Come on, man. Weezer is fucking kid stuff.
Which subsequent releases do you consider “lackluster?” In Utero? Unplugged?
Ha, I was wondering the same…
Well, judging from his username, perhaps the OP considers 1991 to be an annus mirabilis for melodic American rock, so anything afterwards just feels dull to him. I’d agree that Mike Mills hasn’t penned a decent tune since that year.
Buried yes, but not really all that catchy, IMO. Good, but not catchy.
Maybe the reason why this thread is here is that the OP doesn’t remember how barren the landscape was at the time–at least that’s they way it felt for me. It wasn’t so much that Nirvana was all that special, but rather that there wasn’t much else going on (in the United States, at least).
[QUOTE=Jonathan Chance]
The fact is that it was increased production that spelled the difference between Bleach and Nevermind.
[/quote]
Yes, and also I think their producers saw the vacuum with music at the time, so I got the impression that there was a lot of contrivance (with the media, as well) to promote a “new” thing, along with a “new scene” (Seattle).
To be certain, they were good from the start, but the circumstances probably are what leads to the OP’s confusion
FYI, nearwildheaven is a she. 
Ah, thanks! So linked in my mind with Mike Mills, I had trouble imagining a woman. My bad.
No problem. I’ve just seen her point out in other threads that she is female when other posters address her as a male.
This was kind of the impression I got at the time. Granted, I liked Nirvana, but at the time Bleach was released, they were just one of many Sub Pop/Seattle bands that had that sound. I seem to remember that Mudhoney and Soundgarden were the two bands expected to be biggest out of the Sub Pop scene of the time (at least if you read zines or were in some kind of indie music scene).
Bleach was good, but not something game-changing. Another “chugga-chugga” grunge album. Major labels began cherry picking the top bands (IIRC, Soundgarden was the first to move up) expecting a new Seattle sound, and it was probably just a matter of time before one of the majors figured out the right combination of studio polish and marketing to get their horse out of the gate first. Some bands languished because their handlers had no idea what to do with them once they got them (Mudhoney among them, unfortunately). Nirvana had a bit of street cred (or at least less of a backlash) in being shepherded to DGC through the patronage of Sonic Youth, which also helped burnish their credibility, and the label had plenty of prior experience in selling and handling “alternative” bands (Siouxsie and the Banshees and The Cure on the earlier parent Geffen, Sonic Youth).
I think a pretty good indication of how surprising the success of Nevermind was is the fact that when it hit number 1 and they became huge they were touring Australia. They had been booked for the first Big Day Out as a support for Violent Femmes. Several of the gigs were booked at hotels but moved to larger venues due to their new found fame. There are some reflections by people involved in the tour in this 2 part article and a retrospective of their famous ANU bar gig here.
Sometimes I think of hair metal in terms of 1950’s rock music - some real rock music had come out and gotten everyone’s attention, so wannabe’s like Pat Boone released rock n’ roll albums and had big hits - just like Poison, Whitesnake and that other non-dangerous, fluffy crap in the 80’s.
Nevermind was the Catcher in the Rye within that context - similar in form, polished for crossover appeal, but raw and dangerous in how it tapped into teenage alienation. Kurt Cobain became grunge’s Holden Caulfield…
(Hmm, so what was Appetite for Destruction? Naked Lunch? Last Exit to Brooklyn? ;))
I am a little older than the target audience. I remember sitting in a heavy metal bar right outside of Fort Hood. They had live bands and in between they would play music. I was sitting there drinking a beer when I heard SLTS come over the speakers. Pulled me right out of whatever funk I was in. I immediately needed to know who it was. In context it stood out from the rest. Its hard to look back and see how different it sounded from what was around at the time.
*When We Were Very Young *
My kid, who was born in 1992, went through a Nirvana stage himself in about 7th grade. I’ll never forget him literally running through the door after school, excitedly asking me if I’d ever heard of this “new” band, “uh…I think they’re called Nirvana?” Felt awful telling him about Cobain’s suicide a decade earlier. (But now I know how my mom felt when I developed a decade-too-late crush on Hardy Boys era Shawn Cassidy in the 80’s)
Wait, what my point? I don’t remember. Oh, yes: Nirvana has/had It. The X-factor (the real one, not the TV show). They had that indefinable Something that made people pay attention out of all proportion to their actual innovation or even skill - that thing that good scouts look for and bad promoters try to create. And, they were “lucky” enough to stop making music before they began to suck. The went out at their zenith, and so that’s where they stayed in our CD racks, hearts and mythos.
And yes, in the days before file sharing and customizable playlists, Nirvana and grunge *was * new to those of us who listened to the radio in other states. Here in Chicago, we found out about Nirvana and Pearl Jam right about the same time, and unless you were a DJ or hung out with DJs trading obscure music on mix tapes, Nirvana and Pearl Jam were what you were going to hear on B96, and they sounded *very *different from every goddamn thing on the Billboard 100 from 1990. That’s a big difference in music today; you don’t have to wait for the radio DJ to play something new, you can get a link from a friend to a band’s website and download an album in moments. One “new sound” doesn’t push old sounds out of public consumption any more, but at one time, it really really did. When I was managing a Blockbuster store and corporate tried that awful CD selling experiment, we had, I think, six categories: Country, Rock, Classical, Soundtracks and Urban. Better shoehorn yourself into one of those if you wanted to sell CD’s. We literally didn’t know where to put Nirvana (I think it ended up in Rock.)
::snerk::
Not fair, but a great shot.
Same here. I was quietly amazed at Kurt’s guitar abilities while live on stage. The huge amount of music-y noise they were able to throw out was also jaw dropping (to me).
I was around 30 years old, maybe still 29. It was pretty soon after Nevermind songs started hitting different radio stations in my area.
Still a Foo Fighters fan, btw. They make real pretty noise.
I was at thee 121212 concert. Saw the rest of the band lay with Sir Paul. Does that count?
I think it was all about the right time. The timing for Nirvana was perfect, as was the whole Seattle/Grunge movement. The 80’s glam/hair/pop metal or whatever it must be called was all about looking pretty and partying hard. It was dying out…the copy bands were everywhere…which always leads to less credibility.
Nirvana/Pearl Jam/Soundgarden - they were the exact opposite of the 80’s. It was fresh and new. That’s why it was so successful so quickly.
Nevermind was the poster for the 90’s grunge movement. Truth is, it could’ve been any of the Seattle bands leading the way. It just all depended on who was marketed correctly and what singles were pushed on radio and MTV. (yes, that’s when they still showed videos and they were rather important to the music industry)
Personally, I think Soundgarden was the best grunge band by far.
Yeah! MTV!
I’m wondering if one of those early am shows may have been my first taste?
I remember seeing some stuff that no one would consider mainstream at about 2 or 3 AM on MTV