Why isn't "so 90s" a thing?

You can trade in a human soul for it!

Wow. I have absolutely no memory of pogs. Looking them up and seeing the pictures…not even a brief recollection.

Similarly, I think a lot of 90s aesthetic is embodied by Poochy, the kung-fu hippie from gangsta city.

I think the rise of the internet in 1995 led to a loss of mostly shared cultural entertainment experiences. This has led to a loss of distinive styles that everyone* remembers. In 1983 everyone watched the MASH finale. In the 70s everyone watched the Brady Bunch. In the 60s everyone watched the Andy Griffith show, etc. I think the series finale of Seinfeld was probably the last such shared experience. After that we began to have so many entertainment options available that the feeling of shared experiences began to disappear. Twenty years from now when people ask about the teens, what distinctive styles will there be? There are so many different things to watch these days that there won’t be a large group of people that remember the same things because we are all watching different things now. I think that is what led to the loss of a distinctive feel to the late 90s and everything since then.

  • I realize not everyone watched the MASH finale, but as a percentage of the population I think it will never be topped due to the multiple options available now.

Can’t believe no one has mentioned “tribal” tattoos.

I work in academia, and it’s kind of a running joke that college students all dress alike. I’m sure that’s been a joke since well before I was born, but for the past few years the obvious “uniform” for female students in cooler weather has been yoga pants (nearly always black), fleece jacket (usually North Face or Columbia), and midcalf length boots. The only real variation I notice is in the style of boot, but it’s not a huge range even there. They often have their hair in a ponytail and/or held back with a headband, although oddly (to someone my age, at least) they tend to top this extremely casual daytime look off with a full face of makeup.

I’d say it’s a pretty distinctive style, and one I’m sure their children will laugh at someday when looking at mom’s old college pictures.

It was pretty fetch…

Granted the rapid cuts don’t give you a great chance to stop and take it all in (and half the clothes are work uniforms or Halloween costumes) but those clothes looks very dated to me. I’m not skilled enough in the ways of fashion to really articulate it but it looks very 90s to me.

The most viscerally '90s thing I can think of is the general look of music videos of the time, especially late '90s: that harsh, high contrast lighting. Shadowy corridors. Fish eye lenses. I suspect David Lynch was a big influence at this time, because you also tend to see glimpses of mysterious characters for whom I think no better adjective applies than “Lynchian”. A few examples:

Fountains of Wayne - Radiation Vibe

Rolling Stones - Anybody Seen My Baby

Foo Fighters - Monkey Wrench

Sneaker Pimps - Six Underground

MTV stopped playing music videos in the early '00s and I don’t think they’re enough of a cultural force anymore for many people to say “that video is so '00s!” or “so '10s!”

I don’t know… I think a lot of it is because the 90s were essentially divided 3 ways; the early 90s (1990-1993) were very 80s like, although musically, some things were starting to change- hair bands were fading out, harder rock was coming into vogue, hair was still big, etc…

The mid-1990s (1993-1997-ish) were the grunge era, when the dominant aesthetic was that of the grunge bands - flannel, grunge rock, long lank hair and a generally (for lack of a better description) unclean look.

The late 1990s were more dominated by the late 90’s pop, which was typified by a combination of manufactured acts (boy bands, Britney Spears, etc…) and a much heavier dose of R&B/rap than previously (Bone Thugs n Harmony, Destiny’s Child, Blackstreet, Puff Daddy, Usher, Beyonce, etc…) and a sort of proto-2000s sounding pop. Gone were the grunge bands and harder rock and so was the aesthetic.

So if someone were to say to me “That’s so 90s!” I’d think “When exactly?” because at least to my eyes (turned 18 in 1990), there were three distinct phases.

But it’s sort of like that all the time. It’s not as though the calendar flips and everything changes. The early 80s were similar to the late 70s and the early 70s similar to the late 60s. Mad Men is all about a bunch of guys in the 1960s slowly realizing that it’s not the 1950s any longer. When I graduated high school in 1991, no one was dressing like this page from a 1982 magazine or even this more classic 80s style. People were too busy with that obnoxious neon print California look crap (which I associate more with the early 90s than the 80s).

More to it though, I usually see the “The 90s weren’t distinctive” remark framed with “…because I can’t tell the difference between music/fashion from 1997 and today” which suggests a lack of innovation today rather than a “problem” with 1997.

Still rocking mine Lol
Always inspired by Layne Stanley…

Man-buns, stupid beards, stupid mustashes, craft beer…

You have a point there; things haven’t really changed too much since I got out of college… in 1996.

But the point I was trying to make is that unlike earlier and later decades, the transition between the various fads and what-not was extremely abrupt with the onset of grunge and its equally abrupt end. I mean, grunge was a thing from about 1992-1995, and that was it, but when it was in vogue, it was pretty much THE thing. Most other societal things like that were more gradual in their onset and fading.

I will say there’s one place you can really see and even describe a 90s aesthetic… the first websites.

Here are some gems… 17 Ancient Abandoned Websites That Still Work | Mental Floss
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I dunno. I can think of several post-90s fashion things off the top of my head: in addition to the man-bun and stupid mustaches already mentioned, there was the metrosexual look, the trucker hat look, skinny jeans, yoga pants, thrift store fashion, and probably a whole bunch more that I’m missing because I’m generally fashion unconscious, but this stuff was so visible to me that even I couldn’t miss it.

ETA: Oh, and also big-framed, and often colorfully framed, glasses, and glasses as accessories. Not that it didn’t exist before, but the 2000s seems to be when it came back in more mainstream culture.

90’s fashion
same as 80’s fashion
strangely same as 70’s fashion

Well depending on your crowd i guess

Dude, open flannel shirts over colored tee shirts, worn out jeans, workboots? I invented that look.

The theme song of Portlandia:

DREAM OF THE 90’S
The dream of the 90s is alive in Portland! (Portland…)
The dream of the 90s is alive in Portland!
The tattoo ink never runs dry!

The dream of the 90s is alive in Portland!
All the hot girls wear glasses (yeah!)

The dream of the 90s is alive in Portland!
Sleep ‘til 11,
You’ll be in heaven.

The dream of the 90s is alive in Portland!
(The dream is ali-i-ive…)

The dream of the 90s is alive in Portland!
My flannel shirt still looks fly.