Yeah yeah yeah, I understand their contribution as some of the founding fathers of grunge. But, there are other artists from the era and genre whom it could be argued have much more talent. Such as Chris Cornell, more successful due to longer life, and Layne Stanley who is just vocally much more talented than Kurt Cobain, but whose life also ended early. However, the local airwaves, primarily those in Phoenix, San Diego and San Antonio, which I can speak of, still just non-stop blast Nirvana. Yeah, they have some bangers. But I want to hear some other shit man! Hell some people even argue that the true talent of Nirvana was Dave Grohl, but I’m not here for that. But sure, bang that stuff, instead.
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I think kurt, as talented as he was, made very commercial and easy to digest music. Thats why i think he got the recognition at the time, and why they are still regarded as the face of grunge. Alot of their stuff isnt that interesting and i personally find bands like, STP, Soungarden and Hole more interesting to listen to.
They all get a ton of credit. They are all awesome.
i wouldn’t say the others are “disregarded”. sure maybe to the most surface level, shopping mall music, mainstream audience they are. but anyone with the slightest interest in 90s alt knows about AIC, Soundgarden, STP, and Pearl Jam at the very least.
sure Nirvana is probably the most overrated of the bunch, but the others get their flowers too
I think anyone who’s actually a grunge fan would probably rank bands like Soundgarden and STP and certainly Alice in Chains higher than Nirvana tbh. Nirvanas still awesome but yeah, I agree the other big grunge guys are better.
No. Hmmm? Maybe. Sure. Probably. But what are you gonna do? It’s music history. Rewrite it?
“Every generation throws a hero up the pop charts.”
Edit. Also, I think time has leveled the playing field for all of them. But yes, Rolling Stone…
I don’t think the other big names are disregarded. But none of them, not even PJ, had the effect on the culture that Nirvana did. As to their overall body of work, I’ve come to appreciate it more as I’ve gotten older. Cobain was an amazing songwriter. I think only PJ in their prime came close to being as good at songwriting.
As to Dave Grohl, none of us would even know his name if it wasn’t for Kurt Cobain.
No one else’s songwriting came close though. “Teenage angst has paid off well/now I’m bored and old.” I mean, to start an album with that line.
Nirvana ripped off mudhoney.
Off-topic but people keep saying how grunge killed hair metal, and that grunge killed itself… Uh, no. Nirvana was not the only grunge band out there…
Also nu metal killed grunge.
My wife would literally leave me for Kurt Cobain in a heartbeat.
Valid.
Nirvana is the only grunge band I can really stand. I do appreciate some of their songs quite a bit, though.
There are a lot of good artists nobody cares about, and it’s kind of strange that Nirvana gets so much attention and praise. They’re good… but, eh, at the end of the day they are just simple grunge with interesting songs if you learn what they’re about.
nirvanacels downvoting you
you can’t win against them
I think part of the credit lies in how young kurt/Nirvana was during their coming up and height of success. I cannot imagine being that prolific with anything by 27. Nirvana has a more distinct sound with chaotic guitar riffs, especially in early albums; they also had more blunt/offensive lyrics as opposed to bands who wove song themes in a more poetic or obscure way. They took over the airwaves with controversial music videos, lyrics, and album art. I love AIC and Soundgarden/Cornell’s work, the circumstances around Chris’ death still make me sad. I think though those two bands fall more in to a rock category with less punk / social defiance influence, so it doesn’t seem as unique, except for their vocals.
Shame Courtney had Kurt killed
3 songs. That’s it
And Velvet Underground were better than the Beatles. Yawn.
They hit the sound and the timing just right. 1 year earlier or 1 year later and it would be a completely different story.
They were great for 90s bands. Arguably Pearl Jam, AIC, SG, STP got and get as much or more radio time. I could be wrong though, as I haven’t really listened to the radio in 15 years.
To everyone, I think OP is relating this to commercial success and honestly it’s just because of the unfortunate suicide that occurred which made him larger than life. Honestly AIC is great but they had touring issues to due Stanley’s heroin addiction. Don’t really know where I was going with this
I saw a lot of the grunge era bands live in their prime.
Alice In Chains blew them all out of the water.
AiC should’ve been “IT” instead of Nirvana imho.
The credit they get, is exposing the world to the genre, not creating it, or even being the best representation of it. They hit “The Word” in 1991, introduced themselves with “Courtney love is the best fuck in the world” and then played Smells like Teen spirit for an unsuspecting audience.
You can say that others would have still found success, especially in the US, but there no denying the lighting bolt that was, Nirvana. I was there, I watched it on TV as a 13 year old and it was like it awoke something in me Id never heard before. They are not my favourite band, even of the time, but they got me into the genre. And they got me good.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GcpcEo_veK4 This is the performance that did it.
THANK YOU!
Don’t get me wrong, they were a good band and they had some bangers, yes, but they were SO OVERRATED.
And they didn’t even start grunge. The first grunge band was Green River back in the 80s, and then there was the U-Men, Mudhoney, and the Melvins, the last of whom rejected Cobain as a member. It was just the local Seattle era punk scene and it was blown out of proportion by Sub Pop because their president figured out that indie labels do best when they have a local sound they represent. Motown had sou in Detroit, Wax Trax! had industrial music in Chicago, and Sub Pop would be out of Seattle with grunge.
So many other artists had so much more talent than Cobain, but the mystique of him killing himself made everyone forget what else was happening in the 90s.
For all his personality issues, Billy Corgan is a thousand times the genius Cobain ever was. Nirvana never had anything that came close to the beauty and complexity of this:
https://youtu.be/kx-D8_gn5O4?si=Le8uwOr9wPPIws79
I don’t think it’s credit or respect, I think it’s familiarity. Kurt’s death and the subsequent existence of the Foo Fighters just meant more people knew names and then radio plays popular stuff.
But I don’t think there’s living soul out there who’s like pshh, Soundgarden?! What did they do
Nirvana wrote simple, straightforward pop songs with a somewhat raw exterior and that’s why they had the biggest mainstream success in that scene. Add on the died too young mystique and Kurt’s whole tortured soul persona and you’ve got legendary status. Wouldn’t really call them founding fathers of grunge though as they arrived on the scene pretty late and were heavily influenced by earlier bands. That would be the Melvins, Soundgarden, Green River, Skin Yard, the U-Men, etc…
One word: Melvins.
I know what you mean but let’s just be happy and not tear down one legendary band to build up others.
We all got all the CDs, we’re in all the subreddits.
Without any of 6 to 10 bands Grunge isn’t what we are so lucky to have it be.
It’s… complicated. I was a teenager when all that happened, and I will say that outside of the initial burst from Teen Spirit, other bands were bigger than Nirvana. Pearl Jam were way bigger with mainstream audiences for a few years, until Cobain died, which changed the dynamic like it always does when an artist dies.
Outside of that though, I think where Nirvana made the biggest impact was in influence on other musicians. Not even just the post-grunge bands that aped them and the other Seattle bands. Everybody, even artists established in other styles, suddenly felt the need to make at least one loud song, or an entire loud album. The Nirvana influence specifically was pretty much always evident – the distortion + chorus, the plunky basslines, songs ending in messy sputtering feedback, etc. Their impact with the public was big, but their impact in the record industry was even bigger proportionally.
That said, you still hear plenty about the other most popular Seattle bands, and a few other bands – STP, Chili Peppers, Smashing Pumpkins – but almost nothing about most 90s alternative, even artists that had huge hits. It was such a broad and varied era of music, it bums me out to have it reduced down to only five or six bands that people just stick to talking about over and over.
Any fans that do even a small amount of research of the Seattle bands know Nirvana’s success didn’t happen in a vacuum. Soundgarden was the first band to get a major label to sign them. Their manager and Chris Cornell’s wife at the time, Susan Silver used those contacts to get Alice signed to a major label. Alice was the first of those bands to break out nationally with their hit Man in the Box. Their success lead to MTV making the decision to play “It Smells Like Teen Spirit” from Nirvana a year later and the rest is history.
The Gits. Mia Zapata.
Names that echo through back rooms and broken amps,
carried not by radio waves,
but by those who listen deeper.
That’s You!
And yet, do not mistake absence for injustice,
nor assume the crown was wrongly placed.
Some kings rise not by conquest
but by changing the air itself.
It was Nirvana, Kurt, raw and unrelenting
who cracked open the sky,
and let the light fall where it may:
on Soundgarden, STP, Alice in Chains—
and yes, on The Gits.
To call him King is to name a small, loud kingdom
but it was a kingdom.
And in its noise, others were born.
The (radio) dial spins shallow now.
The signal fades.
And still, the music waits beneath.
Dave Grohl sucks lmao
I’m GenX & lived in Seattle throughout the grunge era. I agree with you. I was always and remain more partial to the AIC, Pearl Jam, Soundgarden, Mad Season, Temple of the Dog crews. I don’t have anything against Nirvana really, I just preferred the guys & music I mentioned. Cobain was definitely talented, tortured genius maybe, but also at times an insufferable, pretentious prick.
They’re not really grunge
I have never heard anybody argue that Dave Grohl was the “true talent” of Nirvana. Grohl was an opportunist who was fortunate enough to be the drummer for one of the most important bands in music history, but he never contributed anything to Nirvana except his kickass drum skills. Once Nirvana ceased to be, Grohl emerged as a bona fide rock star (and covert narcissist), but he never had Cobain’s talent, vision, or influence on popular culture, and never will.
I’m sorry that you don’t get it. Nirvana actually changed popular culture, seemingly overnight. They didn’t invent alternative music, but suddenly alternative was “cool”, and what was previously considered mainstream became very uncool, like, instantly. No other band of the last 40 years had such a profound impact on North American culture, and if you weren’t around to witness the change yourself then I guess it’s understandable that you don’t see what the big deal is.
Where’s all the love for silverchair?
Your issue is with the radio stations being dinosaurs, man. The people who were/are into the 90s rock know that Nirvana were just another one of the great bands at the time among many.
Radio became for the boomer generation, and when they finally accepted a few 90s bands into rotation, they only let the “lighter” songs in, like some from Nirvana and some from Pearl Jam, along with some RHCP. Boomer rockers are very sensitive to heavy-sounding guitar rock, so when they sense it crosses the line, it doesn’t make the cut. They didn’t accept Stone Temple Pilots, The Smashing Pumpkins, Alice in Chains, Soundgarden, Melvins, Hole, or anything else from Nirvana that was “too heavy” (which meant most of their music). Radio reflected this.
And then it just stuck like that because radio’s been dying out.
The founding fathers of grunge? Way to make it clear you know nothing about music 🤣
Your problem isn’t with Nirvana but with radio stations, there are innumerable ways to listen to what you want, try those.