Stone Temple Pilots - Purple

Release Date: 07.06.1994

★★★★★ Tracks:

Interstate Love Song
Big Empty

This disc still includes some shitty second-hand grunge, but it's hard to dislike STP's quality singles. The DeLeo brothers (guitarist and bassist) are responsible for most of the writing, as is the case with the two really fantastic tracks here, their first single "Big Empty" and third one, "Interstate Love Song". When "Big Empty" came out as a single promoting STP's upcoming record as well as The Crow soundtrack, a cult classic, it marked a strong shift towards pop rock for the Nirvana/Pearl Jam copycats; the jazzy bass line, 7th chords and acoustic slide guitar giving the group some much needed uniqueness.

A few months later came perhaps one of the most recognizable singles of the 90's, "Interstate Love Song". Encompassing classic Americana, Pop and only a slight tinge of Grunge, it's STP’s most timeless track, and whereas “Plush” is a guilty pleasure of mine forever trapped in the 90’s, “Interstate Love Song” will forever be a classic.

Stone Temple Pilots - Core

Release Date: 29.09.1992

★★★★★ Tracks:

Plush

I remember a trip to the Keys with my parents and a big group of our friends. We all stayed in the same hotel, and during the evenings our folks would go out and get hammered while us kids were left to fend off boredom in the hotel rooms, with the eldest member acting as babysitter. All of us were sitting on the floor around the TV making fun of each other while intermittently checking in on MTV, waiting for our favorite music videos to play.

Jackpot.

“Plush” was manufactured rock’n’roll - built off trends and plagiarisms and insincerities - but it didn’t matter to this twelve year old. The hooks were on point and the video contained all the supercool imagery one kid could ask for. It was the summer of 1993 and the apex of grunge; the genre had me hook, line and sinker. My dad took a quick break from the drink a day or so later and took me to the record store, probably in hopes of a new record momentarily stopping my whining. But soon even I realized the rest of Core sucked; it would not see the Discman many times thereafter. “Plush” however would easily sit near the top of a list of my favorite guilty pleasures to this day.