Play Live Radio
Next Up:
0:00
0:00
0:00 0:00
Available On Air Stations

World Cafe 30th Anniversary Playlist, 1991: Tom Petty, Uncle Tupelo And More

World Cafe celebrates 30 years with a 1991 playlist
WXPN
World Cafe celebrates 30 years with a 1991 playlist

To celebrate the 30th anniversary of World Cafe, we'll be looking back and posting playlists from each year of the show. As music has evolved over the years so have our playlists, growing to reflect many genres and styles of music.

World Cafe in 1991, the first year we were around, was strong on singers and songwriters: Uncle Tupelo, Loreena McKennit, Billy Bragg, Bruce Cockburn (our first guest), Bonnie Raitt, Kirsty McColl, Marc Cohn and Tom Petty are all represented. The year was also peppered with some of our now long-time favorite albums, like Screamadelica by Primal Scream, Matthew Sweet's Girlfriend, Bandwagonesque by Teenage Fanclub, The Low End Theory by A Tribe Called Quest and Buddy Guy's Damn Right, I've Got The Blues.

While 1991 is generally remembered for the rise of Nirvana and grunge, the not-as-familiar names – the musicians and the albums they made – continue to have a home here at the Cafe. Enjoy.

Copyright 2021 XPN

Bruce Warren is assistant general manager for programming of WXPN in Philadelphia. Besides serving as executive producer of World Café, Warren also contributes to Paste magazine and writes for two blogs: Some Velvet Blog and WXPN's All About The Music Blog.