10 Amazing '90s Bands That Everyone Forgot About
9. The Cardigans
The best aspect of the '90s is that it was a glorious time for the independent labels. For all of the great acts that were already superstars, there were many songs that reached the charts that would have been considered left of the dial just a few years before this. And while the Cardigans couldn't really be considered the most hardcore band in the world, they really got a raw deal out of their one big hit.
As much as they may have been immortalized for their single Lovefool off of the Romeo + Juliet soundtrack, their back catalog goes a lot further than that one slice of pop. Going through their albums, you can see the kind of sophisticated rock act that they were trying to be, flirting with lounge flavors and big band instruments in the vein of acts like Belle and Sebastian, and even making other perfect pop songs out of it like Rise and Shine.
Even after they got a taste for fame, they were never content to just stay in one lane, using their next album to get a little bit heavier, almost turning themselves into a Swedish version of Garbage, all while making pop-ified covers of hard rock songs by Black Sabbath and Thin Lizzy. A lot of bands might like to not mess with the formula once they find the sound that works, but The Cardigans seem content just doing whatever the hell they want and seeing where their muse takes them.