# New for the Nineties: Any new music genres begun in the 1990s? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [March 21, 2003, 12:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-for-the-nineties-any-new-music-genres-begun-in-the-1990s/162947 "2003-03-21T00:48:11Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Derleth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Derleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Derleth)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2003, 12:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-for-the-nineties-any-new-music-genres-begun-in-the-1990s/162947/1 "2003-03-21T00:48:11Z")
I know there’s a lot of different kinds of music out there. I’ve listened to bands as diverse as The Dwarves, Simon & Garfunkel, Mannheim Steamroller (in collaboration with Mason Williams, no less), U2, Gorillaz, and others I can’t begin to think of right now. 🙂 There are many I’ve never heard of, too. Each more-or-less falls into one or more genres, which can be construed broadly or narrowly. Most, if not all, of those genres existed before 1990. Or did they? Hence my post here. Psychadelic was invented in the 1960s. Punk was invented in the 1970s. Rock-n-roll itself, mother of genres, was invented in the late 1940s-early 1950s. You can generally say things like that, sometimes pointing to specific albums or acts as seminal or revolutionary. Can anyone here say the 1990s produced anything that can’t be classified into a genre that existed before 1990? I know there is a lot of new ground to cover in music, if only because I know enough not to say the opposite. 😉 I just want to know what new ground was covered in the 1990s. ---
**Author:** ![Earl\_of\_the\_CC](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/58956e/32.png) [@Earl\_of\_the\_CC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Earl_of_the_CC)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2003, 12:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-for-the-nineties-any-new-music-genres-begun-in-the-1990s/162947/2 "2003-03-21T00:53:05Z")
I think this one may be tought to pin down, but wasn’t techno created in the 90’s? ---
**Author:** ![Rabid\_Squirrel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e0b2c6/32.png) [@Rabid\_Squirrel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rabid_Squirrel)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2003, 1:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-for-the-nineties-any-new-music-genres-begun-in-the-1990s/162947/3 "2003-03-21T01:15:24Z")
Eck… I think techno was kinda lurking about in the 80’s with the birth of synthesizers. It progressed to dance/house/drum ‘n’ bass/hard house/ jungle/trace/nrg/etc since then. And yes, I agree that to the untrained ear they _can_ sound similar. The ‘ol’ Seattle grunge rock scene got kicked off in the 90’s although you could rightlyfully argue that it’s a attitude/image thing rather than a truely new genre music. Again with the ‘nu’ (shudders) rock and the sub-genre thing. The SKA sound (kicking around since the 80’s) was supposed to go mainstream in the 90’s, but never really took hold. ---
**Author:** ![Mr\_Salads](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/c2a13f/32.png) [@Mr\_Salads](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr_Salads)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2003, 1:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-for-the-nineties-any-new-music-genres-begun-in-the-1990s/162947/4 "2003-03-21T01:20:17Z")
Rabid, I don’t think there’s anything to argue about grunge. It’s a genre of its own, something that was very distinctive of the 90’s. Techno also gained exposure in the late 90’s. ---
**Author:** ![Banger](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/8491ac/32.png) [@Banger](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Banger)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2003, 1:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-for-the-nineties-any-new-music-genres-begun-in-the-1990s/162947/5 "2003-03-21T01:24:56Z")
**New Order** was playing techno back in the 80s. **Husker Du** ’s later stuff in the mid to late-80s sounds a lot like the grunge of the 90s. Ska originated in Jamaica in the 60s. The British combined it with other genres (including punk) in the late-70s “Two-Tone” era with bands like **The Specials** and **Madness** , as did **Fishbone** , **The Untouchables** and **Operation Ivy** combine ska with other sounds in America in the 80s. The ska of the 90s more of a resurgence of these earlier sounds than a new sound. ---
**Author:** ![Aslan\_of\_Narnia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ecd19e/32.png) [@Aslan\_of\_Narnia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aslan_of_Narnia)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2003, 1:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-for-the-nineties-any-new-music-genres-begun-in-the-1990s/162947/6 "2003-03-21T01:25:52Z")
Goth? ---
**Author:** ![Lobot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ce7236/32.png) [@Lobot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobot)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2003, 1:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-for-the-nineties-any-new-music-genres-begun-in-the-1990s/162947/7 "2003-03-21T01:26:37Z")
What about grunge? ---
**Author:** ![Lissla\_Lissar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8491ac/32.png) [@Lissla\_Lissar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lissla_Lissar)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2003, 1:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-for-the-nineties-any-new-music-genres-begun-in-the-1990s/162947/8 "2003-03-21T01:30:43Z")
But what type of goth? EBM, maybe, and the hard techno stuff, but Siouxse and the Banshees, the Cure, and Depeche Mode were 80’s goth. ---
**Author:** ![Lobot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ce7236/32.png) [@Lobot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobot)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2003, 1:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-for-the-nineties-any-new-music-genres-begun-in-the-1990s/162947/9 "2003-03-21T01:31:06Z")
Sorry, I forgot to reload the page, hence my redundant last post. ---
**Author:** ![irkenDoom](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/c2a13f/32.png) [@irkenDoom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/irkenDoom)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2003, 1:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-for-the-nineties-any-new-music-genres-begun-in-the-1990s/162947/10 "2003-03-21T01:42:11Z")
Techno has been around since the late '60s, really, with Kraftwerk. The Beatles even used Moog synthesizers on Abbey Road (not really techno, but the synthesizers were in use). I know rap has been around since the late '70s, but what about hardcore gangsta rap? That was early '90s, right? ---
**Author:** ![Already\_in\_Use](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/a9adbd/32.png) [@Already\_in\_Use](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Already_in_Use)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2003, 4:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-for-the-nineties-any-new-music-genres-begun-in-the-1990s/162947/11 "2003-03-21T04:11:16Z")
Rap-rock? ---
**Author:** ![Lizard](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/dfb087/32.png) [@Lizard](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lizard)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2003, 4:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-for-the-nineties-any-new-music-genres-begun-in-the-1990s/162947/12 "2003-03-21T04:29:07Z")
You can’t really put grunge squarely in the 90s. A lot of the bands formed in the 80s, and had been knocking around the Pac. Northwest for years before Nirvana and Pearl Jam exploded. In fact, I think _both_ those groups, along with Soundgarden, formed around 1987 or so. ---
**Author:** ![Lizard](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/dfb087/32.png) [@Lizard](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lizard)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2003, 4:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-for-the-nineties-any-new-music-genres-begun-in-the-1990s/162947/13 "2003-03-21T04:43:31Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Already in Use \* > \*\*Rap-rock? \*\* Nope. Run-DMC and the Beastie Boys invented that stuff, in the early-to-mid-80s. I heard someone once even make a good case that Aerosmith’s _original_ version of “Walk This Way” was the first rap-rock song, which is why Run-DMC’s remake was so successful. They already had the song, they just went out and performed it with a modern twist. Someone here mentioned hard core gangsta rap. NWA is considered the chief originators of gangsta rap, although they lifted some style elements from Public Enemy. Both groups formed and became popular in the 80s. Boy. When you look at it this way, the 80s were a pretty hopping time musically everywhere but on mainstream radio. That decade laid the foundation for what has dominated both the rap and rock scenes for the last 15 years. ---
**Author:** ![Alphagene](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Alphagene](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alphagene)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2003, 4:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-for-the-nineties-any-new-music-genres-begun-in-the-1990s/162947/14 "2003-03-21T04:47:46Z")
Big Beats. For a while “electronica” pretty much meant “aggressive use of synthesizers”. Then the big beats genre got started in the mid 1990s. Propellerheads, Crystal Method, and The Chemical Brothers spiked their electronica with breakbeats and sampling from hip-hop, and guitar licks and bass lines from rock. The artists didn’t generate huge album sales, but the genre was and still is endemic in pop culture, from _The Matrix_ to Reebok Ads to _Spinter Cell_. Unfortunately, people still generally associate electronica with , IMHO, much lamer genres, like trance, or whatever swill America’s Greatest Jingle Composer Moby burps up with his soy milk. ---
**Author:** ![Alphagene](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Alphagene](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alphagene)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2003, 5:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-for-the-nineties-any-new-music-genres-begun-in-the-1990s/162947/15 "2003-03-21T05:13:41Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Lizard \* > **Nope. Run-DMC and the Beastie Boys invented that [rap-rock], in the early-to-mid-80s.** I dunno. Run-DMC is strictly hip-hop and Aerosmith is all rock. Walk This Way was more of a one-time crossover than a genre. Great song though. Beastie Boys is a better case, but while _License to Ill_ is late eighties, back then they were still considered hip-hop, despite the presence of metal guitar riffs (and despite the fact that they aren’t very talented rappers). Even since then, they don’t have a continuous rock presence in their music. Sure Shot, Root Down and hell, even Girls lack it. Even as recently as 1993, the rap-rock combo was considered more of a one song crossover gimmick between rap groups and rock bands. See the _Judgement Night_ soundtrack. ---
**Author:** ![JKilez](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e5b9ba/32.png) [@JKilez](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JKilez)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2003, 5:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-for-the-nineties-any-new-music-genres-begun-in-the-1990s/162947/16 "2003-03-21T05:15:17Z")
Hey! Whatever you think about Trance, it also was born in the 90’s. Digweed/Sasha/Oakenfold/et al have created some great mixes. And how can you mention Big Beats without Fatboy Slim? Sure he is more mainstream, but any former member of The Housemartins can’t be bad. ---
**Author:** ![ProjectOmega](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/b487fb/32.png) [@ProjectOmega](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ProjectOmega)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2003, 5:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-for-the-nineties-any-new-music-genres-begun-in-the-1990s/162947/17 "2003-03-21T05:15:28Z")
My vote is for nu-metal. ---
**Author:** ![Wumpus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8c91f0/32.png) [@Wumpus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wumpus)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2003, 5:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-for-the-nineties-any-new-music-genres-begun-in-the-1990s/162947/18 "2003-03-21T05:41:51Z")
Grunge already existed in the 80s. I remember my roomate from Seattle going on about some local band called “Soundgarten” in 1986. The Run DMC/Aerosmith “Walk This Way” dates from 1986, but there was rock/rap before that. Check out Afrika Bambaata and John Lydon’s (he of the Sex Pistols and Public Image Ltd.) “World Destruction” from 1984. Or, for that matter, Run DMC’s own “Rock Box” from the same year. Techno is firmly rooted in the 80. House music sprang up in Detroit and Chicago in the middle of the decade. Certainly the basic formula of a modern techno track had been worked out by '87 or so, annoying repetitive sampled vocals and all. The original goth period _was_ the 1980s, as already noted. Big Beats is the closest thing to a new genre mentioned so far, but I’d still view it as a development of '80s dance/electronica, much as modern hip hop is a development of '80s rap. Ditto with things like no depression – they’re offshoots of already existing genres. So I guess musical development ended sometime around 1988 or so. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Banger](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/8491ac/32.png) [@Banger](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Banger)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2003, 5:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-for-the-nineties-any-new-music-genres-begun-in-the-1990s/162947/19 "2003-03-21T05:59:11Z")
**The Red Hot Chili Peppers** also played rap/rock during the 80s, my theory being because Anthony Kiedis can’t sing 😛 _Uplift Mofo Party Plan_ is my favorite of their albums, and features a lot of rap/rock. ---
**Author:** ![Banger](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/8491ac/32.png) [@Banger](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Banger)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2003, 6:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-for-the-nineties-any-new-music-genres-begun-in-the-1990s/162947/20 "2003-03-21T06:06:33Z")
“World Destruction” is a great song too… > [@](#): > > This is a world destruction, your life ain’t nothing, the human race is becoming a disgrace… [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-for-the-nineties-any-new-music-genres-begun-in-the-1990s/162947.md?page=2)