Falling Back In Fields of Tape
 Britt Brown

Classic 90s Albums That are 100 Times Radder on Cassette than CD or Vinyl (in no particular order) – VOLUME ONE

1) Breeders – Last Splash
The key for a sweet tape album is that like 90% of the songs have to rule. Cause you don’t wanna waste your life skipping around all the shit songs. Fortunately, on LS, there’s ZERO need to fast-forward because every song is awesome. Kim Deal’s done a ton of dumb stuff in her life, but she didn’t do it here. The CS format forces you to experience every track (not just Cannonball), and when you do, you realize the Breeders used to be amazing. Which is nice and logical thing to learn.

2) Smashing Pumpkins – Siamese Dream
I’m not too forgiving with William Corgan’s horseshit. I think his lyrical ratio of teenage barf vs decent rock words is probably…50 to 1? Maybe even 100 to 1. Seriously, any time you bother catching some snippet or phrase, it’s like “you are you, I am me” or something like that. BUT – Siamese Dream definitely has some classic moments, and is the one audio statement where he minimized his suck while increasing his (rare) good qualities. You’re a freak if you think you need on this on vinyl, but a fucked, cracked-case cassette copy can really hit the spot.

3) Soundgarden – all/most
Getting into Chris Cornell is obviously treading deep into uncool waters (I mean, his hair is epic, but still…), HOWEVER – most of their relatively early-ish stuff (like Badmotorfinger or before) is way heavier and less lame when shoved/compressed on to cassette tape. We scored a copy of Louder Than Love at a Goodwill in Ventura and it’s actually a sweet listen when yr getting siked for a show.

4) Dr. Dre – The Chronic
Duh. Pretty obvious. If yr in a phase of your life where you’re throwing this on a lot, the last thing you need is some shitty, fragile compact disc that can’t handle a little rough-and-tumble. Sounds best when fished out of the cracks on the floorboards of a grossly messy car full of bad music. You pick it up, see Dre scowling at you on the cover, and just start partying.

5) Danzig – When the Gods Kill
Perhaps not a canonized 90s “classic” like Downward Spiral or something, but Danzig is key to the post-goth-punk framework, and though none of his records officially “suck”, this is my personal favorite. Glenn busts out some hilarious lyrics (e.g. “I can make a young girl lay down for me…because I’m evil”), does lot of his 50s/Elvis style jams, and hires H.R. Giger to do the cover art. He’s easing comfortably into his middle-aged ridiculous-hood, and it rules. A good album to forget about for a decade, then listen to once and be like, “Fucking Danzig, man.”

6 ) Afghan Whigs – Gentlemen
Again, I don’t know if this a “classic” per se, and paying tons of attention to Greg Dulli’s discography definitely gets you nowhere in this life, but I’ve owned Gentlemen since like the 8th grade and whenever I throw it on (about once every 4 years) I’m always surprised by how relatively little it sucks. The old-school brooding, self-righteous vibes on here have a sort of universal appeal that nearly any mid-level modern misanthrope could relate to. And since tapes are fairly small, you can always stash it away afterwards if you don’t want to advertise to the world at large that yr in a human-hating mindset.

7) Beck – Mellow Gold
Welcome to the record I smoked my first joint too. Sad/lame, but true. This guitar virtuoso (his favorite band? Yes) dude I used to know put MG on and then started rigging a coke can into a caveman pipe. It was a night of firsts. Later, I got pretty into early Beck. We used to always joke/theorize about what the voice yells at the beginning of Truckdrivin Neighbors Downstairs…my friend Jay always swore the guy goes “Why don’t you call your mommy? You lousy jew.” But despite his die-hard Scientology leanings, I’m not confident that Beck is into subliminal anti-Semitism. I feel like he’s more mellow than that. Right?

8) Veruca Salt – American Thighs
One of the better 1-hit-wonder bands of the 90s. Cashing in on post-grunge Alternative rock worked out rad for these Chicago Willy Wonkans. Pretty meaningless overall, but Seether and Get Back and some of the side B shit has some good riffs. Bonus points: super easy to find in thrift stores, cause a whole generation of kids ditched this tape fast when alt-rock died (circa ’95-96).

9) Thurston Moore – Psychic Hearts
Plenty might disagree, but this solo album kinda functions to me as a post-Experimental Jet Set SY record, in that it’s pretty song-based and catchy like most mid-90s Sonic Youth stuff was. Very little filler, “alternative” art-scrawl art, polaroids of young Thurston on the inside: a charming outing overall. DGC must have been siked on this one. Especially since he agreed to release it under his own name instead of “T he Virgin Whores” (which is what I read he was originally insisting on).

10) Built to Spill – Perfect From Now On
If you hate this band, then all their albums suck on tape (and CD). But if you think Doug Martsch did a few things right in his lifetime, odds are they’re on this record, cause it’s pretty overtly their best one. Jam-heavy, long songs, good for driving around California (or other places probably). Manda used to have this on CD but if you try to play it now it has so many skips it sounds like Oval. I spilled coffee all over our tape copy but it still sounds perfect. From now…till forever.