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I actually love those Soundgarden and Pearl Jam albums but I've never really liked Nirvana. Mostly because I don't really like punk music and Nirvana was basically a punk band.
I never understood what Grunge was anyway. All those bands sounded different to me - the main common factor was that they were all from Seattle.
I was just thinking about this the other day, yeah grunge was really more of a social movement than a genre.
To me the bands Nirvana sounds most like are Sugar, the Vines, and some of those riot grrrl bands like Bikini Kill. None of which are really considered grunge.
Pearl Jam (at least their first two albums) sounds much more like "classic rock" acts (including GNR) than like Nirvana. Soundgarden is like a cross between Led Zeppelin/Greta van Fleet and A Perfect Circle/Deftones.
The point of grunge was never to be sophisticated, if anything it was a reaction against how inauthentic popular music was (seen as) becoming, a desire to bring back raw, visceral displays of emotion.
It was also about grunge bands' politics and image as much as the music itself. When Kurt Cobain said he wished he were gay to anger homophobes, and Eddie Vedder scrawled "Pro-Choice" on his arm at a concert, at the time popular musicians doing that was pretty subversive, even though now no one would notice or care.
LOL! There were bands making these points and living the life well before Nirvana, Pearl Jam, etc. became part of the marketing machine known as "Grunge" and blew up to become MTV stars.
It's cute Kurt wished he were gay. I can't imagine Bob Mould (gay) or Grant Hart (bi) from Husker Du, (who influenced Nirvana) thinking it was necessary to anger homophobes. They just went out and played - loud and fast
August-September 1991 is arguably one of the greatest two-month periods in the history of rock music. So many classic, iconic rock albums that continue to have impact decades later were released.
The reason this is in the "vs." forum is because many of these albums were very clearly associated with two places: Washington State (mostly Seattle) and California. In many ways they reflected the places and their character at the time.
So my question is - which set of albums released during this period do you think are better, do you think better reflect their place and time, and have had a greater impact.
California Albums:
Metallica - Self-Titled (Black Album) - Released August 12, 1991
Guns N' Roses - Use Your Illusion I & II - Released September 17, 1991
Red Hot Chili Peppers - Blood Sugar Sex Magik - Released September 24, 1991
Washington Albums:
Pearl Jam - Ten - Released August 27, 1991
Nirvana - Nevermind - Released September 24, 1991
Soundgarden - Badmotorfinger - Released September 24, 1991
Washington, although I thought the best album was Alice in Chains' Dirt from 1992.
I don't like any of these artists except for RHCP, which I adore. So I vote California.
Nirvana was nice until, ironically, they became commoditized by the corporate blob post-Cobain's death. Now you have Sandals doing all-inclusive resort ads with "Come As You Are" playing. Cringe.
Cannibal Corpse: Butchered at Birth
Death: Human
Deicide: Legion
Morbid Angel: Blessed are the Sick
Obituary: The End Complete
In that case you’d need to consider Option 4 then: Oslo, Norway
Dimmu Borgir
Mayhem
Satyricon
Arcturus
To be fair I’m not sure if they were all active in 1991
Re: the question I definitely prefer the Seattle sound. Fits the teenage angst time period much better! And all three albums there were bangers.
Amongst the Cali albums I despised GnR’s sound and Metallica hasn’t had a good album since And Justice for All. RHCP’s album in 1991 is widely considered their pinnacle hit so they have that going for them but I consider a landslide victory for Seattle…
The influence of the Seattle bands was much greater and was a big shift from the hair bands that existed just a few years before. The hair bands quickly out of fashion by then.
Seattle bands, like Minneapolis bands Husker Du and The Replacements, had a low key Scandinavian influence. My wife's parents were born in Denmark so maybe I notice this more, but those are the most Scandinavian US cities and they have that northern European dreariness that leads to people being understated. So many of the glitzy hair bands were from around NY or LA. The early 90s attitude had to come from Seattle, GNR and RHCP were more unique in their own ways, while Nirvana/Pearl Jam etc had a much bigger influence on what followed.
The influence of the Seattle bands was much greater and was a big shift from the hair bands that existed just a few years before. The hair bands quickly out of fashion by then.
Seattle bands, like Minneapolis bands Husker Du and The Replacements, had a low key Scandinavian influence. My wife's parents were born in Denmark so maybe I notice this more, but those are the most Scandinavian US cities and they have that northern European dreariness that leads to people being understated. So many of the glitzy hair bands were from around NY or LA. The early 90s attitude had to come from Seattle, GNR and RHCP were more unique in their own ways, while Nirvana/Pearl Jam etc had a much bigger influence on what followed.
Great point - this is also why Seattle and Minneapolis have an oddly similar feel in certain respects.
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