FAR AND AWAY THE 80s.

Proof:

Husker Du
Sonic Youth
Pussy Galore
Butthole Surfers
The Minutemen
Cocteau Twins
Dinosaur Jr.
Wipers
Meat Puppets
Prince
Tom Waits (best era)
The Fall
Big Black
The Replacements
Early R.E.M.

decades dont really start and end exactly though

for example, i'd say the 80s ended in about 1991

And those are just American bands, mostly.

Anywhere you draw the line is going to be arbitrary and will depend on specific trends. You might as well just say the '80s are 1980 to 1989.

we do things differently down here

80s win, for me, just on the basis of this troika of 87-8 releases: The Joshua Tree, Appetite for Destruction, and Straight Outta Compton.

Throw in Public Enemy, the Smiths, Metallica, all that DC hardcore/post-core,... Good times, people.

In accordance with my tastes, I've always ranked it as:

90's
00's
80's
50's
60's
70's


I own very, very few cd's from the seventies.

Consider looking into the '70s output from these:

Neil Young
David Bowie
Can
Brian Eno
Kraftwerk
Talking Heads
T. Rex
Pere Ubu
Ramones
Iggy Pop/Stooges
The Clash
Elvis Costello
Al Green
Funkadelic/Parliament
Magazine
Devo
XTC
Fela Kuti
Willie Nelson
Roxy Music
Nick Drake
Joni Mitchell
Marvin Gaye
Stevie Wonder
Neu!
Led Zeppelin
Pink Floyd
Sly and the Family Stone
John Cale
Patti Smith
The Rolling Stones

But even with the number of ones listed there that I like, it's still a very small amount compared to the number of '90s artists I do.

This is the underlying problem with the question. The 60's ended in 1974.

i've thought it over and decided the 90s, but it's very arbitrary. my favorite decade was the one i grew up in (80s).

Assuming this is primarily about rock...

50's - case for: beginnings and thus strong in archetypal geniuses like Chuck Berry; case against: the beginnings don't even cover the full decade and beginnings = not fully developed

60's - case for: the album; Hard to beat trio of Beatles/Stones/Dylan; also Hendrix, Velvets.

case against: the early 60s

70s - case for: early decade continues/maintains quality of late 60s for a while; funk (man, forgot P-Funk in the Artist Of The 70s thread, how could i?); reggae; proto-punk; punk; Miles Davis' guitarists

case against - classic rock running out of ideas


80s - case for: new wave/post-punk; amerindie golden age; world music coming on; Prince; rap

case against - dubious production

90s case for - ever increasing volume of 'pretty good' in an ever growing number of subgenres

case against - volume of pretty good in an ever growing number of subgenres somehow makes it harder to ID the stone cold classics of yore

00s incomplete

Conclusion: Clearly it's the 60s or 70s. For variations on basic rock the mid to late 60s is hard to beat but the 70s had plenty of good rock too even before the refreshing blast of punk. Also, I dig variety beyond rock and roll and the 70s is superior there. Punk gives the 70s the edge.

The older rock and roll gets the harder it is to come up with fresh sounding variations simply because so many things have already been done. The 60s were a sweet spot for rapid evolution in rock. folk-ROCK. psychedilic-ROCK. country-ROCK. at a certain point how do you really invent anything that broad within rock and roll? so in a lot of areas the 60s got there first which counts for something even though it was easier then. The 70s open with quality stuff like Layla, a fat double LP, in the classic rock mode. Perhaps straight rock peaked in 1972 with another double, exile . born to run seems like one of the last big unapologetic bombastic unironic rock and roll albums. i mean of inspired, high quality, i'm not counting stuff like Boston. if it was, that's 1975 and so when was all this supposedly inferior time in the 70s supposed to be? 'Ramones' came out the very next year and the onslaught of New York and English greatness was on through decade's end. Look at the yearly lists and there can be lack of depth but always there's a good handful of the super great (which i would value much more than a few more pretty good at the bottom of the list which i lack the time or the bucks for anyway) So I dig the seventies as a nice balance of style diversity combined with quality at the top.

Nope, the sixties ended in 1970 when the EPA started regulating automobile emissions.

This is one of those things you don't admit on a public forum.

Best decade: '65-74
Fave decade: '90s

To be fair, I guess he belongs more under:
Haven't Heard Enough That I Like

Well, I was just trying suggest things for you to look into for that decade, and by your own admission you're not very familiar with over half of the artists I listed.

I'm not trying to argue with anyone who picks the '90s as a favorite decade, but you seem to have nearly dismissed a crucial decade of music.

I voted for the '70s, which makes the grade because of the revolution that took place after 1976 and was the period that saw the birth of the most important bands in my musical life: The Clash, The Jam, Wire, Sex Pistols, SLF, The Cure, Joy Division, Talking Heads, Ramones, etc.... My favorite 10 year period is 1976-1985.

Oh yeah, and I forgot to add Wire to that list. I'm sure there are a bunch of others, too.

I think the 70's not the 80's is a critical peak for world music. Its by far the best period for reggae and dub. Then layer on soul, funk and black jazz. This is the sort of generalization that will get me in trouble but the early 70's is when black musicians started making music primarily for black audiences and funk, soul and a lot of jazz got more funky and a lot more righteous (and to my ears a lot more interesting).

Then consider all the cross pollination going on... rock, soul, jazz and funk all being mixed together,, country rock, the early roots of rap coming out of both funk and soul jazz poetry, etc. All followed by punk, post-punk, new wave and powerpop in the late 70's.

If you have broad taste in music, I don't see how you could prefer any other decade. So much great stuff going on in so many different styles of music.

listen to the album "Call Me"

Any of these three albums would be a good place to start:
Let's Stay Together
I'm Still in Love With You
Call Me

I've actually been meaning to look further into his stuff since those are the only ones I have.