You spent your teen years as far underground as the suburbs would allow. You avoided broadcast radio apart from a static-filled community college radio station, MTV was only watched after 10 p.m., you never saw Can’t Hardly Wait, and new music was only introduced to you by trusted older brothers and germ-ridden public headphones at Tower Records.
So, how is it possible that when Sheryl Crow says all she wants to do is have some fun, you know that the location is under the Santa Monica Boulevard? How did these songs get locked in our subconscious when we made every attempt to avoid them? Here is a list of songs that you sing into your beer at the bar because you heard them once at a house party.
Harvey Danger “Flagpole Sitta”
Sure, you saw “Disturbing Behavior” in theaters, but you don’t remember a single cell of that film and conflate it with “The Faculty.” Still, somehow, you’ll be damned if you never questioned the medical quandary of why a psychiatric ward would cut off someone’s legs.
The Verve “Bittersweet Symphony”
Wait, this wasn’t Oasis or Blur or Bush or one of those? You may not know the band, but then again, you’re a million different people from one day to the next. I can’t change my mold. No, no, no, no, no, no, no.
Deep Blue Something “Breakfast At Tiffany’s”
You weren’t a theater kid; you didn’t go to cast parties. You’ve also never seen “At Tiffany’s.” So, how is it that this pop song about a couple desperately trying to stay together can pull at your heartstrings when your sister plays it at a family BBQ, like you are being reminded of your first high-school breakup?
Gin Blossoms “Hey Jealousy”
Okay, yeah, maybe now you are one of the 165 million streams of “Hey Jealousy” on Spotify when you are thinking about the one that got away, but where did it start? How did you know to go to that specific song when feeling nostalgic for you-know-who?
The Wallflowers “One Headlight”
I mean, you snorted with derision at the fact that the band was fronted by Bob Dylan’s son but why do you hum, “Got to be something better than in the middle, me and Cinderella, we can put it all together, we can drive it home with one headlight” as you drive around your hometown when visiting your parents for Thanksgiving?
Sugar Ray “Every Morning”
Sure, even photos of Mark McGrath made us feel like we were being sexually harassed, and the song reminded us all of that toxic couple we all knew and hated. But “Every morning there’s a halo hangin’ from the corner of my girlfriend’s four-post bed. I know it’s not mine, but I’ll see if I can use it for the weekend or a one-night stand,” replaced all the proper pronoun grammar Mrs. Roberts tried so hard to teach us.
Smash Mouth “Walkin’ on the Sun”
While All Star has been Shrek-meme’ed to death, I mention “Walkin’ on the Sun” because it would be a crime not to mention that “Weird Al” Yankovic’s polka remixes of pop music is probably the main culprit as to why we all have 90s lyrics embedded in our hippocampus while we avoided pop music at all costs. He should be charged for those crimes. It is also why we can’t sing these songs at karaoke, because we don’t know what the original song actually sounds like.
Barenaked Ladies “One Week”
Like reruns of “The Big Bang Theory” now, this song was absolutely inescapable in 1998; it was in commercials, TV, and was in the confoundingly popular “American Pie” movie (and “Digimon: The Movie” if that was more your style). We have all wondered if we shouldn’t sing ‘Chickity China the Chinese chicken,’ when singing this song like skipping over the n-words in “Insane in the Brain.”
Lit “My Own Worst Enemy”
“It’s no surprise to me I am my own worst enemy cuz’ every now and then I kick the living shit out of me,” is the, “In the room the women come and go, Talking of Michelangelo,” for the Millennial generation.
Sixpence None the Richer “Kiss Me”
Oh my God, you saw “She’s All That” on a group date with your Church friends, it’s ok to admit it now. Freddie Prinze Jr. and Rachael Leigh Cook had fantastic chemistry.
New Radicals “You Get What You Give”
Sure, you mocked Gregg Alexander’s bucket hat at every turn, but if someone started the breakdown, “Courtney Love and Marilyn Manson…,” you’ll absolutely echo, “You’re all fakes, run to your mansions. Come around, we’ll kick your ass in!”