90’s Blog

This is my blog for the 90’s genre, the genre that I have chosen to write about is Grunge.

The Grunge scene originated in the northwest of America, in the state of Washington (Seattle to be specific).

Seattle was a rather wet place to live, with the weather being mostly rainy and cold. As a result of that, the fashions associated with Grunge weren't born out of being fashion conscious, but actually had the humble origins of just keeping the wearer warm, a lot of the businesses in Seattle were based around logging, as such, warm clothing was needed for the cold and rainy climate of Seattle.

Common clothing included things like:

• Plaid flannel shirts
• Jeans (commonly worn out)
• Old boots

Seattle is a rather small place in comparison of the rest of America, so it was rather cut off from outside influence culturally.

A lot of the music that inspired the genre were inspired by the ethos of local Hardcore Punk bands, the economy was poor, and people had just seen the back end of Ronald Reagan’s run as President. As a result, a lot of the topics that inspired the Grunge scene communicated the youths disdain of the political state of the country.

Despite the lack of much outside influence, another inspiration were British Metal and NWOBM, with bands like Black Sabbath and Motörhead been referred to as an influence in interviews. The instrumentation of Grunge followed that of its influences, such as:

• Guitar - (often downtuned and raw like Hardcore Punk. However, featuring the heaviness from the Metal influences)

• Vocals - (the vocal style depended on the singer generally, there were differences between them. For example, Kurt Cobain and Eddie Vedder shared similar vocal styles, a quite raspy voice that came from the throat. Another example would be Chris Cornell, who had a Classic Rock influenced voice which quite clear, with a wide vocal range. Generally the vocals were loud and passionate)

• Bass - (depending on the artist, the bass could be very punk influenced. However some bands, like Pearl Jam for example, had rhythm section which showed a slight Funk groove behind it)

• Drums - (like the bass, the drum style depended on the band. Nirvana's most well known drummer Dave Grohl had a hard hitting approach influenced by Hardcore Punk. On the other end of that was Matt Cameron from Soundgarden and later Pearl Jam, who payed more attention to technical ability, and showed influences from Jazz and Funk drumming)

By the mid 1980’s a lot of the early bands of the scene started forming and playing shows in small clubs and house parties. By the time August of 1985 came a long, some of the early pioneers of Grunge came together to record a compilation album named ‘Deep Six’, which was released March the following year. Some of the bands featured on this compilation included:

• The Melvins
• The U-Men
• Malfunkshun
• Green River
• Soundgarden

(Note: The album helped raise some awareness of the band Soundgarden, who would later end up as one of the more commercially successful of the Grunge bands).

Grunge bands were known to be anti-mainstream, the band Mother Love Bone were a major influence on the genre hitting the mainstream.

They were fronted by Andrew Wood, who was popular in the Seattle area.

They recorded the album ‘Apple’, which was thought to have been the first really big selling Grunge album. However, just a few days before the release of the album, Andrew Wood died of a heroin overdose.

His death caused huge shock, and suddenly the atmosphere behind the scene changed, people stopped thinking of themselves as invulnerable. Unfortunately, Andrew Wood’s was the first of many deaths involved in Grunge, others include Kurt Cobain of Nirvana, and Layne Staley of Alice in Chains.

Chris Cornell of Soundgarden contacted Jeff Ament and Stone Gossard of Mother Love Bone about an album in Andrew Wood’s honour. Chris Cornell had been his roommate, so he was deeply effected by his death.

Jeff Ament and Stone Gossard were wanting to start up a new band, which eventually became Pearl Jam, Eddie Vedder auditioned for the band, and while he was there, ended up doing backing vocals for some of the songs off of the ‘Temple of the Dog’ album, one song in particular that should be noted is ‘Hunger Strike’, which became a duet between Chris Cornell and EddieVedder, this secured Eddie Vedder’s role in Pearl Jam.

('Hunger Strike' by Temple of the Dog, from their self titled album, uploaded by 'uncnick157')

Afterwards, Pearl Jam started touring and writing material, and released their first album in 1991.

In the late 80’s, more bands became active. That band that would become Nirvana got together in 1987, and released ‘Bleach’, their first album. Like many Grunge bands, they were signed to the indie label ‘Sub Pop’, owned by Jonathan Poneman and Bruce Pavitt, up until 1991, when they were signed to ‘David Geffen Records’. Through them, they released their second album, which blasted the genre, and Nirvana, into the mainstream.

In 1991, Nirvana released ‘Nevermind’, which unexpectedly went mainstream very quickly, the title track ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit’ become known as the anthem for a generation, and Kurt Cobain, the singer and guitarist was reluctantly given the title ‘the Godfather of Grunge’, I would say a big part of the success of the album would be the very pop hooks in the songs, with songs like ‘In Bloom’ and ‘Lithium’ becoming fan favorites.

('In Bloom' by Nirvana, this is the version released on Sub Pop, before Nirvana signed to DGR, note Chad Channing on drums, uploaded by 'numbernintynine')

However, Kurt Cobain struggled with a heroin problem for the next few years, and after releasing another two albums (Incesticide and In Utero), he tragically killed himself in 1994 through a shotgun wound to the head, his death was a major contribution to the downfall of Grunge, and soon after, many of the mainstream bands either fell from the spotlight, or split up.

Bands like Soundgarden, Nirvana, Alice in Chains and Pearl Jam have gone on to inspire artists like Nickelback, Puddle of Mudd, 3 Doors Down and Kings of Leon, who play in the genre of "Post Grunge", which came after the Grunge explosion.

Most prominent influences would be in the vocals, which feature the raspy throaty passion of singers like Kurt Cobain and Eddie Vedder. And the guitar, which would feature a similar, but more commercial variation on the thrashy powerchord sequences, and heavy guitar riffs. What I mean by more commercial is that the recordings by these Post Grunge bands normally have a much cleaner production behind them.