"Tonight, Tonight" is the best song of the 90s.

[schild]

Johnny Cash's "Hurt" is on par with Shatner's "Common People".  Its all about the novelty

And yet, ironically, they're both so vastly superior to the originals it's not even funny.

[Wasted]

Johnny Cash's "Hurt" is on par with Shatner's "Common People".  Its all about the novelty

And yet, ironically, they're both so vastly superior to the originals it's not even funny.

You are wrong, their very appeal is based on the importance of the original songs.

[schild]

Johnny Cash's "Hurt" is on par with Shatner's "Common People".  Its all about the novelty

And yet, ironically, they're both so vastly superior to the originals it's not even funny.

You are wrong, their very appeal is based on the importance of the original songs.

Actually their very appeal was based on Johnny Cash doing a great cover on his death bed and the mere existence of William Shatner.

Songs only need exist to be covered. Are you saying Weird Al songs are only good if the song preceding it were good? Cuz he's made some good shit out of some pretty awful shit. A lot of bands have. The Pulp song was always nearly unlistenable to me and the importance and beauty of Hurt was circumstantial to Cash's life and current situation (current at that time at least).

[Wasted]

Johnny Cash's "Hurt" is on par with Shatner's "Common People".  Its all about the novelty

And yet, ironically, they're both so vastly superior to the originals it's not even funny.

You are wrong, their very appeal is based on the importance of the original songs.

Actually their very appeal was based on Johnny Cash doing a great cover on his death bed and the mere existence of William Shatner.

Songs only need exist to be covered. Are you saying Weird Al songs are only good if the song preceding it were good? Cuz he's made some good shit out of some pretty awful shit. A lot of bands have. The Pulp song was always nearly unlistenable to me and the importance and beauty of Hurt was circumstantial to Cash's life and current situation (current at that time at least).

Seriously the Cash version is no-where near the NIN one musically, and to most people it was 'old country singer does a NIN cover, thats kinda cool'.

Shatner's version is only win because his character is at direct odds with the spirit of the song, he is the daddy the girl will call when everything gets too much, he's an out of touch star with a quirky style that has the good grace to poke fun at him self.  That you personally didn't like Pulp's version doesn't change the fact it was an anthem at the time and a great song.

They are good covers, made good because they have a direct contrast to the original.  Though Shatner's humour reaches far they are generally only good covers to people that know the original.  A truly good cover is one where people have to remember that there was an original.

[schild]

Shatner's version is only win because his character is at direct odds with the spirit of the song, he is the daddy the girl will call when everything gets too much, he's an out of touch star with a quirky style that has the good grace to poke fun at him self.

My mistake. I forgot something couldn't just be fun to listen and sing along to. I'll be sure to look for deeper meaning in my covers.

Maybe it was an anthem in Europe, but I don't think I heard it on the radio here even once. And I actually did listen to the radio back then.

[IainC]

Shatner's version is only win because his character is at direct odds with the spirit of the song, he is the daddy the girl will call when everything gets too much, he's an out of touch star with a quirky style that has the good grace to poke fun at him self.

My mistake. I forgot something couldn't just be fun to listen and sing along to. I'll be sure to look for deeper meaning in my covers.

Maybe it was an anthem in Europe, but I don't think I heard it on the radio here even once. And I actually did listen to the radio back then.

Pulp's Different Class album got airplay like almost nothing else during that time. All the singles - Disco 2000, Common People, Sorted for Es and Whizz, etc were on rotation with all the main radio stations in amongst the Blur and Oasis tracks.

[schild]

Pulp's Different Class album got airplay like almost nothing else during that time. All the singles - Disco 2000, Common People, Sorted for Es and Whizz, etc were on rotation with all the main radio stations in amongst the Blur and Oasis tracks.

In Europe.

[Wasted]

It was big in Australia too.

And everytime the Shatner versoin was played, it was always referenced as a cover, not left to stand on its own.  same with Cash and Hurt.

[Engels]

I just listened to a few Pulp tracks and ya, I can see why it didn't make it in the US. See, when an American calls someone a Eurofag, this is EXACTLY what they mean. Jesus wept.

Edit: Ok, I take that back, because it sounded meaner than I meant it. But good god people.

[schild]

It's not so much Eurofag as it's just really terrible new wave that came long enough after new wave that people FORGOT.

Edit: Also, in the mid-late 90s, I went out of the way to get a lot of eurofag music. Pulp got one listen to and forgotten.

[NowhereMan]

Apparently the European DJs never got your memo.

The Johnny Cash Hurt cover though? That one is hugely superior to the original, it happens.

[Fabricated]

Does rap count?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Odq2Mvvw6XA

[Tale]

I just listened to a few Pulp tracks and ya, I can see why it didn't make it in the US. See, when an American calls someone a Eurofag, this is EXACTLY what they mean. Jesus wept.

Edit: Ok, I take that back, because it sounded meaner than I meant it. But good god people.

You're like my mum at any kind of Asian restaurant. Clueless about the food, so it's "weird" and she won't eat it. The rave scene, manc and other cultural movements of the 1990s went over your head, so you're looking at Pulp out of its cultural context and without a translator. Mum, billions of happy people eat, understand and enjoy this.

It's deliberately overblown English art school wankery by a pre-1990s band in a post-rave Britain. Jarvis Cocker had a sort of ironic cool about him in that context - see the song "Sorted for E's and wiz" and just the general sound of the album "Different Class". He's still around, retaining that cool niche within British culture, but his music suits a purpose, not the American pop charts.

It's not so much Eurofag as it's just really terrible new wave that came long enough after new wave that people FORGOT.

Edit: Also, in the mid-late 90s, I went out of the way to get a lot of eurofag music. Pulp got one listen to and forgotten.

What does "Eurofag" mean? It sounds like it might mean "we are a newbie nation without any understanding of other countries or irony or where our culture and words even came from, so let's call all the European shit we can't understand 'gay', so we can concentrate on missing the jaw-dropping campness of every branch of our military, Hollywood and local bands, to save us the embarrassment of acknowledging the sheer heterosexual sexiness of the French". D'accord?

[Tale]

Best song without a video is Don Was' "I Feel Better than James Brown."

Holy shit, I agree with you about something from 1990s music. I loved that Was Not Was album. I feel better than James Brown, I feel better now, how do you feel?

[schild]

Given my current situation, I'm thinking of transferring to the moon. Worse pay, better hours.

[stray]

Eh, I almost thought Daniel Ash made that one song about the Moon in the 90's. Then I'd link it. 

[Tale]

Suddenly, CIA men dressed in bikinis tried to stab us with fountain pens. Fidel blew mustard gas through his cigar and immobilised the lot of them.

edit - album also had the Was (Not Was) version of Papa Was a Rolling Stone. Still sounds fresh today.

[Phildo]

Nineteen tequilas later we had a deal.  Havana goes back to the mob and Fidel and I open a chain of Kentucky Fried Chicken shops.

[schild]

Dad, I'm in Jail.
Dad, I'm calling you from jail.
Say hi to mom.

I'M IN JAIL.

[Engels]

I just listened to a few Pulp tracks and ya, I can see why it didn't make it in the US. See, when an American calls someone a Eurofag, this is EXACTLY what they mean. Jesus wept.

Edit: Ok, I take that back, because it sounded meaner than I meant it. But good god people.

You're like my mum at any kind of Asian restaurant. Clueless about the food, so it's "weird" and she won't eat it. The rave scene, manc and other cultural movements of the 1990s went over your head, so you're looking at Pulp out of its cultural context and without a translator. Mum, billions of happy people eat, understand and enjoy this.

Not quite. I'm like your mom at an Asian restaurant if your mother is Asian. I'm half german, spent ~18 years of my life in Europe. So not really, no. And before you go on about how I'm just too macho, or whatever, I'm a huge fan of the Cure, Bauhaus and Depeche Mode, so my metrosexual credentials are well in order, thank you very much.

It's deliberately overblown English art school wankery by a pre-1990s band in a post-rave Britain.

Bingo.

[Jeff Kelly]

And yet, ironically, they're both so vastly superior to the originals it's not even funny.

Seriously the Cash version is no-where near the NIN one musically, and to most people it was 'old country singer does a NIN cover, thats kinda cool'.

Seriously. What? Also I am with Schild on this one.

Johnny Cash's Version of 'Hurt' is so much better than the original it's not even funny.

[Azazel]

The 00s has already been won, btw. Johnny Cash - Hurt.

For the 90s:

Cher - Believe
Elton John - Candle in the Wind 1997
Los Del Rio - Macarena
Coolio - Gangsta's Paradise
Seal - Kiss From A Rose
All 4 One - I Swear
Whitney Houston - I Will Always Love You
Tag Team - Whoomp There It Is
Boyz 2 Men - End of the Road
Sir Mix-A-Lot - Baby Got Back
Bryan Adams - Everything I Do
Sinead - Nothing Compares 2 U
Britney - Hit Me Baby One More Time

I'd lean to Sir Mix-A-Lot or Boyz 2 Men.

This list is a perfect example of why threads like this are pretty much pointless except for a general discussion. I find pretty much everything on Sky's list there excremental, but it's all just opinion and taste anyway - mine and his both.

People have refuted that. You've simply restated that it is. It's the neo-con method of argument - ignore all evidence to the contrary and repeat the lie until enough people who are hard of thinking agree with you.

This has always been schild's method of making an argument on the internet, at least for the past several years.

I've made up my own criteria which I refuse to explain but they prove beyond argument that 'We're Going to Ibiza' by The Vengaboys is the best song ever written. Just so you know. Should I start my own thread?

You're wrong of course. The correct answer is the Vengaboys "We like to Party". Part of the criteria is the hot brunette. 

[schild]

This has always been schild's method of making an argument on the internet, at least for the past several years.

This implies I make actual arguments on the internet rather than just get it right the first time.

[Azazel]

You write stuff. Sometimes you're right. Sometimes it's opinion. Sometimes it's trolling for a good time (honey). Sometimes it's just bollocks.   

[Wasted]

And yet, ironically, they're both so vastly superior to the originals it's not even funny.

Seriously the Cash version is no-where near the NIN one musically, and to most people it was 'old country singer does a NIN cover, thats kinda cool'.

Seriously. What? Also I am with Schild on this one.

Johnny Cash's Version of 'Hurt' is so much better than the original it's not even funny.

I get it, he's a big american icon and could have sang "Baby got back" on his deathbed and it would have been praised as a poignant insight into the baser instincts that controlled his life. I'm sure there are plenty of Americans in his core demographic that didn't know it was a cover as well.  What the fuck ever, his voice in the song is shit, the acoustic is pretty good but doesn't hold up to the original.  Its a good song, especially if you care about him but I can't see many people who don't know the history picking it over the original.

To those of us elsewhere some american country singer was made cooler by the fact that he even knew about NIN let alone covered them.  That was all.

All this thread has proven, besides that Tonight Tonight is not the defining song of the 90's, is that cultural differences exist and subjective things are subjective.  Wow 

[IainC]

You're wrong of course. The correct answer is the Vengaboys "We like to Party". Part of the criteria is the hot brunette. 

If it's all about her then turn the sound off and watch the video to Boom Boom boom.

[schild]

I get it, he's a big american icon and could have sang "Baby got back" on his deathbed and it would have been praised as a poignant insight into the baser instincts that controlled his life. I'm sure there are plenty of Americans in his core demographic that didn't know it was a cover as well.  What the fuck ever, his voice in the song is shit, the acoustic is pretty good but doesn't hold up to the original.  Its a good song, especially if you care about him but I can't see many people who don't know the history picking it over the original.

To those of us elsewhere some american country singer was made cooler by the fact that he even knew about NIN let alone covered them.  That was all.

All this thread has proven, besides that Tonight Tonight is not the defining song of the 90's, is that cultural differences exist and subjective things are subjective.  Wow

haha wow

[ahoythematey]

The thing is, it's not a case of cultural differences or subjectivity in this instance.  Reznor himself has basically said that Cash took that song away from him and made it into something of his own.  Trent wrote down a piece of his soul and performed what was written, then Johnny Cash took those words and music and performed a piece of his own soul through it.

Also, you are way wrong about the voice.

[schild]

He's wrong in the first sentence. Cash isn't really a big American with everybody. He's a respected country singer, for sure, but big? I only like 3 of his songs.

Not to mention Jeff is from Germany afaik. >_> And that's just the beginning.

[ahoythematey]

Good point.

HAY!  TELL THE KAISER I SEZ HAI!

[Wasted]

Everyone is wrong and everyone is right.

To plenty of people the song was a novelty and that was all.  To plenty of people it was great.  To everyone with a high opinion of themselves it was definitively one way or the other so much that it isn't even funny

[schild]

A Novelty? Man, I only liked 2 other Cash songs before that. Thing really was no novelty - great, bad, indifferent, I can get.

But novelty? Novelty?

[Wasted]

yes a fucking novelty, it like you've read nothing I've written so far, its was the first stupid comment that started this stupid arguement.

[stray]

Man, just about everyone knows Johnny Cash. If not, you're pretty fucking stupid. Or an African Bushman. 

[ahoythematey]

A novelty is Alvin and the Chipmunks, or the Jerky Boys.