Poll: Bandwagonesque v. Nevermind v. Loveless

i had to click on this thread cuz i couldn't remember what bandwagonesque even was.

anyway, loveless wins cuz i like it. and i've never heard the other ones. (well, i've heard nirvana. just not the whole album.)

Nevermind, geez

Bandwagonesque is a great album but it's going to get so slaughtered here it'll be embarassing.

FYI this poll's broken for images off ppl.

Yikes. Sorry about that. Do you mean you can't see the options? (They're images of the album covers).

surely screamadelica should be included in this as well.

1991 albums better than nevermind:

talk talk - laughing stock

bathory - twilight of the gods

slowdive - just for a day

jesus lizard - goat

slint - spiderland

paradise lost - gothic

mercury rev - yerself is steam

the field mice - for keeps

cows - cunning stunts

neil young - arc

coil - love's secret domain

ween - the pod

massive attack - blue lines

pixies - trompe le monde

carcass - necroticism: descanting the insalubrious

n.w.a. - efil4zaggin

death - human

kmd - mr.hood

geto boys - we can't be stopped

ice cube - death certificate

the orb - the orb's adventures beyond the ultraworld

morbid angel - blessed are the sick

bolt thrower - war master

autopsy - mental funeral

swans - white light from the mouth of infinity

dismember - like an ever flowing stream

entombed - clandestine

matthew sweet - girlfriend

Not really familiar with Screamadelica, but I thought it was more of a departure from rock (into house, maybe?). Of Scott's list, I do think Laughing Stock would make sense in the poll (rock disc with massive influence). Matthew Sweet's disc is certainly great, but I kind of feel like it's a step down from Bandwagonesque, Nevermind, Loveless and Laughing Stock.

But wow, maybe Screamadelica should have been an option:

There's no overestimating the importance of Screamadelica, the record that brought acid house, techno, and rave culture crashing into the British mainstream -- an impact that rivaled that of Nirvana's Nevermind, the other 1991 release that changed rock.

love's secret domain was so goddamn great

i think i may have bought all three of these albums on the same day

couldn't tell you the last time i listened to any of em

primal scream were such a bad band that made terrible music. you have to remember that. mudhoney peter fonda biker sample intro beats everything primal scream ever did.

Anyway, I love all three poll options. But I have a weakness for power-pop, so I lean toward Bandwagonesque.

(Sean's comment upthread is probably right, tho: Bandwagonesque will probably get steamrolled.)

Nevermind > Loveless > Bandwagonesque

I like Teenage Fanclub, but I never understood the appeal of this particular album. It's quite bad IMO. Grand Prix is about a million times better.

lovelsess by so much

Nevermind

TF & Nirvana voters proudly announce themselves. Defenders of one or more of the ridiculous aggregation of brilliant LPs that dropped in 91 make their cases. Silent MBV voters tip the scale toward a massive landslide victory b/c this is ILX.

Went w/ Kev fwiw (yawn)

In what way is 'Just for a Day' better than 'Nevermind'?

while it may be difficult to objectively argue that it's "better" i'd much rather listen to jfad than nevermind

But would you rather listen to JJ Fad than Nevermind? JFA?

yes

Poll is broken. Loveless x 1000.

Yeah. It looks fine to me, but apparently people without images turned on can't see the options (which are album covers, rather than text names). My bad; I'm not very tech savvy. I'll see if something can be done about it.

Voted Nevermind but if Screamadelica had been on here I would have had to think about it really hard.

And probably would have voted for B.A.D. II The Globe over either, but this I recognize as an idiosyncrasy.

surely screamadelica should be included in this as well.

1991 albums better than nevermind:

No, and no.

Without question, this are the 3 best albums of 1991. Good poll.

these*

Okay.. I might put The Low End Theory over Bandwagonesque, but 3 out of the top 4 is not bad.

no and yes. between this thread and that stones throw poll, scott seward = REAL TALK xxxpost

Out of everything in that list I've heard, only The Pod and Orb's Adventures.. would come close. (That Matthew Sweet album is def not better than Nevermind, nor is Mr. Hood, the least impressive Pixies album, Blue Lines, or any Morbid Angel LP.)

billstevejim you struck me as potentially a big Jesus Lizard fan but I guess not!

and the talk talk is like better than all three in this poll combined

I'm into Jesus Lizard, but I've only heard 3 songs from that album, and all of Liar.. Not especially into that Talk Talk album.. I've tried many times.

"Nevermind"

"Grand Prix" >>>> "Nevermind" though.

ILM must have changed a lot for this not to be obvious

i'm not saying that's a good or bad thing BTW

I assume you mean it will be Loveless? It's funny; when I first thought of the poll, it was going to be only Bandwagonesque v. Nevermind, because I remember people complaining about and/or laughing at SPIN Magazine for making Bandwagonesque -- instead of Nevermind -- their No. 1 album of 1991. But as I was putting the poll together, I read that article from Stylus (RIP), in which the author was all worked up that Bandwagonesque topped both Nevermind and Loveless. At that point, I remembered, "Hey, Loveless was from 1991!," and figured it would have to one of the choices. As I say, maybe Laughing Stock should have been a choice, too.

I'm just pointing out that it seems to me that Loveless (and Laughing Stock) came into its current status over a longer period of time.

surely screamadelica should be included in this as well.

btw i voted bandwagonesque. as it took me such a long time to realise it's geniuzs. in the beginning i found it a bland and boring indie pop album.

how old you were in 1991 (and maybe whether you're a yank or britishish) will probably determine things here. big points to nevermind for being partially recorded in wisconsin. there are still stories in madison about a broke kurt and co hitting the bars around the capitol square

I was in my early 20s in 1991. Nevermind felt like it detonated over the music landscape. I still love it (and Loveless, too), but I seek out Bandwagonesque much more often. And it has my vote.

^ OTM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TjT58fvDpVk

23 y/o at the time these came out. Didn't like Nevermind much then (kept getting into arguments at work about whether to play an advance copy of that or Galaxie 500) and can't imagine listening to it now except for research. The massive success of that album still strikes me as a huge historical mistake, on par with the lionization of Daydream Nation.

Might listen to Loveless for fun, but again I've always prefered Isn't Anything and still don't get what the Loveless fuss was all about.

Might listen to Bandwagonesque for light fun, and it was awfully catchy at the time...probably my favorite of the three in '91. I still think Spin got it right.

Today I look at that list and Talk Talk jumps out as the album I actually play because I want to hear it, with Swans and Pixies trailing slightly behind.

Personally speaking, the arrival of Chickfactor the next year was a much more significant event than any of these.

I was 17 in 1991 - "Nevermind" definitely felt like a massive sea change to me at the time. After interminable 80's hair bands, generic indie, and rave/dance music, it was like someone had swept the chicken carcasses from the banqueting table. After losing a lot of interest in music between '89 and '91, Nirvana's album was one of the things that got me right back into it. I won't vote for it though. As the Tiny Mix Tapes review at the top of the thread mentions, it's badly sequenced on side two and just drags. OTOH I won't be voting for TFC, because "Grand Prix" >>>>>>> "Bandwagonesque". I'm not familiar enough with MBV to vote for "Loveless" either. So I guess that makes me an I-hate-fun-me curmudgeon, or perhaps someone who's just knocked out that I'm now more that twice the age I was when these albums came out.

do you ever think some ppl are fronting with this whole OMG WEEN/BOLT THROWER/COWS IS BETTER THAN NEVERMIND shit nowadays?

yup absolutely

i think loveless is probably the "best" of the 3 albums in the poll -- inventive, influential, thoroughly conceived and executed, etc. nevermind is undoubtedly the one i've listened to most, cumulatively, although if you limit it to the last 10 years it's probably a close call. bandwagonesque is nice but there's plenty of latter-day power-pop i like more.

I voted Loveless without hesitation; the only '91 album that comes close to it is Julian Cope's Peggy Suicide.

Nirvana was important to me culturally - it made the freaks, weirdos and music geeks temporarily cool. I think Bleach and In Utero are both better than Nevermind, as is Incesticide. The last may just be a compilation, but it is sequenced better than Nevermind.

do you ever think some ppl are fronting with this whole OMG WEEN/BOLT THROWER/COWS IS BETTER THAN NEVERMIND shit nowadays?

actually no, and I think it's because how you feel about nevermind probably correlates heavily (with notable exceptions amongst the oldsters) along age lines. I think it had a massive impact on people who were in college and that it seemed like a terrific-not-timeless record to people who were a few years older. Exceptions aplenty amongst then-greying-now-greyer critics, I'm sure The Gun Club's Divinity did a lot more for me in '91 than Nevermind did, and so did the Swans & Death albums on Scott's list upthread. if it's challops to honestly report one's listening habits instead of saying "I TOO WAS THERE AND FELT THE LOVE" then I dunno, but then and since, it's been for me a fine album about which I don't really care and which I don't expect to ever listen to again. unlike mental funeral, which I still listen to at least once a month, because I enjoy it more.

^^^ Yeah. Bought Nevermind and Steady Diet of Nothing on the same day, played Nevermind pretty solidly for 3 months, got bored and ended up preferring Steady Diet. At least in the UK Nevermind wasn't this brain-sweeping force that cleared everything around it, it was just a really good album that got kinda inexplicably popular.

despite never having heard Nevermind or Bandwagonesque all the way through in one sitting, I can confidently state that this poll would be a lot more evenly-balanced without a certain Irish colossus decimating the opposition

Shields isn't that fat.

Louis means that he's thinking of how much better Yeats is than any of these guys

He's talking about The Importance of Being Earnest, John.

Louis means that he's thinking of how much better Yeats is than any of these guys

A dreaded sunny day
So let's go where we're wanted
And I meet you at the cemetry gates
Keats and Yeats are on your side
But you lose
'Cause weird lover Wilde is on mine

http://www.fantasticfiction.co.uk/images/n0/n922.jpg

^^^Wilde's much more talented uncle

louis doin the lit equivalent of what whiney was accusing cats of upthread

Can't front, MTW is pretty damn anti-Catholic.

Too bad it's hellaciously exciting!

"anyway, loveless wins cuz i like it. and i've never heard the other ones. (well, i've heard nirvana. just not the whole album.)"

Scott, I think we were separated at birth.

And yeah, Goat by Jesus Lizard destroys any of the above. (props to Warmaster as well).

1991 albums better than nevermind

The Electric Eels – God Says Fuck You (Homestead)
Kix – Hot Wire (Atlantic)
Amy Grant – Heart In Motion (A&M)
Malidita Vecindad Y Los Hijos Del 5 Patio – El Circo (Ariola Mexico)
Corina – Corina (Cutting)
Bang Tango – Dancin’ On Coals (Mechanic/MCA)
Sandee – Only Time Will Tell (Fever/Ral/Columbia)
Mylene Farmer – L’Autre (Polygram France)
Anacrusis – Manic Impressions (Metal Blade)
Gazebo – I Like Chopin (Alex)
Mecano – Aidalai (BMG U.S. Latin)
Mano Negra – Amerika Perdida (Virgin France)
Lisa M – Flavor Of The Latin (Sony Discos)
L’Trimm – Groovy (Atlantic)
Fobia – Mundo Feliz (Ariola Mexico)
Cypress Hill – Cypress Hill (Ruffhouse/Columbia)
The Nomads – Sonically Speaking (Sonet)
The Neon Judgement – Are You Real (Play It Again Sam)
Les Negresses Vertes – Famille Nombreuse (Delabel)
Michael Jackson – Dangerous (Epic)
Kik Tracee – No Rules (RCA)
The KLF – The White Room (Arista)
Los Prisioneros – Grandes Exitos (Capitol/EMI Latin)
The Kentucky Headhunters – Electric Barnyard (Mercury)
Junkyard – Sixes, Sevens & Nines (Geffen)
I Start Counting – Catalogue (Mute)
Guns N Roses – Use Your Illusion II (Geffen)
Guns N Roses – Use Your Illusion I (Geffen)
Daddy Freddy – Stress (Chrysalis)

yerself is steam was almost as 'revolutionary' and certainly as good as loveless fwiw

I can definitely see an Anacrusis vs Nirvana thread blooming... ;)

Amy Grant – Heart In Motion (A&M)

Xhuxk we don't see eye to eye on everything but I'm with you here

Did we ever discuss Heart in Motion, J0hn? I have a feeling we did.

I was never convinced that Nevermind was the best record of 1991 until I saw all these lists. I mean, I'm pretty fond of Blue Lines and I've had a lot of fun with some of the others, but it's not even close.

Actually, I reckon Woodface was 1991, and it at least makes me pause

"do you ever think some ppl are fronting with this whole OMG WEEN/BOLT THROWER/COWS IS BETTER THAN NEVERMIND shit nowadays?"

i felt the same way back then though. in 1991, i liked all the stuff on my list better than the stuff i heard on nevermind. i'm just old though. nirvana wasn't a "sea change" for me and they weren't saving me from anything. i listened to tons of cool stuff before they put out a record and after. doesn't mean i think they suck or anything. those are catchy songs! but the one and only time i ever got excited by nevermind was for a brief second when i first heard it at a party and thought it was a new squirrel bait album. then someone told me, no, it was nirvana. and then i thought, well, at least they are squirrel bait fans!

Eh, Nirvana - Nevermind > Amy Grant - Lead Me On > Amy Grant - Heart In Motion. Lead Me On has at least half a dozen great songs on it, Heart In Motion has "Every Heartbeat" and, uh, a bunch of other songs.

When I was 16 it was Nevermind for me all the way. Hadn't heard Loveless until years after that, and while it has its mindblowing parts, but that time I was also getting into Flying Saucer Attack and Spacemen 3 and JAMC, etc. so the for me shoegaze thing was about appreciating all these different approaches rather than one monumental album. Around that time I went back to Nevermind by downloading tabs and learning the songs. I read the lyrics to the songs for the first time and it made me appreciate Kurt's songwriting even more than I did originally.

Are there any threads discussing Landmark Albums you thought were just okay because you weren't the right age? Scott's response to Nevermind reminds me of how I acted when Kid A came out.

Heart In Motion has "Every Heartbeat" and, uh, a bunch of other songs.

"Good For Me!" "I Will Remember You"! "Baby Baby"! "Hats"!

Trompe Le Monde is insanely better than most of the records that came out in 1991 or since for that matter.

my brother played me pod by ween when it came out and it blew me away!!! i was really stoned though. that helped. but it excited me and made me laugh and was a memorable listen. i probably haven't heard it since, but that was a memorable moment! i haven't listened to blue lines in years either, but i thought it was great back then. and profound in some new way. though nothing can probably surpass how i felt when i brought the safe from harm twelve inch home and playing it for the first time. before the album came out. that actually did feel like some sort of sea change. in retrospect, it didn't lead to much except maybe some cool portishead singles, but i didn't have to care about that then.

i'm just old though. nirvana wasn't a "sea change" for me and they weren't saving me from anything. i listened to tons of cool stuff before they put out a record and after. doesn't mean i think they suck or anything. those are catchy songs!

Yeah, they're pretty good. I like the album, love "Teen Spirit," always have. But if you'd been listening to loud weird noisy indie guitar bands since at least, say, the first Flipper album or Butthole Surfers EP, it was honestly not that big a deal. Even the pretty pop-melody part of just seemed like something Husker Du/Replacements/Squirrel Bait/Soul Asylum/ Dinosaur Jr/etc. had been doing for the previous seven or so years. Refined, maybe. But refinement isn't the same thing as a sea change.

is it possible that something other than Loveless will win in ilx?

xp Though Teenage Fanclub, fwiw, seemed like a much much much smaller deal. They didn't even seem like a decent powerpop band, as far as I could tell.

And I've just never liked MBV much; they bored me then, bored me now. Always reminded me of Jesus & Mary Chain with the hooks taken out. So despite my list above, my vote here easily goes to Nirvana.

Always reminded me of Jesus & Mary Chain with the hooks taken out.

holy mother of god

i bought that first teenage fanclub album on matador and listened to it all of once. so, i guess i kinda wrote them off. i lumped them in with boo radleys and other bands that were a big deal in the u.k. and were only worshipped here by the bob magazine and magnet. the same people who still listen to new bob mould and robyn hitchcock albums. you know, like jack rabid.

loreena mckennitt "the visit" ftw

FWIW, I think that Teenage Fanclub album gets misunderstood when taken as a power pop album. Yeah, everything they did after it was power pop, and they wanted it to be power pop, and they ripped off power pop to make it, but it's not power pop to my ears. Which is probably why I like it.

Other thing I always come back to is: I bought Never Mind The Bollocks, Confusion Is Sex and Creamed Corn From The Socket of Davis at three different *mall record stores* in New Jersey so the idea of Nevermind suddenly ushering in some sea change has always seemed weird. I mean, I know what happened in its aftermath, but it wasn't like water suddenly came to the desert, at least for me.

do you ever think some ppl are fronting with this whole OMG WEEN/BOLT THROWER/COWS IS BETTER THAN NEVERMIND shit nowadays?

Maybe not frontin. Maybe they just enjoy being quantitatively wrong.

i laughed at "these are without question the three best albums of 1991"

also at scott including 'arc' over 'weld', surely the most contrarian piece of contrarianism on this thread so far. chuck and scott r u doing these off the top of ur head

when i was fourteen (almost ten years later, and in england) pretty much all my friends listened to nirvana, or at least this album. they did not listen to either of the other two albums. probably none of the other albums mentioned in this thread, except use yr illusion i and ii.

from what i can tell, the global advent of emo seems to have given 14-year-olds away from the pulsebeat something else to listen to and latch onto, which is a good thing: and i guess nevermind is historical for them, now, in a way it isn't for me, even though i was six when it came out. i mean, it's historical if you're over 40 or under 20 or so, it seems like. (feel free to quibble with the range here.)

hands up: how many people who have posted on the thread care enough about the question, as posed in the thread title, to actually have voted?

i voted for nirvana just because i didn't want to see the absolutely boring loveless take the win.

important thinking itt

loveless is just as overrated as nevermind is.

"Banwagonesque" I thought mediocre & derivative when it came out, I never understood why it got all the props it did, didn't understand why I never seemed to read any dissenting opinions about it at the time either. On top of that, my abiding memory of the fucking thing is that if you went out to the indie disco on a fri or sat night, you couldn't avoid hearing it, and it fucking ruined many nights out for as much as a year, due to it being heavily rotated by the local DJs. In retrospect, I wonder if it was the shock troop advance commando attack sorta thing for the wave of tedious nostalgia/retro rock that ruined british guitar music in the wake of britpop. Probably not, but y'know.

"loveless" I like plenty though if I'm reaching for a MBV rekkid, it's almost always going to be "isn't anything" Even though I like it, I think Xhuxk's "Jesus & Mary Chain with the hooks taken out" is kind of apposite and I do think that the mary chan blow MBV into the weeds generally.

"nevermind" I still like a lot, the tunes are still good & strong generally, the performances still propulsive & thrilling if you crank it up. I voted for "Nevermind"

From the stuff listed upthread by Scott & Xhuxk, i like "Blue Lines" about as well as nevermind, "Spideralnd" a little better, though I haven't played it in many years, "Laughing Stock" and "Cypress Hill" nearly as much.

People that vote MBV are like people that convince themselves that Trout Mask Replica is better than Abbey Road

but the thing is dude

ohhh, that first Cypress Hill record is fucking amazing! It's so overlooked. It's got a great vibe, kind of like "Illmatic" does. I think the production is even better than "Low-End Theory."

for comparative purposes whiney maybe start the '68/9 (?) thread with abbey road, trout mask replica, and a donovan album

in the court of the crimson king?

i don't think you're mapping these the same way i am

Loveless is the only one that can hold my attention after many repeated listens over the years.

Always reminded me of Jesus & Mary Chain with the hooks taken out.

That was actually my first impression of Loveless as well, until I realized shortly after that they were trying for something different, more like Cocteau Twins with feedback and fuzz. I was 17-18 when I had this realization, which was 17 years ago.

1991 was just the most musically disillusioning year for me in my entire life. And that had to do with exactly two factors: I was eighteen, and indie bands were streamlining their sound and signing to majors.

Nirvana Nevermind, Metallica Black Album, Voivod Angel Rat, and Ministry Psalm 69 all made me want to strangle the artists involved. Of those four, Angel Rat is the only one I've ever owned.

This is not an attempt to look cool or precocious. It's simply the state of mind I was in at that age that year. Nirvana Bleach (and tour) were big deals for me. Nevermind was a big disappointment.

And fwiw, I didn't get into Loveless until way later and I still think it's a nice listen more than a revelation/masterpiece. Stereolab writes better songs than MBV for crying out loud, and they usually only need one riff and one beat to do it!

1991 was just the most musically disillusioning year for me in my entire life. And that had to do with exactly two factors: I was eighteen, and indie bands were streamlining their sound and signing to majors.

So . . . Bandwagonesque or Loveless, I take it? They were both released on Creation Records, an indie label.

Voivod Angel Rat

This is actually a great album! Can't believe I left it off my list above (which btw was not done from memory; it's from a file on my desktop.) Though I can see how some people who loved all of Voivod's earlier, more convoluted stuff may have heard it as a betrayal. (I like their early stuff, too, but Angel Rat is still easily one of my favorites.)

it's historical if you're over 40 or under 20 or so, it seems like

I don't get this. Wouldn't people now in their 30s be more likely to feel it was a life-changing album, not less? (Though maybe I don't understand what you mean by "historical." I mean, it's obviously a historical album. It'd be idiotic to argue otherwise. I just don't think it's a great one.)

it has to be 'bandwagonesque', I mean, come on, look at who they inspired--the diggers, swiss family orbison, superstar, some people bought some bmx bandits records that may have not--that is quite a legacy.

xhuxk sorry by 'historical' i mean "part of the vast dead apparatus of history that speaks not to me on my own level", i guess that wasn't immediately apparent by my choice of the word 'historical'

So . . . Bandwagonesque or Loveless, I take it? They were both released on Creation Records, an indie label.

"indie" in UK has a diff. meaning, this is one of the oldest argts to have tho I'm sure you know this. MBV got an advance higher than most indie labels could even count in '91.

whiney do you really think Grunge Geir is a good look?

just teasin' btw, all love y'know

1991 was just the most musically disillusioning year for me in my entire life. And that had to do with exactly two factors: I was eighteen, and indie bands were streamlining their sound and signing to majors.

And in both instances, you grew up and realized you were wrong.

I like Loveless because the songs sound like they were on mushrooms

also why I like Coil btw

Trompe Le Monde is insanely better than most of the records that came out in 1991 or since for that matter.

― Adam Bruneau, Sunday, July 5, 2009 11:09 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark

love that album so

lol The Face magazine didn't think kurdt was kute enough. their 1991 album list:

1 Massive Attack - Blue Lines
2 Primal Scream - Screamadelica
3 Young Disciples - Road To Freedom
4 PM Dawn - Of The Heart, Of The Soul And Of The Cross: The Utopian Experience
5 St Etienne - Fox Base Alpha
6 Seal - Seal
7 REM - Out Of Time
8 Omar - There's Nothing Like This
9 Prince - Diamonds And Pearls
10 Galliano - In Search Of The Thirteenth Note
11 Lenny Kravitz - Mama Said
12 Pet Shop Boys - Discography
13 Dream Warriors - And Now The Legacy Begins
14 The KLF - The White Room
l5 Ultra Nate - Blue Notes From The Basement
16 Public Enemy - Apocalypse '91
17 Various Artists - Paradiso
18 808 State - Ex:el
19 Teenage Fanclub - Bandwagonesque
20 A Tribe Called Quest - The Law End Theory

Here was Spin's 1991 list:

Teenage Fanclub - Bandwagonesque
R.E.M. - Out Of Time
Nirvana - Nevermind
Pixies - Trompe le Monde
Pet Shop Boys - Discography
Robyn Hitchcock - Perspex Island
Public Enemy - Apocalypse '91: The Enemy Strikes Black
Soundgarden - Badmotorfinger
Smashing Pumpkins - Gish
P.M. Dawn - Of The Heart, Of The Soul And Of The Cross: The Utopian Experience
Metallica - Metallica
Massive Attack - Blue Lines
Fugazi - Steady Diet Of Nothing
Urge Overkill - The Supersonic Storybook
Pearl Jam - Ten
Seal - Seal
De La Soul - De La Soul Is Dead
Mudhoney - Every Good Boy Deserves Fudge
Guns N' Roses - Use Your Illusion I And II
Hole - Pretty On The Inside

Out of Time? They're Out of (Their) Mind.

That Urge Overkill disc was pretty good, tho imo.

Yeah, I thought that too. Had forgotten when the UO album came out.

In 1990 they had Catholic Education at #7, so really what could they do but put the follow-up at #1.

...and much as I love him, that Robyn Hitchcock album really blows.

Rolling Stone Two Star review of Bandwagonesque:

Alternative Rock is dead; long live demographics. Since virtually all of the great late-Seventies and early-Eighties independent labels got snatched up by the big boys, the sound that once shook the underground has been touted – and accepted – as the latest groovy thing for going on ten years now. The elements have barely budged – enigmatic band names, droning guitars, pretty melodies and exhausted male singers.

Far from the freshness and punch of its previous effort, A Catholic Education, Teenage Fanclub seems to have lapsed into an alternative-rock coma. Bandwagonesque has not a single musical surprise in store: From the pop-culture in-jokes ("Pet Rock," the wordless "Is This Music?") to the faux spiritualism ("Star Sign," "Guiding Star") to the halfhearted stabs at irony ("The Concept," "Metal Baby"), each song lopes along at a slowish midtempo, made more endless by high, thin vocals and moments of decorative guitar feedback. And it's all repetitive repetitive repetitive.

The huge record labels have an excuse to call such homogenized product "alternative" – they're notoriously out of touch. The fans who reject Poison's or Amy Grant's image because those artists are obviously packaged and marketed with numbers-crunching calculation will happily fork over the $12.99 for Teenage Fanclub's equally persuasive images – eye-searing fluorescents and fisheye-lens photos of the unsmiling, unkempt band members. But these pleasantly innocuous melodies are alternative to nothing, certainly not to their antecedents – Bernie Taupin, Kansas and nursery rhymes. Still not convinced? Try singing Boston's "More Than a Feeling" to the tune of "Smells Like Teen Spirit." (RS 623)

ARION BERGER

other albums from 1991 that were better than nevermind:

varttina - oi dai

mano negra - king of bongo

old - lo flux tube

gorguts - considered dead

mekons - the curse of the mekons

nova mob - last days of pompeii

terminator x - terminator x & the valley of the jeep beats

son of bazerk - bazerk bazerk bazerk

julian cope - peggy suicide

neil young - weld

main source - breaking atoms

organized konfusion - s/t

immolation - dawn of possession

cathedral - forest of equilibrium

the obsessed - lunar womb

cranes - wings of joy

diamanda galas - plague mass

this mortal coil - blood

dog faced hermans - mental blocks for all ages

the young gods - play kurt weill

fear of god - within the veil

born against - nine patriotic hymns for children

fudge tunnel - hate songs in e minor

last crack - burning time

roxette - joyride

heidi berry - love

skin chamber - wound

chubb rock - the one

thee hypnotics - soul, glitter & sin

Son of Bazerk still gets regular play in my house.

that nova mob album is not better than nevermind, shit it's not even better than loveless.

i love that album! it's one of my favorite albums of the 90's!

weird.

it's the only solo husker du thing i've ever owned or heard too.

it makes me sad. and sometimes it feels triumphant to me. i like that it's about the sadness of history. the production is a little wonky at times, but it doesn't bother me.

Scott, you should try Grant Hart's solo stuff. His 1999 disc -- Good News for Modern Man -- is great. (xp)

Haven't heard Nova Mob.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bfx7tvGisbA

it's not for everybody. the pompeii one. i think you either feel it or you don't.

o_0 at that Rolling Stone review of Bandwagonesque.

Tempted to vote Bandwagonesque cuz that's what I actually listen to the most and has the most sentimental value, but really its not a patch on the impenetrability of Loveless. Nevermind way way way far behind the other two.

scott that roxette album is not better than nevermind or bandwagonesque. loveless maybe, but only maybe

1991 was just the most musically disillusioning year for me in my entire life. And that had to do with exactly two factors: I was eighteen, and indie bands were streamlining their sound and signing to majors.

And in both instances, you grew up and realized you were wrong.

Yes and no. Certainly I'm the first to admit that at 18, I didn't like seeing bands groom themselves for success. But then, at 36, I still don't. I just understand the whole process better now.

Anyone who disagrees with the following is a moron: Bleach > Nevermind. Justice > Black Album. Mind is a Terrible Thing > Psalm 69. Nothingface > Angel Rat.

Also, I saw Nirvana live pre and post Nevermind and I can personally attest to the fact that their live show suffered immediately.

DRAIN YOU

I would signing with a big label is usually a big idea unless that label requires you to change your style. Usually it means nothing else than bigger budgets and bigger budgets=better music.

bigger budgets=better music

They can mean that, but I'm sure that's not always true.

impenetrability of Loveless.

why is impenetrability a virtue on its own?

I was 18 and I think all of these came out during my first term at university.

Loveless - this is the album I was eagerly waiting for and easily my favourite of these three, but at the time I felt a bit underwhelmed by it (not because it was bad, it just seemed a bit *less* experimental than the Glider & Tremelo EPs that had come out before it).

Bandwagonesque - I couldn't really understand why people were raving about this. It's very bland. I didn't dislike the group and I loved 'Everything Flows', but this just seemed a bit dull and polished. Worst of the three, haven't heard anything off it for years and years.

Nevermind - Again, I didn't actually think Nirvana were bad, but I was mystified by how massive they became, and (much like Oasis a few years later) I grew to dislike them because they were so hyped and omnipresent. They didn't seem to be doing anything special or significantly different from what was already around, but somehow took over the world for a year or two.

i know what you mean about nirvana and the hype but at least they made decent melodic indie rock whereas oasis just made totally forgettable retro-rock without any interest at all. me too i thought bandwagonesque was bland and boring but it isn't. it is absolutely wonderful. behind all that polish and blandness there are wonderful melodies and a lot of noise. whereas loveless is a noise record with the tunes hidden behidn the noise, bandwagonesque is a pop record with the noise hidden within the beautiful harmonies and melodies.

why is impenetrability a virtue on its own?

mm I guess because no matter how many times you listen to it, there is always more to hear

more what, go-nowhere fuzzy guitar strumming and marble mouthed moaning?

its just one of those records where its endlessly absorbing trying to figure out exactly what is going on, how the sounds are being made (even tho I know Shields' guitar set-up was not especially complicated). its the same with Phil Spector's 60s singles - everything is so smashed into this mono mess, things blur together in a unique way.

I am aware these are not particularly profound or novel observations about MBVs sound but whatevs

spectors 60s singles had hooks and shit tho.

"more what, go-nowhere fuzzy guitar strumming and marble mouthed moaning?"

you tell 'em, chuck! hey, wait...

spectors 60s singles had hooks and shit tho.

eh, there are hooks in the MBV stuff. I think the bigger difference is that Spector loved a) really, propulsive, strong rhythm sections and percussion and b) singers and Kevin Shields wasn't interested in either of those things, really.

some folks here in need of a raggetting

i think a lot of my loveless hate comes down to two things. a) the drum sound (and to a lesser degree the production in general) and b) that everyone had built it up for me so much that when i finally heard it, age fourteen or fifteen i guess, i just couldn't hear anything revelatory or mindblowing in it at all. and i was into other other guitar-noise-rock bands at the time!--the sonic youths were my favorite band, and i was getting really into stuff like flying saucer attack & bardo pond. my first listen to the Dead C's "Trapdoor Fucking Exit" was a lot more impressive and memorable than the pile of thin pink goo that is the loveless experience.

"the sonic youths" - I must have missed them

dude come on over and listen to my u.k. pressing of loveless really loud. sounds great! and it's not thin at all. the bass is totally in yer face.

isn't anything, that album always sounded bad to me. i had a u.s. pressing and a cd of it and it always just sounded like a rehearsal for loveless. the feed me with your kiss u.k. 12 inch i have sounds MASSIVE. so great. the album version is so pitiful in comparison.

"the sonic youth":
http://www.sonicyouth.com/mustang/lp/lp05a.jpg

also read "youths" as rhyming with "soothes."

i do think loveless has hooks. it's really pretty catchy. and i just like how it sounds. i might even love how it sounds. and i like those singles that go with that album. it really DOES sound great loud. i wish i had a copy here to play now, actually.

loveless has ENORMOUS hooks, and hooks within hooks, etc amen

there is one memorable loveless song and it is "Sometimes." that song i really liked, and like.

is that because "sometimes" is a lot sparser than the others? it seems to operate along more of a single melody than the other tracks, which bend and soar and dive all at once in (imo glorious) guitar-chaos

i mean, "when you sleep" for instance has hooks a mile wide but Shields piles on layer after tremeloed layer on top of them, an effect which for me strengthens the hook, but might for someone else detract from it

fwiw "loomer" is my loveless favourite, that chorus is elemental, even if (especially if) it does sound like it's being played underwater

I'm guessing the people who are listing 20+ albums they're claiming are "better than Nevermind" probably haven't listened to it since 1991.

Seriously.. Heart In Motion?? Use Your Illusion???

Also the 2nd half of Nevermind has Lounge Act, Stay Away and On A Plain which are all badass.. I'm not sure what anyone is talking about with how it's a poorly sequenced record.. Up until this thread, I've never heard a single person use this argument against Nevermind.

"Loomer" is one of the most beautiful things I've ever heard.. I wish it was longer than 2:40.

there is one memorable loveless song and it is "Sometimes." that song i really liked, and like.

the best songs on Loveless sound like they should be on Souvaki ("Sometimes" and "When you Sleep"). In my opinion, Souvlaki is a far better album, and one I return to much more than Loveless.

I can't really comment on the sequencing of Nevermind (haven't really ever ingested it as an album per se) but I do have major qualms with the thin production. They were promising a remixed "heavier" 10th anniversary edition, but that never happened. I'm still holding out for this to occur so I can enjoy it. I think the songwriting is great. But the sound is pretty lame... especially following a budget recording that is so much meatier and more satisfying.

Nevermind is thin? It sounds quite beefy to me, especially in comparison to, say, In Utero.

really love all 3 albums for different reasons ...
i was 13 years old in 1991 living in mexico, so my musical tastes have shifted with the times ....

If it wasnt for Nevermind I guess 90% of my generation would still be listening to hair metal, so Nirvana was alpha and omega for me the start of it it all, i wouldnt have listened to TFC or MBV for that matter, if i hadnt bumped into Kurt, Dave and Chris trashing everything in SNL.

I really enjoyed Bandwagonesque, know all the lyrics at heart, but lacks any life changing expiriences at least for me. I remember the trek in my bicycle to my local record shop to buy that cassete tape very fondly though.

But Loveless does it for me, i didnt hear it untill i was 19-20 years old and still come back to it at some time or another, a true classc, and aural orgasm.

Heart in Motion?!?!!?!

And no irony or anything.. just straight up "Yeah, Amy Grant is better than Nirvana.. that's how cool I am, that I contain an opinion that's just so subversive"

What, no Cooleyhighharmony? Just to round things out?

I remember my reaction to Loveless when I first heard it being "wow, I can't believe something this fuzzy and indistinct is so tuneful catchy!" Also, I was a big big fan of "Soon" before I heard the album.

"If it wasnt for Nevermind I guess 90% of my generation would still be listening to hair metal"

instead of what, nickleback? thanx a bunch, nirvana.

ALBUMS FROM 1991 THAT ARE BETTER THAN NIRVANA COS THEY IS JUST SO OVERRATED

2 LEGIT 2 QUIT
Waking Up The Neibhbors
THE "JEREMY" SINGLE I LOVE THAT "YELLOW LEDBETTER" gets to me every time i heard it
We Can't Dance by Genesis
Paula Abdul "Spellbound" FOr the vocal performance on "Hush Hush" alone
The Mo Money soundtrack
For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge (I cried the first time I saw the "Right Now" video)

instead of what, nickleback? thanx a bunch, nirvana.

True, these bands are sonically identical.

"And no irony or anything.. just straight up "Yeah, Amy Grant is better than Nirvana.. that's how cool I am, that I contain an opinion that's just so subversive"

LOTS of people prefer amy grant to nirvana!

I'm sure they do, but why discuss this on a thread comparing 3 alternative rock albums??

Also of all the bands to pull out, Nickelback really isn't bad. It's not like they're pulling a Coldplay where they're doing bland middlebrow shit very, very badly; they do bland middlebrow shit very, very well and most people who object to them object to that entire milieu.

nirvana begat stp who begat creed who begat all the other horrible constipation rock that gets played ad nauseum on the radio. there is definitely a line from nirvana to nickleback.

i don't like nickelback's songs. they are dreary and completely unmemorable to me. i hear them on the radio and i go BLAH.

xp scott but black sabbath and the beatles and flipper and black flag and the pixies and the vaselines and blah blah blah begat nirvana so by that logic thank you, flipper, for nickelback?

There's also a line from Nirvana to Lil Wayne.. The Beatles also influenced lots of bullshit.

It's not one band's fault that other shitty bands have existed.

Finally seeing MBV live this year gave me a new appreciation of Loveless, but I still don't listen to it that often. I remember seeing Smells Like Teen Spirit on MTV and just thinking "no, not for me." Ignored them forevermore. So Teenage Fanclub gets the vote, just for being the most twee of the three, which is where my heart was at the time.

Trying to remember what the biggest three releases of 1991 would have been for me. Julian Cope's Peggy Suicide for sure, he was my favorite and it was a revelation after the mediocre My Nation Underground and the start of an epic run of yearly releases that would continue until 1996. Pavement's Perfect Sound Forever 10", my gang was wild about Pavement even before Slanted and Enchanted came out and PSF seemed to be the pinnacle. Third would probably be Glass Arcade, since Sarah Records was on an absolute tear from 1990 to 1992 and could do no wrong to my ears.

We did listen to that Public Enemy album in my car all the time, but that was probably because people riding in my car loathed Julian Cope and Sarah Records and would always insist on the Public Enemy that resided permanently in the car's tape case since I never played it in the house. I still love "Lost at Birth." That siren! The whole album sounds like a funhouse ride at Astroworld though.

this thread is taking flight at last

"I'm sure they do, but why discuss this on a thread comparing 3 alternative rock albums??"

it's a thread about three supposedly great albums from 1991. mentioning OTHER supposedly great albums from 1991 hardly seems out of bounds.

you could argue that "safesurfer" has the best guitar solo of 1991

btw I have to vote Nirvana here because at the time I only knew "Soon" (which I loved but didn't bother following up on until 6 years later) and I have always hated Teenage Fanclub without hesitation or reservation

btw i voted Loveless as I listen to it regularly vs. really only putting on Nirvana demos anymore vs. still never having heard a single Teenage Fanclub song

Nirvana ultimately mean more to me than Amy Grant, but Heart in Motion is almost as good as Nevermind. What's so hard to understand?

"xp scott but black sabbath and the beatles and flipper and black flag and the pixies and the vaselines and blah blah blah begat nirvana so by that logic thank you, flipper, for nickelback?"

lots of bands took a dreary watered-down version of nirvana's sound to the bank. nobody did this with flipper. though i do think nirvana themselves were a watered-down version of pixies, husker du, etc, they did have someone in the band with a knack for a catchy tune. very few of the post-nirvana bands did.

Amy Grant is super nice. Like, amazingly stunningly nice.

some folks here in need of a raggetting

― lynndie englisher (country matters), Monday, July 6, 2009 4:55 PM (1 hour ago)

otm. loveless DOES have huge hooks and lots of them, but i'm not entirely sure that's even the point

xp

nirvana begat stp who begat creed who begat all the other horrible constipation rock that gets played ad nauseum on the radio. there is definitely a line from nirvana to nickleback.

― scott seward, Monday, July 6, 2009 6:05 PM (4 minutes ago)

alright but so what, MBV gave rise to a bunch of shitty indie all around us presently. i'm not gonna go to perry-length challops and say nickelback arent god-awful, but it's not like everyone influenced by MBV is any good at all

i don't care if bands rip off other bands till the cows come home! as long as they have something of their own to bring to the table. like a good song. jack white just reminded me of the pixies and the gun club and lots of other people, but he had some catchy tunes. thus, i allowed him to live.

Voted for Nevermind. I listened to bad Robyn Hitchcock instead of Teenage Fanclub in 1991, and didn't discover Loveless until six years later. I'm amazed that I knew Inspiral Carpets, Blur, Slowdive, etc and heard no MBV at all.

and to be inundated by dreary bands who ripped off nirvana but who didn't have the talent of nirvana and to hear their horrible moaning for a decade or more is a bit much, thanks. a thousand shitty bands who ripped off unplugged nirvana at that!

I'm not hating on Amy Grant.. I know the album well and I appreciate its strong yet timely production values and songwriting, and she's an ok singer, but I was 11 years old at the time and I listened to practically anything my parents brought home.. In 2009 I'm throwing on this CD for nothing more than memories and laughs, as contemporary Christian music normally is not something I can stomach.

strong yet timely production values and songwriting

could say this about Nevermind tbh.

i don't care if bands rip off other bands till the cows come home!

But that's 'cause you like the Cows, Scott! You even said so upthread.

New Nickelback single "Burn It To The Ground" is actually fun (rocking "Children Of The Grave" groove and dorky lyrics about having no shirt or class and all), fwiw. (Though obviously I'm just trying to be "cool" and "subversive" for saying so, right.) Don't think I've liked any previous single by them that much, though.

Anyone ensconced in the Christian pop scene at the time, can you describe the furor over Amy Grant going secular? As devastating or as pivotal as Dixie Chicks rejecting Bush?

Right now I'd rather put up with a hundred Heart in Motion clones.

Also: if I didn't know one jot about Amy Grant's beliefs, I wouldn't peg HIM as Christian rock.

I listened to bad Robyn Hitchcock instead of Teenage Fanclub in 1991

Perspex Island > Bandwagonesque

I still own that one!

I wouldn't peg HIM as Christian rock

Actually, I think they're more goth.

xhuxk, wasn't so much complaining about you including that album as that it was mentioned in the 2 posts that followed.. Out of all the albums you mentioned.. I like your list.

I'm trying to remember what my favorite albums were in 1991. Have a feeling that what I liked most wasn't anything that had come out that year. Vaguely remember a number of things by bands/musicians I liked coming out that year that were all kinda disappointing -- Out of Time, some Morrissey album, the Ministry album mentioned upthread ...

SERIOUSLY can we talk about Yerself Is Steam a bit more here?

"Amy Grant is super nice. Like, amazingly stunningly nice."

i think she's sexy too! in that nice wholesome clean white teeth kinda way.

has anyone mentioned this album yet?

http://www.touchandgorecords.com/images/catalog/fullsize/277-1.jpg

"Also: if I didn't know one jot about Amy Grant's beliefs, I wouldn't peg HIM as Christian rock."
Probably why they were so upset then, if that's the one she went secular on.

"i think she's sexy too! in that nice wholesome clean white teeth kinda way."
http://www.worthprotectionsecurity.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2009/03/orbit-gum-girl-7264701.jpg
who would win?

nirvana begat so much, so many bands that don't even sound a bit like nirvana...so many kids picked up guitars because of them, friends i know that play electronic music now, or black metal, or weird psych or all kinds of shit...

I voted for Bandwagonesque because I think it will lose anyway.

No snark intended: what about Nirvana inspired so many bands to pick up guitars? The Pixies and Jane's Addiction were having gold records and lots of college hits. Was it Nirvana's multiplatinum that did it?

Yes.

Could be wrong, but I'm pretty sure Motley Crue etc. inspired lots of people to pick up guitars, too.

Sure, but by and large the bands they started sounded like Motley Crue; also I don't know that MC was as across the board successful as Nirvana was. (Not saying they weren't; I don't know if they were or not.)

Could be wrong, but I'm pretty sure Motley Crue etc. inspired lots of people to pick up guitars, too.

― xhuxk, Monday, July 6, 2009 10:50 PM (2 seconds ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

yeah no shit but skot was acting like all nirvana spawned was post grunge shit like nickelback and creed

here's a perfect example i found - jay reatard....

Memphis-based punk rock juggernaut Jay Reatard has adopted a fistful of musical approaches since he first began recording in his bedroom, writing and recording frantic punk, synth punk, power pop and straightforward rock & roll tunes at a frantic pace since releasing his debut EP in 1998. Reatard was born Jay Lindsey and dropped out of school when he was 15, owing to boredom with conventional education and a problematic home life. Lindsey became interested in rock & roll when he heard Nirvana via MTV, and in his mid-teens he began writing songs. After seeing Memphis punk blues legends the Oblivians open for Rocket from the Crypt, Lindsey was inspired to try something similar and created the Reatards, which initially was just Lindsey, who sang, played guitar, and beat on a bucket with a stick for the benefit of his four-track cassette machine.

[i]Could be wrong, but I'm pretty sure Motley Crue etc. inspired lots of people to pick up guitars, too.

― xhuxk, Monday, July 6, 2009 10:50 PM (2 seconds ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink</i

xhuxk you were like getting big black 7 inches sent to you in the mail for free, you don't know the impact nirvana had to kids in 91 in small towns, pre-Internet

"yeah no shit but skot was acting like all nirvana spawned was post grunge shit like nickelback and creed"

i'm saying that all the stuff that i actually HEAR is the shitty stuff. like, on the radio.

thing is that probably 90% of the kids who were got into alt-rock/grunge/indie/etc after Nevermind loved Crue or GNR or Metallica or Def Leppard or Aerosmith and might've gone into rock at some point anyway before that stuff gave them a particular direction to go in that might've been a little more DIY and seemingly open to anyone who wanted to try.

amy grant paved the way for creed more than nirvana, I'm guessing. how many christian acts successfully crossed over before her?

kurt talking about shit like vaselines and raincoats and meat puppets and etc etc i think was just as important as nirvana's music

by and large the bands they started sounded like Motley Crue

xp Actually, I wouldn't be surprised if tons of people in '90s grunge and death metal and rap-rock and industrial and pop-punk and pop-country bands started out covering bands like the Crue and Poison etc. So I'm not sure about "sounded like" part.

Crue (who I don't even like much btw) had a #6 LP in 1985, a #2 in 1987, a #1 in 1989, and a #2 best-of in 1991. So they obviously sold pretty well, though right, Nirvana may have outsold them overall. Less certain Nirvana outsold Guns N Roses or Def Leppard or Bon Jovi, though. (Not denying Nirvana were influential, obviously; they were hugely influential. Just saying they're hardly alone in that.)

yeah totally -- I wasn't that into Nirvana and actually liked Pearl Jam more, but KC totally pointed me toward SY, Meat Puppets, etc. and that was in itself a huge deal for me.

xpost

Motley Crue, Pearl Jam, and GNR all outsold Nirvana.

imo there's a certain plateau at which sales don't really matter that much -- like those bands all sold more than 5 or 10 million, they all permeated the monoculture so let's just talk about what kind of different impacts they made instead of just comparing numbers.

xp I mean, the biggest recent hit cover of a Motley Crue song was by Carrie Underwood, who doesn't exactly play the same kind of music. Most widely herd recent Def Leppard covers have been by Taylor Swift.

Eddie Vedder played Sonic Youth, Slant 6, and Klark Kent on his Pearl Jam "pirate" radio show. Then Jeff Ament or somebody busted out some Outkast. Later Eddie played some Foo Fighter demos and talked about Ms magazine.

maybe loveless would be a better album if there were more stuff on it like the b-side of "only shallow" ("sugar" if i'm remembering correctly?), straightforward, dreamy, and hooky, instead of the monochrome jet engine guitar thing blasting all over the place

monochrome jet engine guitar thing blasting all over the place

you do get that this is exactly why ppl like it so much, right

mudhoney peter fonda biker sample intro beats everything primal scream ever did.

even Primal Scream's Peter Fonda biker sample intro?

^^^yeah I didn't get that either. like, its cool when one band does it, but terrible when another band does the exact same thing? does not compute

doesn't have to happen every song, is what i'm saying. there are dynamic shifts on nevermind loveless lacks in comparison

The not-so-dissimilar production choices on Loveless and Nevermind were more influential than the songs: the aqueous, briny-rich of the former (Smashing Pumpkins), the quartz-hard thickness of the latter (Sonic Youth, Garbage). At a certain point both sounds converge and turn into goth again.

mudhoney peter fonda biker sample intro beats everything primal scream ever did.

even Primal Scream's Peter Fonda biker sample intro?

Neither as cool as when Genesis P. did it on Jack the Tab.

The "neither as cool" bit was a joke by the way [/ILM]

Eddie Vedder played Sonic Youth, Slant 6, and Klark Kent on his Pearl Jam "pirate" radio show. Then Jeff Ament or somebody busted out some Outkast. Later Eddie played some Foo Fighter demos and talked about Ms magazine.

― Philip Nunez, Monday, July 6, 2009 7:15 PM (50 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

oh man i thought those 'self-pollution radio' specials were the coolest thing ever when i was 13

mudhoney peter fonda biker sample intro beats everything primal scream ever did.

"even Primal Scream's Peter Fonda biker sample intro?"

yes! the way they used it sucked!

scott do you not at least like "burning wheel" or "accelerator"? both those songs bang massively imo

"shoot speed kill light"?

were there really all these kids blindly and sadly listening to cinderella and bon jovi until nirvana showed up? all this "vast pre-internet wasteland" talk. didn't anyone have mtv or access to spin magazine at the very least in 1991? didn't even really lame mall stores carry sst records? or was there no desire to explore other avenues until teen spirit was shoved down the throats of nirvana converts?

i feel like people romanticize this band a weeeeeeeeee too much sometimes.

i get the love. don't get me wrong. and i believe they changed people's lives and all that. but you would have to be living in a pretty deep hole in 1991 to not be at least a little bit aware of alt-rock in general.

i haven't listened to everything primal scream has done. every video i ever saw just seemed really lame to me. kudos for hiring an ex-member of Felt though! that i support.

xpost

It does seem odd that I could live in a half-a-horse town in the middle of England and know about all these bands that apparently blew minds when Cobain repped for them but maybe it's an age thing.

ignore the video

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q5ScuQqa-WY

well, I was 9 in 1991, and that was about the year that I became actively interested in popular music. I liked GNR and Def Leppard and Aerosmith, and then when Pearl Jam and Nirvana came out I started to like bands like that more. i'm sure the teens and college students of that era were already up on that stuff but for younger kids it was a big deal, it's really a generational thing,Scott.

also

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K-ROepOxoGw&feature=related

that's enough PS for now

or was there no desire to explore other avenues until teen spirit was shoved down the throats of nirvana converts?

I think this is the case. At my highschool, the population of kids that dressed like jocks - presumably to fit in - seriously diminished when Nirvana hit.

wait, i take it back! i just figured it out in the backyard smoking a cigarette! it's what soulja said. it's an age thing. if you are 11 and don't follow music much and then you turn 12 and grunge hits and you love it and it doesn't sound like yer brother's crue collection than of course it is like the world has turned and it is revolution.

sorry, should have thought of that.

I was a senior in high school at the time, and Nevermind was the cassette of choice blasting out of cars in the parking lot; but not more so than Achtung Baby, Use Your Illusions I-II, Blood Sugar Sex Magik, and a few others. I couldn't hear the differences in greatness between "Come As You Are," "The Fly," "Justified and Ancient," and Amy Grant's "Good For Me," sorry. I KNEW Nirvana were special cuz I read SPIN and Rolling Stone.

in 1985 i was already a big husker du fan - zen arcade spoke to me, blah, blah, blah - but when i heard this it seemed to create beauty in my troubled acid-addled head in such a meaningful way...you know, music can really hit you. and this really hit me. in a way that nirvana never could later. but nirvana were cool. except when they weren't. like the time that doofy dude through his bass up in the air and it landed on his face. and like when they were idiots on headbangers ball.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PImYNoVrsl0

same thing at my school. no other band ever had anything close to an impact like that. that's a pretty huge deal. all of a sudden it wasn't cool anymore to be a dick. maybe there are places where my bloody valentine or teenage fanclub had that kind of impact. i wouldn't know. anyways it's hard to separate how much nirvana changed what cool meant (and way for the better) with how great that album is

xpost

Well, no, no one turned into unicorns and handed out flowers in the hallways thanks to Nevermind. Quite the reverse: it was the same as it ever was, except now that the assholes were listening to Gang of Four with the misfits.

I mean, Nirvana was pop music in 1992.

xp Alfred - I also was a senior in HS at the time. Nirvana wasn't the most popular band there either - RHCP, U2, probably Guns and Roses, Metallica, whatever r&b/pop stuff was in the top 40 - were equally played. I think the big difference was the cultural DIY fandom/question authority/emotional vulnerability stuff that Nirvana put out there. I think musically they weren't that big a departure from the rock and metal that a lot of the kids were into, so that it was more approachable/appealing. Nirvana were dudely enough, so that the emotional vulnerability and weirdness wasn't written off as "faggy" - unlike Morrissey or The Cure or Depeche Mode.

"teen spirit" video struck some kind of nerve, depicting the nerdy dudes being dudelier than than the jocks while the cheerleaders cheered them on in the gym. in more sophisticated precincts this might have been met with a shrug or a sneer, but not where i was. all of a sudden girls liked the quiet ratty guys, which the jocks respected, and there was a moment of forest party kegger utopia when everyone got along. the "jeremy" video seemed to seal the shift, but that's a whole other can of worms

child abuse is universal?

http://symonsez.files.wordpress.com/2008/07/bastille-stormed.jpg

Hey I grew up on a fucking goat farm in rural Oregon and was a huge fan of Bleach and Birthday Party and Big Black and what have you. If it takes an MTV video or SNL to make you pay attention... (we had no cable access where I lived, I just asked a lot of questions and went to the library).

I was a freshmen in college when Nevermind hit and I'd been anticipating it madly for several years. Saw Nirvana twice previously, opening for Sonic Youth in '90 and Dinosaur earlier in '91. But by the time Nevermind was released, songs like Enter Sandman had made me question everything these bands were up to.

"Nevermind is thin? It sounds quite beefy to me, especially in comparison to, say, In Utero."

Umm... I don't even know what to say to this. Listen to the rhythm section on both records and get back to me.

Also 1991

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3244/2507911377_cf32745a55.jpg?v=0

the tipping point into ridiculousness comes when you're holding a cup of shitty beer, talking to the homecoming king starting linebacker or whatever about how he really relates to eddie

xpost

And this!

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_Iu3QYLD0w4M/SCJDmZLtZ6I/AAAAAAAAAkM/VX1XmbP_SQc/s320/Lysol.jpg

u mean this guy right

http://i250.photobucket.com/albums/gg272/AsakuraHao2004/eddie_satan.jpg xp

musically they weren't that big a departure from the rock and metal that a lot of the kids were into, so that it was more approachable/appealing. Nirvana were dudely enough, so that the emotional vulnerability and weirdness wasn't written off as "faggy" - unlike Morrissey or The Cure or Depeche Mode.

But what about Faith No More and Jane's Addiction and Living Colour and King's X (all weird beatniky metallic bands who preceded Nirvana onto MTV, though maybe none of them were as ubiquitous as "Teen Spirit" wound up being in late '91) -- were none of them dudely enough either? (Thing that always bugs me the most about the whole "sea change" legend is the "killing off of hair metal" myth -- by '90 or '91, hair metal was pretty much already off MTV, give or take an isolated Extreme ballad or two. No wonder the biz needed a new kind of loud rock to market -- there was a major void to fill.)

I really have to go look through the shelves but my honest recollection of fave release of '91 was this one:

http://images.amazon.com/images/P/B0000018VT.01._SCLZZZZZZZ_.jpg

And kinda shocked no one has mentioned this yet (not that many of us heard this until a few years later):

http://metal-blogs.com/blackiss/files/2007/12/2282.jpg

The last two hair metal hits I remember getting mad rotation in the late '91/early '92 era were Mr. Big's "To Be With You" and Firehouse's "Love of a Lifetime." I guess Ugly Kid Joe count too.

But what about Faith No More and Jane's Addiction and Living Colour

I think they definitely paved the way for Nirvana ... but I guess what I was trying to get at was the acceptance of weirdness/emotional vulnerability that Nirvana prompted. The aforementioned bands were definitely dudely but didn't really question the average high school boy's rules about masculinity.

ian, if only

Hmm...I'm gay, and Nirvana didn't make me question masculinity at all. Not a jot. I'm not trashing your experiences; they just weren't mind. Buying the Pet Shop Boys' Behaviour in spring '91 and Suede the next year stirred something more ominous than anything from the Pacific Northwest.

mind = mine

i've talked about this before, but the classic rock radio station i listened to at work in 91/92 had to be dragged kicking and screaming into the grunge era. they held out for as long as they could until it became impossible NOT to play the stuff. i think they were really worried that they would lose their older dude two for tuesday crowd if they went grunge. but when they did switch, it was literally all grunge all the time. they went from stubbornly playing kiss's "domino", mr.big, jackyl, brother cane, sass jordan, and def leppard to nirvana, temple of the dog, pearl jam, etc. along with red hot chili peppers and other nu-rock hits.

emotional vulnerability that Nirvana prompted. The aforementioned bands were definitely dudely but didn't really question the average high school boy's rules about masculinity

Thing is, hair metal bands (at least at first) dressed like girls. Poison were total drag queens with pink guitars, until they chickened out. And power ballads had emotional vulnerability up the wazoo -- especially say "Sweet Child O' Mine," and Axl was pretty girly in his own right. So I've never gotten how that was such a humongous change, either; why hadn't Poison made the average high school boy question rules about masculinity already? (Hell, Sylvester was supposedly a big fan of that band!)

no, alfred, i think the point was that listening to nirvana was a way for straight boys to be emo without getting beaten up. kinda like def leppard were before them.

xh-post

xp - what I meant by "question masculinity" was basically saying a guy can be cool and be "in touch with his feelings," as opposed to acting like a macho jock.

xxp what scott said.

yeah but the glammy hair bands were all about getting laid and chicks digging the way they looked, and some of them, especially Axl, liked to say "faggot" a lot -- Kurt wore a dress onstage and slipped things like "everyone is gay" and "rape me" into his songs that were a little more ambiguous, which isn't in itself a huge deal but there was definitely a different attitude being put forth

xpost

yet Axl also loved the Pet Shop Boys, would drive around in a limousine with the stereo blasting "Being Boring," and backstage at a show told Neil Tennant that he'd love to write with them sometime. That's just our Axl.

Just because it wasn't my experience, I still understand that Nirvana had this effect on a lot of people. Thriller was an event for me. Smells Like Teen Spirit was a big deal for another (even my) generation. It's all part of believing that you're part of the myth. I just knew too much so it couldn't affect me the same way. I don't discount its importance to the culture at large. I just deny that it's musically better than a lot of other things going on before, during, or afterwards.

yeah, plus Axl loved Elton and Freddie...guy had issues, definitely.

had issues maybe, but if g'n'r are one of the most traditionally macho bands i can think of.

xp Axl lived in LA. I think he loved these people because they were famous.

don't know where i was going with that. scratch the 'if.'

xp I was always kinda confused by the way the hair metal bands dressed. Their songs showed such little respect for women, I couldn't understand why they were dressing like them.

yet Axl also loved the Pet Shop Boys, would drive around in a limousine with the stereo blasting "Being Boring," and backstage at a show told Neil Tennant that he'd love to write with them sometime. That's just our Axl.

My favorite Nirvana moment: When Dave Grohl screamed over-and-over into the mike, at the end of Nirvana's ferocious set at the MTV Music Awards, "Hi, Axl! Hey, Axl! Hi, Axl!" Don't know why his juvenile taunting made such an impression on the 22 year old me, but it did (maybe because I wanted to see a GnR/Nirvana fistfight on the VMA stage).

Apropos of nothing, obv.

king's x were on mtv?

i remember seeing the video for "Black Flag" a lot between airings of "Evenflow" and "Come As You Are," believe it or not.

Kurt wore a dress onstage

A lot more heavyhandedly/grandstandingly than Poison wore their frocks and makeup in 1987, at least to my eyes. He looked like he was trying to make a point or something. They looked like they were doing it because it was fun, and because it felt good.

king's x were on mtv?

"Over My Head" was on a lot, in 1989/90. (And Pinnick was a gay black Christian, right? Not sure whether he was closeted then or not, though.)

Axl also a major George Michael fan back then, btw.

Also don't remotely understand how Axl could be seen as "traditionally macho." He sang like a girl, danced like a girl, wrote love poems like a girl.

so you're asking why millions of teenagers responded to heavyhanded grandstanding gestures towards questioning gender roles better than a bunch of effeminate but ultimately macho-minded peacocking?

yeah, kurt in the wedding dress on headbangers ball was just dumb. like he thought it was a big deal to do it. it wasn't even funny. i mean, by then, even my brother had been wearing dresses on stage for years. maybe his fans thought it was radical though. again, the age thing.

...and apparently Axl used to get called "faggot" himself plenty back in Lafeyette, Indiana for liking Devo and the Sex Pistols etc. so much. (So yeah, he had issues. No argument there.)

I agree that it seems lame now and it seemed lame to me then, too. I'm just saying, I knew straight guys who'd wear dresses to school as a stunt or a way to seem 'different' after that. xpost

axl and kurt had a lot in common.

mbv FTW.

axl and kurt had a lot in common.

But still seemed to hate each other in the early 90s.

kurt just got the punk thing wrong, really. and so did axl. they didn't know how to do it right.

i was nine years old when kurt offed himself btw. this may be why i don't have much feeling on the "cultural impact" of nirvana. i liked nirvana & pearl jam at the same time i liked ace of base & alanis.

kurt:us punk::axl:uk punk

xxxp Why would I say teenagers didn't respond to Poison, GnR, etc, when several million clearly did (and at least as many girls as boys, fwiw)?

I mean they responded to it AS a gender role/envelope-pushing thing when they didn't w/ Poison, which you kept wondering aloud about

kurt and axl both wanted to be punk as fuck AND wildly popular. which will fuck you up in a big way.

having cake + eating it too.

http://www.kurtcobainnews.com/rolling_stones_kurt_cobain_nirvana_cover.jpg

get it, we are businessmen now. no, really, we are. but....no, we aren't, but...oh ironing generation you've got me all bugaboo.

http://images.wolfgangsvault.com/images/catalog/detail/RS674-RS.jpg

still can't believe butt-head lost to beavis!

"Liz Phair: Babe in Boyland"

Dr. Dre > Meat Loaf seems like an odd winner/loser pairing.

Cypress Hill > Suede is my personal fave

seriously Cypress Hill/Suede what? I think I bought that issue ... I forget what the criteria were lofting beavis into the winner's circle.

Oh, come on. Beavis so >>>>>>>>>>>> Butt head.

yeah totally, that's the soundest decision in that whole thing

"Janet Jackson >>> Michael Bolton" = Rumble in the Jungle type shit here.

Janet would tear that apart that clown limb from limb.

Eighteen years later, this song still makes me smile:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BjMQk42pTL0

(From a 1994 concert).

This thread was almost good, and of course it has to turn into yet another argument about Nirvana's impact.. It's sooooo tired..

Great video of "The Concept" btw. I think I made the right choice.

Every discussion on "Bandwagonesque" here seemed to be of the "It was the first album we listened to together"

but I do have to say...

yep: It was the first album we listened to together

Particularly as she did say the line about not doing drugs but does the pill, and had never heard the song before.

Oh yeah.. the Beavis And Butthead thing was that it was voted for both "Best TV Show" and "Worst TV Show"

Beavis has a bit more depth.. He's the more emo of the 2. Butthead was a bit more sure of himself.

I don't get what showing Nirvana's RS covers is supposed to prove about anything.. That they weren't punk? Who cares.

I was 19 when all these albums came out, and I was a rabid fan of all three bands prior to these releases.

At the time, I would have rated Nevermind first. I bet there were times where Bandwagonesque took first. I had discovered Big Star the year before, and then in early 91, Ryko put out Sister Lovers, Big Star Live, and Chris Bell's I Am The Cosmos. Oh, and a power pop friend had turned me onto Badfinger. So I was soaked in Big Star and Badfinger, and TFC came along. That was revelatory. New bands making that kind of wistful, sparkly power pop, with a fuzzy edge.

I dug Loveless, but my love for it blossomed over the years. I listen to it way more these days then I did back then. And Bandwagonesque was eventually eclipsed by Grand Prix and Songs From Northern Britain. SFNB is one of my all-time favorite albums.

Yeah, it's curious to see Bandwagonesque competing against the critical and commercial high water marks of these other bands' career when it is not even close to being the best TFC album.

Depends on where you're coming from. I agree that they got a lot better later on. But there are also those who prefer their "dirtier" early sound to the cleaner powerpop sound of "Grand Prix" and "Songs From Northern Britain".

I made Bandwagonesque an option because some critics were scratching their heads over why it -- rather than Nevermind -- was chosen by SPIN Magazine as the No. 1 album of 1991. I'm not sure I would compare Teenage Fanclub's work, feel or aesthetic with Nirvana's otherwise (I love them both, but they're going for different things). I included Loveless as an option when I realized -- based on the Stylus article cited in the original post -- that it was from 1991 also, and I thought "Wow, you can't ignore that disc in this discussion."

Since then, a few more albums -- notably Primal Scream's and Talk Talk's 1991 discs -- were mentioned that I think could have also been included. My bad on those, I guess.

(xp)

weird, I gave up on TFC after Thirteen (which is okay, great in spots but fairly weak in others) - had no idea their later output was so well-regarded. Or is that just a UK thing...

you sound suspicious...

oh its just a tic of my listening habits - when I've been following an active band since their inception and they make a bad album, its really rare that they regain my interest (it does happen but over the years I've noticed its kinda rare and I'm a rather unforgiving bastard who doesn't expect bands to recover once they've started to slip)

Not from UK, and yeah, Grand Prix is much better than 13.

But there are also those who prefer their "dirtier" early sound to the cleaner powerpop sound of "Grand Prix" and "Songs From Northern Britain".

I get the sense that Spin/RS/MTV were grasping blindly away at things to anoint prior to grunge-a-mania, and Teenage Fanclub were beneficiaries of this 'next big thing' confusion. Wasn't this an era where Jason Priestly had tastemaker status?

"yeah, kurt in the wedding dress on headbangers ball was just dumb. like he thought it was a big deal to do it. it wasn't even funny. i mean, by then, even my brother had been wearing dresses on stage for years. maybe his fans thought it was radical though. again, the age thing."

No, it was hilarious, I think you're forgetting how monumentally ugly that dress was.
http://www.mtv.com/bands/n/nirvana/thumbnails/mtv_25/mtv_25_nirvana_140x105.jpg

mean, by then, even my brother had been wearing dresses on stage for years

men have been wearing dresses onstage since the dawn of entertainment, doesn't mean it can't still be funny

Voted Nirvana on grounds of MBV being overrated and Teenage Fanclub being a made-up band.

did somebody already comment on the weird cover connection between nevermind and bandwagonesque? the us-dollar. i like that teenage fanclub don't show it, they just put the sign on the sack. one meta point to them. nirvana have a real dollar note floating in the water there. what is it doing there? with the thread attached to it it looks like a bait for the young boy. will he bite it? he doesn't seem to be too interested.

It's worth mentioning that neither Smells Like Teen Spirit or Nevermind reached number one in the US until January 1992, probably about two months after the Spin list was put together. Smells Like Teen Spirit was nominated for the Grammy for best song in 1993. The supposed huge cultural impact of the album hadn't been felt or defined yet.

Just out of interest, here's the NME singles list for 1991 (for albums they had Nirvana at #1, TFC at #2, Screamadelica at #3 and Loveless at #9):

1. Higher than the sun - Primal Scream
2. Justified & ancient - The KLF
3. Loosing my religion - REM
4. Starsign - Teenage Fanclub
5. The concept - Teenage Fanclub
6. Get the message - Electronic
7. Smell like teen spirit - Nirvana
8. Unfinished sympathy - Massive Attack
9. Pearl - Chapterhouse
10.Size of a cow - The Wonder Stuff

lol chapterhouse

It's an outrage that Pearl by Chapterhouse is rated above Size of a Cow!

it has this slight noisy twist, it has an extra sonic layer behind the harmonies.

To me, that is what their later albums have. No, not a slight noisy twist, but an extra sonic layer in some extra details and not to mention a lot of great stereo effects.

"men have been wearing dresses onstage since the dawn of entertainment, doesn't mean it can't still be funny"

yes, of course, i just thought that kurt wasn't that funny. or good at wacky gestures or punk "statements". which is why i put the rolling stone cover up. cuz the corporate magazine t-shirt thing was just soooo lame.

wtf is going on in the last three seconds of that tfc clip

i actually like the old people arguing about nirvana aspect of this thread and wish ppl would stop complaining about it

re: the impact of the dress thing: all the ppl i knew in high school who liked this band maintained a sort of deliberate blind spot about that sort of behaviour, because it was a bit gay, and they couldn't be having with that

the corporate magazine t-shirt thing was just soooo lame.

True, but I kind of like his hair and sunglasses in that picture. (By the way, I'm not as convinced as Scott that either Kurdt or W.Axel did punk "wrong." I'm honestly not even sure what that means; they did punk righter than lots of supposed "real" punk and hardcore bands in the '80s/'90s/'00s who sold way less records, but then I'd say that about Michael Jackson, too. Not entirely convinced either Nirvana or Guns N Roses were punk rock bands per se, either. Nirvana were almost more a powerpop group, to be honest, at least when they were at their best. And GnR at their best played hard funky rock. But they both had a lot of self-and-passersby-destructive punk-like emotion and paranoia etc in their songs.)

"yes, of course, i just thought that kurt wasn't that funny."
90s guitar rock comedy-off!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OJk2RNlj8EU

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s-j31YoEeRU

when I've been following an active band since their inception and they make a bad album, its really rare that they regain my interest...I'm a rather unforgiving bastard who doesn't expect bands to recover once they've started to slip

Strangely, this is something that Shakey and I apparently actually have in common. (For instance, I basically had zero interest in hearing Chinese Democracy last year. And when I finally got around to it, it just confirmed my skepticism.)

"By the way, I'm not as convinced as Scott that either Kurdt or W.Axel did punk "wrong."

i don't mean musically. i think they were both good pop stars who made good music. i mean publically. they were both so self-conscious and it used to embarrass me when they would make "punk" gestures or statements or act like they didn't give a fuck or whatever when it was SO obvious that they really did care. about their image and how they were viewed.

slash was way punk though.

I thought it was general consensus that Duff was the only member with punk cred in GNR.

Adler was the only one with funk cred, though.

But Scott, lots of punks (from the Stooges and Dolls and Pistols and Ramones and Clash and Black Flag and GG Allin and Bikini Kill on) totally self-conscoiously cared about their image and how they were viewed. Still not understanding how that's not punk. (Though I'm sort of playing devil's advocate, since I totally agree with you about their public gestures often being embarrassments.)

i mean attitude. not cred. dave grohl has punk "cred". how punk is he? not very!

i don't mean musically. i think they were both good pop stars who made good music. i mean publically. they were both so self-conscious and it used to embarrass me when they would make "punk" gestures or statements or act like they didn't give a fuck or whatever when it was SO obvious that they really did care. about their image and how they were viewed.

― scott seward, Tuesday, July 7, 2009 3:04 PM (5 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

when has anyone ever not been embarrassing or self-conscious when making "punk" gestures!? like, hasn't that been status quo since the Sex Pistols, if not earlier?

xpost to xhuxk

also did Adler actually have "funk cred" in some concrete way like he played in funk bands or are you just saying he had some smoove beats?

Sarah Palin: Punk or Mod?

i mean, in a way, that's why so many kids loved and identified with kurt. he was often uncomfortable and miserable and awkward. he just happened to have the looks of a male model which is where the identification probably ended for most people. and maybe that's why i have some resentment directed toward kurt and grunge. punk got pretty after they came around. especially with the pop punk crowd. and punk had never REALLY been pretty previously (with the exception of the clash's male model bass player and some others). it was music for geeks and nerds and outcasts. after kurt, pretty people liked it too. and this bugged me. a little. cuz part of me will always be 16.

Gene Simmons used to make snarly noises about Cobain's looks in the mid nineties – "He's a beautiful guy! What'd he have to bitch and moan about?" etc.

really i think one of kurt's biggest redeeming features is how self-conscious and embarrassed he was, and thought he was such a poser and all the other bands were so much more real or artistic than him or whatever.

scott no offense but your posts on this thread have reminded me why i'm glad you haven't been posting on my 90s/00s sonic youth threads, lol

i take scott and chuck's points about Cobain's discomfort in the dresses, etc, and I meant what I said yesterday about Nirvana not making me question sexuality, but it was more subversive to watch the beautiful Cobain wearing dresses and making out with Kris Novoseic than an ugly man dressing like an ugly woman with lots of makeup like Nikki Sixx and Tommy Lee did.

did Adler actually have "funk cred" in some concrete way like he played in funk bands or are you just saying he had some smoove beats?

Mostly the latter, though as I recall both Adler and possibly Slash had some younger-days disco on their resumes. (Actually, Slash might get funk cred himself, for collaborating with the only guy ever to come out of Indiana with better dance moves, a higher voice, and more paranoid lyrics than Axl):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KqDOsKKhb88

ugly man dressing like an ugly woman with lots of makeup like Nikki Sixx and Tommy Lee

Yeah, but Poison and Warrant (and Axl) were pretty, right? (Not so sure about those Britny Fox guys.)

(And actually, Dee Snider = both uglier and earlier than the Crue dudes.)

If Republicans love your band, I'm pretty sure your transvestism is non-threatening, and even possibly homophobic.

I don't know about "Punk not pretty"...Adam Ant???

Siouxsie Sioux ans Wendy O. Williams, too.

Wendy o_O Williams

I heard model/actress Elizabeth Hurley was in Crass.

Did you mean: "Elizabeth Hurley was in Crash."

No results found for "Elizabeth Hurley was in Crass.".

"scott no offense but your posts on this thread have reminded me why i'm glad you haven't been posting on my 90s/00s sonic youth threads, lol"

hahaha! i have to give SOME people a break. i also stay away from all smashing pumpkins threads and all latter-day flaming lips threads.

anyone prettier than paul simonon in punk?

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_StfQ_dy7LhQ/SUwqSs0OB-I/AAAAAAAACv8/xyHgof4lEPM/s400/disneyrollergirl+paul+simonon.jpg

if he hadn't existed, bruce weber would have had to invent him.

http://www.facebook.com/profile/pic.php?uid=AAAAAQAQvcdhTPGjVjgTQ6O-dJxVzwAAAAo39h8xvSlpFQfCp1i49J5l

That's Peter Murphy.

(xpost)

Paul looks like Nikki Sixx now, alas.

that guy looks very stoopid. he isn't feeling very comfortable in his outfit. wtf is he doing with his hands in the second photograph? it looks as if he had lost his handcuffs. what a git.

he just happened to have the looks of a male model

Kurt was cute. But male model cute? Really? For one thing, he was too short (for the runway).

blah blah blah

lol. Still hoping Bandwagonesque makes a respectable showing (I've given up the ghost on it winning).

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

I like all three of these, but I gotta go with Loveless

I actually just bought my CD copy of Bandwagonesque a few months ago, replacing an old tape copy.

if it was a catholic education v bleach v isn't anything it would be more straightforward

Actually that would be much harder for me!!

Never got the love for A Catholic Education, but it sounds like the kind of album I should like. Must try again, I guess.

Not sure how one can list 28 albums supposedly better than Nevermind if you hadn't even heard it all. I loved Nirvana but when I heard it, I hated the production and some of the songs felt unfinished. I was all about Slint and MBV, Massive Attack, Talk Talk, Public Enemy and The Jesus Lizard. Nirvana grew on me later to sneak into top 10. I remember buying Bandwagonesque around Thanksgiving after seeing it in that Spin issue and like the Big Star-isms. But it barely made my top 25.

if it was a catholic education v bleach v isn't anything it would be more straightforward - how about In Utero vs. Thirteen vs. that Wire cover?

or everything flows vs love buzz vs you made me realise

hmmm.. now there's a poll!

I like all three of these, but I gotta go with Loveless

― da croupier, Monday, 13 July 2009 02:09 (4 hours ago) Permalink

how about omg! they're still making records? so boring! who cares? vs. kurt you fucker i can still barely listen to my nirvana records vs. who needs a sequel to Loveless? we have Belong now

loveless. no contest.

I missed this thread because I've been hiking the Appalachian trail for the last few weeks. I went with Nevermind b/c I like pop music and it's the best pop album of the three (on that front, "Lounge Act" over "Alcoholiday" over "Sometimes" but all three are hot). Its mass success felt like vindication of...something...at the time but that was just a dream. Nowadays we can just talk about the tunes, though each album scratches different itches, ergo the kinda distracted discussion here. I'd like to read more pro-Bandwagonesque here, just b/c we've talked about the other two many times before. "Alcoholiday"'s "there are things I want to do but I don't know if they will be with you" just kills, such insouciant ambivalence.

I missed this thread because I've been hiking the Appalachian trail for the last few weeks

You might have missed something else.

Insert appropriate ironic emoticon here.

:^I

he was really in south america with his mistress.

"Not sure how one can list 28 albums supposedly better than Nevermind if you hadn't even heard it all."

eh, i've heard enough. has there ever been a live through this -vs- nevermind poll? cuz i like that album a lot. that's probably the best grunge-related album there is.

the poll should be bandwagonesque vs. loveless vs. seamonsters. nevermind is not only from a different continent but it also ha a totally different vibe. and speed of course. as an american poll there could be nevermind vs. gish vs. goat. and i would go probably for the wonderful tripping hard rock of <a href="http://musik.antville.org/stories/993832";>gish</a>.

will i ever those ilx tags?

will i ever learn i meant, sorry.

Ooh, one hour to go! Exciting!

voted Nevermind, MJ's death has made me re-examine my roots

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

i have learned from all this that all three album titles are compound words, and the one with the least letters won

Hm. After having my expectations shaped by reading the thread, I was surprised by two things in the results: (a) it was closer than expected between Loveless and Nevermind (74 votes to 72 votes) and (b) Bandwagonesque did okay (36 votes).

Yeah, I was going to say - the order is exactly what I was expecting, but I was expecting Loveless to run way out in front, and was expecting Bandwagonesque to maybe languish in the teens. I'm glad all three were repped reasonably strongly.

as they should since all 3 are amazing

1991 albums better than nevermind:

* * * *

coil - love's secret domain

* * * *

― scott seward, Saturday, July 4, 2009

__________________________________

love's secret domain was so goddamn great

― worm? lol (J0hn D.), Saturday, July 4, 2009

the album stream on youtube is making a convincing argument for this album.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DewJHJlYOIU

can't find it for sale on itunes, bandcamp, or boomkat. obscure!

Yeah it's out of print, sadly. Saw it for $500+ on Amazon!

Classic album though!

Bandwagonesque is the only album that doesn't sound dated to me 23-years-hence. Nirvana were never as good as their buzz and Loveless (Tremolo and Isn't Anything were far superior) was never as good as the ideals of the critics.

Fanclub's album is the only one of these that i might listen to when i turn 80, if only for it making me feel young.

Also, add Peggy Suicide (Julian Cope) and anything that Levitation put out in '91 for trix more involving than anything Nevermind had to offer (save, "Where Did You Sleep Last Nite", which is one of the smartest covers ever).

Fanclub's album is the only one of these that i might listen to when i turn 80, if only for it making me feel young.

100% OTM. this album makes me feel young.

mon frere

gonna pop a bag of chicarrones and dig into this mighty thread. I do not get bandwagonsque at all, apart from the last track. Why did they waste the best hook on an instrumental!?!

talk talk - laughing stock

This is a work of genius. However, comparing it to Nevermind is like comparing apples and giraffes.

comparing these albums is unfair, but if you could only keep one band's catalog (and the other two disappear from existence), ya gotta go w/ TFC

talk talk - laughing stock
eh

bathory - twilight of the gods
Is this their Viking stuff? No thanks

slowdive - just for a day
this is fine

jesus lizard - goat
dude’s voice = no

slint - spiderland
dude’s voice = no

paradise lost - gothic
lol no

mercury rev - yerself is steam
dude’s voice = no

the field mice - for keeps
some of this is amazing but some of it is terrible

cows - cunning stunts
haven’t heard

neil young - arc
fuck yes

coil - love's secret domain
I am too lame to enjoy Coil but I love the idea of them or whatever

ween - the pod
sounded great when I was 21 and trippin

massive attack - blue lines
not a massive attack fan

the rest of those albums are pretty good to great. sorry for all that.. eeesh

I really hope you lot are all confusing Arc with Weld.