How did Grunge come about?
batmon
27,574 Posts
What was the climate that made it come about?There's an exhibit about NYC music mid 70s to early 80's. Punk, Disco,Hip Hop, blah-blah-blah... the ususal footage and shit. Whatever. My co-worker and I were discussing how the bad NYC economy helped this happen.What was happenning to create Grunge? Was it purely an industry creation ala New Wave, or were there social conditions that factor in?
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and then a marketing creation, just like "crack." It doesn't exist. Bands that are called "grunge" can somehow be punk, metal, poppy, all sorts of things.
Pretty much it's fake.
that said:
Melvins RULE!
My friends and I were proto-grunge kids in the early-mid 70's. My standard look was ripped to shit jeans, timberland boots, "ironic" t-shirt (Fritz The Cat was my fave) worn under a ripped flannel shirt with none of the buttons buttoned. We listened to a mix of 60's rock and early punk. This was in upstate NY.
When I saw photos of grunge kids in the early 90's, they looked exactly like we did back then.
Dinosaur Jr., Green River, Die Kreuzen, Sonic Youth, Pussy Galore, Swans, Big Black, Melvins, late-period Black Flag, etc. were diverse & early exponents of that movement away from hardcore into uncharted but still abrasive territory. I was in my teens in the 80s and most of my "punk" friends and I dug that stuff because it was new, experimental, vital NOT top-40, and we knew they grew up on the same music we did.
When "grunge" as a term was officially coined in the late-80s to describe Seattle-area Sub Pop label bands such as Nirvana, Soundgarden and Mudhoney, all of these outfits were all influenced by the bands mentioned above.
I'd argue that "grunge" went commercial with the first Alice In Chains and Pearl Jam albums, and pretty much any successful "grunge" bands that followed were 3rd rate imitators of a sound they had little original connection to, and neither did a lot of their fans.
It was originally a term to describe a regional (Pacific Northwest) sound but quickly became diluted as imitators from around the country adopted a similar sound to Nirvana, Pearl Jam, and/or Alice In Chains.
As noted above, very few original "grunge" bands labeled themselves as such. It was just a convenient media term. Mudhoney's Mark Arm (or Steve Turner?) was quoted as saying "Grunge? Isn't that what gets on your dishes when you don't wash them?"
Here's a pretty good overview: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grunge
Basically punks that could actually play more than 3 chords!... I did grow up listening to alot of 'grunge' cus of my mates who where into all those bands (before it bacome a pop culture thing) and read a few books (include Mr True's ramblings).
I read in one of these books (i think its the Pearl jam bio) how the punk crowds and the heavy metal crowds where two totally different scenes in the arly 80s round seattle, which I found funny at the time.... and how Green River where sort of the first dudes to mix it up....
But then you got all those bands saying they where influenced by alot of the 'garage' rock bands of the late 60s and early 70s...so it could be that gurnge was just a modernised version of that...with some nicer fret work and less cock rock shredding moments....
Has hip hop got a 'grunge' equivalent? The backpackers/indie label scene? Or would the hip hop version be a dude straight spitting on a shit mic with a dj cutting up a 2 scratched up versions of Apache/Funky Drummer/Big beat etc?
I think in addition people like to see it as people taking Rock music back from the hair metal bands and bringing some purist elements back to it
I don't know the answer, but there is definitley the hip hop equivalent of hair metal.
Yes, because true grunge equals listening to loads of Sabbath and getting fucked up to the point of laughing your brain off.
If that's not your starting point as any sort of grunge-minded person, then you are simply doing it wrong.
the garage rock era was basically dead by the late 60s/early 70s
the real heyday of that sound was 1964-68
To me, "grunge" (at least that which I heard, I'm by no means an expert) had that slower emo quality to it. Some of it was slow, some was faster and heavier, but while punk is fast and aggressive and angry, grunge could be fast and perhaps angry but, at the end the day, was more angsty than anything else, sometimes musically and often lyrically. I'm speaking very generally of course.
How the grunge emo/angst vibe evolved from punk (or post/punk) I don't know. I'm not versed enough in either genre to speculate.
One significant facet of the climate in the early 90s - the indie musicians wholeheartedly rejected the polished, technology-driven sounds of 80s production. Think about how hair metal, Rick Astley, Starship, and John Parr sound - tons of reverb and digital effects, midi instruments, and of course the artificial gated snare drum. The "grunge" musicians took it back to about '73, with vintage tube gear, guitars and big drum sets, recorded by dry microphones with only room sounds to give ambiance. The back-to-basics sound combined the loud excesses of early 70s arena rock with the d.i.y., anyone-can-be-in-a-band outlook of punk. I am mainly speaking on the early Sub Pop and local-level bands - if you're considering Pearl Jam and the like (major label "grunge"?) then of course their producers used tons of artificial post-production effects, just a bit more tastefully than in the 80s.
http://www.redbullmusicacademy.com/video-archive/lectures/subpop_session
Well, everything in due time.
I see your point - hair metal sounds really good right now. It's also resonating with the kids. I've noticed college radio starting to host vintage hair metal specialty shows. And then Dee Snider hosts a nationally syndicated hair metal show that seems to be growing in popularity. Sometimes people need braggadocio and extreme displays of talent.
However, I will say that underappreciated local-level grunge, shit-rock and sludge from the early 90s is going to be ripe in a few years for collectros and nostalgia hounds. When I made that "1993" mix for waxidermy I decided to not focus on the grunge, but as I was listening thru records deciding what to put on, I was really liking some of those grunge moves. Bands like LIQUOR BIKE.
As far as the fashion, just heshers with punker's thrift store clothes...
I offer a counter-narrative: grunge--and, in particular, Nirvana--was rock music's last grasp at relevance. A grasp which, in hindsight, was unsuccessful. Hence the deification of Nirvana as some kind of great band by rockist critics.
Sidenote: the last time I floated this theory, the one Paychex said I didn't know what I was talking about, which then prompted me to take it up a notch with the absurd declaration that I had never heard Nirvana.
I think it will be an interestingthing to watch the revisionism that happens with inevitable Grunge Revival in the next 10years . As opposed to Hair Metal and Disoc, the main point and message of Grunge was anti-corporate and very self aware (to a fault most woudl say). although I guess they had thier way with the Punk Rock Revival over that past 10years..so maybe it wont be that difficult. And the music of the 60's (civil rights, free-love) etc was very quickly co-opted into the greed machine, but there in lies a pretty interesting point.
The Grunge Movement kind of liked to think of itself as alot smarter than the boomers and always liked to point out the emptiness of that generations selling out. It'll be interesting to watch this play itself out. Or am i lumping Gen X into Grunge?
And for the record, yes, i was into grunge and am a GenXer.
Eh. Maybe it was a "last grasp at relevance" on the part of rock critics (many of whom were too old to fully relate to this new genre when it came about), but the bands themselves were just playing the kind of music that came natural to them. I'd venture to guess that very few of the pioneering "grunge" bands cared about any kind of relevance. In fact, most had a healthy sense of humor about the whole enterprise of rock and its trappings.
Post punk was all about taking the rebellion and angst of punk and putting it out in a more slow thick brooding approach. Emo is considered to be kind of post hardcore music starting in DC with like... sunnny day real estate and fugazi... i hate using the word post... but post punk and punk are too totally different things. I think grunge had 60s garage rock as a major influence coupled with classic punk and where punk was heading in the mid to late 80s. Grunge was a total buzzword though used to encapsulate the indie/punk/garage rock scene of the 90s though. Too big of a tent really.
U SOUND SHAGGY.
And I concur with the above. The Sub Pop folks didn't give a shit about relevance. They just wanted to be free to ride their machines without getting hassled by the man. And they wanted to get loaded.
Side note: I discovered some Sugar Shack 7-inches in my basement a few weeks ago. That stuff still sounds great 20 years later.