Tucked away in Journals, Kurt Cobain wrote a letter to his ex-girlfriend Tobi Vail (of Bikini Kill) about how he perceived his band in the American cultural landscape. Teenage angst paid off well, as Kurt Cobain once humblebragged, but we fans received something in return, something that it took decades for many of us to fully appreciate. If you’re into your older sister’s Aerosmith and Led Zeppelin records, Nirvana could open you up to Bikini Kill and Daniel Johnston. Cut your teeth on the Beatles and Nirvana can quickly usher you toward Flipper and the Melvins. The band remains a gateway for new listeners, a bridge between generations and extremes. Musically, Nirvana was a cagey mix of ludicrously macho classic rock, scummy punk, irrefutable pop hooks, and precocious indie twee. Fashion laughably wrapped itself in flannel and heroin chic, Hollywood set a rom-com in the midst of Seattle’s music scene, while a Sub Pop receptionist outed the “lamestains” in the “lamestream” media and Cobain graced the cover of Rolling Stone with a T-shirt reading “Corporate Magazines Still Suck.” Nirvana pulled back the veil to reveal such major institutions to be the hapless fools they were then and still are now. For a few years, corporate rock had to pretend to be college rock. Seemingly overnight, the music industry was suddenly chasing down the likes of Royal Trux, Steel Pole Bath Tub, and the Jesus Lizard so as to hand them suitcases of cash. They flipped the axis on what mainstream and alternative meant, usurping the likes of Michael Jackson, Garth Brooks, and Guns N’ Roses at the top of the charts. Like Elvis, the Beatles, and Easy Rider before them, Nirvana instantly inverted the status quo.
Thirty years later, we can still feel the band’s aftershocks, even though Kurt Cobain, Krist Novoselic, and a rotating cast of drummers (that fortuitously landed on the mighty Dave Grohl) only lasted seven years and made three studio albums before Cobain decided it was better to burn out than to fade away. Those bands were cool, but it was “Love Buzz,” the first single from Nirvana, that proved to be seismic, wholly shifting the paradigm of ’90s culture. For the first year of the series, the Sub Pop Singles Club released music by underground luminaries like Sonic Youth, Fugazi, and the Flaming Lips, bands that have remain touchstones in alternative rock ever since.
Npr nirvana mtv unplugged series#
By that point, Sub Pop was already a label of some renown, both in the Pacific Northwest and on college-radio playlists nationwide, thanks to releases from acts like Soundgarden and Green River and an overall aesthetic cutting ’70s classic rock with ’80s hardcore, spraying cheap beer over all of it, a sound that would soon be called “grunge.” A mix of reverence and irreverence, it was a series that saw grunge bands covering Black Flag, as well as former Black Flag singer Henry Rollins covering Cheech & Chong. In November 1988, Seattle’s Sub Pop label inaugurated its seven-inch-vinyl-only Singles Club with the debut single by a new, unheard-of band hailing from the logging purgatory of Aberdeen, Washington. Then again, Mili Vanilli would have never made it on “Unplugged.Krist Novoselic, Kurt Cobain, and Dave Grohl. Back in the day, unplugged was the ultimate because it showed the musicians in their natural and naked environment and that’s where you would see the real talent of the artist. Also around this time MTV was going through its own changes, they were once the absolute king of music for videos, interviews etc until the reality shows took hold and forever changed that network. Cobain was a legend for his time and although short lived, his music definitely made an impact that expanded beyond grunge.
The grunge scene as good as it was hit a steep plateau mid 1994 as House was gaining more popularity in the UK, Techno in Germany and musicians finding their roots again in rock and Indie in the US especially.
I would agree though that the MTV sessions were far from career defining. Both at the time and in hindsight I'd say they were still on the incline.
Why do you think they were past their peak? They'd only made 3 studio records and a handful of singles with their last record (not Unplugged) arguably being their most artistically interesting.
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