When I preview this, the video shows up, but when I post it, only the link shows.  Any thoughts? 

As far as OTHER music (meaning, R&B/Rap), R. Kelly, Mariah, Blackstreet, and Mary J Blige really contributed to the fusion of hip hop & R&B.  The 90's were a fantastic time for the New Jack Swing movement along with the rise of Neo-Soul (Erykah Badu, D'Angelo, Raphael Saadiq).  And of course, rap went from West Coast back to East Coast to the rise of the South, all in ten years.

Ok, so I had to do this.  Mariah Carey was the biggest selling act of the 90's so I figured I would post some stuff on her. 

 

Perhaps her biggest contribution to music was this remix.  This made hip-pop mainstream and after this, virtually all pop stars copied it, and still do today to a large degree. 

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AUFmS9n87ho

 

 

Sorry but 80s R&B artist were doing it before Mariah.

 

Jody Watley was the FIRST with this song.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vjioG7jeBQ4

 

FYI Jody brought "voguing" to the masses not madonna.

sigh, I know, and I knew the Mary J Blige comment would come up.  Thats why I simply said, 'this made it mainstream'.....

Ed O'Neill

Married With Children, nuff' said.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L-qRJM5750A

 

No Ma'am

 

 

Ed O'Neill is from Youngstown and once was signed by the Steelers although he was released before the start of the regular season.

^

fun. Al is the man

sigh, I know, and I knew the Mary J Blige comment would come up. Thats why I simply said, 'this made it mainstream'.....

 

I know what you meant and I was just complimenting what you said.  But we all know what "mainstream" means ;).

sigh, I know, and I knew the Mary J Blige comment would come up.  Thats why I simply said, 'this made it mainstream'.....

 

I know what you meant and I was just complimenting what you said.  But we all know what "mainstream" means ;).

 

I think this song really brought rap/hip-hop rnb/pop ('93 was the first year rnb/soul/pop blurred lines (ie the majority of songs crossed over) music to "main stream" america.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bg0FCwkd57k

 

^Seconded.  That and Seattle, I think.

An Obituary from the 90's, ZIMA is finally laid to rest. 1994-2008. RIP

 

"it doesn't suck if you put a jolly rancher in it..." uncredited quote from my highschool days

 

http://www.slate.com/id/2204596/

 

 

The Long, Slow, Torturous Death of Zima

Fourteen years after its heyday, Zima is finally at peace.

By Brendan I. Koerner

Posted Wednesday, Nov. 26, 2008, at 6:53 AM ET

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

 

There are a million ways to slight a rival's manhood, but to suggest that he enjoys Zima is one of the worst. Zima was the original "malternative"—a family of alcoholic beverages that eventually came to include such abominations as Smirnoff Ice and Bacardi Silver—and it has long been considered the very opposite of macho: a drink that fragile coeds swill while giving each other pedicures.

 

That stereotype has persisted despite the fact that Zima's brief heyday came nearly 15 years ago. The brand was then hailed as a marketing coup, an ingenious way to sell beer—or rather, a clear, beerlike solution—to consumers who eschewed traditional suds. But virtually overnight, Zima was done in by its medicinal taste and girly-man rep: After selling an astounding 1.3 million barrels in 1994, the year it went national, Zima's sales fell to just 403,000 barrels in 1996.

 

Many drinkers assume that Zima vanished shortly thereafter and has since existed solely as a punch line. But Zima actually survived for more than another decade, until MillerCoors pulled the plug on Oct. 10. Rarely has such a famously maligned product enjoyed such a lengthy run—a testament to its brewers' Madonna-like knack for reinvention. The Zima that died a quiet death last month bore little resemblance to the malternative that swept the nation during President Clinton's first term.

 

Zima debuted in the midst of the "clear craze" of the early 1990s, when products ranging from Crystal Pepsi to Mennen Crystal Clean deodorant sought to take advantage of a vogue for (literal) transparency. Coors, then the nation's No. 3 beer-maker, hopped on the bandwagon by devising a simple process for making a clear brew—just filter your lowest-grade lager through charcoal (a process that strips away both color and taste), then make the liquid palatable by adding citrusy flavorings.

 

Miller, then one of Coors' chief rivals, mastered this technique, too, creating Clear Beer, which failed miserably. Coors thought it knew why: the presence of the word beer on the label. Clear brews may have been beer-based, but they were bound to disappoint true hops aficionados—there was no foamy head, and the taste was sodalike rather than malty. So Coors decided to pitch its see-through drink at male consumers who didn't love beer but fancied themselves too macho for Boone's Farm. (Coors pointedly instructed stores to never place Zima alongside wine coolers, which male drinkers regard as effete.)

 

Coors threw $38 million into promoting Zima's nationwide rollout in 1994, more than it spent hawking Coors Light that year. The campaign's centerpiece was a series of TV commercials starring a black-hatted pitchman who replaced his S's with Z's and touted Zima as "zomething different." The ads offered no inkling of what Zima was supposed to be, exactly, but the mystery obviously intrigued the masses: In 1994, Coors estimated that 70 percent of America's regular drinkers gave Zima a try.

 

Unfortunately for Coors, most of those drinkers tried it only once, since straight Zima tasted like tinfoil soaked in Fresca. Some college kids mixed the drink with schnapps, creating a head-splitting cocktail dubbed Nox-Zima, but few other drinkers were so enterprising. To Coors' horror, Zima proved most popular among young women—a demographic that, while generally fond of getting tanked, just doesn't have the same thirst for hooch as its male counterpart. And once the ladies took a shine to the stuff, the guys avoided Zima as if it were laced with estrogen. (Coors was also widely accused of marketing Zima directly to high school students, many of whom were convinced that Zima couldn't be detected by Breathalyzers.)

 

By the end of 1994, Zima had become a favorite whipping boy of David Letterman, who regularly featured it on his nightly Top Ten lists. (The No. 9 sign that your senator may be nuts? "Breakfast, lunch, and dinner—Zima!") Coors tried to lasso male consumers with new ads featuring pickup football, to no avail. Then in 1995 it launched Zima Gold, a caramel-colored version of the malternative that boasted high alcohol content (5.4 percent) and a bourbon-and-Coke tang. It barely lasted three months on the market before it was pulled for lack of sales. It was simply too late to salvage Zima's rep among men.

 

Coors was widely expected to kill the brand, as Miller had done with Clear Beer. (Several me-too malternatives, such as Pabst's Izen Klar and Stroh's Clash, had suffered similar fates.) But the company instead chose to reinvent its once-proud brew. It altered Zima's formula to make it taste even more like Sprite and launched a new ad campaign touting Zima as the ideal thirst quencher for oppressively hot days. Sales never came close to reaching their 1994 levels, but they did rebound to a respectable 610,000 barrels by 2000. That's peanuts compared with a flagship beer brand like Coors Light, which sold 16.6 million barrels that year. But Zima was a high-margin product—charcoal-filtered dreck that sold for superpremium prices. It could still earn its keep on low-volume sales, most of which took place in warm-weather states during summer.

 

Zima went through two more complete retoolings, the first in 2004 when it was transformed into Zima XXX. Coors pumped up the alcohol content to 5.9 percent and introduced flavors such as Hard Punch and Hard Orange. The move was made after Zima had lost significant market share to Smirnoff Ice, which benefits from confusion over whether it contains vodka. (It doesn't, at least in this country.) Coors sensed that the only way to compete was by hyping Zima as a drink worthy of daredevils.

 

The gambit failed. Three years later, Coors (on the verge of its merger with Miller) reversed course and decided to embrace a group of consumers it had once reviled—women in their 20s. Zima was relaunched with less alcohol, fewer calories, and an array of fruity flavors such as pineapple citrus. Going after women wasn't a great way to grow the product's market, but Coors believed that today's young females could sustain Zima as a niche product.

 

This last, dainty incarnation of Zima might still be with us were it not for killjoy lawmakers in Utah and California. In the former state, notorious for its tough liquor laws, Zima was one of the few potent tipples available in grocery stores. (Most alcoholic beverages are available only in state-controlled shops.) But MillerCoors withdrew the brand from Utah in September, after the state's legislature passed an onerous law requiring new labels that indicate a malternative's alcohol content in bold, all-caps letters. It didn't make economic sense for the brewer to print Utah-only labels.

 

In California, meanwhile, the state's Board of Equalization decided to tax malternatives as distilled spirits rather than beer (the dubious rationale being that such an increase would discourage alcohol abuse among cash-strapped minors). MillerCoors could have challenged the $3.10-per-gallon tax hike by submitting scientific evidence attesting to Zima's lack of liquor. But for a brand that already had one foot in the grave, that apparently seemed like more trouble than it was worth. Shortly after the regulation kicked in on Oct. 1, MillerCoors finally threw in the towel on Zima. California had been one of its largest markets.

 

For a brand that was selling tens of thousands of barrels per year up to the bitter end, Zima's demise has inspired surprisingly little anguish among its fans.

 

This online petition aims to send 1 million signatures to MillerCoors headquarters; as of this writing, it's just 999,947 names short of that ambitious goal.

 

There are surely more than 53 Zima lovers in America, and many of them are doubtless male. But that's a love that dare not speak its name.

 

Brendan I. Koerner is a contributing editor at Wired and a columnist for Gizmodo. His first book, Now the Hell Will Start, is out now.

 

Article URL: http://www.slate.com/id/2204596/

 

 

Copyright 2008 Washingtonpost.Newsweek Interactive Co. LLC

 

 

sigh, I know, and I knew the Mary J Blige comment would come up.  Thats why I simply said, 'this made it mainstream'.....

 

I know what you meant and I was just complimenting what you said.  But we all know what "mainstream" means ;).

 

I think this song really brought rap/hip-hop rnb/pop ('93 was the first year rnb/soul/pop blurred lines (ie the majority of songs crossed over) music to "main stream" america.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bg0FCwkd57k

 

 

I suppose.  But the difference I see here is that Mariah was 'squeakey clean' and to do a collabo. with ODB was pure genius and really brought pop and hip hop together in new ways.  Salt-n-pepa never had a 'squeaky clean' image and thus it wasnt out of their realm to do these types of songs.   

 

sigh, I know, and I knew the Mary J Blige comment would come up.  Thats why I simply said, 'this made it mainstream'.....

 

I know what you meant and I was just complimenting what you said.  But we all know what "mainstream" means ;).

 

bah! 

sigh, I know, and I knew the Mary J Blige comment would come up.  Thats why I simply said, 'this made it mainstream'.....

 

I know what you meant and I was just complimenting what you said.  But we all know what "mainstream" means ;).

 

I think this song really brought rap/hip-hop rnb/pop ('93 was the first year rnb/soul/pop blurred lines (ie the majority of songs crossed over) music to "main stream" america.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bg0FCwkd57k

 

 

I suppose.  But the difference I see here is that Mariah was 'squeakey clean' and to do a collabo. with ODB was pure genius and really brought pop and hip hop together in new ways.  Salt-n-pepa never had a 'squeaky clean' image and thus it wasnt out of their realm to do these types of songs.   

 

sigh, I know, and I knew the Mary J Blige comment would come up.  Thats why I simply said, 'this made it mainstream'.....

 

I know what you meant and I was just complimenting what you said.  But we all know what "mainstream" means ;).

 

bah! 

 

SNP didn't have any drama. En vogue was my generations version of the supremes and was squeaky clean as you put it.  Both groups were Grammy winners. 

sigh, I know, and I knew the Mary J Blige comment would come up.  Thats why I simply said, 'this made it mainstream'.....

 

I know what you meant and I was just complimenting what you said.  But we all know what "mainstream" means ;).

 

I think this song really brought rap/hip-hop rnb/pop ('93 was the first year rnb/soul/pop blurred lines (ie the majority of songs crossed over) music to "main stream" america.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bg0FCwkd57k

 

 

I suppose.  But the difference I see here is that Mariah was 'squeakey clean' and to do a collabo. with ODB was pure genius and really brought pop and hip hop together in new ways.  Salt-n-pepa never had a 'squeaky clean' image and thus it wasnt out of their realm to do these types of songs.   

 

sigh, I know, and I knew the Mary J Blige comment would come up.  Thats why I simply said, 'this made it mainstream'.....

 

I know what you meant and I was just complimenting what you said.  But we all know what "mainstream" means ;).

 

bah! 

 

SNP didn't have any drama. En vogue was my generations version of the supremes and was squeaky clean as you put it.  Both groups were Grammy winners. 

 

No drama...sure.  But both groups portrayed an 'edge' of the time.  Atleast I think so.  Mariah's albums until this time were titled:

 

'Mariah Carey'

'Emotions'

'Music Box'

Daydream'

 

You cant get more squeaky clean, ha.  Not to mention the 'Butterfly' 'Rainbow' and 'Glitter' soon to follow.  ugh!  (love her)

 

No drama...sure.  But both groups portrayed an 'edge' of the time.  Atleast I think so.  Mariah's albums until this time were titled:

 

'Mariah Carey'

'Emotions'

'Music Box'

Daydream'

 

You cant get more squeaky clean, ha.  Not to mention the 'Butterfly' 'Rainbow' and 'Glitter' soon to follow.  ugh!  (love her)

 

Every RNB girl group had a "tude".  Thank the Supremes.

 

En Vogues albums, video's, marketing was all about "class", "luxury" and "fabulousness".  Paring them with SNP was just as ingenious as Mariah (who had yet to celebrate her blackness until that point) with Dirt McGirt.  and en vogue like Mariah, each girl could "sing".  those gals turn it out!

yea, I remember really liking en vogue when I was young.  Plus, I was WAY into Mariah growing up. How my parents didnt realize I was gay is a mystery. 

yea, I remember really liking en vogue when I was young.  Plus, I was WAY into Mariah growing up. How my parents didnt realize I was gay is a mystery. 

 

Lawwwwwwwd.  We'll I LIVE and I mean LIVE for En Vogue.  Those girls a fierce.  I don't normally too my horn, but if I had the power to work with them again, I would do it exactly the same.

 

Mariah, she aiight.  I have to give the girl credit though, she got pumps down!!!!

Mariah, she aiight.  I have to give the girl credit though, she got pumps down!!!!

 

Wait, what?  ha. 

Mariah, she aiight.  I have to give the girl credit though, she got pumps down!!!!

 

Wait, what?  ha. 

 

OK.  MayDay, talk to these chi'renz!  Please

 

 

Gayanese translation

"she got pumps" = "she wears fabulous shoes"

Mariah, she aiight.  I have to give the girl credit though, she got pumps down!!!!

 

Wait, what?  ha. 

 

OK.  MayDay, talk to these chi'renz!  Please

 

 

Gayanese translation

"she got pumps" = "she wears fabulous shoes"

 

Now I understand...

So when MC Hammer was rapping about "Pumps and a Bump" he was rapping about high heeled shoes? Geez, no wonder his career tanked.

Mariah, she aiight.  I have to give the girl credit though, she got pumps down!!!!

 

Wait, what?  ha. 

 

OK.  MayDay, talk to these chi'renz!  Please

 

 

Gayanese translation

"she got pumps" = "she wears fabulous shoes"

 

Now I understand...

 

I guess I earned back my "princess points"?  hummmmmmm?

Do you really need them? :evil:

Gayanese translation

"she got pumps" = "she wears fabulous shoes"

 

Ok, I thought this was what you were talking about.  But then my mind went straight to something with her boobs and pumps and I got confused. 

But it is rare that I hear someone use 'pumps' anymore.  Maybe 'kicks' or 'oh my god...shoes!!!!!' but rarely 'pumps'

Gayanese translation

"she got pumps" = "she wears fabulous shoes"

 

Ok, I thought this was what you were talking about. But then my mind went straight to something with her boobs and pumps and I got confused.

But it is rare that I hear someone use 'pumps' anymore. Maybe 'kicks' or 'oh my god...shoes!!!!!' but rarely 'pumps'

 

Youngins...hehehe

 

Do you really need them? :evil:

 

No since I prefer to addressed as HRH!

Do you really need them? :evil:

 

No since I prefer to addressed as HRH!

 

HRH???

Her Royal Hyena-ness. ;-)

Her Royal Hyena-ness. ;-)

 

Oh lord.....  I may be gay, but I just can't bring myself to spew fairy dust all over the forum.  hehehe

 

<bows before Her Royal Highness>

Her Royal Hyena-ness. ;-)

 

You Puta!

 

Gayanese translation

"she got pumps" = "she wears fabulous shoes"

 

Ok, I thought this was what you were talking about.  But then my mind went straight to something with her boobs and pumps and I got confused. 

But it is rare that I hear someone use 'pumps' anymore.  Maybe 'kicks' or 'oh my god...shoes!!!!!' but rarely 'pumps'

 

You need to hang out in my mothers closet more often!

 

 

Her Royal Hyena-ness. ;-)

 

Oh lord.....  I may be gay, but I just can't bring myself to spew fairy dust all over the forum.  hehehe

 

Sure you can.  Just remember I'm the "good witch of the East" of the forum.  I'm sweet and innocent unlike the "wicked bitch of the West".

 

 

 

Her Royal Hyena-ness. ;-)

 

<bows before Her Royal Highness>

 

Thats more like it!

 

 

You need to hang out in my mothers closet more often!

 

I spent plenty of time in my mothers closet growing up, both literally and figuratively.   

You need to hang out in my mothers closet more often!

 

I spent plenty of time in my mothers closet growing up, both literally and figuratively.

 

I think he meant grandmothers closet....He forgets how young you are in his old age.  ;)

 

When I think 90s, I think of cheesy alternative songs like

. 

 

I could name probably three dozen cheesy 90s alternative groups!

 

Kurt Cobain single-handedly ruined the 90s. The 90s were a time of extreme economic growth but rock music was as dreary and depressing as it could possibly get. I think it was because crack-cocaine was harder to get in the 90s, compared to the 80s. I know Kurt Cobain had a lot of personal problems but I don't get why American culture thinks its so sexy for guys like him to be found dead in their bedroom next to a gun and bottles of oxycontin. This guy is apparently a "cultural icon" and people act like he committed suicide to die for our sins and we all should be thankful for it. I can't even make out half of what he's saying in "Smells Like Teen Spirit". Nirvana would easily win the "most Google'd lyrics of all time award" if there were an award for such a thing. Well, maybe Sean Paul would win, I'm not sure. Anyway, you can hardly compare Nirvana's "Nevermind" to something like "Back in Black", "Led Zeppelin IV", or "Axis: Bold as Love". Sh!t, you can't even compare it to "Purple Rain". The only reason Nirvana was so influential is because the 90s were a time of extreme brain drain in Rock and Roll. We're still feeling the Rock and Roll recession as these musicians who were influenced by Kurt Cocaine still think it's cool to be depressed and whiney all the time.

So when MC Hammer was rapping about "Pumps and a Bump" he was rapping about high heeled shoes? Geez, no wonder his career tanked.

 

Girls in bikinis in high heeled shoes (pumps) with a bis a$$ (bump).

When I think 90s, I think of cheesy alternative songs like

. 

 

I could name probably three dozen cheesy 90s alternative groups!

 

Kurt Cobain single-handedly ruined the 90s. The 90s were a time of extreme economic growth but rock music was as dreary and depressing as it could possibly get.

 

Kurt Cobain just wrote the music and was molding into an icon.  He wasn't the one who thought that he had a marketable product and put millions of dollars out to spread Nirvana across America and beyond.

 

People must have liked the dreary music enough to make it a cultural phenomenon. 

I didn't appreciate that being in high school during those peak Nirvana years, all the girls wore 3 layers of sweaters and generally dressed like they had grandkids.  Now the high school girls dress like hookers.  I know this because my brother just graduated.  Wouldn't have minded the 70s or 80s... wouldn't have minded the modern era, but no no I got to go to high school just in time for the Kurt Cobain misery tour.  Thanks for taking all the fun out of rock music, Kurt.   

1996 was the big turning point in the 90's, and one of the biggest turning points in media history. The Telecommunications Act of 1996 changed the landscape forever. This opened the floodgates for the Clear Channel homogenization of music we experience today. So when talking 90's pop culture, realize there are two different worlds- the world before 1996, and the world after 1996. The Telecommunications Act of 1996 is still incredibly controversial and academic types battle about it on a daily basis. Reagan's dream of consolidation and homogenization was fortified for good with this act. At least that's what my professors told us.

 

Absolutely. 1996 is when everything mainstream went in the sh!tter. Mainstream rap before 1996 -- pretty good! After? F-ing terrible. Since then, we've had whiny nu-metal, whiny nu-rock (Nickelback, Seether et al.), whiny Nu-Country, whiny Emo and just whinyness overall. The only mainstream music that isn't a pathetic-athon is rap, but it has turned into rap's version of hair rock.

 

I totally agree!  That's when I started listening to mostly ska and punk.

^That's what I did too.

>all the girls wore 3 layers of sweaters and generally dressed like they had grandkids.

 

There were also a lot of girls with shaved heads.  Also there was that hideous unisex hairstyle where people shaved their heads except the top, then pulled it back into a weird pseudo-fountain pony tail.  That was big around 93-94.  Also there was the Doc Martin + neck beard combo. 

 

There were also those weird burlap hooded coats.  They looked like they originated at some Indian reservation roadside stand in Arizona or New Mexico and gave their wearer the profile of a druid.  In my neighborhood they were called "wigger coats" but they quickly jumped over from aspiring thugs to the fledgling jam band scene where they can still be seen from time to time.  I never knew where you even bought those things.  At least Doc Martin's had a commercial (Sentiment's Rock City -- where all Cincinnati rocks their Doc's!).         

 

 

-Radiohead started a cult following in the 90s with "The Bends" in 95 and "OK Computer" in 97 (and they are still great)

 

-Sonic Youth

 

-My favorite author Douglas Coupland dwells on 90's culture in his books

 

-Has anyone mentioned Mike Judge?  Admit it you loved Beavis and Butt-head too.

 

-Nintendo

 

I might get cracked on for admitting this, but I still like the Gin Blossoms.  They played a free concert in Canton and it was totally awesome.  You could just tell that they were enjoying themselves, plus they sounded great.

 

+1 MTV has made itself unwatchable.  I watched MTV 2 since they used to play a lot of 90's music and shows, now it is just a place where they replay their current shows over and over and over and over.

 

-Late Night with Conan Obrien peaked in the 90s  (I still feel ill that Carson daily got a late show....blah)

-The Browns came back in the 90's (of course they left in the 90's too)

When it came to culutre, I took the 90s off. I tried to listen to grunge and rap, but every song seemed to forget that melody is an important part of music. To me, it's the most important part. So I turned off the radio for much of the 90s, didn't watch MTV and few things entertained me anymore on prime-time television. I did enjoy many of the movies and found myself listening to smooth jazz, new age and some dance music, or a few of the holdover bands from the 80s like Depeche Mode and U2. But most of the cultural stuff you guys are writing about... I have little or no idea what they are.

 

-Has anyone mentioned Mike Judge?  Admit it you loved Beavis and Butt-head too.

 

 

My most favorite show, King of the Hill, debuted in 1997 and is the second longest-running animated show behind The Simpsons...

 

viya con dios

The vast majority of hot chicks at my high school just wore hoodies or pajamas (hot in a "I don't give a sh!t" sort of way).

 

I graduated in 2001 and can verify the hoodie/pajama trend. 

The vast majority of hot chicks at my high school just wore hoodies or pajamas (hot in a "I don't give a sh!t" sort of way).

 

I graduated in 2001 and can verify the hoodie/pajama trend. 

 

As RNR would say, "suddenly I feel old."

Not old..."vintage"  Vintage makes everything way cooler right?

Oh yeah, I almost forgot, the best music video ever was made in the 90s

 

<embed src="

type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="480" height="295"></embed></object>

 

 

<param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WPF-MC7qCJA&hl=en&fs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object>

Let's not forget the rise of patchouli, the hippie stench.  It smells like a homeless person doused with industrial solvents.

No, this is the best video created in the 90s.  If I do say so myself.  ;)

 

 

Nothing like a video with a touch of Cleveland flava!

I always liked this video from the 90s.

 

 

Jamiroquai's Virtual Insanity