In 1990 I turned 12 and started taping things from the top 40 with the intention of keeping it, I think I had already been doing this before but I don't think anything stuck around for very long. I still have some of the recordings from 1990. Me and my older brother also started making charts, our favourite 20 songs from this week's top 40, we would disappear off separately on Sunday night then come together and share them number by number. You can find my top 40 for the year that I compiled at the time here.
If you look at that chart, it has some of the singles I bought that year (Gazza, Aztec Camera, FAB featuring MC Parker), it has plenty of pop that I couldn't necessarily recall today, but it also has the seeds of where I was about to go with my musical tastes. My brother was starting to listen to indie music, in particular those associated with Manchester, baggy and associated hangers on for starters, hence the presence in that chart of the likes of The Charlatans and the Soup Dragons. Within a year The Farm and EMF would release albums that would kick off my record collection proper, they would become "my" bands, but that's for the next blog. As an aside the EMF and Farm songs featured there are eligible for the 1991 chart I'll be doing next as the albums were released then, rather than being separated out because the singles were released in 1990.
After a while I started to separate the tapes I had into Rock, Indie and Dance. I had by far the most indie tapes, rock and dance were fairly equal for a time. As you'll see below dance didn't stand the test of time with me, although my first rock tapes contained some entries in here like Holy Smoke, Thunderstruck and Hangar 18 as well as other songs that didn't quite make it (Poison's Unskinny Bop anyone?).
As with 1989, in particular with the American bands, some of the songs in this chart didn't become known over here until the following year as the world caught up. So albums like Extreme's Pornograffiti and The Black Crowes' Shake Your Money Maker were two of the first rock albums I ever bought, just not actually in 1990. Mix in some of the aforementioned indie and rock, throw in some Senseless Things, Pantera and Manics that I caught up with after discovering them in the next year or two and you have a very solid year of songs. No really classic albums I don't think, but 1991 was poised and ready to change all that in a big way.........
1. Senseless Things - Tangled Lines
2. Megadeth - Holy Wars....The Punishment Due
3. Pantera - Cemetery Gates
4. Pantera - Domination
5. Inspiral Carpets - This is How it Feels
6. Senseless Things - Is It Too Late?
7. Iron Maiden - Bring Your Daughter....to the Slaughter
8. Charlatans - The Only One I Know
9. Megadeth - Hangar 18
10. Extreme - Decadence Dance
11. Black Crowes - Jealous Again
12. Black Crowes - Hard to Handle
13. The La's - There She Goes
14. AC/DC - Thunderstruck
15. Charlatans - Then
16. Manic Street Preachers - New Art Riot
17. Extreme - More Than Words
18. Black Crowes - She Talks to Angels
19. Pantera - Cowboys From Hell
20. Stone Roses - One Love
21. Manic Street Preachers - Strip it Down
22. Pop Will Eat Itself - 92°F
23. Extreme - Hole Hearted
24. Extreme - Get the Funk Out
25. Senseless Things - Leo
26. Carter USM - Rubbish
27. Happy Mondays - Step On
28. Extreme - It('s a Monster)
29. 1000 Homo DJs - Supernaut
30. Black Crowes - Stare it Cold
31. Slayer - War Ensemble
32. Black Crowes - Twice as Hard
33. Extreme - Song For Love
34. Napalm Death - Suffer the Children
35. Napalm Death - Vision Conquest
36. Extreme - He-Man Woman Hater
37. Black Crowes - Sister Luck
38. Inspiral Carpets - She Comes in the Fall
39. Happy Mondays - Loose Fit
40. Extreme - Pornograffiti
41. Megadeth - Rust in Peace....Polaris
42. Helmet - Repetition
43. Iron Maiden - Holy Smoke
44. Pantera - Heresy
45. New Order - World in Motion
46. James - Come Home
47. Aztec Camera - Good Morning Britain
48. Megadeth - Tornado of Souls
49. Megadeth - Lucretia
50. Slayer - Seasons in the Abyss
