Juice with Junior

I don't know if you guys have noticed this but we're currently living in a retro world right now.

Yes, it's 2008, but for many people in music it may as well be 40 years ago, unless you're making that electro/vocoder crap that the clubs in Jersey are lovin' now.

For those artists that make good music, so many are harking back to the past for their sound and inspiration that its almost surprising that the trick still works.

Looking for the 60s sound? Try Sharon Jones & the Dap Kings or Duffy, Solange Knowles or Raphael Saadiq, or Adele... Wait, you said the 70s? Sorry... Well then, try Hercules and Love Affair, or Estelle, or Justice, or the Scissor Sisters, or Moby, or The Ting Tings, or...

Oh, I'm so sorry, you said the 80s. I have bad hearing. Then, wait we have Black Kids, or Mstrkrft, or Katy Perry, well I think you get the idea; the past is providing tons of musical creativity to artists these days. I don't necessarily have a problem with that.

I think a well done homage to an era is still a great song by itself. I just, I... Listen, I was born in 1982 which means that by the time I was old enough to have some idea of what was going on in the world, it was 1994, which means I have a fondness for 90s music.

BUT NO ONE IS DOING 90s MUSIC RIGHT NOW!

Every other decade of the last millennium is grist for the mill for artists who are probably too lazy to come up with their own ideas, yet my favorite time period (mostly because it's the only one I remember) is being woefully ignored!

I often talk about things in the world that I don't like and it usually starts out with some background and goes on to talk about why I don't like the thing, and how I would like the world to look.

But even I know the things I complain about aren't that serious. The lack of 90s retro-love, however, that is a serious problem in desperate need of someone to step in and give the 90s some much-deserved respect.

How else am I gonna rock backwards clothes like Kris Kross, or wear big t-shirts buckled at the corner over leggings, or do the Hammer dance, or wear those gigantic gold plated earrings that every round the way girl in the Bronx was wearing in 1992 unless I have some new songs styled after the musical decade I adore.

I can't be retro by myself!

Someone needs to come out the gate with a banging bass beat with some smooth harmonizing over it like SWV (below)...



Or a rock song that has actual words and depth in its meaning like Pearl Jam's "Jeremy" (below), a song I literally Couldn't Get Away From living with my grunge-loving sister.



And why has all the recent dance music looked back to the disco era lately when Ace of Base's "All That She Wants" (below) is right here, waiting to have a song bite its Euro style.

How amazing would a new song with this sound be...



By the way, when this song came out, I thought for months that it was about a woman that lost her baby... as in her actual child. I thought the same thing about Lisa Stansfield's "All Around the World." What can I say? I was young! I didn't know nothing 'bout love!

Um, back to my point. There's so much there, music creators of now! Not only do you have the thumping basses, the rampant sampling, the lack of electronic flourishes, but you also get to indulge in all the 90s trademarks that I love!

Black and white music videos! Skin tight black clothes! Backwards Kangol hats!

There's just so much!

What do you think? Are you in favor of a 90s revival in music?

Or are you still trying to get through all the new 60s stuff? There is a lot, I know!