The Catchiest Songs of the ’90s: The Verve, Smashing Pumpkins, TLC & The Cranberries episode artwork

EPISODE · Aug 10, 2026 · 29 MIN

The Catchiest Songs of the ’90s: The Verve, Smashing Pumpkins, TLC & The Cranberries

from Professor of Rock

To me the definition of great hit song is one that is so catchy and undeniable that whenever it comes on you feel like your 50 Feet tall and invincible. Some decades just hit different — and the 90s produced a run of songs so irresistible that the world still hasn't gotten over them. It’s time ro count down the catchiest sings of the decade! The greatest earworms of the 90s that you’re grateful to have stuck in your head and the stories behind them that nobody ever told you… including how one production assistant placed the master tapes for the Smashing Pumpkins' 1979 music video on top of his car and drove off… scattering them across the Los Angeles freeway. The band was forced to fly back across the country on a red-eye and reshoot the entire thing from scratch. Then there’s the Verve's Richard Ashcroft, who spent years pouring his grief into Bittersweet Symphony, a song that became a global anthem, but was strong-armed into signing away every dollar it ever earned. And there's one of the decade's most celebrated music videos, Waterfalls, that was delivered by a singer who was under house arrest, hiding an ankle monitoring bracelet underneath her costume the whole time. Plus the Cranberries' Linger that was originally about underwear. But a shy girl who was mocked by her bandmates turned into the most enduring song of the decade. Let’s do it.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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The Catchiest Songs of the ’90s: The Verve, Smashing Pumpkins, TLC & The Cranberries

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