Review: 'Alternative for the Masses: The '90s Alt-Rock Revolution '

2025 has been a pretty good year for acknowledging that the nineties alternative rock scene was something that actually happened. In previous years (and this year) publishers couldn't pump out enough pages about sixties rock, seventies rock, and Beatles, Beatles, Beatles. Meanwhile the era of Nirvana mostly boiled down to, well, Nirvana. But what about Shudder to Think? What about Helium? What about Belly and Urge Overkill and Primus and Arrested Development and Throwing Muses and Pixies, Pixies, Pixies?

Review: Vinyl Reissue of Urge Overkill's 'Saturation'

In the wake of the (fortunate) demise of hair metal, Kurt Cobain led a movement away from rock’s preening, hair-flipping poses toward a new age of sincerity and authenticity. Yet, Cobain was also a big fan of Urge Overkill, whose big riffs harkened back to the days of Boston and Bad Company and whose hair was simply grown for flipping. That’s probably because corporate rockers like Boston and Bad Company were really dumb, but Urge Overkill wielded wit like a hidden stiletto in James Bond’s boot heel.

With their 1993 breakthrough Saturation, U.O. made capital-R Rock cool again with their ironic songs about sexy Fidel Castro and soap operas, loungesplotation persona, and irresistible hooks. Yet it wasn’t all a big joke with Nash Kato, “Eddie” King Roeser, and Blackie Onassis. The bizarrely titled ballad “Bottle of Fur” homes in on the ache of lost love with absolute sincerity (despite Nash’s knowingly seventies use of the term “make it”). Roeser’s monstrous “Stalker” revives the guys’ Touch-and-Go era punk power. Blackie O’s “Drop Out” provides a fleeting glimpse of the former losers lurking under all that crushed velvet. All this made for one of the best albums of Rock’s best year since the sixties ended.

Saturation is now being reissued on vinyl by Porterhouse Records. Sadly, the thumping CD bonus track, “Operation Kissinger”, does not make the cut. Gladly, the sound is warm, the vinyl is blue, and the martinis are still chilled.