Bands of the ‘90s

We’ve been buying a lot of old Japanese magazines lately. What’s wild is how seriously they took bands in the ’90s. Not just album coverage — full-on editorials. Proper shoots. Japanese editors didn’t treat musicians like content; they treated them like cultural icons. There was admiration in it. The photos feel considered and aspirational without being try-hard — backstage, on the street, in studios, just existing but elevated. Bands were visible in a way that feels almost impossible now. 

What hits isn’t that the imagery is bigger or louder than what we see now — it’s that it felt earned. There was a real sense of anticipation back then. You’d find one on a shelf, or it would show up in the mail, and you genuinely didn’t know what you were going to get. That unknown factor made it better.