Years · 1999
(Some of) The Greatest Albums of 1999
The best albums of 1999 — Fiona Apple's When the Pawn, Blink-182, Mos Def, The Roots, Muse's debut, and Red Hot Chili Peppers' Californication.
The biggest headache of looking at music of 25+ years ago is the sheer volume of awesome stuff that’s lasted and grown in stature in society’s collective musical mind. It’s such a fun problem, but narrowing it down to few enough that I can actually get my ADHD self to write about the many I’ve enjoyed. The perception of this music has aged like wine, and just like when I’m sitting at an Italian restaurant stuttering and stammering as I try to decode the most basic wine list, I don’t always know where to start. This is the end of the 90’s, the beginning of the decade when I actually started to grow into a music taste of my own in the 2000’s. Some of this music I heard contemporaneously, some I heard later as I realized what I’d missed. But it’s all been a ton of fun to revisit.
Welcome back to 1999! And as always, let me know about your favorites that I missed! I’ll add them to the playlist and we can jam in the year 1999 until the inevitable rise of the machines, which in 2025 is somehow even more likely than the Y2K doom scare ever was.
When the Pawn… — Fiona Apple
An absolute powerhouse of an album that I was certainly too young to appreciate in 1999.
Enema of the State — Blink-182
It’s funny how much I enjoy this album of pop-punk upbeat whininess when I seem to dismiss the same kind of complainy poor-teenage-me music coming out in 2025.
13 — Blur
I guess it was a trend in the late 90’s for alt rock bands to explore new directions, and who can blame them - electronic music was taking off, and Britpop was fading from the mainstream, so what better way to reinvent your sound?
Black On Both Sides — Mos Def
It seems inexplicable that I would have so little knowledge of this album until now.
Things Fall Apart — The Roots
Another amazing hip-hop album focused on live instrumentation over loops.
Showbiz — Muse
Muse’s debut album is like a stadium-sized circus sideshow soundtrack, with the slow build vocals and crescendoing arrangements perfectly in tune with one another.
Californication — Red Hot Chili Peppers
By the time I was 10 I could probably recite every lyric from this album.