90s music was all fake and gay. Let’s get that right out front. We hadn’t invented the phrase “fake and gay” yet, though, so we were forced to make due with a phrase from Lit Crit: “Deconstruction”.
[Not to be confused with Disintegration, which as we all know is the greatest album ever].
Nirvana’s genre-defining hit “Smells Like Teen Spirit” was a deconstruction of Boston’s “More Than a Feeling”. Pearl Jam were the deconstructed Doors (though this is more because of Eddie Vedder’s “kinder, more sensitive Jim Morrison” act than for the music). The Counting Crows were deconstructed Sixties folk, the Smashing Pumpkins were deconstructed Pink Floyd (I like Smashing Pumpkins), the Gin Blossoms were the deconstructed Eagles, and so on, finally reaching its nadir with Oasis, the “deconstructed” Beatles who were so deconstructed, McCartney et al could’ve sued them for plagiarism and probably won.
Severian, “Alt Music Thread”, Founding Questions, 2022-07-06.
September 6, 2026
QotD: 90s music
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