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101 Best Songs of 1994 - #1 - Notorious BIG - Juicy (1 Viewer)

uhhhh, "What's The Story" is one of the greatest albums of the 90s man.
It's the greatest album of ALL TIME for me.

And if someone would have told me in 1990 that my pick wouldn't have been in the late 60s or early 70s, but an upcoming 90s group, I would have considered them insane.

The brothers being arrogant turds much of the time doesn't change the greatness of the album. 

 
I had to google Lanegen/Liam, because I didn't know this story.

https://www.loudersound.com/features/the-truth-behind-the-mark-lanegan-and-liam-gallagher-feud

:lmao:

Liam really is an All-Pro at insulting people, it's a shame for him his brother is a Hall of Famer.
And Lanegan was prone to violence.  So fancy lad got pretty lucky to escape a beating.

I find the Oasis love interesting......I guess pretentious Liam just turned me off and I never really felt like I was missing out.

 
I guess pretentious Liam just turned me off and I never really felt like I was missing out.
You're not alone. I just didn't belabor the point. Oasis is best in small doses for me, and they could have left that attitude back in England for all I cared.  

 
"Where Did You Sleep Last Night?" is one of the greatest, deeply-felt acoustic renderings of a blues song one can imagine. It just slays. The quotes above are right. By that time, I had sort of had it with Nirvana and the whole grunge scene, but that performance was breathtaking right away. I still listened to it back about five years ago regularly. Now, things are a little different, but it was such a heartfelt blues masterpiece that I could absolutely see the genius of the performative element of Nirvana. I used to think Mudhoney was a better band. That song pretty much spoke to the opposite side of things. 

On less of a emotive note, the part where he's ####### around with his guitar and telling the story of trying to get David Geffen to buy Leadbelly's guitar from Leadbelly's estate is funny. Right before he launches into...that. 
Lanegan and Cobain used to listen to Leadbelly albums when they would hang out, back in the day.  They actually started a collaboration of Leadbelly songs that never came to be......"Where did you sleep last night" actually appears on Lanegans first solo album "The Winding Sheet", as well......it's a good rendition, but not as emotional.  I think Kurt nails this one.

 
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Several Ace of Base songs still on the board, sorry if I stole your Thunder Scorchy. 
Luckily for me, only one was released in '94 (Don't Turn Around).  According to my research, The Sign was a huge hit in '94 but was released the year earlier and All That She Wants the year before that.  For the record, I consider the latter two "pleasures" rather than "guilty pleasures."

 
And Lanegan was prone to violence.  So fancy lad got pretty lucky to escape a beating.

I find the Oasis love interesting......I guess pretentious Liam just turned me off and I never really felt like I was missing out.
Both they and Lenny Kravitz were big at the time and I remember feeling like both acts had some decent songs but their overall sound was way too derivative. I mean, two of Oasis' most famous songs unapologetically lifted hooks from the Beatles.

 
Morbid, but whenever I listen to Where Did You Sleep Last Night I can feel Kurt dying. That's how powerful that performance was. Best cover of anything ever made. Chills just writing this right now.
That last line, when his voice is cracking and all he can get out is "The pines ... pines ... sun ... shines ..." gets me every time

 
Both they and Lenny Kravitz were big at the time and I remember feeling like both acts had some decent songs but their overall sound was way too derivative. I mean, two of Oasis' most famous songs unapologetically lifted hooks from the Beatles.
I can't do Lemmy Kravitz.  Fly away is so repetitive.  He was more about an image, than music, always seemed like to me.

 
Rusted Root!  Yes!
Lol. 

The gb I mentioned who dated Pearl Jams bass player...she directed that Rusted Root video. I have no idea how she managed to score that with no background, but she's a pretty kick ### lady. She was Also somehow friends with Evan Dando who I used to see around we we hung out after college.

But damn..rusted root.

 
One of the greatest covers of any song by anyone. Another appears on the same album.


#2 -Nirvana - Where Did You Sleep Last Night?

A legendary performance that is absolutely impossible to separate from its context.  Nirvana MTV Unplugged first aired on December 16th 1993 (the record was released in November 1994).  It was the end of finals week in Gainesville and I was packing up to drive back home to Maryland, but took a break to sit and watch the show with my roommates.  Obviously, none of us knew that it would form our final memories of Kurt Cobain.

I was in the same exact room on April 8, 1994 when Kurt Loder broke in and reported Cobain's death.  Did I really just leave MTV on the tube back then?  Did someone else bust in and tell me the news and I turned on the TV?  I swear it's the first one, but memory is a funny thing.  I do know for sure that MTV aired Nirvana Unplugged nonstop over the next few months and every song, but especially the last one, would take on a whole new weight.

Judging now, Where Did You Sleep Last Night has to the most anguished vocal performance by a rock star ever captured on video.  That last verse, where Kurt absolutely shreds his vocal chords - my lord...  Quotes taken from the oral history of the show published by The Ringer:

Even Kurt seemed to know.  When MTV tried to get the band to go out and do an encore, he replied:

Where Did You Sleep Last Night
And there’s the other one.

 
#1 - Notorious BIG - Juicy

Maybe I should have taken Kurt Cobain's advice posted on the previous page:

Well, I don’t really think you’re gonna top that. I think you’re done.


I live in a smallish town that straddles the Baltimore city line, about 10-15 minutes from downtown.  It's kind of diverse for a suburb but no one is gonna confuse it with the westside neighborhoods just a few miles down the road either.  We have a cute little main street with mom-and-pop restaurants, coffee shops, and a record store.  On the side of one of the downtown buildings, there's a two-story mural depicting the crown worn by Biggie in his "King of New York" photoshoot with the opening lines from Juicy in giant letters: It was all a dream.

Now, as much as I like Nirvana, Soundgarden, Alice in Chains, etc., I can't imagine there are too many murals (aside from maybe in their hometowns) dedicated to their lead singers popping up on suburban buildings.  Yet here, 220 miles from Cardoza Queens, we have a monument to one of the greatest rags-to-riches tales ever put on wax.

When I first started putting together my list, I knew Juicy had to end up at #1.  I also knew that lots of folks would grumble 🙂.  I was shocked when doing some background research that Rolling Stone actually agreed, ranking Juicy as the 31st best song of all time, the highest placement of any song from 1994.  Lots of other publications felt similarly:

Blender Magazine ranked it #168 on its Top 500 Songs of the '80s–'00s list in 2005.

Pitchfork Media ranked the song at #14 on their Top 200 Tracks of the 1990s.

PopMatters ranked it #1 on their Singles of the Year list in 1994.

Q Magazine ranked Juicy the ninth greatest hip hop song of all time.

The Source included it on their The 100 Best Rap Singles of All Time list [no rankings].

VH1 ranked it #1 on its 40 Greatest Hip Hop Songs of the 90s.

BBC ranked it #1 on its Greatest Hip Hop Songs of All Time.


So with that, here's the #1 song of 1994.  It's such a perfect testimony that I don't even mind Puff Daddy talking in the background throughout.

Juicy

 
Nice finish, scorchy! I'd pen a soliloquy about how this moves me, but I'll just let it ride. I could have sworn this would be Dr. Dre and "Let Me Ride," but I may have the year wrong. This is much better. East Coast represent. 

Remember Rappin' Duke/duh-hah duh-hah
You never thought that hip hop would take it this far...


 
Nice finish, scorchy! I'd pen a soliloquy about how this moves me, but I'll just let it ride. I could have sworn this would be Dr. Dre and "Let Me Ride," but I may have the year wrong. This is much better. East Coast represent. 

Remember Rappin' Duke/duh-hah duh-hah
You never thought that hip hop would take it this far...
I loved Rappin' Duke so much when I was 12.  I heard it first at the roller-rink and found a 12".  I don't even need to google the lyrics so I'm going for memory:

So ya think your bad, with your rap

Well I'll tell ya pilgrim I started the crap

While you were in diapers and wetting the sheets

I was at the Ponderosa rappin' to the beat

 
I loved Rappin' Duke so much when I was 12.  I heard it first at the roller-rink and found a 12".  I don't even need to google the lyrics so I'm going for memory:

So ya think your bad, with your rap

Well I'll tell ya pilgrim I started the crap

While you were in diapers and wetting the sheets

I was at the Ponderosa rappin' to the beat
Did you listen to Dr. Demento? It was a syndicated show featuring musical humor. He played this all the time. 

 
Somehow I totally missed out on Biggie. I could blame that partly on the fact that I was out of the country from '95-'98, but obviously that doesn't explain my ignorance of a song that came out in '94.

I do remember Puffy's insipid tribute song after he died (that one was inescapable, even in Eastern Europe) and by the time I returned to the States in '98, Puffy was cashing in on his association with Biggie like a homeless guy who found a winning lottery ticket.

But during Biggie's actual prime, I was totally clueless. That's on me, so I'm certainly not going to criticize your choice, but for me, the list ends with Nirvana.

Great job putting this all together!

 
Did you listen to Dr. Demento? It was a syndicated show featuring musical humor. He played this all the time. 
At the time, I didn't. Not sure if it was on in my town. But Bob The Dragon would play his homemade tapes a lot freshman year. It's how i first heard Leonard Nimoy's Bilbo Baggins and some bizarre ode to Hyapatia Lee.

 
Mainly outside my wheelhouse, but the one song that I'm sure all the Pantera fans roll their eyes out is on the 1993 shortlist.
This slipped by. Is there a Pantera fan that would roll his eyes at a song off of Vulgar? 

I think I know which one it is. That's still a (probably too intensely macho) good song, though Anselmo's preening takes on a different meaning these days. It's sorta ugly. 

 

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