The Best Summer Movie Soundtracks Of The '90s
Summer is officially here, even though it's been ball-dripping sweaty since at least early May. This is also about the time that we are already steeped in big-budget Hollywood summer would-be blockbusters, the kind of movies that have fast-food promotions and shitty toys that break before Labor Day. You know, fun movies you don't need to think about until they come on one lazy, rainy Sunday afternoon. Like Matthew Broderick's Godzilla. 
This movie is old enough to drive.
One of the best things about growing up in the '90s was the movie-soundtrack industry, which fed us all sorts of second-rate songs left off major albums, unlikely collaborations, and left-field covers. We bought most of the soundtracks of the movies we saw, even from the other seasons of the year, because no girls liked us, which meant extra cash.
These days, the summer movie soundtrack isn't what it used to be, at least in terms of audacity. Sure, the Transformers series does a good job of lobbing crap at ya, and the Spider-Man soundtracks weren't all awful (we guess), but it's not the same. Or maybe being a music-starved teenager in the '90s was better than we thought.
We picked 25 songs from our favorite soundtracks from the best, and stupidest, summer movies of the '90s. We tried to use the best from May until late August, but we relented on September 1993's Judgment Night and its soundtrack featuring rappers teaming up with grunge and metal heroes of the period.
Helmet and House Of Pain? Ice-T with Slayer? Sonic Youth and Cypress Hill? Sure. Fuck the rules. Our apologies to devotees of the South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut and The Nutty Professor soundtracks, as they are not available on Rdio. And screw you, buddy, if you didn't like Last Action Hero.
A few of these songs were available but the full albums were not, so here are some notes:
Red Hot Chili Peppers, "Soul To Squeeze" (Coneheads, 1993)
Guns 'N Roses, "You Could Be Mine" (Terminator 2: Judgment Day, 1991)
Madonna, "This Used To Be My Playground" (A League Of Their Own, 1992)
Cowboy Junkies, "Sweet Jane" (Natural Born Killers, 1994)
Tonic, "You Wanted More" (American Pie, 1999)
Smashing Pumpkins, "The End Is The Beginning Is The End" (Batman & Robin, 1997)
U2, "Hold Me, Thrill Me, Kiss Me, Kill Me" (Batman Forever, 1995)
Coolio, "Gangsta's Paradise" (Dangerous Minds, 1995)
The Mavericks, "Blue Moon" (Apollo 13, 1995)
Foo Fighters, "Walking After You" The X-Files, 1998
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