uys, if the ‘90s taught us anything, it was that with a soft blue-tinged light, a black turtleneck, some kind of Shakespeare’s Sister styling, and a cup of black coffee for effect, everything can look stylish.

The ‘90s, if you were to look at the cultural mark of the time, were apparently very sparse and to-the-point. Which is probably why everyone had so much time to do stuff like make everything from scratch. Need to make your home video look dreamy? Pull a stocking over the camera lens (an idea ripped straight from 1987’s Wings Of Desire). Don’t know what to wear? Wear a black turtleneck and lots of eyeliner. Make everything black-and-white but IRL so you look just a little cooler than everyone else.

If you think some of us are now obsessed with minimalism, including those stone-and-sand home decor palettes, you have the ‘90s music video scene to blame. Go ahead, blame them now. We’ll wait.

It gave us the idea, that if we too, rattled around an empty apartment, dancing to the opening bars of a stylish song like Naomi Campbell, or looking thoughtful in black like Linda Evangelista, or simply pulling a sheet around ourselves while we wandered around the ether looking for purpose, that we too could be cool. Or at least, our life choices, no matter how stressful of times they resulted in, could at least be masked by the veneer of a monochrome palette bathed in iron tones.

As people growing up on a steady diet on ‘90s MTV, we believed that writing thinky poetry like Lisa Loeb was the key to solving all romantic angst. The fact that she sang her heart out in a flesh pink, almost empty save for a chair and cat apartment, gave us further encouragement to just give into the beatnik within. Her black dress, those cat-eye glasses, and awkwardness was a whole mood.

‘90s music video is an aesthetic to be reckoned with. You don’t have to be a millennial to enjoy it or own it. It is about taking off every single frill, being as bare bones as possible with all stylistic choices, and emotional decisions. Streamline everything. Keep what resonates, and let go of what no longer makes sense.

And if that seems too stark for you, remember that you too, like Alanis Morisette, can spend your time hanging upside down in your quirky, colorful space: both physical and head.

Pictured: George Michael’s ‘Freedom! ‘90’, Lisa Loeb’s ‘Stay’, Alanis Morisette’s ‘You Learn’.