10 Best Rock Ballads Of The 90's

10. 1979 - Smashing Pumpkins

When constructing a ballad, most people automatically assume that it has to be about a romantic relationship between two partners. Whether it's to woo the girls in the front row or a wistful tune about missing your old flame, most of the lyrics of these tunes tend to be love letters to someone in particular.

Coming off of the Smashing Pumpkins' universal smash double album Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness, this tune is instead Billy Corgan's ode to nostalgia. The year 1979 in the lyrics has been quoted by Corgan as the year that he grew out of his childhood and into a brooding adolescent. As such, the song has an unstoppable riff that seems to conjure up images of a simpler time before the commitments of everyday life seeped in.

Suddenly, that guitar riff brings you right back to the days of tearing up the town with your old buddies, not worrying about what tomorrow will bring. The romanticism painted in the lyrics is like Corgan reached into the human spirit and focused it in musical form. This song is like a mini time machine to your youth, but it's made all the more heartbreaking when you realize you can never go back.