I never got into grunge at all, though I did buy one Nirvana album. I do like a couple of parody songs about grunge. In Children of the Corn Nuts, Wammo of the Asylum Street Spankers sings "I was Flattle before Flattle was cool." And then there is Todd Snider's Talkin' Seattle Grunge Rock Blues Hey, hey, my, my, rock 'n' roll will never die, Just hang your hair down in your eyes You'll make a million dollars. Well, I was in this band goin' nowhere fast We sent out demos, but everybody passed So one day, we finally took the plunge Moved out to Seattle to play some grunge. Washington State that is. Space Needle ...Eddie Vedder ...mud 'n' honey! Now to fit in fast, we wear flannel shirts, We turn our amps up until it hurts, We got bad attitudes, and what's more When we play we stare straight down at the floor, wow-ee Pretty scary. How pensive ...how totally alternative. Now to fit in on the Seattle scene We gotta do somethin' they ain't never seen. So, thinkin' up a gimmick one day We decided to be the only band that wouldn't play -- a note. Under any circumstances. Silence ...music's original alternative. Roots grunge... Well we spread the word through the underground, that we were the hottest new thing in town. The record guy came out to see us one day, and just like always, we didn't play; it knocked him out. He said he loved our work. He said he loved our work, but he wasn't sure if he could sell a record with nothin' on it. I said tell 'em we're from Seattle. He advanced us two-and-a-half million dollars. Hey, hey, my, my, rock 'n' roll will never die, Hang your hair down in your eyes You'll make a million dollars. Well, they made us do a video, but that wasn't tough, 'Cause we just filmed ourselves smashin' stuff. It was kinda weird, 'cause there was no music, But MTV said they'd love to use it. The kids went wild, the kids went nuts, Rolling Stone gave us a five-star review; said we played with guts. We were scorin' chicks, takin' drugs, then we got asked to play MTV Unplugged; you shoulda seen it. We went right out there and refused to do acoustical versions of the electrical songs that we had refused to record in the first place. Then we smashed our sh-t. Well, we blew 'em away at the Grammy show, by refusin' to play and refusin' to go. And then just when we thought fame would last forever, Along come this band that wasn't even together. Now, that's alternative ...hell, that's alternative to alternative. I feel stupid ...and contagious. Well our band got dropped, and that ain't funny, 'cause we're all hooked on drugs, but we're outta money So the other day I called up the band, I said, "Boys, I've taken all I can, "Shave off your goatees, pack the van... "We're goin' back to Athens."
I find Kurt Cobain a way more interesting grunge icon then Eddie Vedder, and IMO Nirvana > Pearl Jam. Something about Eddie Vedder and Pearl Jam that I don't like, I thought they were a bit contrived and they're music were ordinary at best. Granted, I don't follow them or ever listened to their CDs except for Ten, but to me obscurity and irrelevancy is where they best belong. Kurt Cobain once called Pearl Jam out, calling them careerists, especially Jeff Ament, saying they had no roots and would kiss whoever's @ss so that they could get big.
"Grunge" is just a label by the media. You should give it a listen, it is Rock n Roll at it's finest (rebellion)
A-Train jokingly mentioned Temple of the Dog but their one album was awesome and my favorite grunge album. Now granted most of them went on to become Pearl Jam and you had Cornell and Soundgarden's drummer, but still that album was fantastic. And although not really grunge, but I guess somewhat glam rock but an influence nonetheless was Mother Love Bone. "Stardog Champion" is a highly underrated album, IMO.
Yes along with "Bleach" and "In Utero". "In Bloom" is my all-time favorite Nirvana song, but every song on "Nevermind" is so good, not a single skippable track in my mind. Why do you ask?
I really liked all of these bands, but at the time, Pearl Jam was my favorite and Nirvana my least favorite.....not that there was a HUGE amount of separation. Then one day, I saw PJ in concert in Nacogdoches. I was so pumped.....and I did enjoy the show......but I wasn't blown away. Several months later, I caught Nirvana in Houston.......and I was blown away. I still like most of the music from all of them, but mostly I remember that Nirvana concert. Kick ASS!
Crazy Horse Otherwise I like(d) all the bands listed, with the edge to Nirvana. Didn't appreciate them enough until I saw the Unplugged episode that was just riveting.
I think the root of my problem is that the rebellion strikes me more as a marketing gimmick than true rebellion. And even if the rebellion is genuine, I really couldn't see that there was much to rebel about. Maybe it's a blind spot with me because some people whose opinion on music I really respect have high praise for these bands. Maybe it's just that I am rebelling against the rebellion because I felt as though I was having it shoved down my throat in the early 90s. So I went in the other direction and sought out "roots" music (for lack of a better term). With a few exceptions, my rocking days are in my rear view mirror. I'm no longer a "hard rock miner" (er...minor). Still, I'll give some of it a try during some of my musical meanderings
i like all four bands but alice in chains is my favorite by far. layne staley is one of my 2 or 3 favorite singers and jerry cantrell had some great licks. their unplugged cd is the ****.
Alice In Chains by far in my book. The vocals were amazing, bands are still trying to copy them today. Every CD they had was great from beginning to end.
THANK YOU, FAOS! It's stupid that it took that long for someone to mention the best band of the 90's. I consider STP to be Grunge - the guitars sound the same as the other bands as well as Scott Weiland's voice. It's nice to see this thread come up. Grunge is my favorite kind of music. You can see in the Favorite Bands thread that all of these groups minus Pearl Jam are in my list of favorite bands. I would rank the bands as follows: Stone Temple Pilots Tie between Alice in Chains & Nirvana Soundgarden Pearl Jam I think these bands came up with some of the best sounding guitar riffs ever. I truly love the harsh grinding of their guitars - just brilliance. EDIT: Oh okay, so STP isn't from Seattle. When talking about a list of best Grunge bands, however, it is mandatory that they be included.
where did you see them? when they came out with all the hype, i resisted nirvana. eventually they ended up overwhelming me. i saw them at the astro arena, awesome!
Yeah, I didn't include STP because they weren't from Seattle and became popular at the tail end of the grunge fad when the new buzzword became "alternative," along with others like Smashing Pumpkins. They sure rocked, though.
Without a doubt - Pearl Jam. The beauty of PJ is that your only going to like them if you make the effort to find out they have a new album, go pick it up, and listen to it yourself. Your not going to be exposed to anything they're doing if you don't want to. If the most recent PJ album you've got is ten or vs. then you've missed the boat. While the depth of each album isn't what it once was, you can be sure to find 3-5 kick ass songs on each album (Love Boat Captain, Save You, Of the Girl, Low Light, etc.) Figuring that most people who have replied to this are music fans, do yourself a favor and check out some of PJ's lesser known stuff. I think you will be suprised. BUT at the end of the day, when all of these bands where around at the same time we were all a part of one of the greatest music scenes ever. While PJ is my all time fav band - there are a handful of early 90 bands who would make my top 20.
