When I watch '90s TV shows, I've been thinking about what there is that dates them. Here's what I've come up with:

-People weren't using cellphones so much unless they were corporate types.
-The prevalence of backwards baseball caps, flannel, and haircuts with the sides shorn short and high on top, or spiked. Also, I think piercings were much more acceptable in the mid-late '90s than they are now.
-Technology not prominent in interior design.
-Straight hair or hair with ringlets was more common on women, so was showing more skin.
-In general, darker and less elaborate looking. Clothing, lighting, etc. was all darker. Also, things didn't have the overdone and overproduced look with lots of bright sunlight like they do now.

on Saved By the Bell, Zack often used a cellphone.  Only it was one of those big white ones that looked like something the Army would use in field combat ;D

Early 1990s (as in 1990-1994):

*Big cell phones (or none at all)
*Boxy '80s cars in the street
*A mix of Grunge and neon, alot of Hawaiian shirts
*Crappy computers, no laptops
*Arcade games

Late 1990s (1995-1999)

*Crappy computers, dial-up sounds
*more boxy cars
*Grunge wear

Early 1990s (as in 1990-1994):

*Big cell phones (or none at all)
*Boxy '80s cars in the street
*A mix of Grunge and neon, alot of Hawaiian shirts
*Crappy computers, no laptops
*Arcade games

Late 1990s (1995-1999)

*Crappy computers, dial-up sounds
*more boxy cars
*Grunge wear




Boxy cars in the late '90s? Well the older ones were but a lot of cars by the late '90s were the more modern rounded style. Laptops were around in the early '90s but they were big with poor battery life and crappy screens, I think the first ones came out at the end of the '80s. The computers are crappy now, but in 1997 a 200 MHz Pentium was a pretty nice computer. Dial up, however was always considered slow even then, I remember always being frustrated with slow internet. Dial up is much worse today for the people that have it because of the much more detailed web pages. I remember seeing pagers and car phones (the ones in the bag) in stores in 1996. Pagers were still fairly prevalent even in the late '90s, they're pretty much dead nowadays.

Boxy cars in the late '90s? Well the older ones were but a lot of cars by the late '90s were the more modern rounded style. Laptops were around in the early '90s but they were big with poor battery life and crappy screens, I think the first ones came out at the end of the '80s. The computers are crappy now, but in 1997 a 200 MHz Pentium was a pretty nice computer. Dial up, however was always considered slow even then, I remember always being frustrated with slow internet. Dial up is much worse today for the people that have it because of the much more detailed web pages. I remember seeing pagers and car phones (the ones in the bag) in stores in 1996. Pagers were still fairly prevalent even in the late '90s, they're pretty much dead nowadays.


Yeah I remember in the mid-to-late '90s thinking pagers were cool.  Even in the early '00s they weren't totally obsolete.  I think even as late as 2002/'03 some people had them.  But they're definitely a more circa 1990 thing. 

You're right about dial-up, even in the late '90s the webpages were a lot less advanced.  Ever seen a 1996 webpage?  It's incredibly primitive-looking; in those days the Net was more like a digital library than the alternate world it is in the 21st Century.  Of course, the '90s computers are only relatively crappy, whereas 1980s computers were sucky even then.

About the boxy cars, well around 1992-'93 they stopped being boxy, but in the late '90s many of the cars on the street were still boxy, whereas today it's like 1 of 5.

Yeah I remember in the mid-to-late '90s thinking pagers were cool.  Even in the early '00s they weren't totally obsolete.  I think even as late as 2002/'03 some people had them.  But they're definitely a more circa 1990 thing. 

You're right about dial-up, even in the late '90s the webpages were a lot less advanced.  Ever seen a 1996 webpage?  It's incredibly primitive-looking; in those days the Net was more like a digital library than the alternate world it is in the 21st Century.  Of course, the '90s computers are only relatively crappy, whereas 1980s computers were sucky even then.

About the boxy cars, well around 1992-'93 they stopped being boxy, but in the late '90s many of the cars on the street were still boxy, whereas today it's like 1 of 5.


Oh yea the webpages were a lot less advanced, no embedded flash, streaming video and stuff. Webpages in 1996 were mostly text and small pictures. It was really just for news, research, message boards, and chatting. Online gaming didn't take off until a few years later. I can remember using the AOL chat rooms back in like 1997. Yea I used to think pagers were cool as well, I actually had a prepaid type one like in 1998 or 1999 even though I already had a cell phone, lol. I remember upgrading my old IBM aptiva to a 56K modem because it came with a 33.6K and it was really slow, the 56K wasn't as much of an improvement as I was hoping.

The 'grunge look' was more early 90s...Though the hair-styles were the big give away for the early 90s...in one word BIG. Women also wore those big jeans that seemed to be grabbing at their neck  ;D, and of course, denim shorts (and I'm not talking baggy denim shorts, REAL denim shorts) and colourful clothing for guys in the early 90s (Watch Fresh Prince of Bel Air for example). The back-ward cap thing is also distinctly 90s; indeed, the whole baseball/basketball cap thing seems to have been so widespread in the 90s. In primary school I remember feeling naked if I wasn't wearing a cap.  :)

Yeah, I wore a backwards baseball cap in elementary school to look cool, everyone wore one.

In hindsight, I think it's funny that back in the early 90's, people thought it was cool to dress up like lumberjacks.  ::)

Well first of all a lot of you are saying that hair was big in the early 90s. In fact this is far from the truth. I was in high school at the time & i can tell you right now that even back in 1991 it was super dorky & uncool to still have big hair. The main hairstyles i remember for guys was long hair with undercuts or another one was having a totally shaved head except for a long fringe. Also mid length longish ragedy Kurt syle hair was obviously a popular thing. I did not see one girl with big hair in 1991, at my school or anywhere for that matter. With girls i just remember mainly seeing very straight long hair. Maybe there were a couple of hair bands left in 1990 that were still flogging a dead horse, but other than that big hair was totally out with the general population. Also colorful clothing was not really in at the time either that's more of a late 80s thing. In terms of a lot colorful clothing in Fresh Prince, i'd have to say that show was a product of the late 80s & started back then & i remember thinking it already looked outdated even back in 1991. I think most TV shows from 90 to 92 weren't really an accurate reflection of the fashion of the time especially for people who were teens at the time because they seem to drag across stuff from the decade before. I thought sows like Fresh Prince looked more 1988 than early 90s. Also i never saw one Hawian shirt even in the early 90s, that's more of an 80s Miami Vice thing. I just remember lots of grungy clothing & a lot of surf brand clothing that doesn't look that much different than the surf wear that's out there right now. I don't know, maybe Australia is a little bit ahead when it comes to fashion unless it's things we adopt from the U.S.
As for people wanting to look like lumberjacks, i don't think it looked anything like that not that it was even the intention anyway. It still doesn't look that funny to me even now when i see old footage or photos. Metal heads wore flanelete shirts long before grunge emerged. The fact that more people started doing it when grunge came along was because everyone was trying to copy all these people from bands that were from Seattle & Aberdeen which is a bit of a lumberjack area, so generally flanelette was rampant & easy to get especially at thrift stores.

Well first of all a lot of you are saying that hair was big in the early 90s. In fact this is far from the truth. I was in high school at the time & i can tell you right now that even back in 1991 it was super dorky & uncool to still have big hair. The main hairstyles i remember for guys was long hair with undercuts or another one was having a totally shaved head except for a long fringe. Also mid length longish ragedy Kurt syle hair was obviously a popular thing. I did not see one girl with big hair in 1991, at my school or anywhere for that matter. With girls i just remember mainly seeing very straight long hair. Maybe there were a couple of hair bands left in 1990 that were still flogging a dead horse, but other than that big hair was totally out with the general population. Also colorful clothing was not really in at the time either that's more of a late 80s thing. In terms of a lot colorful clothing in Fresh Prince, i'd have to say that show was a product of the late 80s & started back then & i remember thinking it already looked outdated even back in 1991. I think most TV shows from 90 to 92 weren't really an accurate reflection of the fashion of the time especially for people who were teens at the time because they seem to drag across stuff from the decade before. I thought sows like Fresh Prince looked more 1988 than early 90s. Also i never saw one Hawian shirt even in the early 90s, that's more of an 80s Miami Vice thing. I just remember lots of grungy clothing & a lot of surf brand clothing that doesn't look that much different than the surf wear that's out there right now. I don't know, maybe Australia is a little bit ahead when it comes to fashion unless it's things we adopt from the U.S.
As for people wanting to look like lumberjacks, i don't think it looked anything like that not that it was even the intention anyway. It still doesn't look that funny to me even now when i see old footage or photos. Metal heads wore flanelete shirts long before grunge emerged. The fact that more people started doing it when grunge came along was because everyone was trying to copy all these people from bands that were from Seattle & Aberdeen which is a bit of a lumberjack area, so generally flanelette was rampant & easy to get especially at thrift stores.


Interesting.

Although I'm not sure that's totally accurate.  You may know better than me, but I find it hard to believe that there was no big hair.

Nontheless, "early nineties" haircuts do tend to have a more "straight" look to them, but they seem to have an '80s vibe.  Were they just like the haircuts of today?  Because I kind of doubt that.  Although it wouldn't suprise me if the TV shows were a bit dated.

One big haircut in the '90s was the Leonardo diCaprio, I used to think that haircut was hot when I was younger. It's long, parted hair with tips slightly frazzled at the end and shaved underneath, the hair cascading over it. Then there's the look with it very short at the bottom and high and layered at the top which I also used to like, and for girls, short hair slightly bobbed with bangs was in, because of Uma Thurman's character in Pulp Fiction. I also think long straight hair, the Gwyneth Paltrow Shakespeare in Love hairdo, the Jennifer Aniston cut that everybody had in the mid-90s, the messy scrunchy ponytail and bun look, the spiral perm a la Mariah Carey, the Courtney Love haircut (a wavier, grungier take on the Uma Thurman in dyed blonde), and spiked hair with blonde tips for guys were pretty big '90s hairdos. Also, long straight hair made its first comeback since the '70s.

If I date the '90s, do I have to buy it dinner and drinks first?  Or can we just get to the foreplay? ;D

Dinner and drinks.

Nontheless, "early nineties" haircuts do tend to have a more "straight" look to them, but they seem to have an '80s vibe.  Were they just like the haircuts of today? 

Actually if you remember the Edward Furlong haircut from T2 with the longer fringe, you might notice a lot of the emo kids still wear their hair like that. Also i still see the Leonardo Dicaprio these days except it's not shaved underneath these days. We used to call those a bowl cut.

Actually if you remember the Edward Furlong haircut from T2 with the longer fringe, you might notice a lot of the emo kids still wear their hair like that. Also i still see the Leonardo Dicaprio these days except it's not shaved underneath these days. We used to call those a bowl cut.


Interesting.

Now, to the contrary, were there Emo kids in the nineties?  I'd imagine there were a stray few, esp around 1998 and 1999, but I see Emo as definitively '00s, just like Grunge is definitively '90s but may have had a few thousand followers in 1989 or something.

Interesting.

Now, to the contrary, were there Emo kids in the nineties?  I'd imagine there were a stray few, esp around 1998 and 1999, but I see Emo as definitively '00s, just like Grunge is definitively '90s but may have had a few thousand followers in 1989 or something.


I really don't remember there being any emo kids even in the late '90s. I'm sure there might have been a few around somewhere, but emo was fairly unknown until 2002.

I really don't remember there being any emo kids even in the late '90s. I'm sure there might have been a few around somewhere, but emo was fairly unknown until 2002.


I think in it's early years (1985-2001) you really had to be deep into the scene.  2002 on, and it's trendy and mainstream.

I didn't even hear the term emo until 2003. I think 03-04 is when emo and the '00s indie rock stuff and its million genres exploded onto the mainstream consciousness, everyone and his brother and best friend's uncle's hot daughter became emo or indie or something, and that was still big through mid-05. It was definitely around in 02-03, but it multiplied in popularity until 2005, I don't think it's really gaining as many followers (the whole subculture) since late '05.  As for emo haircuts, I think for girls that style I mentioned in my "'00s hairdos " thread is pretty common, along with long wavy hair that's a bit straighter and skinnier than mainstream, and for guys, thick wavy dark hair swept down over the eyes seems to be pretty big.

I think in it's early years (1985-2001) you really had to be deep into the scene.  2002 on, and it's trendy and mainstream.



Wow emo was around in '85. I honestly didnt know that.

Wow emo was around in '85. I honestly didnt know that.


I didn't either until recently, but that's what Wikipedia says.  It was extremely underground then though.

I think that the early 90's pop culturaly lasted from about late 1991-very early 1995.

As for cell phones, I remember our first cell phone we got sometime I think in late 1993. That thing was huge! We didn't take it outside of the car and the whole receiver/electric console were in a bag. We still have it somewhere because I came across it again about a year and a half ago. It was also a CellularOne Phone (Now Verizon Wireless).

I think that the early 90's pop culturaly lasted from about late 1991-very early 1995.



That's pretty accurate. I say that the apex of grunge was in the early 90's and that by early-'95 even though it would last two more years its peak was past and it started to head downhill in terms of popularity.

That's pretty accurate. I say that the apex of grunge was in the early 90's and that by early-'95 even though it would last two more years its peak was past and it started to head downhill in terms of popularity.


I think the early '90s were gone by 1993. The 1993-1996 period is different from the early '90s.

Grunge definitely survived through the late '90s in terms of what the alternative folks and a set of devotees were listening to, even though bands like Weezer and Radiohead were much more popular by then, and singers like Beck and Jeff Buckley.

I think in it's early years (1985-2001) you really had to be deep into the scene.  2002 on, and it's trendy and mainstream.

Actually there was no way emo was around in 1985. You had a lot of cross polanisation of goth, punk & new wave  in the early 80s & goth really evolved from punk & something called death rock which was around in the early 80s (look up the bands called 45 Grave or Christian Death). Emo is really just an amalgamation of old & new. It's not Idie, it's not Goth, it's definitly not punk & it ain't New Wave, but it has kinda just borrowed from probably all of the above to create an unoriginal abomination that's supposedly meant to be some kind of movement & music but is actually niether. The term Emo emergerged in the very early 00s. Don't quote me on this, but i think the term is supposed to stand for "emotional music" LMAO. I just wish those people would stop sucking manufactured cool from MTV's teat long enough to realize how lame they are.

Interesting.

Although I'm not sure that's totally accurate.  You may know better than me, but I find it hard to believe that there was no big hair.

Nontheless, "early nineties" haircuts do tend to have a more "straight" look to them, but they seem to have an '80s vibe.  Were they just like the haircuts of today?  Because I kind of doubt that.  Although it wouldn't suprise me if the TV shows were a bit dated.


Actually i do remember one bit of colorful clothing from the 90s. You only wore them if you were into rap though. They were 2 different brands of very baggy pants. They were Cross Colors & the other brand was Rusta Colors. They were a thick materal, i think denim, but they came in wacky bright colors like bright blue, bright purple, bright green etc. They were basically like regular jeans only ultra baggy & in crazy colors. To me they looked like clown pants. Was i the only person to have the sense not to wear those pants  ;D

Grunge definitely survived through the late '90s in terms of what the alternative folks and a set of devotees were listening to, even though bands like Weezer and Radiohead were much more popular by then, and singers like Beck and Jeff Buckley.

Grunge technically was really around even in the 80s in the form of indie/alternative bands like Pixies & Sonic Youth ect. Kurt actually has been quoted as once saying "we were just trying to rip off The Pixies". Also Listen to some of his screams in some of Nirvana's songs & then listen to some songs by the Pixies, you might hear some similarities but not just in the vocals, but in the music aswell.
It's all pretty much the indie/alternative college radio type stuff coming into the forground  after being relatively underground for some time & then some 40 something year old person putting a whole new label on something that's been around for a while because they don't get it or understand why so many kids are wearing flanellete in summer. I always thought the term grunge was a massive marketing gimmick cause all those other popular bands from Seatle that were riding the grunge wave sounded nothing like Nirvana & nothing like each other either. There was very little similarity in style & sound, only slightly in dress because they were from the same place. I just thought of Nirvana as an alternative band that became very successful & had a genre named after them & then had a whole bunch of other bands from the same area that sounded nothing like them thrown into that same new basket. The record labels & media needed to fill this new basket quickly so they nievly(spelling?) got other bands from the same home town that just happened to have a very small indie/punk scene going on. The term or label grunge only came along when Nirvana themselves became popular. Notice how many music stores don't even have an alternative section now. The term is pretty laughable these days, cause after alternative sort of emerged into the foreground by the mid to late 90s it's hard to really call it alternative anymore since even that term in itself became a label when originally it was just a term for bands & music that didn't really fit in any other categories instead of a category that bands later were trying to fit into. That's why we must be careful when it comes to labeling & grouping, sometimes labels are not good. Confused? You should be cause not everything in life is black & white, there is usually a lot of grey area. ;)

Bands like Husker Du, The Pixies, Sonic Youth, Big Black were precursors to grunge in the '80s alternative scene. Personally, I think The Pixies are just about the most influential alt rock group, equaling the Talking Heads, R.E.M, Nirvana, The Smiths, and the Velvet Underground. You can see their influence in most "indie rock" being produced nowadays.

Bands like Husker Du, The Pixies, Sonic Youth, Big Black were precursors to grunge in the '80s alternative scene. Personally, I think The Pixies are just about the most influential alt rock group, equaling the Talking Heads, R.E.M, Nirvana, The Smiths, and the Velvet Underground. You can see their influence in most "indie rock" being produced nowadays.

I can totally agree with that.

I can totally agree with that.


Me third!

Actually there was no way emo was around in 1985. You had a lot of cross polanisation of goth, punk & new wave  in the early 80s & goth really evolved from punk & something called death rock which was around in the early 80s (look up the bands called 45 Grave or Christian Death). Emo is really just an amalgamation of old & new. It's not Idie, it's not Goth, it's definitly not punk & it ain't New Wave, but it has kinda just borrowed from probably all of the above to create an unoriginal abomination that's supposedly meant to be some kind of movement & music but is actually niether. The term Emo emergerged in the very early 00s. Don't quote me on this, but i think the term is supposed to stand for "emotional music" LMAO. I just wish those people would stop sucking manufactured cool from MTV's teat long enough to realize how lame they are.


So did the "Emo" term originate circa 2000 then?

I think it was an underground thing in 2000 or so that became mainstream in 2002 and really big in 2003 or so.

I think it was an underground thing in 2000 or so that became mainstream in 2002 and really big in 2003 or so.


Sounds right :)

The earliest mainstream mention probably goes back to 1998.