A year of Tunes

Some of our musical favorites for the year were Esquivel ("It swings!"), Joe Satriani ("Listen to it, then if you have to ask why, your not worthy of my time. :)"), and Erasure ("The mechanized snails were cool"). The "winner," though, with two votes, was Grandes Exitos de Juan Luis Guerra.

Where but skew?

Where do you see popular music going in 1996?

"In the dumpster, if the lists of most popular albums are any indication..."

"The start of music video disks like MPEG on CD-ROM rather than just CDs. Kinda takes the fun out of making up images to go with the music. I always disliked MTV for that."

"Up. It has to. It can't possibly get any worse. And if it does, I'm going to pour acid in my ears and never turn on the radio again."

"Hopefully, far away."

"I actually think that music's getting gradually better. Evidence from the last half-decade:

  • Liz Phair, Shelleyan Orphan, Mazzy Star, and other original, innovative new performers survived long enough to make a second album.
  • Lou Reed's better than ever (Magic and Loss, New York, Songs for Drella).
  • Duran Duran's gone and uncelebrated.
  • Broadway musical scores have ceased to be quite so much like Kansas in August.
  • Enough people like the stuff David Byrne's been doing lately to keep him doing it -- especially his promotion of international music. It's a big world, as Joe Jackson has pointed out.
  • A lot of new bands still sound pretty much alike, but at least they sound good in their unoriginality. That's progress."
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