CHAPTER 15
The Nadir: The Late 1990s and Early 2000s
Nu-metal, Britpop and the long dip
28 works, in the order the book names them
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001/Book/2009
Perfecting Sound Forever
Greg Milner
In his book Perfecting Sound Forever (2009), Greg Milner cites Shellac’s ‘Wingwalker’, a song about a woman who performs acrobatic stunts on the wings of aeroplanes, as the model example of a record that sounds three-dimensional, perhaps even four-dimensional, ‘so that the music not only existed as an object, it also moved in the world, imprinting itself by the way that its shape – the peaks and valleys that defined the wingwalker’s physical and psychological journey – seemed to make the air molecules dance as the shape unravelled’.
Open in Goodreads ↗ -
002/Compilation
Death to the Pixies
Pixies
When reviewing Pixies’ posthumous Death to the Pixies compilation in 1997, David Stubbs of Uncut magazine defined the mood of the UK music scene when he asked, ‘Were they [Pixies] really to blame for all those smelly American longhairs with Black Sabbath fixations (Black Sabbath, I ask you) and nothing but nothing to say?’
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003/Album
OK Computer
Radiohead
In its place, he was enjoying the ‘moody’ sound of Radiohead’s OK Computer.
Open in YouTube ↗ -
004/Album
Diabolus in Musica
Slayer
Disillusioned by what he saw as the infiltration of ‘frat boys’ into the metal scene, guitarist Kerry King was disengaged from the writing process of Slayer’s 1998 effort Diabolus in Musica (though, weirdly, he did pen the rapidly sung lyrics to ‘Stain of Mind’, which is easily the most nu-metal song on the record).
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005/Album
Roots
Sepultura
Having dipped his toe into nu-metal waters with some of the material on Sepultura’s Roots, Max Cavalera formed Soulfly and packed its songs with nu-metal guest spots.
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006/Album
Volume 8: The Threat is Real
Anthrax
There were some riffs on 1998’s Volume 8: The Threat is Real that could be identified as vaguely nu-metal in nature.
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007/Album
Volume 8
Anthrax
There were some riffs on 1998’s Volume 8: The Threat is Real that could be identified as vaguely nu-metal in nature.
Open in YouTube ↗ -
008/Album
Load
Metallica
It’s like Metallica’s 1990s Load/Reload period only looser, wilder and more carefree.
Open in YouTube ↗ -
009/Album
Reload
Metallica
It’s like Metallica’s 1990s Load/Reload period only looser, wilder and more carefree.
Open in YouTube ↗ -
010/Compilation
Blur: The Best Of
Blur
Damon Albarn complained of the genre’s flatness when promoting Blur: The Best Of.
Open in YouTube ↗ -
011/Album
The Real Thing
Faith No More
Hemmed in by such restrictions, Martin spent the recording sessions for The Real Thing on an obsessive self-appointed quest to unearth the ultimate guitar tone.
Open in YouTube ↗ -
012/Album/1992
Angel Dust
Faith No More
When its follow-up, Angel Dust, was being made in 1992, Martin was mourning the death of his father and understandably disengaged from the recording process.
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013/Album
Euphoria Morning
Chris Cornell
For a start, it was topped by what is the least heavy album on its whole countdown: ex-Soundgarden singer Chris Cornell’s decidedly folky Euphoria Morning.
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014/Album
Yesterday Went Too Soon
Feeder
Their debut had taken its cues from Smashing Pumpkins, but Yesterday Went Too Soon sounded about as heavy as The Stereophonics, who, incidentally, also managed to creep into Metal Hammer’s top 20.
Open in YouTube ↗ -
015/TV series
Top of the Pops
BBC
Their singer wore a balaclava, provocatively, on Top of the Pops.
Open in IMDb ↗ -
016/Album
The Holy Bible
Manic Street Preachers
Bleak and grimy, 1994’s The Holy Bible was full of references to irrepressible Western consumerism, anorexia, totalitarianism, self-abuse and serial killers.
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017/Album/1998
This Is My Truth Tell Me Yours
Manic Street Preachers
This Is My Truth Tell Me Yours (1998) was Manic Street Preachers’ second album since their capitulation to orchestral Britpop.
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018/Album
Siamese Dream
The Smashing Pumpkins
Half a decade earlier the ambitious Chicago band had released one of the heaviest albums of the grunge era outside the discography of TAD. Produced by man-of-the-moment Butch Vig, Siamese Dream had as many as a hundred guitar tracks in a single song and flaunted a 1970s rock sound so layered that your average stereo system could do it little justice.
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019/Album
Adore
The Smashing Pumpkins
Corgan was imbibing ‘copious quantities’ of ecstasy when making the record in question, Adore.
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020/Album
Animal Rights
Moby
Because Animal Rights hardly sold any copies, Moby was subsequently forced to take a different tack by appropriating a load of old Alan Lomax recordings for 1999’s Play, flogging the results to colossal marketing companies, buying himself a luxury penthouse apartment and spiralling into drug and alcohol dependency.
Open in YouTube ↗ -
021/Album
Play
Moby
Because Animal Rights hardly sold any copies, Moby was subsequently forced to take a different tack by appropriating a load of old Alan Lomax recordings for 1999’s Play, flogging the results to colossal marketing companies, buying himself a luxury penthouse apartment and spiralling into drug and alcohol dependency.
Open in YouTube ↗ -
022/Film
The Beyond
Lucio Fulci
One of these sections, the middle part of the furious ‘Why You Lie’, contains a sample from Lucio Fulci’s cult horror film The Beyond: a little girl shouting ‘Mummy!’ before a woman’s face is splashed with acid.
Open in IMDb ↗ -
023/Album/1997
Endless, Nameless
The Wildhearts
Endless, Nameless’s mix was so rough and full of static squeals that some punters returned their copies to the shop under the mistaken impression that there had been a manufacturing fault.
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024/Album
Infernal Love
Therapy?
Northern Ireland’s Therapy? had not managed to fully sabotage themselves with 1995’s Infernal Love, the creepy and gothy follow-up to 1994’s pop-metal masterpiece Troublegum.
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025/Album/1994
Troublegum
Therapy?
Northern Ireland’s Therapy? had not managed to fully sabotage themselves with 1995’s Infernal Love, the creepy and gothy follow-up to 1994’s pop-metal masterpiece Troublegum.
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026/Album
Semi-Detached
Therapy?
Having previously looked like a squat demon biker who’d stepped out of a Frank Kozik cartoon, singer and guitarist Andy Cairns could be seen clean-shaven with short hair and smarter clothing on the insert to 1998’s Semi-Detached.
Open in YouTube ↗ -
027/Album/1999
Suicide Pact – You First
Therapy?
Their 1999 Suicide Pact – You First was recorded cheaply and quickly, although the band still found time to sample the beating wings of a trapped butterfly and undertake 666 seconds of field recording in a Milton Keynes shopping centre.
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028/Documentary
Kurt & Courtney
Nick Broomfield
After his wraithlike appearance in Nick Broomfield’s woolly Kurt & Courtney documentary, Earth’s Dylan Carlson was on his own long withdrawal from the business of making music.
Open in IMDb ↗
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