I’ve been really enjoying the Red Hot Organization’s “No Alternative” and “Dark was the Night” recently, both because they raised a lot of money for AIDS research and because they do a great job of capturing the 90s alternative sound and 00s indie sound respectively, and it’s got me thinking how much I love compilations generally for how they can give you an impression of a place/time/music scene. Any collections like that you think I should know about?
The soundtrack to Dirty Dancing sent me off in directions of 1960s dance and doo-wop and also 1980s pop in a big way.
Brazil Classics 1 - Beleza Tropical, was compiled by David Byrne from Talking Heads and has some incredible Latin stuff on it.
Hugh Masekela – The Chisa Years 1965-1975 (Rare And Unreleased) has some African jazz and funk that sounds like nothing else and is what American funk would sound like five to ten years later.
Pomegranates, from 2009, is a compilation of pre-revolution Iranian funk that is shockingly listenable.
The best way to discover new punk bands in the 90s was through comps. The Punk-O-Rama, Give Them the Boot, and Fat Wreck Chords compilations are the soundtrack of my teen years. But my favorites were the Nitro Records ones. Deep Thoughts and Go Ahead Punk… Make My Day were my favorites.
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