Rethinking the Grunge era

http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/musicblog/2008/oct/31/grunge

Twenty years ago this weekend, Nirvana released Love Buzz, the first single by the band who would ignite grunge from an interesting local scene to a global phenomenon.

And this is significant why? Because grunge wasn't just another musical or youth trend - it was the ultimate expression and fusion of most of the defining cultural, ideological and social threads of the modern western world. Feminism, liberalism, irony, apathy, cynicism/idealism (those opposite sides of one frustrated coin), anti-authoritarianism, wry post-modernism, and not least a love of dirty, abrasive music; grunge reconciled all these into a seminal whole.

For Generation X-ers, male grungers represented all that is good in men. They were the fabled "New Man" with the volume turned up to 10, gentle-natured but discordant and angry. The women were intelligent, non-conformist, cool. Each took the best aspects of their opposite gender and retained the best of their own. Grunge took back loud music from poodle-rock and gave it a heart, soul and brain. It married a love of noise with thoughtfulness and sensitivity, putting a trash soundtrack to lofty principles and uncommon erudition. It turned old paradigms on their head, like the one that said rock music was made by "real men" and feminism was for ball-busting harpies and emasculated weirdoes.

Grunge wasn't nihilist or moany - they really did want a better world for everyone. It was misrepresented as being self-absorbed, but actually addressed big themes, things outside the artists' private concerns - a rare thing in popular music.

These bands weren't restricted by the limits and ideologies of genres like punk, which insist that you write certain kinds of music and lyrics. They didn't recycle banal cliches but tackled weighty subjects - one could almost describe Soundgarden, for instance, as existential.

So Pearl Jam wrote about domestic abuse, illiteracy, the maltreatment of the mentally ill. Nirvana looked at alienation, rape, stultifying conformity. Alice in Chains dug deeply into the black hole of addiction. Soundgarden pondered the search for meaning in an indifferent universe. Courtney Love wrote ferocious lyrics about misogyny, eating disorders, sexual predators.

Aesthetically, they eschewed babes, booze and fast cars for cropped hair, college degrees and ever-present frowns. And they lived out their principles in concrete, courageous ways.

Most grunge bands were politically active. Lollapalooza combined music with information stalls on everything from organic food to voter registration. Pearl Jam fought a ruinous battle with Ticketmaster and refused to make promos; Nirvana constantly antagonised their new, macho audience.

It was a long way from Axl Rose thrusting his crotch in your face on MTV, and of course it couldn't last. Grunge was replaced by frat-boy rock, pimp-wannabe gangsta rappers and hyper-sexualised Britney/Barbie dolls. Plus ça change ...

For my generation, grunge was more than just music: it was subterfuge, knowledge, philosophy, empathy, wit, courage, love, desire and anger, and it saddens me that nothing has truly replaced it. Sure, there will always be musicians who are politically aware, socially concerned, risk-taking; not everyone is Fred Durst. But the days when gender constructs became virtually meaningless, when brains and coolness and sex appeal weren't incompatible, when mass popular culture transcended humble origins to become something profound, subversive and greater than itself … those days are gone. They're in the grave with Kurt Cobain, Layne Staley and Kristen Pfaff.

*rolls eyes*

good lord

what a boring and misleading and stupid narrative.

which is even worse because that type of stuff covers up what could be much more interesting story, of that weird time when the remnants of 80s metal, thrash, and nascent "alternative" rock all coexisted in sort of strange and cool ways...

i graduated in 1993, so i was of the age, but i remember just weird juxtapositions of taste in me and all my friends...like listening to jane's addiction's "nothing's shocking" while waiting to buy "use your illusion" at a midnight opening for musicland....or being excited that soundgarden was opening for metallica....and all those forgotten "intelligent" metal bands that sort of straddled the era like mind funk and warriorsoul and even queensryche....

the beauty of grunge is in the palm of your hand.

These bands weren't restricted by the limits and ideologies of genres like punk, which insist that you write certain kinds of music and lyrics. They didn't recycle banal cliches but tackled weighty subjects - one could almost describe Soundgarden, for instance, as existential.

So Pearl Jam wrote about domestic abuse, illiteracy, the maltreatment of the mentally ill. Nirvana looked at alienation, rape, stultifying conformity. Alice in Chains dug deeply into the black hole of addiction. Soundgarden pondered the search for meaning in an indifferent universe. Courtney Love wrote ferocious lyrics about misogyny, eating disorders, sexual predators.

Aesthetically, they eschewed babes, booze and fast cars for cropped hair, college degrees and ever-present frowns. And they lived out their principles in concrete, courageous ways.

banquet of rong

far far better was the mojo article re sub pop a few months ago.

the biggest mistake is thinking grunge was the beginning of the 90s when it was really the end of the 80s

This dude's other Guardian pieces included an Ironic Review "John Peel was bad not good like you think aaaaaahhhhhh" one, and, I will quote the headline of it in full for you here, "The time is right for intellectual reality TV"

one could almost describe Soundgarden, for instance, as existential.

one could almost describe Soundgarden, for instance, as existential.

one could almost describe Soundgarden, for instance, as existential.

one could almost describe Soundgarden, for instance, as existential.

one could almost describe Soundgarden, for instance, as existential.

one could almost describe Soundgarden, for instance, as existential.

ALMOST.

That's right. So I guess that means that actually, one couldn't.

the biggest mistake is thinking grunge was the beginning of the 90s when it was really the end of the 80s

Grunge was the middle of the 90s. The 90s began around 1986-87 with the synthpop bands losing popularity while Run DMC discovered guitars and house music got massive. They haven't ended yet.

(and will not end until hip-hop becomes roughly as relevant as prog rock was in 1985)

grunge was the finale of 80s US underground rock culture something you know less about than most things, which is saying something

so wrong, even more than usual for you. I was 32 in '88 and Mudhoney/Soundgarden/Seattle were all the rage.

(xpost to dumbass)

grunge was the finale of 80s US underground rock culture

There is always an underground, but the decade is defined by the mainstream.

decades are actually defined by calendars and shit you funny little norwegian.

Anyway, the 80s started in late 1979 with "Video Killed The Radio Star" and two Gary Numan UK chart toppers. And it lasted until acts like Howard Jones, Thompson Twins, Culture Club and even Duran Duran failed to sell as much as they used to. Which was around 1986.

(About the same time, synthpop acts started using guitars to an increasing extent, and sampling and FM synthesis had started to completely dominate synth based music while analog synths were nowhere to be heard. Obviously, the 80s had ended)

Yeah, but that's when hair metal started to get really popular, and... you know what? Madness this way lies.

Hair metal=not synth music=not 80s music. Thus hair metal=beginning of the 90s.

It was a great time to be poor. I could buy shirts from army and navy for £2.00 a shot and still look cool.

The music was mostly wretched though.

...

Musically, For the most part, american minstrels and angst-merchants who were mostly at least 10 years older than their target audience. Terminal students on a route to the loot. No wonder Cobain killed himself. The one true talent of that pathetic genre saw through nthe whole shallow process.

I was 32 in '88 and Mudhoney/Soundgarden/Seattle were all the rage

WTF???? Maybe to like 100 people.

Thus hair metal=beginning of the 90s.

― Geir Hongro, Saturday, November 1, 2008 1:02 AM (9 minutes ago) Bookmark

lolololololololololololololololololololllolololololol

Grunge replacing hair metal was merely one set of circus performers replacing another.

Grunge was all the rage, and I was too busy buying every Pink Floyd and Led Zeppelin album I could get my hands on to notice. When Kurt died I was like, "Who?"

I do like Alice in Chains, though. Especially Jar of Flies.

grunge inspired post-grunge. lock thread.

post-grunge inspired neu-wave. lock thread.

mr snrub = longest-running sockpuppet?

Nirvana was my favorite band in '89-'91. Whenever I saw them live as an opener (main support to Sonic Youth, Dinosaur...), they were untouchable. Especially when Crover was drumming. So fucking good.

I saw them once ever as a headliner in Fall of '91 shortly after the release of Nevermind. They were awful, the stage show was ironic (bubble machines?, go-go dancers?!). I flipped them off and cursed them between every song. (Mudhoney's opening set absolutely killed, though)

Hard to say what my perception would have been if I wasn't an 18 year old boy at that time. A year later, I saw Danzig at the same venue and loved it.

Green River is playing here in Portland soon. They were the first and the best.

Is it true British people love Mudhoney?

i just saw a nirvana cover band on halloween and goddamn if there isn't a band that rocks quite like nirvana.

No, it's not true that British people love Mudhoney.

Whatever exactly hair metal was, it was not the beginning of the 1990s.

It is OK to invent elastic decades the way Hongro is doing, but I am not terribly convinced by his attempts above.

Cobain was talented - he could produce melodies, structures, songs. That was the central great fact about grunge, I think, and the reason the Nirvana records all have at least something good on them. Of any other bands I would be a lot more doubtful.

everyone should love mudhoney they pwn and rule

i love how geir spends his time in a grunge thread talking about thompson twins and howard jones

also: dude at work bought the new mudhoney...it sounds just like mudhoney! crazy!

"For my generation, grunge was more than just music: it was subterfuge, knowledge, philosophy, empathy, wit, courage, love, desire and anger..."

poll?

GEIR UNLESS YOU HAVE GOTTEN BAKEd AS A FUCKIN CAKE AND LISTENED TO DINO JR YOU CANT TELL ME JACK S HIT ABOUT GRUNGE

20 years ago tomorrow. Still funny, lamestains.

http://www.nytimes.com/1992/11/15/style/grunge-a-success-story.html?pagewanted=all&src=pm

That's right. I totally forgot that it was People magazine what broke grunge.

was looking at a big book of 90's alt rock concert posters and it was so terrible. it was like a zoot suit riot of horrible color and design. raygun magazine looks subtle in comparison. every single poster looked like this:

http://blog.humuhumu.com/wp-images/gig-poster-from-coop.jpg

Loved all that shit.

http://blogs.phoenixnewtimes.com/uponsun/flyer-90s-lollapalloza.jpg

http://media-cache-lt0.pinterest.com/upload/287245282453532098_A6XSB7fB_b.jpg

god, I forgot that was Kozik. First thing that comes to my mind when I think of that guy are those damn rabbit toys.

looking back, still the worst thing about it was the the perpetual flu season aesthetic of flannel shirts, overlong sleeves and lack of vitamin d. not a healthy scene.

"aesthetic of flannel shirts, overlong sleeves and lack of vitamin d"

Also known as Canada.

Great piece but (in reference to the opening anecdote) two sides to every story -- here's a blog entry from the drag queen mentioned but not identified in the shoot, which was a David LaChappelle one. And personally I'd love to have a photo shoot from him!

http://lindasimpson.org/2011/05/i-was-a-model-for-david-lachapelle-in-new-jersey/

it's a great look

listening to grunge today:

couple Gruntruck albums (solid!)

Skin Yard (there's a newer remix of Fistful of Chunks that sounds pretty fucking great, very underrated grunge album)

U-Men (2017 subpop comp) - I get why they were important to grunge but definitely feel of a different era (didn't know they formed in 1980)...i dig it, like Scratch Acid meets Wipers or something like that

Love Battery - Dayglo is good grunge