There ’s a affair in pop culture call the20 - year nostalgia hertz . It explains why kids in the 2000s got really into’80s music , and why there ’s now regenerate interest inall thing Y2K. But back in the recent ’ 90s , young people across America upped the older - school ante and fell hard for jive , a genre that had n’t been popular since before their parents were born .
Seemingly overnight , washcloth shirts and baggy jeans were out ; gabardine suits and fedoras were in . Horn - tooting bands like Cherry Poppin ’ Daddies and the Brian Setzer Orchestra were all over the radio set . The Gap ’s “ Khakis Swing ” ad inspired couples nationwide to ratify up for saltation lessons — no doubt desire they ’d be able to fly through the air like the pros in the commercial message .
This unlikely swing rebirth reached its peak in 1998 and fizzle out by year ’s end . well-nigh a quarter - century later , it ’s such a strange blip on the radar that young folks — and even some oldsters who were there — are baffled by the whole affair . In former 2021 , Twitter user Simone Smithwent viralby asking , “ Can a Gen X please explain why y’ all bugger off really into swing medicine for like 2 year in the ' 90s ? ”
Royal Beginnings
To understand how and why ’ 40s medicine blew up halfway through Bill Clinton ’s 2nd term , it ’s utile to rewind about a X . The neo - swing movement began in Los Angeles in 1989 withRoyal Crown Revue , a mathematical group write for the most part of former punk rockers . Members included Mark and Adam Stern ( and their vernal brother , Jamie ) of the pioneer LA hard-core band Youth Brigade . On lead vocals was Eddie Nichols , a streetwise New York City native who grow up grasp the Sex Pistols andFrank Sinatrain adequate measure .
With key stimulus from Mexican - American sax player Mando Dorame , whose grandfather had been an LA zoot - suiter , Royal Crown Revue developed a “ mobster bop ” sound rooted not in grown - dance orchestra swing , but rather in ’ 40s - era R&B precursor jump blues . ( Most “ golf shot ” revival bands were really playing jumping blue . ) Nichols topped off his crew ’s tunes with hardboiled language animate by pulp novel , cinema noir , and his own mishap .
Royal Crown Revue found their footing as the first generation of SoCal punks began aging out of their combat boot and leather jackets . With their sharp vintage screw thread and cheerful music , the mathematical group offered tatted - up twenty- and thirty - somethings an alternative to the alternative — a countercultural movement based on midcentury Americana . As they make headway popularity in Los Angeles and San Francisco , Royal Crown Revue help oneself to institute a prospering underground scene that could n’t stay secret always .
Hollywood Comes Calling
By 1994 , Royal Crown Revue had built such a local buzz that director Chuck Russelltapped them to appearin the comic Koran filmThe Mask , starringJim Carreyand Cameron Diaz . The following year , after replacing the stark brothers with more seasoned musician , Royal Crown Revue sign with Warner Bros. and seemed poise to take neo - swing to the next story .
Unfortunately , they never really go their mainstream moment . Warner Bros. was n’t sure how to market a swing band , and when Jon Favreau asked to hurtle the group inSwingers , the 1996 depleted - budget indie movie he write , co - produced , and star in , the label reportedly demanded a euphony licensing fee that would have break the banking company — so Favreau travel to Big Bad Voodoo Daddy , a swing outfit from nearby Ventura who had of late consider over Royal Crown ’s residence at Los Angeles hotspot The Derby .
Led by singer - ballad maker Scotty Morris , another ex-wife - hoodlum , Big Bad Voodoo Daddy were n’t as dark and restive as Royal Crown Revue . But they had terrific songs , two of which they performed inSwingers . As the 1996 box office collapse detect an consultation on home base video recording , Big Bad Voodoo Daddy double up their newfound fame into a deal with Capitol Records . Even without a major crossover exclusive , their 1998 albumAmericana Deluxewent Pt , and they wound upplaying the Super Bowlwith Stevie Wonder and Gloria Estefan in January 1999 .
Meanwhile , two other neo - swing bands were make inroads on pop radio . One was the atrociously named Cherry Poppin ’ Daddies , perverted ridiculer from Eugene , Oregon , who ’d been challenging auditor since 1989 . The Daddies were n’t exclusively a swing band ; they dabble in everything from funk to punk to ska . But when fans started arrive at their merch kiosk necessitate for the album with the most swing song , the lot ’s manager had a smashing idea : The Daddies should compile an album of all their swing clobber , plus a few new tunes in that style .
The result was 1997’sZoot Suit Riot , an indie release later picked up by Mojo Records . On the strength of thetitle track , which crack up Billboard ’s Mainstream Top 40 , the record album go double platinum . It ’s an especially astonishing feat when you consider that “ Zoot Suit Riot ” is loosely establish on theZoot Suit Riots of 1943 , wherein U.S. military man on shore leave in Los Angeles viciously attacked unseasoned Mexican - Americans known aspachucos . The racially motivated ferocity was due in part to the pachucos wearing zoot suits , fabric - heavy outfit that defied wartime cloth rationing . In “ Zoot Suit Riot , ” Daddies frontman and songster Steve Perry uses the drunken revelry as a metaphoric backdrop for a call meant to galvanize the neo - swing community . It went over a lot of multitude ’s heads .
A Pop Culture Golden Age
Far less conceptual was the Brian Setzer Orchestra ’s cover of the 1956 Louis Prima favorite “ Jump , Jive an ’ Wail . ” The Prima archetype seem in the Gap ’s “ Khakis Swing ” spot , which premiered in April 1998 , so it ’s no surprisal Setzer ’s rendition flew up the chart when it arrived two months later . Setzer had previously revive rockabilly as frontman and guitar player of ’ 80s hitmakers Stray Cats , and he instill his gravid - band swing with plenty of his trademark ’ 50s - fashion latticework . “ Jump , Jive an ’ plaint ” hit No . 23 on Billboard ’s Mainstream Top 40 , and the albumThe Dirty Boogiewent two-fold platinum .
Rounding out the list of swing bands that sold in the million were Squirrel Nut Zippers . Unlike their suppose match , the Zippers were from the East Coast ( North Carolina , to be exact ) , and they did n’t take on the jumpin ’ , jiving music that had hepcats sipping martinis out in Hollywood . The Zippers favour the hot jazz of the ’ 30s , as well as old - timey blues , country , klezmer , folk , and more . They were eccentric Southern weirdo who were forever brandmark “ golf shot ” when their 1996 calypso oddity “ Hell ” caught fire on alternative radio and pushed their albumHotinto unexpected Pt territory .
That makes four neo - swing bands with platinum or better sale . It was a classic good example of major label observe a vibrant underground phenomenon and sell it to the masses . But that does n’t full account for why , in 1998 , so many teens and twenty - somethings found themselves drawn to the music and fashions from a pre - rock era .
Swing functioned as a reaction to the angsty , schlubby grunge that had been dominant for so long . Remember that golf stroke ’s 1998 pinnacle came one year after ska — another style of upbeat , automobile horn - powered dance music played by dudes in causa — savour its abbreviated moment in the Dominicus . Instead of moping and moshing , young ska and lilt fans had the opportunity to put on decent clothes and go out terpsichore , perhaps with a partner . For once , girls could take part in alternative music without having to concern about getting groped or pummeled in the pit .
Of course , neo - swing was n’t just seasonably — it was also timeless . The fit celebrated classic American imagery that had never stop being cool . The aesthetics encompassed the zoot - courting ’ 40s , the greaser ’ 50 , and theRat Pack’60s . It was Humphrey Bogart , Bettie Page , Cab Calloway , Marilyn Monroe , Dean Martin , andBillie Holiday ; custom car , Zippo lighter , sailor tattoos , and elaborated cocktails .
The music and dress hearken back to a nonspecific gold old age beforeStarbucksand shapeless fiberglass cars , when things were a niggling sexier and less homogenized . It was a search for manner and sophistication and a new ( honest-to-god ) mode to get your gripe . That impulse live on , even if neo - swing is a distant memory .
To pick up more about the brief time when bands with suits and saxophones were all over MTV , hold out Kenneth Partridge ’s bookHell of a Hat : The Rise of ’ ninety Ska and Swing , out nowon Penn State University Press .
