Whip‐Smart by Liz Phair

Whip-Smart, Liz Phair's second album, came out on Matador in 1994, and following the critically adored Exile in Guyville from the year before was never going to be easy. Brad Wood produced, and the songs are sharp and catchy, with Phair's deadpan, conversational voice front and center.

"Supernova" is the hit, a bright, fizzy blast of guitar pop with a big grin on its face, and it earned a Grammy nomination for Best Female Rock Vocal Performance. The title track bounces along on a skipping, schoolyard rhythm, and the rest of the album swings between crunchy rockers and moody, intimate confessionals.

The critics didn't swoon quite the way they had for Guyville, but reviews were mostly warm, it made plenty of year-end lists and came sixth in one of the big annual critics' polls. It debuted at No. 27 on the Billboard 200 and went gold. Phair was suddenly all over television, on Letterman, Leno and MTV's 120 Minutes. Time has been kind: long overshadowed by its famous older sibling, it's now seen as a key part of her story, alongside her other Matador releases and the Girly-Sound tapes. Juvenilia came next.

Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.