Cash, cocaine and chaos – The mad, bad ’90s music biz with author John Niven

Cash, cocaine and chaos – The mad, bad ’90s music biz with author John Niven

Diving deep into all things ’90s. The music business’s last hurrah of excess, extravagance and super-colossal expense accounts came in the ’90s – and John Niven was in the front row as an A&R man* at era-defining label London Records. His experiences of trying to sign the next big thing in a cloud of money and “stimulants” became the cult book and movie Kill Your Friends [https://uk.bookshop.org/a/13277/9780099592099] (the British American Psycho). What was it all like? John joins Miranda to talk Goldie, lengthy expense accounts, All Saints, Jarvis at the Brits, the terror of not finding a hit, rubbing shoulders with Oasis, becoming James Dean Bradfield’s “Fun Bobby’, and how on earth they got away with it.  [* A&R men are the people who find and schmooze the talent, and pay for the “fruit and flowers”]  • Hear more on Hit That Perfect Beat – The London Records Story [https://linktr.ee/ldnpodcast], out now.  • Want an extra mini-pod every two weeks, early ad free episodes and access to merch? ⁠Support us on Patreon [https://www.patreon.com/Talk90sToMe] Follow us on:  BlueSky [https://bsky.app/profile/talk90stome.bsky.social]  Instagram [https://www.instagram.com/talk90stomepod/]  TikTok  [https://www.tiktok.com/@talk90stome] Subscribe to our Spotify playlist [https://open.spotify.com/playlist/4paiGhhtQFRVB8Djsbe8sh?si=63eef3b968024275] • All Saints and Goldie photos: Getty Images  • Buy Miranda’s book Uncommon People: Britpop and Beyond in 20 Songs [https://uk.bookshop.org/a/13277/9781399816915] (or John’s!) through our affiliate bookshop and you’ll be helping the podcast by earning us a small commission for every sale. Bookshop.org [http://bookshop.org/]’s fees help support independent bookshops too. • Advertisers! Want to reach smart, engaged, influential people with money to spend? (Yes, they do exist). Some 3.5 MILLION people download and watch our podcasts every month – and they love our shows. Why not get YOUR brand in front of our influential listeners with podcast advertising? Contact ads@podmasters.co.uk [ads@podmasters.co.uk] to find out more. Written and presented by Miranda Sawyer. Produced by Liam Tait. Audio and video production by Tom Taylor. Managing editor: Jacob Jarvis. Group editor: Andrew Harrison. Music by Soniq Branding from Artlist. Talk ’90s To Me is a Podmasters production.  www.podmasters.co.uk [https://www.podmasters.co.uk] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices [https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices]

Showgirls – Worst film of the ’90s or misunderstood gem?

Diving deep into all things ’90s. Paul Verhoeven’s camp, deranged, Vegas-based “erotic drama” Showgirls was a $45 million Hollywood gamble that became one of the biggest box office flops of the decade. Nominated for 16 Razzies, it got its lead actress Elizabeth Berkeley effectively blacklisted for almost 20 years. But thirty years later, things look very different. Once dismissed as pure camp excess, Showgirls has since been critically re-evaluated as a vicious satire of the American dream, capitalism and the misogynist entertainment industry itself. Comedian Chantal Feduchin-Pate joins Miranda to ask: was Showgirls really the worst film of the 90s? Or perhaps a fierce, misunderstood, protofeminist cult classic?  • Want early ad free episodes and access to merch? ⁠Support us on Patreon [https://www.patreon.com/Talk90sToMe] Follow us on:  BlueSky [https://bsky.app/profile/talk90stome.bsky.social]  Instagram [https://www.instagram.com/talk90stomepod/]  TikTok  [https://www.tiktok.com/@talk90stome] Subscribe to our Spotify playlist [https://open.spotify.com/playlist/4paiGhhtQFRVB8Djsbe8sh?si=63eef3b968024275] • Buy Miranda’s book Uncommon People: Britpop and Beyond in 20 Songs [https://uk.bookshop.org/a/13277/9781399816915] through our affiliate bookshop and you’ll be helping the podcast by earning us a small commission for every sale. Bookshop.org [http://bookshop.org/]’s fees help support independent bookshops too. • Advertisers! Want to reach smart, engaged, influential people with money to spend? (Yes, they do exist). Some 3.5 MILLION people download and watch our podcasts every month – and they love our shows. Why not get YOUR brand in front of our influential listeners with podcast advertising? Contact ads@podmasters.co.uk [ads@podmasters.co.uk] to find out more Written and presented by Miranda Sawyer. Produced by Liam Tait. Audio and video production by Tom Taylor. Managing editor: Jacob Jarvis. Group editor: Andrew Harrison. Music by Soniq Branding from Artlist. Talk ’90s To Me is a Podmasters production.  www.podmasters.co.uk [https://www.podmasters.co.uk] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices [https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices]

From Queen to Mogwai – John Robins on his ’90s music journey

Diving deep into all things ’90s. John Robins was a child at the start of the ’90s and eighteen by the end of it. He talks through his early obsession with Freddie Mercury and Queen’s ‘90s releases, his controversial non-uniform day outfits and how his music taste evolved to the likes of Mogwai and Godspeed You! Black Emperor. Plus, he discusses his new book Thirst [https://uk.bookshop.org/a/13277/9780241740040], which is out now.  Buy Thirst [https://uk.bookshop.org/a/13277/9780241740040] through our affiliate bookshop [https://uk.bookshop.org/a/13277/9780241740040] and you’ll help fund Talk ‘90s to me by earning us a small commission for every sale. Bookshop.org [http://bookshop.org]’s fees help support independent bookshops too. • Want early ad free episodes and access to merch? ⁠Support us on Patreon [https://www.patreon.com/Talk90sToMe] Follow us on:  BlueSky [https://bsky.app/profile/talk90stome.bsky.social]  Instagram [https://www.instagram.com/talk90stomepod/]  TikTok  [https://www.tiktok.com/@talk90stome] Subscribe to our Spotify playlist [https://open.spotify.com/playlist/4paiGhhtQFRVB8Djsbe8sh?si=63eef3b968024275] • Buy Miranda’s book Uncommon People: Britpop and Beyond in 20 Songs [https://uk.bookshop.org/a/13277/9781399816915] through our affiliate bookshop and you’ll be helping the podcast by earning us a small commission for every sale. Bookshop.org [http://bookshop.org/]’s fees help support independent bookshops too. • Advertisers! Want to reach smart, engaged, influential people with money to spend? (Yes, they do exist). Some 3.5 MILLION people download and watch our podcasts every month – and they love our shows. Why not get YOUR brand in front of our influential listeners with podcast advertising? Contact ads@podmasters.co.uk [ads@podmasters.co.uk] to find out more Written and presented by Miranda Sawyer. Produced by Liam Tait. Audio and video production by Tom Taylor. Managing editor: Jacob Jarvis. Group editor: Andrew Harrison. Music by Soniq Branding from Artlist. Talk ’90s To Me is a Podmasters production.  www.podmasters.co.uk [https://www.podmasters.co.uk] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices [https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices]

Prozac Nation! – How one grunge-era depression memoir changed everything

Diving deep into all things ’90s… Elizabeth Wurtzel’s groundbreaking grunge-era memoir of depression, medication and alienation Prozac Nation [https://www.worldofbooks.com/en-gb/products/prozac-nation-book-elizabeth-wurtzel-9780704380080#GOR000511417] divided opinion like few books ever have. How did it become the book of a generation? Does it stand up now? Did Wurtzel reinvent an old genre or start a new one? And would Lena Dunham’s Girls exist without it? Miranda Sawyer is joined by Sian Pattenden [https://sianpattenden.co.uk/], culture writer, artist and musician, to discuss how Prozac Nation changed the game for young women writers.  • Want early ad free episodes and access to merch? ⁠Support us on Patreon [https://www.patreon.com/Talk90sToMe] Follow us on:  BlueSky [https://bsky.app/profile/talk90stome.bsky.social]  Instagram [https://www.instagram.com/talk90stomepod/]  TikTok  [https://www.tiktok.com/@talk90stome] Subscribe to our Spotify playlist [https://open.spotify.com/playlist/4paiGhhtQFRVB8Djsbe8sh?si=63eef3b968024275] Listen to Sian’s band The Sha Sha Shanimals here [https://linktr.ee/shashashanimals].  • Buy Miranda’s book Uncommon People: Britpop and Beyond in 20 Songs [https://uk.bookshop.org/a/13277/9781399816915] through our affiliate bookshop and you’ll be helping the podcast by earning us a small commission for every sale. Bookshop.org [http://bookshop.org/]’s fees help support independent bookshops too. • Advertisers! Want to reach smart, engaged, influential people with money to spend? (Yes, they do exist). Some 3.5 MILLION people download and watch our podcasts every month – and they love our shows. Why not get YOUR brand in front of our influential listeners with podcast advertising? Contact ads@podmasters.co.uk [ads@podmasters.co.uk] to find out more Written and presented by Miranda Sawyer. Produced by Liam Tait. Audio and video production by Tom Taylor. Managing editor: Jacob Jarvis. Group editor: Andrew Harrison. Music by Soniq Branding from Artlist. Talk ’90s To Me is a Podmasters production.  www.podmasters.co.uk [https://www.podmasters.co.uk] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices [https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices]

Alcopops! – Hooch, Metz, Breezers and the booze of the ’90s

Diving deep into all things ’90s. Bright, sugary and brewed to go down far too easily, alcopops arrived in the ’90s with a bang. They blurred the line between soft drink and spirit, encouraged a new generation into the pubs and if you believed the tabloids sparked a youth drinking revolution.  This week on Talk ’90s, Miranda is joined by drinks writer Pete Brown to revisit the sticky-sweet rise of Hooch, Bacardi Breezers and Blue WKDs. We take a look at the moral panic that followed and how their legacy impacts how we drink today.  • Want an extra mini-pod every two weeks, early ad free episodes and access to merch? ⁠Support us on Patreon [https://www.patreon.com/Talk90sToMe] Follow us on:  BlueSky [https://bsky.app/profile/talk90stome.bsky.social]  Instagram [https://www.instagram.com/talk90stomepod/]  TikTok  [https://www.tiktok.com/@talk90stome] Subscribe to our Spotify playlist [https://open.spotify.com/playlist/4paiGhhtQFRVB8Djsbe8sh?si=63eef3b968024275] • Buy Miranda’s book Uncommon People: Britpop and Beyond in 20 Songs [https://uk.bookshop.org/a/13277/9781399816915] through our affiliate bookshop and you’ll be helping the podcast by earning us a small commission for every sale. Bookshop.org [http://bookshop.org/]’s fees help support independent bookshops too. • Advertisers! Want to reach smart, engaged, influential people with money to spend? (Yes, they do exist). Some 3.5 MILLION people download and watch our podcasts every month – and they love our shows. Why not get YOUR brand in front of our influential listeners with podcast advertising? Contact ads@podmasters.co.uk [ads@podmasters.co.uk] to find out more Written and presented by Miranda Sawyer. Produced by Liam Tait. Audio and video production by Tom Taylor. Managing editor: Jacob Jarvis. Group editor: Andrew Harrison. Music by Soniq Branding from Artlist. Talk ’90s To Me is a Podmasters production.  www.podmasters.co.uk [https://www.podmasters.co.uk] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices [https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices]