So join the fan club, and all will be forgiven. And we have a super-special soft spot for lead singers who also drum like the prolific Andy Sturmer. Sadly, the San Francisco group only lasted for five years, making two epic musically intoxicating albums that the band’s cult-like superfans cling to like their lives depend on it. Here’s an extremely bold opening line: Sonically and artistically, Jellyfish are the ’90s’ answer to Queen. Reunion show, pretty please? Until that event happens or doesn’t, we’ll always have the 11 beautifully verbose songs on late-’90s classic Orange Rhyming Dictionary to rock the fuck out to. Indie/emo supergroup Jets To Brazil (featuring members of Jawbreaker, Handsome and Texas Is The Reason) never climbed to the heights and lore of Jawbreaker but released three superb full-lengths before breaking up in 2003. Thankfully, they’re playing Riot Fest next year. The band had the distinct honor (or scorn, depending upon who’s talking) about being one of two Dischord Records groups ( Shudder To Think were the other) to make the leap to a major label after fanfare on an indie and released two solid full-lengths for Atlantic Records before calling it quits in 1997.
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Washington, D.C.’s Jawbox were unsung legends in their own right. For their sole major-label outing, Heads Are Gonna Roll, they ditched many of their ska-punk influences for keyboards and released the minor hit single “Wasting My Life” only to break up in 2002. Releasing their debut album, Forget The World, on formerly underground label Fueled By Ramen in 1997, the Los Angeles group almost hit the big time when they signed to Interscope Records in 1999. While frontman/guitarist Ariel Rechtshaid would eventually go on to be an A-list producer/songwriter for such acts as Adele, HAIM and Vampire Weekend, his ska-punk band t he Hippos were superstars in their own right. Either way, you have four ’90s LPs (and four post-’90s albums) to keep you company in the meantime. They definitely had the industry cred, as they were critical darlings for both journalists and fellow musicians, but it’s speculated that they may not have been metal enough for metalheads to truly embrace or were too metal for alternative kids to latch on to. Possibly the biggest band on this list, New York City’s alternative-metal rockers Helmet seemed to constantly be on the possible brink of a grunge-like movement. Fun fact: At Ease was their debut release for the legendary Tim Armstrong of Rancid’s Epitaph Records subsidiary label Hellcat Records, which hit it big with Los Angeles’ the Interrupters. Also, you can smile at the fact that they were a family band. Searching for perfect ska-punk from the Midwest, specifically Kansas City, Missouri? Well, pick up the Gadjits ’ 15-song sophomore album, At Ease, and marvel at the incredible musicianship of the uber-young band whose average age upon signing was 17 years old. We never underestimate the destructive power of change. The Sacramento quartet were the perfect combination of the beauty of Jimmy Eat World and the aggression of Deftones but released an emo classic a few years too early to be a part of the genre’s global boom taking place in the next century. Stop what you’re doing right now and spend the next 41 minutes in total bliss while listening to Far ’s now-classic fourth LP, Water & Solutions. Fun fact: The original version of DHC had ex- Operation Ivy guitarist Tim Armstrong and bassist Matt Freeman in it just before the two of them formed a band you never heard of called Downfall and a band you most certainly love called Rancid. The sad truth that Berkeley, California’s Dance Hall Crashers never got as big as ’90s ska superstars t he Mighty Mighty Bosstones, Reel Big Fish and Less Than Jake is an abomination. The best punk-ska songs that you never heard? Check. Two frontwomen who sing in perfect harmony? Check. It’s a shame, as ALL were a more than solid pop-punk group in their own right.
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But the band never truly climbed to the heights of their predecessor.
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ALL would forever be mentioned in the same breath and compared to Descendents, and they released nine sonically consistent full-lengths that sold respectable amounts. ALLĪs blink-182 would say, pop punk wouldn’t exist at all without Descendents, and ALL are The Godfather Part II -esque quality sequel to themselves with a different singer but the same amount of power and grit. These 20 underrated ’90s bands should’ve gotten some Times Square love as well. However, some incredible acts and songs fell under the radar during this time. The 1990s started out with DS-1 distortion pedal grunge bands viciously stomping on the global spandex-wearing hair-metal movement from the decade before and ceremoniously ended with the rise of the baggy-pant rockers of nü metal and bleached-blond boy bands with chiseled faces, courtesy of TRL.