i honestly can't listen to nirvana with anything approaching perspective. i don't think i really like them but it's just colored by way too many other things to tell.
― call all destroyer, Wednesday, 15 April 2009 20:28 (fifteen years ago) link
I like the stuff I've heard anyway -- Stooges-y stomping stuff? dunno, I think the main problem I have with most so-called grunge is the vocals. Just a lot of bad singing going on there.
I got off the bus after their major label debut but yeah Stooges are the main reference point and I've always liked Mark Arm's voice. He doesn't do the ass-clenched warbling Eddie Vedder thing.
― Pre-Beatles Yoko Ono (Shakey Mo Collier), Wednesday, 15 April 2009 20:29 (fifteen years ago) link
ha yeah, the ass-clenched warbling Eddie Vedder thing -- that's the big problem. I can remember hearing Pearl Jam when I was a kid and thinking "man i just don't relate to that at all!" obviously some people did/do.
― tylerw, Wednesday, 15 April 2009 20:31 (fifteen years ago) link
I really liked Eddie Vedders voice, but when all those other bands took the template I can see why it became annoying, but when PJ first hit the singing style was something fresh to many people.
― pfunkboy (Herman G. Neuname), Wednesday, 15 April 2009 20:33 (fifteen years ago) link
I always hated it
― Pre-Beatles Yoko Ono (Shakey Mo Collier), Wednesday, 15 April 2009 20:33 (fifteen years ago) link
I was just listening to the royal trux's pound for pound a few mins ago
― cool app (uh oh I'm having a fantasy), Wednesday, 15 April 2009 20:36 (fifteen years ago) link
every listen to it
argh I meant to type everyone listen to it
Melvins Live >>>>>>>> Melvins on record >>> Mudhoney > Nirvana >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> any other band that got called grunge
― Alex in SF, Wednesday, 15 April 2009 20:38 (fifteen years ago) link
while we're on the grunge kick, i never, ever, ever understood why Neil Young got the "godfather of grunge" tag. Are there any grunge bands that actually sound like Neil Young? Even remotely? I know he toured with a lot of them (saw STP open for him in 1993, lol) and did the record with pearl jam but i'll be danged if i hear much Neil Young in those bands. was it just the flannel?
― tylerw, Wednesday, 15 April 2009 20:39 (fifteen years ago) link
not just flannel, but also volume and sloppiness being used as virtues. but I think it was largely an association thing.
― sleeve, Wednesday, 15 April 2009 20:42 (fifteen years ago) link
yeah there aren't very many clear similarities (unless we bring Dinosaur Jr into the picture, but they predate grunge "movement" by a bit)
― Pre-Beatles Yoko Ono (Shakey Mo Collier), Wednesday, 15 April 2009 20:44 (fifteen years ago) link
Plus Ragged Glory came out around then and Sonic Youth opened for him and he was in vogue and got name dropped a lot.
― Alex in SF, Wednesday, 15 April 2009 20:44 (fifteen years ago) link
right -- i guess there was a period pre-nirvana where grunge could mean dino jr and sonic youth. though honestly, "grunge" seems like the best term to describe Dino Jr, moreso than a lot of grunge bands.
― tylerw, Wednesday, 15 April 2009 20:45 (fifteen years ago) link
Actually pre-Nirvana grunge just meant 7 or 8 Seattle area bands. It never meant Sonic Youth and Dinosaur unless journos were being lax.
― Alex in SF, Wednesday, 15 April 2009 20:47 (fifteen years ago) link
Agree that it's easy to imagine "grunge" referring to Dinosaur though. Mascis just seems kind of grungy.
― Alex in SF, Wednesday, 15 April 2009 20:48 (fifteen years ago) link
Vedder and his ilk are so fun to sing along to loudly with your friends. "eeeewaa flerrrrr, come arwahr like feeeevin flaaaaawwrrr".
― hope this helps (Granny Dainger), Wednesday, 15 April 2009 20:48 (fifteen years ago) link
Mascis' vocal whine also kinda similar to Neil
― Pre-Beatles Yoko Ono (Shakey Mo Collier), Wednesday, 15 April 2009 20:49 (fifteen years ago) link
oh yeah totally -- dino jr and neil comparisons are valid!
― tylerw, Wednesday, 15 April 2009 20:52 (fifteen years ago) link
and re: lazy journos calling non-grunge bands grunge, seems like there was maybe a lot of this in the UK?
― tylerw, Wednesday, 15 April 2009 20:59 (fifteen years ago) link
Late 80s at WRCT, we used the adjective "grungy" a lot to describe Touch & Go type stuff, and eventually early Sub Pop. Killdozer, Drunks with Guns, Volcano Suns even. Don't remember it being pegged as a genre until after the NME thing in 1989 about Seattle.
― bendy, Wednesday, 15 April 2009 21:01 (fifteen years ago) link
yeah dinosaur jr, sebadoh,belly, sugar, helmet, babes in toyland even the lemonheads got called grunge.
― pfunkboy (Herman G. Neuname), Wednesday, 15 April 2009 21:37 (fifteen years ago) link
yeah i feel like i read some old article from the UK referring to "American grunge group Galaxie 500" ...
― tylerw, Wednesday, 15 April 2009 22:02 (fifteen years ago) link
dino jr kinda was grunge though IMO
― Lord Iffy Boatrace (M@tt He1ges0n), Wednesday, 15 April 2009 22:09 (fifteen years ago) link
yea i agree
― mark cl, Wednesday, 15 April 2009 22:23 (fifteen years ago) link
i guess there was a period pre-nirvana where grunge could mean dino jr and sonic youth
SY and Dino Jr. had legitimate ties to the grunge scene...not the least of these being Nirvana themselves, who opened for Sonic Youth before they broke big...meanwhile J Masics was a serious contender to replace Chad Channing before they settled on Dave Grohl...
― jagged-electronically mäandernden underbody (Drugs A. Money), Wednesday, 15 April 2009 23:31 (fifteen years ago) link
also SY's split 7" with Green River, and Dino Jr.'s whole Dio-meets-the-Cure (w/ special guest, you guessed it, Neil Young) aesthetic...
― jagged-electronically mäandernden underbody (Drugs A. Money), Wednesday, 15 April 2009 23:33 (fifteen years ago) link
Don't remember it being pegged as a genre until after the NME thing in 1989 about Seattle.
WTF? Grunge was hyped in the NME???
― Mr. Snrub, Wednesday, 15 April 2009 23:48 (fifteen years ago) link
that's the first place it was hyped! wasn't sub pop's whole marketing plan designed to sell a regional scene to the UK?
― tylerw, Thursday, 16 April 2009 00:03 (fifteen years ago) link
J Masics was a serious contender to replace Chad Channing before they settled on Dave Grohl...
I'm surprised that Masics -- who was a fairly big indie-star at the time, I'd guess -- would try to join Nirvana, which hadn't yet broken big (since Grohl was the drummer on Nevermind).
― Daniel, Esq., Thursday, 16 April 2009 00:05 (fifteen years ago) link
i'd heard that bit about mascis/nirvana too -- who knows how serious J was about that though?
― tylerw, Thursday, 16 April 2009 00:06 (fifteen years ago) link
I'm imagining some oakland impresario flying everett true over to introduce krumping or hyphy or whatever it's called.
re: jmascis what is the deal with him supposedly dating uma thurman at the time?
― Philip Nunez, Thursday, 16 April 2009 00:08 (fifteen years ago) link
Why would the NME give anything even close to a shit about obscure rock music half a world away that even its own home country didn't want anything to do with?
― Mr. Snrub, Thursday, 16 April 2009 00:13 (fifteen years ago) link
get a clue
― lorax enforcement officer (electricsound), Thursday, 16 April 2009 00:15 (fifteen years ago) link
This was also my experience - though not sure about the NME thing. I was living in Houston at the time, and pretty much any gross, ugly, obnoxious, Stooges influenced rock group was described as grunge. Local stuff like Sugarshack I spent most of the early 90s trying to convince people that PJ and STP weren't real 'grunge' and didn't even make any sense as a description of whatever Pearl Jam was.
― slugbaiting (rockapads), Thursday, 16 April 2009 00:16 (fifteen years ago) link
the Sugar shack mention was supposed to be backspaced over. nobody wants to see me reminisce about extinct local groups. :/
― slugbaiting (rockapads), Thursday, 16 April 2009 00:17 (fifteen years ago) link
OK I'm assuming this hype didn't amount to much, since there are no grunge records in NME's 1989 EOY list.
― Mr. Snrub, Thursday, 16 April 2009 00:18 (fifteen years ago) link
Oops, wrong link!
― Mr. Snrub, Thursday, 16 April 2009 00:21 (fifteen years ago) link
x-post SY also had a Mudhoney split 10" where the bands covered each other's songs.
― President Keyes, Thursday, 16 April 2009 00:24 (fifteen years ago) link
But I suppose so did Jimmie Dale Gilmore.
― President Keyes, Thursday, 16 April 2009 00:25 (fifteen years ago) link
It was actually Everett True covering Seattle bands for Melody Maker that people are referring to I think, which was in 1989.
― Mark, Thursday, 16 April 2009 00:30 (fifteen years ago) link
I spent most of the early 90s trying to convince people that PJ and STP weren't real 'grunge' and didn't even make any sense as a description of whatever Pearl Jam was.
this x1000
― butt-rock miyagi (rogermexico.), Thursday, 16 April 2009 00:51 (fifteen years ago) link
(except I'd given up by 1995)
x-post to ― slugbaiting (rockapads)'s namedrop. Ha. I put out a Sugarshack record! Actually upon inspection of Discogs, it appears I put out 2... (1993 seems so long ago right now). End reminisce.
― factcheckr, Thursday, 16 April 2009 00:59 (fifteen years ago) link
Sugar Shack is exactly the kind of thing that I thought of as grunge back then. Hair, distortion, noise, garage, punk roots.
― james k polk, Thursday, 16 April 2009 01:38 (fifteen years ago) link
to me, the biggest development of the "grunge" era was the popularization of independent labels and being a music nerd, mainly because of kurt cobain. i honestly don't listen to too much Nirvana at this point, but Cobain will always be a hero of mine for opening up my conception of what music could be. i was 11 i guess when Nirvana broke, and since i was not really a rock fan before that (hair metal type shit was just not for me) it was kind of revolutionary sounding. i had been listening to mostly hiphop since that's what EVERYONE at my pittsburgh public school was listening to. some of that stuff may have been underground to most people, but it was just the most common shit to us since everyone knew about it. but Nirvana sounded like nothing i had heard, and upon reading about them, it was Kurt's non-stop giving props to various labels and bands that made me realise you had to go out of your way to find these things. immediately, i started digging deeper. the grunge-alternative connection via Dinosaur Jr., Jane's Addiction, REM, Sonic Youth, etc opened up me to labels like SST, Caroline, Sub Pop, and all those kind of typical bands.
by the time i was 12 i was trying to go to Lollapalooza to see all this music, but i didnt get there till i was 13 in 93. and that was some eye opening shit. all the second stage acts, the variety of genres (seeing bands like Fishbone, Front 242, and Arrested Development play in a row basically went on to define how i expect to hear music to this day), all the subculture shit associated with the music..... that was some very powerful shit. i started going to high school a few months later in the college neighborhood of Pittsburgh which left me exposed on a daily basis (we took public transportation to school so i got to fuck around after school as much as i wanted) to all the underground record shops, head shops, etc that were basically there for people much older than i was. this was like crack to my friends and i who ate it all up. basement punk shows, smoking blunts and drinking 40s with the hiphop crew, raving, crate digging, etc. this was our life starting when we were 13 years old, for some of us it never stopped. and really, it's all because "Smells Like Teen Spirit" was a pop hit. i can't thank Kurt Cobain enough, i can't imagine what my life might have been like without him. big fucking ups, RIP.
― pipecock, Thursday, 16 April 2009 02:36 (fifteen years ago) link
http://www.outpost-daria.com/images/mystik_spiral.gif
― Vaclav Havel mostly. (Matt P), Thursday, 16 April 2009 02:52 (fifteen years ago) link
If I have to explain to my kids what the 90s were for some reason, I'll save myself a lot of time and show them that picture. Maybe I'll play a 4 non blondes song too.
― filthy dylan, Thursday, 16 April 2009 03:34 (fifteen years ago) link
whoa, nice to see some love for Sugar Shack! Some great music came out of TX in the late 80s, very early 90s.
― slugbaiting (rockapads), Thursday, 16 April 2009 07:26 (fifteen years ago) link
Dino Jr was total grunge - can't understand you guys are debating this.
― baaderonixx, Thursday, 16 April 2009 09:15 (fifteen years ago) link