Thirty years ago, Chile returned to democracy after being shackled by the dictatorship of General Augusto Pinochet for 17 years. Under his oppressive regime, Pinochet put a deadly hault on numerous forms of artistic expression — one of its most famous (atrocious) examples was the kidnapping and murder of protest folk singer Victor Jara who helped lead the New Chilean Song Movement of the late Sixties, early Seventies. You see, Chilean music wasn’t allowed to be political, or much less, criticise its government. Enter Los Prisioneros, a Chilean pop rock band with a knack for glossy anthemic hooks became one of the most defiant groups of their generation. Formed in the late Seventies, the San Miguel band’s early songs proved to be controversial in a time of extreme censorship, so their music gained popularity through labeless cassette distribution. Eighties songs like “El Baile De Los Que Sobran” and “De La Cultura De La Basura testified them as working class heroes with a rebellious spirit who know how to expertly navigate their way around insatiable synth melodies and catchy drum machines made for the dance floor. This era was also the height of the rock en español explosion in Latin America, so their rosy-hued disco pop wasn’t as welcoming in the mainstream — who demanded more rock guitars and, seemingly, pretentious frontmen — a vast departure from the scrappy, socially discontent group Los Prisioneros were known as. So when their fourth studio album dropped, 1990’s Corazones, it wasn’t an instant hit for the reasons aforementioned, yet it slowly became a South American legacy. It also marked a critical time in Chilean history when it was at a crossroads. Part autobiographical, part social-commentary, the record poignantly reflects the stigmas of Chile’s disenfranchised population, and it emotionally evoked the turmoil of an overwhelming transition in politics, all over sleek electronic pulses and intoxicating synth riffs. Songs like “Tren Al Sur” and “Estrechez de Corazón” pack one hell of a rhythm too that lends itself to high-gloss dance rock with a socially political edge. It’s a style that decades later would inspire hordes of Chilean pop groups like Javiera Mena, Alex Anwandter, and Dënver — bands that too fight battles of classism while demanding LGBTQ+ rights over disco-inflected dance pop. The early 2010s saw the first latest explosion of Chilean pop, and it traveled around the globe, a sort of electropop manifesto pioneered by Los Prisioneros.
The ’90s have never sounded better than they do right now—especially for modern-day indie rockers. There’s no shortage of bands banging around these days whose sound suggests formative phases spent soaking up vintage ’90s indie rock. Not that the neo-’90s sound is itself a new thing. As soon as the era was far enough away in the rearview mirror to allow for nostalgia to set in (i.e., the second half of the 2000s), there were already some young artists out there onboarding ’90s alt-rock influences. But more recently, there’s been a bumper crop of bands that betray a soft spot for a time when MTV still played music videos and streaming was just something that happened in a restroom. In this context, the literate, lo-fi approach of Pavement has emerged as a particularly strong strand of the ’90s indie tapestry, and it isn’t hard to hear echoes of their sound in the work of more recent arrivals like Kiwi jr. or Teenage Cool Kids. Cherry Glazerr frontwoman Clementine Creevy seems to have a feeling for the kind of big, dirty guitar riffs that made Pacific Northwestern bands the kings of the alt-rock heap once upon a time. The world-weary, wise-guy angularity of Car Seat Headrest can bring to mind the lurching, loose-limbed attack of Railroad Jerk. And laconic, storytelling types like Nap Eyes stand to prove that there’s still a bright future ahead for those who mourn the passing of Silver Jews main man David Berman. But perhaps the best thing about a face-off between the modern indie bands evoking ’90s forebears and the old-school artists themselves is the fact that in this kind of competition, everybody wins.
It may be that 2019 was the best year for ’90s metal since, well, 1999. Bands from the decade of Judgment Night re-emerged with new creative twists and tweaks: Tool stretched out into polyrhythmic madness, Korn bludgeoned with more extreme and raw despair, Slipknot added a new drummer (Max Weinberg’s kid!) who gave them a new groove, and Rammstein wrote an anti-fascism anthem that caused controversy in Germany (and hit No. 1 there too). Elsewhere, icons of the era returned in unique ways: Nine Inch Nails’ Trent Reznor scored a superhero TV series, Primus’ Les Claypool teamed up with Sean Lennon for some quirky psych rock, and Faith No More’s Mike Patton made an avant-decadent LP with ’70s soundtrack king Jean-Claude Vannier. Finally, the soaring voice of Linkin Park’s Chester Bennington returned for a moment thanks to Lamb of God guitarist Mark Morton, who released a song they recorded together in 2017.
Taking a look at the playlists for my show on Boston’s WZBC might give the more seasoned college-radio listener a bit of déjà vu: They’re filled with bands like Versus, Team Dresch, and Sleater-Kinney, who were at the top of the CMJ charts back in the ’90s. But the records they released in 2019 turned out to be some of the year’s best rock. Versus, whose Ex Nihilo EP and Ex Voto full-length were part of a creative run for leader Richard Baluyut that also included a tour by his pre-Versus outfit Flower and his 2000s band +/-, put out a lot of beautifully thrashy rock; Team Dresch returned with all cylinders blazing and singers Jody Bleyle and Kaia Wilson wailing their hearts out on “Your Hands My Pockets”; and Sleater-Kinney confronted middle age head-on with their examination of finding one’s footing, The Center Won’t Hold.
Italian guitar heroes Uzeda—who have been putting out proggy, riff-heavy music for three-plus decades—released their first record in 13 years, the blistering Quocumque jerceris stabit; Imperial Teen, led by Faith No More multi-instrumentalist Roddy Bottum, kept the weird hooks coming with Now We Are Timeless; and high-concept Californians That Dog capped off a year of reissues with Old LP, their first album since 1997. Juliana Hatfield continued the creative tear she’s been on this decade with two albums: Weird, a collection of hooky, twisty songs that tackle alienation with searing wit, and Juliana Hatfield Sings the Police, her tribute record to the dubby New Wave chart heroes (in the spirit of the salute to Olivia Newton-John she released in 2018). And our playlist finishes with Mary Timony, formerly of the gnarled rockers Helium and currently part of the power trio Ex Hex, paying tribute to her former Autoclave bandmate Christina Billotte via an Ex Hex take on “What Kind of Monster Are You?,” one of the signature songs by Billotte’s ’90s triple threat Slant 6.
