Tonight, I feel like my whole body is made out of memories. I'm a mix-tape, a cassette that's been rewound so many times you can hear the fingerprints smudged on the tape.
Rob SheffieldI get sentimental over the music of the ā90s. Deplorable, really. But I love it all. As far as Iām concerned the ā90s was the best era for music ever, even the stuff that I loathed at the time, even the stuff that gave me stomach cramps.
Rob SheffieldWhen I started out as a music journalist, at the end of the 1980s, it was generally assumed that we were living through the lamest music era the world would ever see. But those were also the years when hip-hop exploded, beatbox disco soared, indie rock took off, and new wave invented a language of teen angst.
Rob SheffieldBut MTV relishes its vestigial role as a star maker, so every year it puts all its clout into making the VMAs the biggest, splashiest, loudest show-biz extravaganza of the year, honoring all this music for existing, after a year of paying barely any attention to it.
Rob SheffieldEvery mix tape tells a story. Put them together, and they add up to the story of life.
Rob SheffieldThe way I pictured it, all this grief would be like a winter night when you're standing outside. You'll warm up once you get used to the cold. Except after you've been out there for awhile, you feel the warmth draining out of you and you realize the opposite is happening; you're getting colder and colder, as the body heat you brought outside with you seeps out of your skin. Instead of getting used to it, you get weaker the longer you endure it.
Rob Sheffield