music from the early and mid 90's was a time when it was artistic and creative.

The world is SO SENSITIVE about EVERYTHING these days. I remember being able to walk around and damn near say whatever you wanted and no one cared or if they did, they just kept their mouth shut. Now, you have to watch EVERYTHING you say because some momo will be offended. All we have today is HORRIBLE TV, HORRIBLE music and whiny people everywhere. There is a sense of entitlement now. Everyone thinks they deserve everything that the next guy does. It wasn't like that in the 90's. Back then you still had to work hard for everything, now everyone wants everything handed to them on a silver platter.

^I live in the Netherlands. The 1990s were the years when everyone was pretty complacent because it was pretty easy to get some kind of social welfare here in Holland. Over the past ten years, that has gotten less and less, and we're all working a lot harder as a result- when we're employed at all, that is. Not all too many jobs to go around, so ironically, even though our work ethic has improved, a lot of us are sitting on our asses involuntarily.

Here's an excerpt from a 1989 song called 'Doing Our Own Dang', by the Jungle Brothers.

My family sets all the trends
From Soul 2 Soul, large to Loose Ends
A&R men sign groups like hell
(Cause that's where the money's at, honey)
The industry's filled with copycats
R&B mixed with sloppy raps
Tribes like us always open doors
But what for, so you can get yours?
You ain't into it, all you want is profit
So I ask you please to stop it
Leave me alone, get off my bone
Cause I'm doing my own...

1990 wasn't a musical Valhalla. There was this Foo Fighters concert a couple years ago, where Dave Grohl was talking about how the success of 'Smells Like Teen Spirit' surprised the members of Nirvana because of all the tame, vapid music that was dominating the charts at the time.

I'm almost the same age as you - May 1998. I miss the noughies too. Mainly because the pop culture today is a watered-down verison of the 00s. I miss new technology almost every month that was exciting, the reality TV was better and not staged.

I miss some of the animation styles that aren't really in use anymore. Now if I want to listen to music I can just use Pandora radio and get huge, free selections of different genres, much more than I used to on the radio. No Lady Gaga or Justin Bieber necessary.

Most nostalgia is just delusion, though. Example: The good old days when everyone was kind and trustworthy, before social media, Katy Perry, Facebook, or the government ruined it.