Immediately after finishing Tomb Raider II, it was only a couple of taps on the controller to just ‘see what TR3 is like’. Which of course ended up in playing it in earnest, trying to figure out all the puzzles and collecting all the secrets. Immediately it’s not that far removed from its predecessor but there are differences as you go along. The main difference is naturally in the locations that Lara finds herself in, and this game is a bit hit and miss. I really, really loved the subways of London and the Nevada desert was fantastic. But the jungle is really hard to navigate, and the underwater propulsion levels were so irritating.

No Scrubs has been a fixture on the 1999 Top of the Pops replays, and I suddenly realised I had only done new TLC music and not any of the classic stuff. This album is so good. There are a couple of interludey bits I could live without, but it’s not as annoying as some other albums are. And the tunes make up for it - obviously No Scrubs and Unpretty are stone cold classics, but the rest of it is great R&B with their intriguing blend of vocals and such a feeling of redemption (the band having gone through some stuff before this album that meant they may not have come. back!) Love it.

If I think about it too much, I get a bit stressed at the weird order I’m playing these Tomb Raider games in, but I couldn’t hold off playing Tomb Raider II any longer. This is the first TR game I ever played, and therefore holds massive nostalgia for me. But even with that, I do think it’s an incredible game - such great levels and locations, perfect puzzle play, and a good story to hang it all on.

Ricky Martin put in a brilliant performance at the MTV VMA’s which reminded me that I haven’t listened to anything by the man. So, kicked it off with Ricky’s breakthrough English language album (he had a few Spanish records before this). Livin’ La Vida Loca is a great way to start an album and the rest of it actually lives up to the opener. There’s even a duet with Madonna - how did that come about? Sometimes with these albums you get lots of repeat songs in Spanish, but La Vida Loca is the only one that falls into this trap, and to be honest, it’s worth listening to twice. A, good, fun, late 90s pop album.

Oops I Did It Again celebrated its 25th anniversary and I was going to listen to the album but then realised I haven’t even done the debut! So it was back to the Britney beginning, and what a joy this is. It’s wonderful sugary pop done very well by a girl just starting out. Okay, Soda Pop isn’t great, and E-Mail My Heart is already dated and only going to get worse, but the rest of it is fab 90s pop. Oops I Did It Again will not be far behind!

Gina G has quite naturally appeared on our TOTP 90s rewatches, with that absolute classic Ooh Aah taking centre stage around Eurovision time. But I was quite surprised that she kept on coming back, I’d assumed she was a one hit wonder, but there she was time and again with another single. So I figured it was worth listening to the album, and guess what? I loved it! It’s 90s and it’s cheesy but it’s really a lot of fun. Some of it is super catchy, Fresh is living rent free in my head at the moment. One of the songs sounds a bit too similar to Ooh Aah, and then you get the repeat for the last track, but otherwise, I surprisingly really enjoyed it!

I finally got around to watching Boybands Forever, a three part documentary on the BBC that aired late last year. I had planned to watch it over Christmas but a few scenes into the first episode, I thought it might be a bit depressing - turns out these boybands haven’t all had the best of experiences. So I waited until January, when we’re all experiencing the blues anyway, so why not share the pain.

I love this. LOVE IT. After watching the new Steps musical recently, I had to dive into one of their albums and headed right back to the beginning for the debut record. It’s cheesy pop, there’s no denying it, but oh such classic pop tunes. Absolute singalong bangers. The non-singles were a bit of a surprise, H getting really stuck in with an older, more experienced person, but it was all brilliant.

I loved this. It came as a bit of a surprise, and a disappointing one at that, when we realised I haven’t done any Suede so far in this album adventure… especially as we keep talking about them during our 90s TOTP rewatch. Finally have remedied that situation and what an album. Some stand out tracks, obviously, in Trash and Beautiful Ones, but I loved some of the others as well, The Chemistry Between Us got stuck in my head for a little while. Just overall great 90s work.

Lovely Louise has popped up a few times on our rewatch of Top of the Pops, which is currently in 1996. I’m always a bit surprised by how many songs of Louise’s I know and remember fondly, and this album is a good collection of them. It’s also got a full album of good songs, with very little filler, although you obviously have to enjoy 90s pop to really dig it. I have one tiny complaint and that is the weird epic key change at the end of Goodbye to Love, which is only there about ten seconds before the end of the song. What’s the point?? But overall a great listen.

This is such a 90s action thriller, fun and very, very watchable but oh man, it is NOT a good film. It’s typical Arnie, lots of muscles and fight scenes, although he only did one pun which was a bit disappointing. The technology parts of it were so obviously nonsense - having a fight with a plane in mid-air, the bizarre new weapons, and not-technology-but-still-weird fight with alligators. So much to not recommend it, but it was somehow still a lot of fun to watch.

I love this recent article on the BBC about a guy called Rob Johnson who has been getting niche and forgotten songs put on the streaming services - just by asking them to upload them! No matter how many tracks a streaming service claims to have, there’s always going to be something missing, and this is all about a mission to try and right that wrong. Most of the time it’s not a malicious or contractual act on the record companies part, they’ve just got a lot going on and it’s easy to miss something along the way.

Okay, this doesn’t quite fit into the 90s category precisely, but it’s close enough. I wanted to listen to some S Club and have already done the first album so quickly moved on to this second one. It’s stacked with that great cheesy over-produced pop and I love it! The first couple of tracks are stand-out, Reach is clearly a belter, but the whole thing works for me.

The 90s repeats of Top of the Pops on BBC Four have had a bit of a break recently (Proms and the Olympics will do that to your channels) but came back with a bang with this amazing episode. It kicked off with the Backstreet Boys which was such a surprise to me that I almost choked on my drink, and aside from the next song, continued to astound and surprise.

We’re getting to the good 90s pop music on the Top of the Pops replays now, and so it’s no surprise that I’ve been dipping into those albums as well. Supergrass are a band where I really only know that one amazing track, so it was interesting to listen to the rest of the album - it’s just more of the same, great open guitar rock from the 90s with catchy vocals and a slightly rebellious teenage vibe.

When I first started listening to this, I thought it was an 80s album and was surprised at how ahead of its time it was. Of course, I quickly realised it was an early 90s record which meant my admiration was slightly misplaced, but that doesn’t mean it still wasn’t fabulous. Great early 90s pop with two very different vocal styles that somehow work really well together. It’s very listenable from start to finish but the only complaint is Stay (clearly the best track on the album) is just stuck in the middle, it doesn’t really go with the rest. It’s a different beast to all the other tracks, but I would still prefer it to be on there!

I love Billie Piper and thought it was about time to dip into some albums from my year of the 90s - 1998! This is, obviously, cheesy 90s pop, but I love it. A couple of number one singles on there, maybe just a couple of filler songs but also some pretty good grooves. The only complaint, if there is one, is it feels like Billie hadn’t found her own voice yet - a couple of the tracks seem to channel, there are some with rap that don’t quite flow. But a good 90s pop listen.

Garbage popped up on the 90s Top of the Pops reruns although they were doing an earlier single than appears on this album. I’ve done a couple of Garbage albums already but had to add this one to the list - it’s SO good. Just great Britpop rock with a few standout singles but a really strong tracklist all the way through. Occasionally, it reminded me of the Pretenders, in the best way, but Shirley Manson still manages to stand apart.

This is a really interesting autobiography, well written and funny, although it starts off a lot stronger than towards the end. But it also goes some way to explaining (not excusing) the recent actions of Smith’s that have made him a bit of a question mark in the eyes of a lot of people. This is a magnificent story of rags to riches and then back down again, whilst also examining what to do when you have everything but it’s still not making you happy. I listened to the audiobook which had the bonus of a bit of character from Will, he’d burst into the raps occasionally or play clips of what he was talking about. Very intriguing book.

I’ve seen this before and remember liking it, particularly the music. I’ve a love/hate relationship with Baz Luhrmann’s film-making but this one is on the good side. The scenery and the visual storytelling is perfect. The only real problem with it is the text. I just can’t with Shakespeare and that makes this a bit of a non-starter from that point of view. It’s probably the most accessible the bard has ever been to me but it’s still not what I’m after.

Let’s cut to the chase: I remembered this being better than it was. It was up there with Scream in my head, one of those 90s slasher movies that has pretty people, good tunes, and a brilliant horror mystery to be unravelled. It had two of those things going for it, but everything else was nonsense. The initial accident that caused the problem was blown out of all proportion and a lot of the choices made afterwards make no sense… laughable in places. The acting isn’t that great, really, they’re all quite young and go on to do a better job in other things, I think. Watchable but probably not a first choice.

I remember liking this previously, but oof, it has not aged well at all, has it? There’s obviously the problematic transphobic ’twist’ ending, but even outside of that there’s plenty of sexism, racism, general bawdy humour that doesn’t sit well anymore. Elements of it are still entertaining, and there a lot of quotable lines in there that still stick in my brain but I’m very happy to move on from this and never look back.

I love, love, loved this album. I’m a big Erasure fan anyway, although not everything they do hits exactly the right spot. This album, though, is basically perfect. Some real bangers on there, particularly tracks 4 to 6, but all of it is great and makes you want to sing along, belting out the words I Love to Hate Youuuuuuu.

During our second 90s evening (it’s becoming a thing!) I noticed something during the Gladiators episode that was so smoothly done, it hadn’t even registered in my mind. The men’s and women’s events were swapped in order throughout the show and for each episode. For example, who was introduced first, sometimes the men, sometimes the women. Who took to the Eliminator first at the end of the episode? This time it was the men, the other time it was the women.

I make no secret of my love for the 90s, and often enjoy a bit of culture from that time. However, a certain confluence of events occurred yesterday that meant I somehow went back in time and was living my best 90s life all evening. First, after hearing that Carl Weathers had died, we wanted to pay tribute to him by watching a movie he’d appeared in. Having already completed Predator and the Rocky series, it was left to Happy Gilmore to complete the gap. Happy Gilmore was released in 1996 so kick-started the time travel evening.

If you’d asked me a couple of months ago about Whigfield, I’d have said she was a one hit wonder. A brilliant hit, obviously but that was it. Turns out, she keeps on popping up on those 90s episodes of Top of the Pops because she has quite a few dance tracks that I remember and recognise. The album is surprisingly good, the songs do sound similar, particularly Another Day and Saturday Night, but I actually really enjoyed listening to it.

I know Boyzone are part of the manufactured band era of the 90s that a lot of people don’t like, but there is something special about them. They have a mix of original songs and covers, most of which are done pretty well, and they have the voices and the togetherness to make it work. I was surprised that they’d done some of the songwriting on this track, they’re more than just pretty faces!

Wow, this is quite the book. It’s creating headlines all over the place, and quite understandably as there are new revelations and shocking moments mentioned in the book. I found it to be a really interesting listen, perhaps not the most flamboyantly written memoir but a really solid piece of work that is honest and open and clearly speaking from the heart. I suspect some of the events in the book will have two sides to the story but it doesn’t matter, the most important thing about this is that Britney has taken control of her life and grabbed the opportunity to tell her side.

We’re into the awesome 1995 on the BBC’s Top of the Pops replay, and that means proper Britpop era. Sleeper popped up recently playing Inbetweener and that led to this album choice for the week. Inbetweener kicks off their album and is probably the best song on there, but that doesn’t mean the rest is a disappointment. In fact, it’s a really good album, lyrically strong and keeps you engaged from start to finish. Not a five star album but not far off!

I just wanted to celebrate the fact that the Top of the Pops replays have started again on BBC Four, after taking an extended break to make way for the Proms. We’d just dipped our toes into the start of 1995 when the classical stuff took over but now we’re back, and it’s brilliant! Britpop is starting to emerge and breakthrough the dance numbers, we’re still seeing warblers like Celine Dion rule the roost, but also the oddities are cropping up like Cotton Eye Joe.

I was expecting good things from this book, and of course it delivered. It’s a memoir of sorts but with Jarvis Cocker, it was never going to be a straightforward story delivered from A to Z. Instead, we’re trawling through a loft and getting stories and insights into a life from the things found there. A fascinating way to find out about someone’s life… and it’s a fascinating life. Great stuff.

This is so much fun but no one could argue it was a good album - even Ant & Dec wouldn’t take that view at this point. Let’s Get Ready to Rhumble is a great bop with terrible lyrics and the rest of the album carries on from there in similar style. I don’t mind the upbeat terrible lyrical rapping, but have to admit the ballads and love songs are really quite cringy. Ant & Dec trying to do that 90s love whispering, ugh. But still, what an amazing time capsule and piece of pop culture history.

Aww, yay for The Corrs, the adorable sibling pop band from Ireland. There are some great tunes on this album, although I have to admit the album version of What Can I Do didn’t really do it for me, compared to the Tin Tin Out remix that was released later. I also feel like it was a great idea to put an instrumental on there, but they could have done a lot more with it. However, overall, a really great album that fits its late 90s genre perfectly.

I was quite surprised how often 2 Unlimited popped up on the Top of the Pops 90s reruns we’re working through. Obviously, No Limit is a banger, but they kept coming back with other songs - who knew they had a whole career? Turns out they had four albums which blows my mind. Having listened to the album, the good stuff is good, but it’s all very similar. In fact there’s a song on this album that has the exact same beat as No Limit, it just goes up instead of down. So weird. Not a bad listen but not one I’d repeat - the singles are enough.

This is another album that has ended up on my list thanks to the 90s Top of the Pops repeats on the BBC. I’m surprised how many of these songs I knew or were familiar, considering it’s really the big What Is Love banger that first comes to mind when you think about Haddaway. The dance numbers are great (although let down by two of them being on the album twice for no good reason), the slower songs are a little bit cheesy, if I’m honest. Fun but not fantastic.

There was no Christmas Day edition of Top of the Pops this year, which was both completely understandable and also a real shock. The show has been drifting further and further from the TV schedules and therefore the public consciousness that it was inevitable it would one day drop off the festive TV guides. But it was still a shame to see it was missing. However, BBC Four is still dedicated to showing old episodes of the music show and the 1998 Christmas Day special has been available for a while. It’s a great show, stacked with 90s pop hits and some surprises along the way, all capably helmed by Jamie Theakston, Kate Thornton and Jayne Middlemiss. SO NINETIES!

This is a rollercoaster of an album, the bangers are brilliant, obviously. Frozen is a tune and a half, and I’d forgotten about The Power of Good-Bye which is a really great song. And then some of the other stuff is great, not quite living up to that level but really listenable. But then there’s also some elements that really dragged. the Candy Perfume one really felt like it was never going to end. Overall, though, a great album.

I know Lighthouse Family are considered slow-going easy-listening lift music but actually, I didn’t mind it. It made for really good background music, and even though I only knew a couple of the songs, it all seemed to work together. It’s not one I would seek out over and over but I can see why those couple of songs are as well-known as they are.

Listening to an A1 album has been on the list for a long time, and it came rushing to the fore after the rumours that Ben from the group was part of the quirky Norwegian Eurovision entry that involved wolves and bananas. This is straight up good hearted late 90s pop and I Love It. I actually knew more of the songs than I remembered - if you’d asked me to name A1 songs I could have come up with maybe two, but I knew at least double that and maybe more. I think it’s brave to kick off with an almost a capella number when you’re known for pop beats, but it leads into Be the First to Believe really well. Fun!

I remembered this as a huge teen film from the late 90s, so have been desperate to watch it but it’s just not been available anywhere. Suddenly, out of nowhere, it popped up on Amazon Prime so I hot-footed it to the sofa with some popcorn and settled in. I was nervous, I’ll admit, because the concept is about as mysogynistic as it gets and I wasn’t sure it would have aged well. Of course the initial bet is in bad taste, but actually, overall, the film wasn’t as bad as I thought it might have been, Laney held her own when it mattered and there were some good guys in amongst the worst of the worst (looking at you PW).

I’ve mentioned before that I’m completely into the Top of the Pops replays on BBC Four at the moment, as they have reached the early nineties and I’m loving this era of music… we’re heading rapidly towards Backstreet Boys and Spice Girls and so much more goodness. They recently rounded out the year 1992 with the Christmas special, and at this moment in time, Whitney Houston had her vice-like grip on the number one spot with I Will Always Love You. This, of course, from the movie The Bodyguard featuring Kevin Costner.

I don’t know why I’ve listened to one Robbie Williams before and it was the second one rather than his first solo effort - but hey, I’m righting that wrong now. This is such an interesting album to listen to knowing its place in time - leaving a globally successful band to go it alone is such a risk, but it’s clear Robbie wanted to spread his wings and get a bit more Britpop, a bit less traditional pop. That’s clear right from the start and carries all the way through the album (Angels, oddly, doesn’t really seem to fit on here despite being such a classic).

The marvellous Manics with a super strong album - that first five tracks are really good, hitting you right from the start with the mood that takes you right to the end. It’s quite a long album, but it never feels like it’s taking too much of your time. I’ve really loved the most recent couple of Manics albums, and whilst this doesn’t quite live up to those for me, it’s still head and shoulders above a lot of other albums.

When I first heard about this book, I knew I had to read it straight away - I actually opted for the audiobook, so Josh Widdicombe talked me through the whole thing. As a concept, this is right up my street. I, too, watched a lot of TV in the nineties, although I didn’t know all of the shows that were mentioned. The ones that I did know, though, I love. Neighbours, Gladiators, Funhouse, etc, etc.

When I want something a bit more relaxing to watch, I dip into Dawson’s Creek on Netflix. Maybe relaxing isn’t the right word, all those hyperbolic teenagers making a drama out of a molehill, but it’s a comforting treat regardless. The only problem with it is, up until this past week, the theme tune was Run Like Mad rather than the correct I Don’t Want to Wait by Paula Cole. Never has the Skip Intro button been more appropriate.

I knew a lot more of this album than I thought, I guess at the time I was really interested in what Mel would do post-Spice Girls. It’s a really good album, with lots of catchy pop songs, but I do think it feels like a hotch-potch collection rather than a coherent album. Like Mel was properly experimenting with all genres - dance, latin, modern pop, classic pop, a little bit of everything. I enjoyed listening to it though, and there are some classic songs on there that will stand the test of time.

Yay for the lovely manufactured pop sounds of the 1990s. There’s nothing particularly special about S Club 7 in the 90s pop universe, but they do have some good and memorable songs. I was a bit surprised that there were a couple of more Spanish-influenced numbers on there, and I liked it when it stumbled on to a track clearly letting the boys taking centre stage for a change. Overall just a nice, feel-good, pop album.

Thankfully, it’s brilliant. It probably has a bit of a benefit from following on the slow-pace chill-fest of Taylor’s latest album, but even without that, it’s just good soft rock. One is genuinely one of the greatest songs ever, but even with that it doesn’t overshadow everything around it - they all stand up.

I needed something warm and comforting this week so dived into the back catalogue of my favourite boy band. This is their second album, and you can tell that they were slightly maturing from their first, but still nowhere near old enough, experienced enough, or in control enough of their albums to let their real sound show.

I’ve had a few disappointments over the last couple of weeks, so I wanted to listen to something I knew I would like - good old-fashioned 90s boyband pop. I fell for the manufactured BSB vs NSync rivalry back in the day but older and wiser I can now listen to it all and enjoy.