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A Malaise of Meaning: What’s with ’90s music?
Before the rise of atheism and Communism, there was Nietzsche and Dostoevsky. Both men managed to pick what would come after the retreat of religious faith, and fans of both authors point to them as nearly having ESP with regard to the future zeitgeist.
I was thinking of the predictive power of art while listening to horrible punk and emo music from the late 1990s and early 2000s. I think it explains the increase in government corruption, the rising suicide rate, and the opioid epidemic. Almost all the songs are musically repetitive and very few could… how I put it… sing? They yell in a manner related to the musical instrument about how they find school boring, society unfair, and their attempts at coitus unsuccessful.
All these topics are fine sources of artistic inspiration, but these songs seem devoid of any depth. However, like Michel Houellebecq’s novels, the emptiness seems to paint a fascinating picture of ennui, though with far less artistic skill.
Like the upper-class Frenchman, Houellebecq, the picture of life depicted by angry white kids from the suburbs is undeniably comfortable. They do not suffer from any serious material deprivations. For the most part, they have dads even if they hate them. They are not afeared being shot by a criminal over a drug deal as in hip-hop. Nor do they sing about getting shot while being an outlaw like in darker country songs. ’90s songs praise getting high, but they seem to lack the bleak sadness of country or blues songs about the depression associated with whiskey and cocaine. As self-indulgent as all those ’60s drug songs were, there was a sincere attempt to expand the human consciousness.
In the 1990s there was so much peace and prosperity that it was boring. People seemed less sensitive to race than we are today. China was backward and, besides, they’d give up Communism eventually. Islamism wasn’t anything to worry about, and the internet wasn’t destroying our mental health.
There was nothing to rebel against. To paraphrase John Lennon, there was nothing to kill or die for, but there was no brotherhood of man.” In addition to this malaise of meaning, or perhaps because of it, the musicians at the time didn’t feel the need to explore other musical traditions or to further delve into the Western Tradition of classical music. I know painfully little about music theory. But I can sort of notice when a talented artist is trying to expand his repertoire. I suspect that if Kurt Cobain continued to live, he would have expanded it. But it seemed like many artists were comfortable with generic angry garage punk.
Now I am oversimplifying things a bit. As Franco has mentioned, there are rivers, streams, lakes, seas, and oceans in music called genres, and within those genres are sub-genres. But I am limiting my focus to the most popular music and asking why it was the most popular. My cousin who used to be in a band mentioned that sad music sells because young people want to listen to people who are sad like them, but they don’t want to expand their minds. So if you are targeting a younger audience you have to dumb it down. That makes sense as far as it goes, but it doesn’t explain why teenagers were so into sadness and anger in the 1990s compared to other decades.
As far as I can reckon, I cannot help but notice a certain existential emptiness in the late 1990s and early 2000s music. I think that emptiness comes from a peace and prosperity without purpose. But what do my fellow Ricochetti think?
Published in General
“Attempts at coitus unsuccessful”?
They sang about not being able to get it up? I don’t know much about modern pop music, but it sounds like a hell of a confessional song. I wouldn’t tell that to my best buddy. If I had that problem. Which I don’t Really, I don’t. Well, maybe I have that problem a little. I am 83 you know. Ewww. I know, icky. I shouldn’t be telling you this. Marie tells me I say too much. She’s probably right. I think I’ll go back and redact it. Nah. Marie doesn’t know everything about decorum.
I like Weezer and Fountains of Wayne.
I have a theory on why Classic rock and pop music of the past was so much richer and will endure into the future because it was quality music. Of course not speaking of all if it. In every era there is garbage.
America was a Christian culture for the most part in the past . The Biblical plumbline of morality was generally accepted by the culture . So America was at least loosely connected to the Author of creativity . This was evident in the lyrics of even Godless songs. Sin , redemption, hell , heaven , God , the devil , evil , grace damnation , angels etc …
Now , we are no longer a Christian ish culture. I would say Godless . When a nation at best disengages from The author of creativity and at worst hates him.
The creative arts will take a nose dive.
I remember the first time I head Nirvana when I was about 13 or so and thinking this is something different, the chords were different, the anger was different. Unlike the the big haired rock groups that were around at the time like Bon Jovi or Def Leppard, this seemed real. I didn’t know what he was shouting about, mulattos and albinos and whatever but he meant it and I wanted to shout along too.
Boomtown Rats Q.E.D
He’s a dose. On behalf of Ireland, I apologise.
I agree with everything said above.
“So if you are targeting a younger audience you have to dumb it down.” So true.
I have little musical training and no knowledge of music theory, but I believe that many early rock musicians had classical training and it showed in their work. That is rarely the case today, and is reflected by consumers lack of knowledge.
In art I was taught that a solid background in using perspective, proportion, composition, etc. is a strong foundation for being a good cartoonist. Some have been successful without that foundation, but they make up for it with a superior sense of humor, irony, or being relatable. Being relatable is a big factor in modern music. But being relatable is not the same as being a talented musician or artist.
I’ll offer this quote by Tom Stoppard, which I would also apply to modern music: “Skill without imagination is craftsmanship and gives many useful objects such as wickerwork picnic baskets. Imagination without skill gives us modern art.”
I was struck by the this scene from the movie Sister Act. I lack the training or vocabulary to describe it beyond saying that the first part has a richness and depth that is amazing. I love that part.
The second part of the performance becomes shallow and uses modern convention that most of the audience will relate to, but is “dumbed down”. It is inferior but the movie characters are portrayed as responding positively, and the movie audience is also expected to. I was disappointed.
There must be some way to blame Madonna for this.
For some reason, every time I see a photo of Cobain, I remember an interview that Playboy (remember, I only read it for the articles) did with Camille Paglia in May of 1995.
Playboy: What about Kurt Cobain?
Paglia: Kurt Cobain’s suicide is a good example of Generation X’s despair.
Playboy: Do you view him as more than another rock star with drug problems?
Paglia: He was a revealing symbol. He called himself passive-aggressive. There was a self-pity, whining. There was a diminishment, a diminution. He was sitting there in his sweater, hunched over his guitar, looking like a little lost boy. Compare that with the great figures of my generation: Jimi Hendrix, Pete Townshend, Keith Richards. The great achievements of rock-of the Sixties, in fact-were done by assertion and energy. This is why I’m worried about the future.
Maybe Paglia was on to something.
One of my co-workers back in the 1990s listened to Nirvana and summed it up as “it’s a guy whining about not being able to get his act together, and worse, not really believing it matters much if he doesn’t.” I listened for about ten minutes and that was all I could stand.
I’d give you about 30 seconds with his girlfriend Courtney Love’s band Hole. That might be generous.
Oh yeah. The only thing worse than listening to Kurt Cobain would be a date with Courtney Love…
Great post. I’ve started a similar post a few times, and can’t get it to make any sense. You’ve far surpassed my efforts.
The empty nihilism of modern music reminds of prison. The lack of freedom is a punishment, but another part of the punishment of prison is being forced to live a life with no meaning. Nothing you think, and nothing you do – nothing matters. Tomorrow will be the same. You’ll be warm and dry, with a full belly. But everything will be the same. What a bleak existence that must be. No wonder wardens can’t keep the peace unless they give the inmates something to focus on. In Nirvana’s album, “Nevermind,” Cobain is obviously struggling with such thoughts.
I think it was George Gilder who said something like, “If you build a welfare state for the women and children, you’ll need to build a police state for the men.”
When I lived in northern Sweden back in the 80’s I was overwhelmed by the over-riding sense of security, boredom, placid comfort, and pointless existence.
After I drink some more bourbon, I may try my post again. I really think you’re on to something. Thanks for prodding me along here. If the resulting post is good, I’ll take credit. If my post makes no sense, I’ll blame you…
My name is Hoyacon and I’m a recovering “Lo-fi” music fan that was a pretty big deal in the ’90s. Guided by Voices, Sebadoh, Elliott Smith, Neutral Milk Hotel. I even suffer the occasional relapse.
Whenever I hear a Madonna song on the radio, I’m always surprised by how good it is. I remember not liking her music back in the 80’s, when I was in high school. But it’s really pretty good, I think.
There are some good tunes, although some are a bit too disco-ey for my taste. I don’t have a real problem with her, other than I feel she began the trend of female singers having a cast of a thousand dancers on the stage at the same time, which drives me nuts. I’m not sure how much to attribute the rise of lip-syncing to her, so I won’t, but it’s another sign of the decline of music.
I take a different view.
Adele produces some very complex and atypical music, and she is the best selling musician working today.
A few decades ago, lots of kids who knew nothing about music bought some really complicated albums from Zeppelin, Pink Floyd, Sting, Rush, and others who were doing some really interesting stuff.
Joe Rogan is making millions by producing long-form interviews with interesting people – just two guys talking for 3 hours straight. Rogan just signed a contract for hundreds of millions of dollars.
There is a thirst for challenging material. It’s just not being met right now, by most artists.
But those who do challenge their audience will sometimes succeed. They’ll often fail, of course. But they sometimes succeed.
I saw VanHalen in Parkersburg, WV in the late 80’s. Eddie did a guitar solo that was over 20 minutes long – probably over 30 minutes, I think. He sat on the front of the stage and played classical music on his guitar for a half an hour, and 20,000 metal heads stood and listened, completely entranced. It was mind-blowing. I don’t remember most of the songs they played that night. But I remember that. I still hum parts of it to myself to this day.
Presuming that your audience is stupid can be profitable sometimes. “Porky’s” comes to mind.
But there will always be a desire for something more. Maybe Beyonce can’t meet that need.
Maybe someone else can…
This is a great question. I’ve been listening to a lot of 70s and 80s music over the past month or so, with a bit from the 90s.
A few of the best rock ballads came out in the 1990s. Bon Jovi’s Bed of Roses and In These Arms were on Keep the Faith in 1992. Poison’s Something to Believe In was in 1990, and Guns N’ Roses released November Rain in 1991. November Rain is probably my favorite rock ballad. These songs were the tail end of the 80s rock era, which was the music of my high school and college years.
Sorry, I never really listened to Nirvana. After my time. I transitioned to mostly country music in the 1990s. The rock and pop music of the 1990s seemed pretty lame.
My suspicion is that, for the most part, rap took over the non-country genres. I find rap to be — well, just add a “c” to “rap” and there you have it. The tail end of Motown seemed to last into the late 1980s, and then it seemed to be swallowed up by the rap monster. I wish there had been a bit more great stuff from Smokey Robinson and Natalie Cole, though I’m thankful that we can still listen to the great old stuff. I’ve really been enjoying some Earth, Wind and Fire over the past couple of days (which was mostly from the 70s).
Strangely enough, I worked for “Up With People” in the early 1990s, as an accountant, and they were having trouble producing songs that the kids liked. One of the composers explained “if it ain’t rap, it ain’t happening.” The kids seemed to be tired of Motown, tired of the pop/soft rock of the 70s and 80s, and tired of the hard rock/hairbands of the 80s.
It was interesting, because some of the country music picked up more of a pop-rock sound in the 90s, which I liked.
On the thesis of the OP, I wasn’t personally bored by the peace and prosperity of the 1990s. I don’t think that people would be bored by peace and prosperity unless some serious moral rot had set in, which I do believe was the case. This is probably implicit in the last line of the OP, about “peace and prosperity without purpose.”
I hope that I’m not being argumentative. I find it interesting. I have more for the next comment, and would appreciate any feedback that people might have.
This part of the OP has me thinking further.
My impression is that the 60s counter-culture had essentially won by some time in the mid-1990s. It’s probably most obvious in the feminist themes. Even much of the rock music of the 1980s had a traditional theme about, ultimately, marriage and family. That may seem strange, but think about some of the best songs — at least, the ones that I liked the best — like the Scorpions Still Loving You, or Bon Jovi’s Livin’ On A Prayer, or even Def Leppard’s Two Steps Behind or Aerosmith’s Angel or I Don’t Want To Miss A Thing (the last was actually in the early 90s).
By 1993, we had Bill and Hillary in the White House, for crying out loud. The idea of a man being a knight in shining armor, or a woman wanting such a man, wasn’t just out of style, it was actively rejected. Though not in country music.
I think that this was even reflected in the Disney movies. I had to look up the release years to confirm the dates. The sequence is:
The first four were traditional, though Aladdin was a rather pathetic hero, whose power derives from dumb luck (or theft). Pocahontas and Mulan had a feminist theme. The female lead was no longer a traditional princess, who needed or wanted a heroic male figure. She was the hero. The days of “girl power” were here to stay.
How could music possibly deal with this? Marriage and family were no longer the goal of life, in the popular culture.
We saw it in our TV shows, too. Out with Cosby and Family Ties, in with Seinfeld and Friends. It seems pretty sad, to me.
She used sex to get ahead and made it sound like it was a legitimate way to go.
I seem to remember some semi-porno film (video) that she was involved in, but I’m not taking the time to look it up. I liked “Borderline” and “Holiday.” That’s about my speed.
A truly great American once wrote:
“Pop culture used to depend on a shared cultural knowledge for purposes of riffing off of it. Now that it has replaced the shared cultural knowledge, it can only riff off of itself, and devolves into noise accordingly.”
Well, actually that was me, earlier today. So not that great of an American.
I do think that when young people are targeted for entertaining either by older people or by their peers, the entertainment tends to be simplified and repetitious. And fatuous.
Nihilism is always a good sell for young people who, despite having experienced nothing of the world, are world-weary.
The only cure for their ennui would be to walk to school uphill in the snow – both ways.
90s era music with the grunge bands from Seattle encapsulated the Clinton era of whiny self-absorption. It was mopey woe-is-me music for a generation that had it so good they had to invent their own traumas. It was all about the misery. And musically I found it simplistic and boring. (Of course I am biased having grown up in the 80s) I find the 80s metal scene much more technically proficient. Full of loud and fast shred-tastic guitar work. It encapsulates the go go full-on excess of the Reagan era. More money, more sex, more drugs, more booze, more party. Big boobs and big hair ruled supreme. It was about getting loaded and getting laid. It was all about the excess.
See Motley Crue.
The “sadness” problem actually came along a bit later. For those of us contemporary to Cobain, there was some relief that the guitar was again driving popular music after so much electronic interference. Metal had faded and there were a few years of “that lovey-dovey stuff” to quote one notable band that was able to navigate all of it by simply going their own direction.
No one was worried about race at the time not only because of the prosperity, but because many of us coming into majority or full-time career age were actually brought up to not factor race. We were in that sweet spot where MLK, Jr. met actual social attitude, short-lived though it was. The grievance industry was still in New York, but expanded quickly in the late 90’s.
When I started teaching and coaching full time around 2006, I saw Cobain and Tupac shirts pretty often and asked the kids about them. They had high regard for them and seemed to treat them as I’d seen others treat the Beatles, a regard that blinded to a certain extent. I’ll add they had no interest in the perspective of someone who had witnessed their rise to popularity firsthand, and all the problems that followed shortly thereafter.
That’s just my midwestern perspective.
I think it’s more about the philosophy than the material conditions. This is where World War 1 fascinates me. Clearly, that generation in Europe suffered great horror and they had a reason to feel bad about the world. But there have been horrible great wars throughout the world and Civilizations have bounced back. Also, in America the same ideas of nihilism were being brewed up by the beatnicks around the same time.
In Russia, various shades or radical atheism goes back even further. However, I will say that periods of great comfort or great suffering can draw these philosophies to the mainstream.
Bingo. Grunge was a response to that, the pendulum swinging in the other direction. It coincided with the peculiar sense of economic diminishment that was abroad in the land in the early 90s, when America seemed, for a time, a bit winded and directionless. Rock always taps into the adolescent mindset, and it was temporarily profitable to favor the self-pitying, self-dramatizing aspect of youth instead of the exuberance.
I was really lucky to lose interest at a time when the music was actually objectively worse than the stuff I’d loved.
What the . . . ?
Atheism predates any religion. It is the natural state of man. Keep in mind that most atheists are not open about recognizing the truth about deities because of the severe social penalty. A lot more good people than you imagine are atheist.
Communism wasn’t quite atheism. Communism was a replacement for religion. Please don’t conflate the two.
Yeah, probably true, nothing in the sense of a war we didn’t like, nor a generation preceding us that accomplished more than we could ever hope to. What we had was consumerism devoted to people who weren’t us, because, numbers-wise, it just wasn’t cost effective.
Woodstock was the example given of the premier and pivotal generational event, and celebrated over and over. On film, quite frankly, it just looked like a lot of mud, but we liked the music, too. The free love? Well, no, free love was killing people when we were the age of the Woodstock attendees, not that we were pre-disposed to follow that example. The drugs? Needles killed the same way the sex did.
Saturday morning cartoons were replaced by infomercials. Next was the closest thing we had to the great rock-n-roll of the 60’s and 70’s: metal. Hard not to punch that meal ticket, but there was a point where every “ballad” released by a metal band went platinum and guitar solos were shoe-horned into everything. I can’t forget the musical beating my ears took every time the solo came on for Linda Ronstadt and James Ingram’s “Somewhere Out There,” a song played incessantly with no guitars found anywhere in it but that solo.
And then it all disappeared and got synthesized. The good thing about that is I can look back and appreciate bands like Duran Duran for actually playing music (that 2003 concert film rocks!).
So, yeah, a bit of rebellion against all that, a bit of disruption to the formula. Heck, Cobain, just consider “All Apologies” here:
Sound something like what everyone is complaining about now? Yeah, just a little. Invented trauma? That’s exactly what the left says about this same complaint Cobain makes when it comes from you.
I never owned a Nirvana album, preferring more complex work from other bands, particularly the continued thinly-veiled Christian themes that came from a highly experimental U2 during the era. That isn’t to say I didn’t rock out to the other stuff at college parties, as I said above, it was a breath of fresh air to hear the likely Neil Young-inspired (give Ragged Glory a fresh listen), hard-driving chords after the vanilla stuff of the years preceding. And if he was singing about something I couldn’t relate to, well, at least he was singing about stuff he wanted to.
Universal themes? No, but it had its value (and its rebellion) in its expression, and some of the music was pretty good. Here’s a band named after a phrase from Ayn Rand’s The Fountainhead.