Best Songs of 1998

A pivotal year for my music fandom and consumption, 1998, embodied by this list, was a time of great change in my tastes and habits. In addition to overspending my bank account on too many trips to Tower Records (in Cambridge and on Newbury Street), I also was amassing quite the mp3 collection (before it all got wiped when a virus hit my computer), and even made my first online purchase of a CD (Neil Young’s Harvest, bought on the long-defunct CDNow).

All in all, I acquired a whopping 122 CDs (and one LP) in ’98, nearly double the year prior, increasing my music collection by nearly 50%. While not everything on this list was acquired twenty years ago, an overwhelming majority are songs that soundtracked my year—one in which I turned 20, finished a tumultuous freshman year of college, and began a new school year with a group of new roommates, some of whom I still am lucky enough to claim as friends decades later.

Looking at this list of songs and artists, I am struck by the still-adventurous nature of popular music of the time. These annual summaries of mine typically drift through genres and trends and float between massively popular and idiosyncratically me. This list certainly does that, but something about it seems even more attuned to what I and others like me were listening to in 1998, so much so that it feels like a document of one of the last eras where anything could be truly popular. Is that a stretch to say? I do not know, you tell me.

For these year-end lists, I like to undertake the seemingly impossibly task of creating an hours-long mix. The order you see below represents that effort, which you can listen to via Spotify and Apple Music. Sadly all 100 tracks aren't available, but you get the general idea. Track notes to come eventually or maybe never.

Show Grid

Tearin’ Up My Heart

*NSYNC

*NSYNC

Jive

1998 U.S. release
Everybody (Backstreet’s Back)

Backstreet Boys

Backstreet Boys

Jive

1998 U.S. release
Fly Away

Lenny Kravitz

5

Virgin

Notes
Open Road Song

Eve 6

Eve 6

RCA

Notes
Circles

Soul Coughing

El Oso

Slash

Notes
Remote Control

Beastie Boys

Hello Nasty

Grand Royal

Notes
My Favourite Game

The Cardigans

Gran Turismo

Stockholm

Notes
Ray of Light

Madonna

Ray of Light

Maverick

Notes
Praise You

Fatboy Slim

You’ve Come a Long Way, Baby

Astralwerks

Notes
Music Sounds Better With You

Stardust

Music Sounds Better With You 12"

Virgin

Notes
What’s It Gonna Be?!

Busta Rhymes featuring Janet Jackson

Extinction Level Event: The Final World Front

Elektra

Notes
Anywhere

112

Room 112

Bad Boy

Notes
Are You That Somebody

Aaliyah

Dr. Dolittle

Atlantic

Notes
Rosa Parks

Outkast

Aquemini

LaFace

Notes
Cut Chemist Suite

Ozomatli

Ozomatli

Almo Sounds

Notes
Plastic People

The Getaway People

The Getaway People

Tangerine

Notes
Never There

Cake

Prolonging the Magic

Capricorn

Notes
In Love

Fear of Pop featuring William Shatner

Volume I

550 Music

Notes
All I Need

Air

Moon Safari

Astralwerks

Notes
Part of the Process

Morcheeba

Big Calm

Reprise

Notes
Shanti

Béla Fleck & The Flecktones

Left of Cool

Warner Bros.

Notes
Nobody’s Fault But My Own

Beck

Mutations

DGC / Bong Load

Notes
Koto Song

Tuatara

Trading With the Enemy

Epic

Notes
Chanty

Son Volt

Wide Swing Tremolo

Warner Bros.

Notes
One Big Love

Patty Griffin

Flaming Red

A&M

Notes
The Difficult Kind

Sheryl Crow

The Globe Sessions

A&M

Notes
Days

Train

Train

Aware

Notes
Suburban Sweetheart

Josh Rouse

Dressed Up Like Nebraska

Slow River

Notes
Believe

Scott Thomas Band

California

Elektra

Notes
Razorblades

Chris Stills

100 Year Thing

Atlantic

Notes
Baker Street

Foo Fighters

My Hero

Roswell

Notes
Jesus or a Gun

Fuel

Sunburn

550 Music

Notes
Car Radio

Spoon

A Series of Sneaks

Merge

Notes
Got You (Where I Want You)

The Flys

Holiday Man

Trauma

Notes
Private Helicopter

Harvey Danger

Where Have All the Merrymakers Gone?

Slash

Limited local release in 1997
Never Ending Math Equation

Modest Mouse

Never Ending Math Equation

Sub Pop

Notes
Spacey and Shakin’

Pete Droge

Spacey and Shakin’

Sony

Notes
Fearless

Gerald Collier

Gerald Collier

Revolution

Notes
Ship Going Down

Citizens’ Utilities

Sunbreak

My Own Planet

Notes
Free to Run

Gomez

Bring It On

Virgin

Notes
In Hiding

Pearl Jam

Yield

Epic

Notes
Walk Unafraid

R.E.M.

Up

Warner Bros.

Notes
Spark

Tori Amos

From the Choirgirl Hotel

Atlantic

Notes
Rubbed Out

Duncan Sheik

Humming

Atlantic

Notes
Waltz #2 (XO)

Elliott Smith

XO

Dreamworks

Notes
Sinner

Neil Finn

Try Whistling This

Work

Notes
Bitter Sweet Symphony

The Verve

Urban Hymns

Virgin

Notes
You Get What You Give

New Radicals

Maybe You’ve Been Brainwashed Too

MCA

Notes
Singing in My Sleep

Semisonic

Feeling Strangely Fine

MCA

Notes
Malibu

Hole

Celebrity Skin

Geffen

Notes
Special

Garbage

Version 2.0

Almo Sounds

Notes
Slide

Goo Goo Dolls

Dizzy Up the Girl

Warner Bros.

Notes
Miles From Our Home

Cowboy Junkies

Miles From Our Home

Geffen

Notes
Walk Slow

Chris Isaak

Speak of the Devil

Reprise

Notes
Ballad of Billy Jo McKay

Shawn Mullins

Soul’s Core

SMG

Notes
Summer

Noel Hartough

Aware 6: The Compilation

Aware

Notes
Glorified

Lotion

The Telephone Album

spinART

Notes
Tree

Sebadoh

The Sebadoh

Sub Pop

Notes
The Boy With the Arab Strap

Belle & Sebastian

The Boy With the Arab Strap

Matador

Notes
April Fools

Rufus Wainwright

Rufus Wainwright

Dreamworks

Notes
Bears

Lyle Lovett

Step Inside This House

MCA

Notes
Desperate Ain’t Lonely

Whiskeytown

Faithless Street

Outpost

Bonus track from the 1998 reissue
Caleb Meyer

Gillian Welch

Hell Among the Yearlings

Almo Sounds

Notes
Angel From Montgomery

Susan Tedeschi

Just Won’t Burn

Tone Cool

Notes
California Stars

Billy Bragg and Wilco

Mermaid Avenue

Elektra

Notes
Smiling Up the Frown

Agents of Good Roots

One by One

RCA

Notes
Feast or Famine

Rustic Overtones

Rooms by the Hour

Ripchord

Notes
Pickin’ Up the Pieces

Widespread Panic

Light Fuse Get Away

Capricorn

Notes
Driver 8

Hootie & the Blowfish

I Will Wait

Atlantic

Notes
Eileen’s Song

Burlap to Cashmere

Anybody Out There?

A&M

Notes
The Dreaming Tree

Dave Matthews Band

Before These Crowded Streets

RCA

Notes
Desireless

Eagle-Eye Cherry

Desireless

Sony

Notes
Please Send Me Someone to Love

Fiona Apple

Pleasantville

Sony

Notes
Lean on Me

Beth Orton featuring Terry Callier

Best Bit EP

Dedicated

1997 UK release
Windy Hill (Cornelius Mix)

The Pastels

Illuminati

Domino

Notes
Two Fine Lovers

Sean Lennon

Into the Sun

Grand Royal

Notes
The Sweetest Thing

U2

The Best of 1980–1990

Island

Notes
Sunshine

The Presidents of the United States of America

Pure Frosting

Columbia

Notes
Nick Drake Tape

Clem Snide

You Were a Diamond

Tractor Beam

Notes
Bobcaygeon

The Tragically Hip

Phantom Power

Sire

Notes
Demons

Guster

Goldfly

Aware

Notes
Little Blind Fish

CPR

CPR

Samson Music

Notes
Ariel Ramirez

Richard Buckner

Since

MCA

Notes
Indian Summer

Chris Whitley

Dirt Floor

Messenger

Notes
Fear of Falling

Golden Smog

Weird Tales

Rykodisc

Notes
Can’t Let Go

Lucinda Williams

Car Wheels on a Gravel Road

Mercury

Notes
It’s Bad You Know

R.L. Burnside

Come On In

Fat Possum

Notes
Battleflag

Lo Fidelity Allstars

How to Operate With a Blown Mind

Columbia

Notes
Teardrop

Massive Attack

Mezzanine

Virgin

Notes
Rabbit in Your Headlights

UNKLE featuring Thom Yorke

Psyence Fiction

Mo Wax

Notes
Every Shining Time You Arrive

Sunny Day Real Estate

How It Feels to Be Something On

Sub Pop

Notes
In the Aeroplane Over the Sea

Neutral Milk Hotel

In the Aeroplane Over the Sea

Merge

Notes
Great Escape

Chaser

Homegrown

Will

Notes
My Mom

Chocolate Genius

Black Music

V2

Notes
Changes

2Pac

Greatest Hits

Death Row / Interscope

Notes
Doo Wop (That Thing)

Lauryn Hill

The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill

Sony

Notes
Hard Knock Life (Ghetto Anthem)

Jay-Z

Vol. 2… Hard Knock Life

Roc-A-Fella

Notes
Déjà Vu (Uptown Baby)

Lord Tariq & Peter Gunz

Make It Reign

Columbia

Notes
Joints & Jam

Black Eyed Peas

Behind the Front

Interscope

Notes
Pad & Pen

A Tribe Called Quest

The Love Movement

Jive

Notes