Years later, the acts that dominate the charts pose as anti-rock stars - and, at the same time, make a lot of money doing it.Recorded less than five months before Kurt Cobain’s death from suicide by gunshot, “MTV Unplugged in New York” by Nirvana now plays as a haunting epitaph for the musician as well as a glimpse into where the band could’ve been headed musically had he not ended his life so young. With its success, record companies turned grunge into one of the most profitable and best-selling rock sub-genres. But for all the band’s anti-corporate rock credentials, Nirvana’s legacy would have a very corporate impact on alternative rock. Neither money nor connections nor even talent were prerequisites. “I mean, in a very short period of time, they went from playing for eight people at a small tavern in the Pioneer Square district of Seattle to playing the Coliseum, and they did it on their own terms.”Īnd their own terms were simple: Nirvana was part of a movement that believed anyone could produce music. “There have been a lot of great and popular guitar-rock bands, but there was always a feeling or a suspicion that their careers were somehow manufactured,” Poneman says. The first time the band was featured on the cover of Rolling Stone magazine, Kurt Cobain wore a shirt that read, “Corporate rock mags still suck.” And despite massive commercial success, Nirvana managed to maintain its credibility by posing as anti-rock stars. You could interpret it as a generation’s call to arms or a simple loud rock song. It appealed to the football players and cheerleaders just as much as it did to the angst-ridden teenage punks. Nirvana crafted a cynical video to accompany the track that showed the band playing background music for a truly spirited high-school cheerleading squad.Īlmost instantly, the song was embraced as a crossover anthem. Singer Kurt Cobain observes his generation as “over-bored, self-assured.” The refrain shouts, “Here we are now, entertain us.” Most ironic is that the very demographic “Smells Like Teen Spirit” appeals to, the so-called slacker generation, is the subject of ridicule in the song. Nevermind, the album that included “Smells Like Teen Spirit,” reached the top of the charts. You couldn’t understand the words, and the chorus sounded like shouting. It’s the kind of music that parents could listen to with their kids.īut “Smells Like Teen Spirit” was a song that parents were going to hate. Check out the pop charts in 1991, and you’ll find artists like Paula Abdul, Color Me Badd and Mariah Carey all dominating the Top 20. It wasn’t a track designed to be marketable, or even accessible. “Smells Like Teen Spirit” became an unlikely hit. I believe that everybody in the room knew that they were listening to something that was truly magnificent.” It’s hard to explain, but then it erupted into this chorus and it was really a jaw-dropping experience. I mean, there was this tension in the bridge. “And then they went into a bridge, which seemed to be leading to something. “It started off with that chord progression, and it went into a really beautiful, almost dreamy verse,” Poneman says. Jonathan Poneman, co-founder of Sub Pop Records, was there. Nirvana performed a version of “Smells Like Teen Spirit” in front of a small crowd at the OK Hotel in Seattle. American punk, while still vital, wasn’t commercially viable. Heavy metal was loud, and the so-called alternative bands from England cranked out such earnest tunes that critics called the style New Romantic music. One of them, Nirvana, achieved mammoth success with its first major-label single, “Smells Like Teen Spirit.” That song, the band and lead singer Kurt Cobain would come to represent the genre.īy the time Nirvana started playing in the small clubs around Pioneer Square in Seattle, pop music was witnessing the decline of the highly produced synthesized sound that had dominated it for years.Īt that time, rock subgenres were pretty one-dimensional. Hundreds of garage bands formed in Seattle over a short period of time. The music was loud, pared down, and largely unrestrained. In the early 1990s, Seattle stood at the center of a new rock ‘n’ roll genre called grunge. To stay up to date on the stories that matter. WBEZ brings you unbiased news and information.
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