Originally Posted by
davei1980
That's awesome! I think those older, simpler bikes were pretty awesome in their own right!
By Y2K every mountain bike had a suspension fork and a suspension corrected frame, and it was a triple. Everyone was glad that "elastomer" suspension forks were pretty much gone but there wasn't yet the nostalgia for rigid bikes. 72/73 was the norm for angles and we were still out over the front wheel.
The things that make the new bikes different since then are really the wheel size with lower pressure, raked out steering, and dropper, and the full squish styles have settled down to basically just two that work really well. The 1x & clutch RD and disk brakes are nice but not as essential.
I do think a lot of the rigid bike thing is fueled by a funny combination of rock-n-roll iconoclasm and middle-aged nostalgia, and enabled by things that have come along since, especially the big tires and dirt-bike steering. You don't find a lot of people out on the trails on those old rigid bikes from the late 80s and early 90s. Although having said that a few of them are sure to chime in.