Thanks for the kind words but I didn't do the hard work. Those individuals you overheard were out in the cold turning wrenches and crimping wires hours after I did my time sitting in the cockpit. Those were some very special people who kept a 40 year old airframe in the air regardless of what time of day or the temperature, now it's 60 years old and still flying. I love our military, so many of them just work miracles.
That's a pretty good assessment. I've always like musicians that contributed in their own subtle way without stomping all over the others, maybe DeFreitas was that way. I know that Guns N Roses enthusiasts always refer to Steven Adler's swing that no other drummer could touch. Boris Williams was one that I really felt quietly helped The Cure really improve their sound.
I'm happy with the affects Nirvana/Grunge had on Rush. If it wasn't for that whole scene, they would probably have continued making albums like Roll The Bones...For awhile longer anyway. I remember when 92/93 hit, they were suddenly mentioning bands like Soundgarden as being their favourite. Before that, they were always saying how metal was stale and one dimensional...Which was true. That would make another interesting thread. Bands who's sound changed as a result.
Hey, this thread took a turn for the better the past few pages! I loved the period we call grunge and grunge's effect on music. I always remained into Pearl Jam, even through the Ticketmaster years. Vitalogy, No Code, Yield, Binaural...some great music in that stretch. I also remained big into the Smashing Pumpkins and Stone Temple Pilots through the 90s. Great songwriting in both of those groups, a hodge-podge of melodies and influences while maintaining that alternative sound. After grunge's heyday in the mainstream, I got into some bands I still enjoy to this day: King's X, Rage Against the Machine, Type O Negative, dredg, Melvins, Tool, Deftones, Faith No More, Devin Townsend (and associated projects). I was also into Dream Theater during this time...starting with I&W through SDoIT I found them really interesting. These groups carried me through the musical doldrums of the late 90s/early 2000s (until Radiohead blew my mind with OK Computer).
One could make an argument that Chris Whitley's major label career was killed by his attempt to emulate grunge on his second album Din of Ecstacy. http://www.allmusic.com/album/din-of-ecstasy-mw0000628210#no-js Personally, I like some of the music on this album, but I can see how it could have turned some fans off.
What was grunge anyway? I'm very much of that generation and it never felt like a meaningful word to me. To us, Nirvana was another punk band. For the most part, we gave up on them when they put out their second record on a major label. But they came out of punk. I've never been able to connect them to Soundgarden, Stone Temple Pilots, or Alice in Chains all of whom sounded like repackaged metal bands to my ears. Perhaps that was grunge? It always felt very contrived to me. Whatever it was, it was co-opted very quickly. Suddenly you had things like Candlebox on the radio. Nirvana definitely made it okay for bands to have more naturalistic haircuts, but that was about it.
You're on the money. Grunge is simply the term created (by folks who couldn't sleep at night without a label to help their own understanding) to describe a record company phenomenon of the successful selling (and arguable exploitation of) the northwest thrash-meets-punk scene and the resulting cultural impact. That's really all there is to it IMO.
Soundgarden always sounded more like Black Sabbath than Nirvana, I always thought it was silly they were swept up into that "scene".
What was Grunge? Pop metal with down tuning. Throw in some woe-is-me lyrics. Bake 30 mins. I loved it, it sounded very fresh at the time, but it is really a made up term, no?
Good post. I didn't think Nirvana was doing anything that Husker Du hadn't done a half dozen years earlir, i.e, merging punk agression with pop melodies/song structures. The main difference, of course, is that Nirvana had a massive hit with Nevermind. I also agree about those other bands you cite sounding more like repackaged metal. Overall, in regards to the 90's I though the shoegazer and lo-fi scenes were fresher sounding than grunge.
Loverboy is not a good example as another poster had noted. The days of Loverboy getting large amounts of airplay (which they did 84-87) were a distant memory when "Teen Spirit" broke.
Yeah it really tried hard (Grunge that is) to make a unified group of bands that were supposed to have similar sounds and almost seem like they were all "created" around the same time. Of course once the interested started investigating (those that didn't already know the history) you see that wait, Alice in Chains were clearly a metal band that was frequented on Headbangers Ball, Nirvana was your basic punk rock indie band, Pearl Jam rose out of the ashes of a semi-glam rock band and Soundgarden were busy channeling 70's hard rock like Sabbath and riff heavy Zeppelin, and oh yeah that "I Nearly Lost You" band had been at it for years as a psychedelic garage rock band.
And one great record means what, exactly? If I think hard enough, I sure I can probably come up with a few really good releases during that time. It was still way down compared to the previous 15 years.
Oh man. '86-'91 was the golden age, I'm sorry that you weren't aware. By the time that Nirvana surfaced, it was over. Rock and Roll didn't get back on track till the mid-90s.
Ok, you've piqued my interest. With what album(s) release(s) did rock get back on track for you in the mid-90s?
Main difference was Nirvana had a better singer and a better songwriter than Husker Du IMO. That's why they had a massive hit. Probably didn't hurt that Cobain was photogenic.
I think if Motley Crue had not parted ways with Vince Neil they could have survived the grunge thing much like Aerosmith. "Primal Scream", released in the Fall of '91, was a good indicator that they were heading into a heavier direction that would ultimately result in the 1994 self-titled album with John Corabi on vocals. I think if that album would have had Vince and been a mixture of the direction that "Primal Scream" was hinting at, and what they created with Corabi, it would have been a success and Motley Crue would probably have a much stronger legacy than they do now.
Chuck Eddy made a prophetic statement in his 1990 tome "Stairway to Hell": namely, that Rush was the hidden influence in many hits from 1990 (Living Colour, Faith No More, etc..) Rush exited the 90's in an (arguably) better commercial position than they exited the 80's with. The synth period is still my favorite Rush period, but record sales don't lie.
I never understand this constant debate. There was a lot that went into changing the popular music landscape in the early 90's. The biggest one to me was Rap music and the Female singers which exploded. The stuff from seattle was huge and fantastic but if the executives at mtv had treated them like the replacements they would have been B level stars also. Behind the scenes at MTV there were basically people who wanted to get rid of the AOR rock bands. Aerosmith, bon jovi, van halen etc.....they were tired of it and wanted to turn mtv into its 120 minutes programming at its peak hours.....and with nirvana and pearl jam they were able to. So the staff at mtv changed the programming, Rap music exploded, Female singers were coming from everywhere led by Mariah carey. lets face it, the main reason the van halen ish bands like ratt/dokken/poison/bon jovi etc were so popular was because of the amount of girls that loved it, those concerts were swarmed with girls, teenage girls. So when the teenage girls become older and the new crop of teenage girls likes Mariah carey and pearl jam plus mtv stops showing posion's videos everything has turned on those AOR bands. anyway I could ramble on about this forever but the number 1 reason was the genre was flooded and the second wave of bands...the warrants/wingers etc were not as talented or as popular as van halen/ratt/bon jovi......so it just worked itself out. If you go back and watch some clips of mtv from around 90-91 the bands themselves are telling Martha Quinn and others that someone needs to do something fresh and new.....I remember nikki sixx and warren demartini saying this exact thing..... Times change.
It wasn't long after 1991 that MTV began to air progressively less and less music videos. Between Headbangers Ball and 120 Minutes, a viewer had access to thousands of rock acts.
It was a shame that Detonator was pushed under the rug in favor of Cherry Pie and Flesh and Blood tracks nearly 24/7
