I realize I might get some flack for this pick, but this is one of the forgotten grunge albums that really stands up after many years. There were a number of hits off this album, with Hey Jealousy being the Gin Blossoms most popular. Listening to the entire album now, it is a little more tame than a lot of grunge albums, but has surprising quality in both the lyrics and music. If you havn't listened to this album in awhile, give it another check now and decide for yourself how it holds up.
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New Miserable Experience
Tags: alternative, gin blossoms, grunge, new miserable experience
I actually was just listening to this recently and made a comment to someone about how it's still one of my most favorite albums ever. I never really considered them grunge. I suppose the release date is right for "grunge" but I find it difficult putting the Gin Blossoms in the same category as Alice In Chains, Soundgarden & Nirvana. Some of it has a Cajun/country feel while other stuff is more pop-rock.No matter what you label it though - 29, Allison Road & Found Out About You are just plain fantastic songs.
Great band, but yeah, not really grunge. Then again, neither were most of the bands labelled "grunge".
I think this album came out my first year at UI. They played one of the local bars (the Fieldhouse, maybe?) and I remember walking by and saying something about them being "another loser bar band" only to later find out "Hey Jealously" was already on heavy rotation on MTV - I hadn't seen a television in months.
I should qualify that last statement; I only heard them from *outside* the bar. The actual album was quite good.
You haven't actually got any flack yet that I can see, so here's some: I've owned this album since "hey jealousy" started getting lots of radio airtime (I bought it on cassette lol), but if you'd referred to it as "grunge" back then I would have laughed in your face. Alterna-pop, maybe.
There, consider yourself flacked
(also: holy crap I feel old)
Yeah, I realized that calling it grunge was probably in poor taste. Going with something like "poppy album from the grunge era" would be more appropriate
Yeah, I realized that calling it grunge was probably in poor taste. Going with something like "poppy album from the grunge era" would be more appropriate