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The whole concept of "grunge" was contrived. Maybe I should pull up that list of "grungespeak" that somebody from Sub Pop made up on the spot when the New York Times called them asking what "grunge" kids wore and said.
Nirvana was just a punk rock band that incorporated some metal influences. Their attitude was very much punk though. Pearl Jam and Soundgarden were just hard rock bands. Alice in Chains was basically a metal band. Though I don't really get too hung up on genre labels. Each band is what it is.
In Utero was a shock to the system for everybody who wanted an album full of "Smells Like Teen Spirit" type songs. Butch Vig was good for making the band go mainstream. Steve Albini was good for making the band sound like Nirvana. My favorite album was Bleach, made before anyone further than 100 miles from Puget Sound had heard of them. I don't feel like Kurt was trying to be "the voice of a generation." I just feel like he wanted to be in a band. Nothing more, nothing less.
It's amazing that Queensryche was able to rise from the same place around the same time and avoid the "grunge" label just because of where they came from.
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Originally Posted by victorianpunk
And please, PLEASE, do not feed me that old, tired "well, at least they ended hair metal" line.
"If Nirvana didn't do it, Nine Inch Nails would have." You might be on to something. Then we would've still had all that followed, Stabbing Westward, Filter, Gravity Kills etc.
Ministry, KMFDM and My Life With The Thrill Kill Kult were around well before Nirvana got big.
Cobain was a BRILLIANT songwriter. I still haven't come across an artist who made use of metaphor and sarcasm better than he did. I think people who say that his lyrics made no sense whatsoever are used to very pointed lyrics that any numbskull could make sense of upon first listen... And, for people who say that they were an untalented band musically, okay.... the music is heavily influenced by punk/noise-rock. It isn't supposed to be technically pristine.
Cobain was a BRILLIANT songwriter. I still haven't come across an artist who made use of metaphor and sarcasm better than he did. I think people who say that his lyrics made no sense whatsoever are used to very pointed lyrics that any numbskull could make sense of upon first listen... And, for people who say that they were an untalented band musically, okay.... the music is heavily influenced by punk/noise-rock. It isn't supposed to be technically pristine.
His song "Moist Vag*" is really impressive.
hahaha.
The whole concept of "grunge" was contrived. Maybe I should pull up that list of "grungespeak" that somebody from Sub Pop made up on the spot when the New York Times called them asking what "grunge" kids wore and said.
Nirvana was just a punk rock band that incorporated some metal influences. Their attitude was very much punk though. Pearl Jam and Soundgarden were just hard rock bands. Alice in Chains was basically a metal band. Though I don't really get too hung up on genre labels. Each band is what it is.
In Utero was a shock to the system for everybody who wanted an album full of "Smells Like Teen Spirit" type songs. Butch Vig was good for making the band go mainstream. Steve Albini was good for making the band sound like Nirvana. My favorite album was Bleach, made before anyone further than 100 miles from Puget Sound had heard of them. I don't feel like Kurt was trying to be "the voice of a generation." I just feel like he wanted to be in a band. Nothing more, nothing less.
Damn dude, you said it. Nirvana was one of the great all time punk bands. The whole grunge thing was a media creation and spawned a mountain of garbage right in the middle of the 90s. Nirvana had more in common with Black Flag than they did with Silverchair, Candlebox or whatever other "next big thing" band MTV tried to pawn off on us.
The whole concept of "grunge" was contrived. Maybe I should pull up that list of "grungespeak" that somebody from Sub Pop made up on the spot when the New York Times called them asking what "grunge" kids wore and said.
More likely, one of the huge megacorporations who were responsible for Nirvana being what they were came up with the "grunge" label at a board meeting.
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Nirvana was just a punk rock band that incorporated some metal influences. Their attitude was very much punk though. Pearl Jam and Soundgarden were just hard rock bands. Alice in Chains was basically a metal band. Though I don't really get too hung up on genre labels. Each band is what it is.
Nirvana's attitude was about as "punk" as Beyonce's attitude is Black Metal. Nirvana was all about self absorbed whining, while punk is about being rebelious and actually having a pair. Even goth can be edgy and have a romantic twinge to it, while Nirvana's attitude was all depressing, morbid, and constantly said. The best way to descibe Nirvana would be as the world's first Emo band.
A real punk attitude is from band's like Bad Brains, Sick of it all and, or course, Agnostic Front.
The greatest punk band of the 90s was, in my oppinion, Atari Teenage Riot.
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"If Nirvana didn't do it, Nine Inch Nails would have." You might be on to something. Then we would've still had all that followed, Stabbing Westward, Filter, Gravity Kills etc.
Ministry, KMFDM and My Life With The Thrill Kill Kult were around well before Nirvana got big.
"Got big" being the operative word. I mean, Nirvana was around before Nirvana got big, not to mention the Melvins and REM were also around before they were. Had the record execs who made Nirvana what they were had instead of grabbed a indurstrial band like, let's say Hate Dept, and Steven Seibold shot himself in like '94, than everyone would be going on about how great Hate Dept was and Nirvana would be completely unknown. Music like Nirvana's was around way before the record companies saw hair metal was fading and needed something to replace it, and arbitrarily picked grunge to be the music they would push. They just as easily could have picked industrial or punk, but I suppose they wanted something that would not sound "new wave" in the least.
It's all about the power of the mass media and marketing...
Ohh, and Smashing Pumpkins were around at the same time, and they do not get nearly the same respect they deserve. I mean, at least they were eclectic and able to make songs that were said and angry AND songs that were happy and uplifting. While Nirvana was the only mainstream band that never, in their history, had one remotely happy sounding song, Smashing Pumpkins had their "Bullet With Butterfly Wings" but they also had "Today".
Damn dude, you said it. Nirvana was one of the great all time punk bands. The whole grunge thing was a media creation and spawned a mountain of garbage right in the middle of the 90s. Nirvana had more in common with Black Flag than they did with Silverchair, Candlebox or whatever other "next big thing" band MTV tried to pawn off on us.
Punk bands at least were confrontational, while Nirvana was just "curl into a little ball and die" kind of music. The best punk band of the 90s, that recaptured that same "WTF?!" feeling that punk generated in the 70s, was Atari Teenage Riot:
I'd argue that songs like "Drain You" and "Dumb" are at least as happy-sounding as "Today."
I'd also argue that Nirvana's rant in the Incesticide liner notes is quite confrontational and thus "punk." Although punk was never about violence and confrontation per se, just a certain sense of nonconformity.
Evidently, you must conform to the ethos of non-conformity to be considered "punk."
You're absolutely right.
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