The 1990s might have been the most eclectic musical decade of all time. Sure, today things are wide open. The landscape is fractured with streaming services aplenty, all of which showcase their nuanced sonic stars. But the 1990s boasted genre upon genre in the mainstream, from grunge to rap to electronic to alt-rock to bubblegum pop and more.
Here below, we wanted to honor a handful of big name artists from the decade that some music fans may have forgotten. We wanted to highlight five female alt-rock stars who owned the Billboard charts as much as they owned the poster space on many a music fans’ bedroom walls. Indeed, these are five female alt-rock stars from the 1990s that we know you love.
Alanis Morissette
The former kids’ TV show star later became perhaps the biggest name in rock during the mid-1990s thanks to her third studio LP, Jagged Little Pill. That album, which was released in 1995, featured iconic songs like “Ironic,” “You Oughta Know” and “Hand in My Pocket,” amongst many others. At one point in time, the whole world was singing along with Morissette as she belted lyrics about rain on a wedding day and going down on someone in a motive theater.
Courtney Love
The First Lady of grunge, Courtney Love was known both as the frontwoman for the brash band Hole and as the wife of Nirvana lead singer Kurt Cobain. With her band, Love released songs like “Doll Parts,” “Violet” and “Celebrity Skin.” She and her beau were on the covers of magazines galore. They were rock royalty. And then it all went to crap after Cobain died in 1994. But there were years there when Hole was one of the biggest groups on Earth and Love was at the center of it all with her sardonic lyrics.
Fiona Apple
When the striking Fionna Apple released the single and accompanying music video for her 1997 track, “Criminal,” she was instantly a star. She was dangerous, beautiful and completely in control of whatever moment she was in. At least, that’s what everyone watching her thought. She was the bad girl of popular music there in the late 1990s and that made her the object of many a discerning music fan’s eye. She could say what needed to be said, even if many thought she shouldn’t. Not an easy task but Apple could do it all.
Shirley Manson
The frontwoman for the bleak rock band Garbage (you can read more about all that here), Shirley Manson has long had a sharp tongue and she is not afraid to use it. Rocking out with her brothers from Garbage, Manson became known for songs like “I Think I’m Paranoid”and “Only Happy When It Rains.” They were dark, brooding, almost apocalyptic. And the band loved every minute of it in the 1990s. Manson had the world in the pal of her hand and Garbage is still rocking stages today.
Dolores O’Riordan
The frontwoman for the seminal 1990s rock band the Cranberries, Dolores O’Riordan wrote songs with force behind them, including the band’s iconic protest song, “Zombies.” Other standout tunes from the Cranberries include “Dreams” and “Linger.” Truly, the group was all over alternative rock radio during the decade. For her part, O’Riordan was captivating, compelling and capable dominating any stage her popular band found to play on. She was one of those you couldn’t look away from.
Photo by Paul Bergen
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