Nirvana and Their Influence...?

["Jim Sigel" <drjimmy_mrjim@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

>do you think music would've been great without nirvana? cause if nirvana, and
pearl
>jam and all the other bands that came out and became the dredded "grunge"
>tag didn't emerge, rock would still be focused around bands with long blonde
hair

This is an excellent topic.  Well done, well done...

First of all, no offense intended to any Nirvana fans out there.  I like
Nirvana; I have two albums that I like ("like").  But this question implies
that Nirvana started something when they hit it big.  It implies that without
Nirvana, we would still be stuck in 80s rubbish and Bon Jovi would be the
biggest star on the planet.  And I think putting that sort of emphasis, that
sort of importance, on such a mediocre band, is wrong.

First of all, IMHO, I think the best thing to come from Nirvana was its
drummer Dave Grohl.  That's about it.  At the time Nirvana hit it big, the
"Seattle Grunge" movement was presented to the public and it caught on.  Pearl
Jam came from Seattle (is that right?) and soon everyone was making hard
guitar driven music, with deeper lyrics and getting away from the glitz of the
80s.  There have been a billion and one copy bands of Nirvana/PJ now (and they
all suck in this narrator's opinion) but it's widely believed the Seattle
sound is the main influence of them.  But who influenced the Seattle sound?

A lot of people don't know, or have forgotten, the explosive music scene in
Minneapolis in the early/mid 80s.  Sure, Minneapolis produced Prince (ugh),
but two of the most influential (and little known bands to the masses) came
from there too.  The Replacements and Husker Du.  By no means were these two
bands "hair bands" and their worst music is as deep, brooding, and intelligent
as the best of Nirvana.  I think Paul Westerberg of The Replacements was THE
best songwriter in the 80s and could write circles around Kurt Cobain.  Not to
mention Bob Mould and Grant Hart of Husker Du wrote incredible power tunes
with that pop hook that Cobain so often gets credit for.  And the best part,
both the Replacements and the Huskers were very much Who fans.

I think any hard rock, guitar driven band can be traced back to The Who.
There can be no way around it.  We all know of Pearl Jam's Who-influence, and
it's pretty obvious that Nirvana (especially Dave Grohl - see Foo Fighter's
video where Grohl is playing a Gibson SG and wearing a while boiler suit) was
influenced by The Who both musically and as performers.  Once you smash your
instruments, you are paying homage to The Who, whether you like it or not.  I
think the chronology goes something like this:

First, you have The Who.  The first band to turn it up loud and blow audiences
away by their performances and fresh subject matter.  The Who were it up until
the 70s Punk scene; NY Dolls, Sex Pistols.  The Clash came along and kept that
punkish raw sound until they got too political and finally poppy.  Then came
the Minneapolis scene and finally the Seattle scene.  But one way or another,
it all comes back to The Who.

Nirvana didn't influence anything significant, just carried on a formula
created by The Who.  I love Neil Young, but calling him the "Godfather of
Grunge" was way off.  Neil loves his distorted guitar, but The Who were doing
it before Neil was.  I think the heavy bands of today, like Creed (whom I
think are terrible) were more influenced by The Who than they were by Nirvana
or Pearl Jam even though Creed has no shame in copying the Pearl Jam sound and
even despite the fact that they don't even know it.

I like Nirvana, however I cannot place such a value on them.  They didn't do
anything big except have some hit songs.  I've heard Cobain called the "John
Lennon" of his generation.  Rubbish.  I bet Lennon spun a little in his grave
hearing that one.  He was a pop star of his generation who delved into deeper
subjects than his contemporaries.  Hell, anyone can look good when your rival
is Axl Rose.  Look at Nirvana's competition at the time.  Guns and Roses???
Hard not to get noticed if you write something personal and juxtapose it
against "Welcome to the Jungle".  For me, Nirvana was huge because it was a
fresh change from the norm and that's all.  The Hair Bands were doing their
thing, getting the MTV airplay, and all the Whitesnake chicks.  And then along
comes Nirvana.  They strip their sound down to a Who-like ensemble, and kick
the 80s bands all to hell.  Very much like the Sex Pistols did in the late
70s.

But nobody is going to compare Johnny Rotten to John Lennon.  Why did they
compare Kurt Cobain then?  Who knows...My guess is that it's the music press
that we all love so much.  After all, if it weren't for modern music writers,
who would tell us who is good and who isn't?  But you think it's possible that
Kurt Cobain's "legend" lives on because there hasn't been anyone else in the
last fifteen years or so who's worth wasting ink on?  For me, that's closer to
the truth.  Phooey.  Give me The Replacements or the Huskers any time, any day
over Kurt, Nirvana, Pearl Jam, et al.  I wish those bands got the exposure
Nirvana did.

Jim in Colo Springs