Grunge was an early 90’s hard rock scene from Seattle that was anti-fashion. Pearl Jam and Alice and Chains don’t sound alike at all to a rock fan , but they’re both Grunge. Stone Temple Pilots “ sound “ grunge, but they’re not, Smashing Pumpkins, Janes Addiction are certainly not, because these bands are not anti fashion, or from Seattle
Grunge like the term punk before it was a catch all term developed by journalists who feel safe when they've labeled and categorized things. Therefore, they lumped bands like Nirvana and Alice in Chains into the same genre even though Nirvana was clearly more from the punk aesthetic and Alice from metal. Therefore a grab bag of bands were thrown into that category although their sounds and influences were quite varied.
Superfuzz bigmuff is grunge but by 1991 every good boy deserves fudge mudhoney had already left it behind. So the term was obsolete even at the time it was first coined
Loved this week in general! Sorry for the book I'm about to write, just inspired by the topic! Turning 13 in 1991, Grunge and Alt took over exactly as I became a teen and the term Grunge was definitely bandied about as much as Alternative and seemed to have a wider definition back then. I think a missing element to this discussion is SONG LYRICS and ANGST which are just as much part of the DNA of grunge as any musical elements. From a perspective of lyrical themes, the Seattle top 4 of PJ, SG, AIC and Nirvana had more in common than they did musically, and I really think THIS is one of the cores of what we saw as Grunge back in the day: The ANGST man! All 4 had it, in different ways. Pearl Jam's Ten always seemed cleaner than the rest and not that grungy to me (other than the vocals, which certainly defined the post grunge sound and the dark tortured lyrical themes)... VS however I thought was much more grungy in its messier guitar attack. Nirvana shared little with PJ musically, but from a lyrical perspective seemed obviously similar back then. Alice in Chains were more metal yea, but the detuned guitars, slower tempos, sour Beatles harmonies added up to Grunge in some inherent way. The lyrical obsession with working out negative addiction and relationship stuff again seemed similar enough to PJ and Nirvana to count them as similar. Finally Soundgarden's more Led Zep type vocal attack from Cornell set them apart a bit from the others but they and Alice and Chains on the other hand seemed to both have the metal/hard rock influence in a similar way. Nirvana came from a more punky almost power pop jangle space and I liked them much less then the other three, but I'm more of a Classic rocker. So, those are bands that I think are still considerably Grunge, along with Screaming Trees and Mudhoney. All these bands share some musical qualities, but most of all ANGST. Mother Love Bone: We definitely all thought they were more in the alt/metal zone a bit. Like a more trad rock Jane's Addiction, but from Seattle. Really for those of us moving from tween to teen who were listening to mainstream metal one year and then alt and grunge the next year, we really noticed all the steps between and were into anything that rocked, so the shift was initially welcomed without concern of genre changing. When AIC's Man in the Box came out it definitely felt comfortably enough metal, but with a more visceral soulful angsty energy from the vocals and riffs, as did Alive from PJ's Ten honestly. And to be honest, Smells Like Teen Sprit really did smash the status quo in ways that those other songs didn't once it hit radio but we could see the same chromatic minor key harmony catchiness that AIC was using. If anything Soundgarden felt the least grunge and the more similar to the Jane's Addictions and Smashing Pumpkins of the world. That said, in the time before Siamese Dream I very much lumped Smashing Pumpkins into a similar space as Jane's Addiction, probably because they both shared a psychedelic/groove influence. And neither as Grunge. Once Siamese Dream came out, because of the sculpted guitar tone, SP seemed very much in their own rarified wall of sound genre of alt rock, which sounded totally new to me, because I didn't really know anything about Shoegaze! BTW a band not mentioned here but to me incredibly tied to the lineage of SP is Weezer. When the Blue album came out, we all thought the guitars sounded a lot like SD. Clearly they were not as majestic or complex but the overall guitar sound that took over the "non post grunge alternative" (I just coined that ha) seemed to come from SP and then Weezer. STP: maybe THEY are the first post grunge? Since they were a band from San Diego mining a sound that literally managed to combine ALL 4 of the Seattle top 4, it seems like that Core could be considered the first post grunge album... or the grandaddy of post grunge?
Agree I thought Man in the box was metal at the time (I think it predated Teen spirit so nobody even talked about grunge or seattle scene at he time). Agree on STP as post grunge. I remember thinking that Plush was by PJ at the time
Swervedriver are surprisingly often considered grunge by a lot of people in America usually, mostly because of their muscular guitar, but they have elements of that, shoegaze, post-britpop, space rock, dream pop, etc. throughout their career. All of those things fall under the category of simply ‘alternative rock’, so let’s just leave it at that!
@setiii5854 they might just be my favorite band, maybe..but here’s my ranking of their albums: 1. Raise (1991); 5/5 stars 2. I Wasn’t Born to Lose You (2015); 5/5 stars 3. Mezcal Head (1993); 5/5 stars 4. Ejector Seat Reservation (1995); 4.5/5 stars 5. Future Ruins (2019); 4.5/5 stars 6. 99th Dream (1998); 4/5 stars
I’ve often seen people classify Helmet as Grunge. Not Grunge. More connected to the east coast noise rock scene and post-hardcore. In my head, grunge peaked in 91 with Nevermind, and was always more of a punk thing than a metal thing. To me Pearl Jam and AIC and even most everything Soundgarden did after Louder than Love is radio rock and metal by ex-grunge musicians. Actual Grunge, as a genre, is early Melvins, Green River, Tad, Skin Yard, Mudhoney and Nirvana being the last of that sound. Screaming Trees early stuff has moments but they were also really psychedelic influenced and had more in common with bands like Husker Du and Puppets.
@@MadailinBurnhopeNone of these bands share any similarities though. Nirvana doesn't sound like Alice In Chains. For it to be a genre, there have to be some defining qualities.
Yeah definitely a Seattle scene thing but to me what always separated "grunge" is that the bands really didn't like being rock stars or celebrated it they were just more focused on the music and rocking out. I have a love/hate relationship with this because I absolutely love 80s rock/metal and think the music was a lot more fun but I also love a lot of the grunge stuff as well/the lyrics were deeper but I feel that Nirvana did try to alienate listeners which I don't like. I prefer Alice in Chains and Soundgarden over Nirvana for sure but I do like Nirvana too. Being a young kid in the 90s Smashing Pumpkins was in that same grouping with the "grunge" bands because they rocked hard but were also alternative/edgy. I think Nirvana fits loosely into grunge but not strictly. They have had a muddy/slimy/grungy sound on a lot of their songs but there is a heavy punk influence too. I agree AIC is more metal than grunge but they do have a very vulnerable/emotive sound which fits more with grunge than metal.
I don't think grunge is anything musical but I do believe there's a link to all these bands lyrically. A lot of self reflection and self hatred. Very raw and emotional. It's the only thing that links all these supposed grunge bands
I agree with Joe, grunge is more of a scene than a genre or style. Did you guys read Everybody Loves Our Town by Mark Yarm? That book nails the definition of Grunge.
Grunge was the Seattle sound, much like how Manchester had its sound. I would not consider any bands outside of Seattle to be grunge, although many like STP jumped on the grunge band wagon. But a band like STP was also definitely California in tone. Bands that vibed allot more with the Seattle sound were other indie bands from more industrial cities such as the Afghan Wigs, and Built to Spill. Grunge was a sludgy heavy dark dank mix of punk, 70s rock, and metal, with a ton of abrupt chord switches. Mudhoney, Melvins, Screaming Trees, SoundGarden, SkinYard. Nirvana, Hole, Hammer Box, The Gits, Seven Year Bitch were all part of this. I would consider Pearl Jam and Alice in Chains grunge just because their music was a part of what we consider to be the whole of the Seattle sound even if those two bands - in very different ways - were different than the majority of the other band's sound. Would also say that Alice n Chains were reluctantly grunge and switched up their sound from edgy LA hair metal to the more heavy sludgy and dark sounds of Seattle once the scene exploded. One more thing, the top 5 were Nirvana, Soundgarden, Pearl Jam, AIC and HOLE. Without a doubt you cannot not observe how important Hole was to the scene, and how many records they sold. Also on another note ,you had the nearby Olympia riot grrrl scene at the same time with Bikini Kill and Sleater Kinney which was also influencing the Seattle sound.
Smashing Pumpkins were never grunge. As a young guy in college when Siamese Dream came out nobody i knew thought of them as "grunge". STP not at all either. They were way too melodic for "grunge"
I always thought Grunge Bands were the big 4 from Seattle(Nirvana, PJ, AIC, Soundgarden) and Screaming Trees and Mudhoney. Basically the Seattle bands. The media tried to lump in Smashing Pumpkins and STP but they never really were. Maybe a case could be made for Core being Grunge. I realize Grunge was just a label basically for bands wearing flannel and blue jeans and writing a lot of downbeat and depressing lyrics. The big 4 from Seattle didn't all have that much in common musically. It was just a way to market the bands and sell clothing basically.
I think that if it was agreed upon that grunge is a style of music, rather than a scene, the bands I'd most closely associate with it are Soundgarden and AIC. A kind of slowed down metal, with classic rock influence, and a bunch of distortion. I'm not convinced Nirvana or Pearl Jam would even qualify! The former blending punk and pop melodies, and the latter, at least the first 3 records, having far more of a classic rock influence, with Jimi McMready. Early Dino Jr., and early STP are sonically similar. Most of the bands mentioned when grunge is discussed; Smashing Pumpkins, Blind Melon, are definitely not grunge. While certain albums, like Metallica's Black Album, Pablo Honey by Radiohead, and Sixteen Stone by Bush, share similarities. There's a lot of variety even within the Seattle bands. As a teenager I was obsessed with Nirvana, and liked Superunknown, Jar of Flies, and Vitalogy, but wasn't a fan of any of the bands; although PJ was the first band I saw live.
I think any band that appeared on the Singles soundtrack has to be at least considered grunge for however brief a piece of their career. Grunge was a few things at the time. Sometimes more low key and sensitive like Lemonheads, who were thought to be part of the grunge scene
I go with Green River, Mudhoney, Alice in Chains, Soundgarden, Pearl Jam, Nirvana, Screaming Trees, and Temple of the Dog. I also include Hole's Live Through This. Outside of those (and in some cases, later albums by the artists listed above), IMHO most acts lumped in with grunge fit more neatly into indie rock, riot grrrl, sludge metal, noise rock, and alternative rock genres. The artists listed have some attachment to a place, attitude, and very generally speaking, sound (that classic rock/punk/metal hybrid). They also share similarities in subject matter. My two cents.
Great topic! Everybody made great points. I do agree that Silverchair and Bush are post-grunge. Imo post-grunge is defined by alt-rock bands who released their major label debut albums after Kurt's death. Silverchair, Spacehog, and Bush definitely fit the post-grunge definition. I agree that Collective Soul isn't grunge but are lumped in it due to their many hits on Alt-Rock radio in the 90s.
Like you (3) so much going back a few months to comment. Grunge - dirty flannels and jeans😂Smashing Pumpkins, a fav certainly more new wave - rock than others mentioned
Perry Farrell has roots as a goth post punk kid. Listen to Psi Com - Xiola or any of the 5 songs on Psi Com’s self-titled EP from ‘85. Triple X Records reissued it in ‘93 and I played that cassette until the tape unraveled. His creative vision was one of America’s saving graces in the 80s, 90s and early 2000s. Happy to hear Jane’s Addiction mentioned in this discussion as part of the musical landscape of the 90s.
I’d agreed that smashing pumpkins are not a grunge band, but they did have a few tracks that I would categorise as grunge. “Siva; “Quiet”; “Today”. Grunge is such a loose term though.
I see grunge as a movement and not as a style of music. Those bands all have different sounds and influences, yet they share that honest (can't find a better word), back to loud guitars/bass/drums, no-frills approach.
Some people try to dismiss grunge as just a regurgitation of '70s hard rock/metal/punk. To some extent, it is, but I also think it recombined them in new and interesting ways.
Soundgarden’s “Hunted Down” “Little Joe” and “Tears To Forget” are grungy gold nuggets. When I made my top singers list, Mark Lanegan’s is the voice I chose to represent this era on the timeline.
I got Facelift when I was 11. Alice was always a metal band that was just able to branch out rather than a grunge band. Also, I know Buzzo would likely hate the association but nobody even brought up The Melvins?
I think Grunge was just a movement…..it was just a timing thing. Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers were considered a new wave band at one point and they were far from being new wave
Grunge is not really a thing. It’s a marketing word. Maybe it was a scene for like, three days. At a push. And the bands I would put in it are Green River, Soundgarden and Alice in Chains. Maybe L7. This isn’t based on quality. There are lots of Washington based bands that I prefer and think are more interesting that I don’t think fit that aesthetic. Nirvana being one. I don’t consider Nirvana grunge. Too much of an arty, noise rock influence from underground bands like The Jesus Lizard and Butthole Surfers for that. Pearl Jam are about as far from Nirvana as you can get, within the real of hard rock (not geographically, maybe). Pearl Jam are a classic rock band twenty years removed, without a shred of punk or art rock or even metal in them. So they don’t fit. They’re like a band that should be on surfer t-shirts. That’s their vibe. The ten album cover is a surfer’s wet dream. They’re also a bit jocky, and just a million miles from Nirvana. Mother love bone fit that vibe too. I could see MLB, Pearl Jam and Soul Asylum being a genre, as they share some aesthetic similarities, but it wouldn’t be called grunge (“spunge” maybe?). The very idea that bands as disparate sounding as Pearl Jam and Nirvana are both supposedly grunge tells you that the concept of grunge is meaningless. lol Then you’ve got Mudhoney, who sound like none of the above. They’re way more dry, and garagey, and totally indebted to bands like The Sonics. Though the term grunge allegedly originated from one of the Green River members, who would go onto form Mudhoney. Maybe Mark Arm. Don’t quote me on that. I don’t think it’s for sure. And the boys are right. Smashing Pumpkins are way too washy and pretty to be grunge. Sonic Youth were art rock, noise rock. Way too experimental. Oh and I can’t believe Kramzer brought up Jane’s Addiction. 🧐 Also, Hansen are probably more authentically grunge than Silverchair lol (even though it doesn’t exist). Hope that clears things up for you boys. I like the channel. 😋
Grunge includes elements of punk rock and heavy metal and often expresses a bleak or nihilistic outlook and often comes out of Seattle bands and comes with a grungy fashion style. Grunge can be a subgenre of alternative rock. Might be best to use it as a loose label. You guys have me thinking there may be no true grunge band. I don't feel much grunge in Smashing Pumpkins (as Joe says "too pretty") but in songs like "Today". I do feel it in Soundgarden, Nirvana, maybe PJ Harvey in a song like "Rid of Me", Mother Love Bone, Alice in Chains, and a couple of songs by Dino Jr (my favorite borderline grunge band or best among all these contenders). Maybe Dead and Bloated or Sex Type Thing or even the pretty but deadly 'Plush' by STP is grunge? Maybe Soundgarden's Spoonman. Blacks Days could be and is such a great grungy song. Keanu Reeves and Angelina Jolie could be our most acclaimed grunge actors. Brad Pitt was a wanna-be grunger.
I always interpreted Alice in Chains as a grunge band because the sounded so dirty even though the first album was almost metal. maybe it was the detuned guitars. I always used them as the base along with early soundgarden and worked outwards from there.
I think of Grunge as the stuff I was into around '89-'91. It was the sound of bands from the early Hardcore and Indie Rock scene that started adding the influence of Classic Rock and Metal into their sound. Mudhoney, TAD, The Melvins, L7, Dinosaur Jr, 7 Year Bitch, Screaming Trees, Green River, Laughing Hyenas, Big Chief, Paw, Willard, and Love Battery are some examples. If there is one quintessential Grunge band it's Mudhoney. Sonic Youth were hugely influential to that scene but are ultimately too much their own thing to be included. I do agree that Goo and Dirty could be considered Grunge albums. They're certainly Grunge adjacent. Nirvana and Soundgarden came from that scene and are definitely part of it, even though Soundgarden's sound evolved away from it by Superunknown. Alice In Chains were pretty much just a Metal band (except that some of their acoustic stuff is almost like a darker version of the kind of college Rock bands like REM and 10,000 Maniacs did.) Pearl Jam is kind of part of it because the members were in Green River but other than a few songs on Vitalogy and No Code they didn't have the sound. Jane's Addiction used to be lumped in with RHCP, Primus, Faith No More, Living Colour, and Fishbone as something called "Funk Metal". Stone Temple Pilots, Smashing Pumpkins, Blind Melon, and Live are not Grunge. Toadies actually to my ears have the sound, but I don't know enough about them to say if they fit or not.
I think it's easy... just classify pretty much every band you mentioned as "alternative rock: or "alternative metal". In reality that's what it all was... an alternative form of rock/metal (a reaction) to the vapid glut of glam/hair bands at the time. The term "grunge" was a scene term for that Seattle area by the media, thats how it started, and then somehow stuck when Nirvana broke nationally, not only bringing attention to those Seattle bands/peers but all of the alternative bands in that wake that were jumping from indie to majors. MTV at that time had "Alternative Nation" hour everyday, not Grunge Nation. It's only lazy fans and journalists over the years who lumped in bands like Smashing Pumpkins, Live, STP, etc...
The Smashing Pumpkins are not grunge band but a song like 'Here is No Why' is very grungy. If grunge is a music and not a scene, some records of STP, Live, Bush, Hole (etc) are legit grunge. Alice in Chains have grunge lyrics and melody with metal guitar works. It's like listing nu-metal bands, only the fans know what is grunge
I’m definitely in the camp that thinks that Grunge is both a music genre and a scene/subculture. I was a junior in high school when Grunge hit its nation-wide zeitgeist. I DO consider Alice In Chains, STP, Bush and Candlebox as Grunge, though the former two if you want to call post-grunge, I’m ok with that. Same with Foo Fighters. I agree that Gish and Siamese Dream sound a bit grungy, but I don’t classically put Smashing Pumpkins in that genre, but I don’t care enough to fight that battle. Amongst the most quintessential Grunge Bands: Nirvana Pearl Jam Soundgarden Alice In Chains Screaming Trees Mudhoney Temple of the Dog Hole Bands that are NOT grunge: The Presidents of the United States Radiohead (obvious now, but wasn’t as clear to some in 1993)
I agree with you on everything aside from Candlebox being fair to consider post-grunge since they started the same year as Pearl Jam and AIC. Bush is absolutely post-grunge though since they are a British band who's first album came in 1995, same as Foo Fighters.
It´s not that complicated. There simply is no such thing as grunge in terms of a music genre. It was just a handy marketing term for lazy music journalists and A&R people. And yes, that´s kind of a lazy depiction from my part but still quite accurate.
Grunge is a fashion best term , as in they look ‘grungy’, which is why the term when used to describe the music is iffy at best, and is a never ending discussion. It’s fashion.
Gonna have to agree with Jason. Alice in Chains are pretty grungy. But this video definitely made me reexamine what I consider to be the criteria for grunge rock.
I’m from Seattle and lived throughout this era. I was part of it. I keep talking to the TV, so I’ll add this: it’s a very limited range of bands who fall under “Grunge” - I agree with some of the panel, but you left out a BIG one, literally, TAD!! and Gruntruck, and MUDHONEY! (who formed from the ashes of, yes, good call: GREEN RIVER) and failed to mention Sub-Pop Records (!!). Alice In Chains were adrift from this scene, they were metal band from the East Side - “Grunge “ was also a term no one bought into and wasn’t really a thing until after Nevermind came out, but as a sensibility was strictly limited to Seattle indie clubs and venues.
As a guy that was in high school in the early 90s, I'd say if it's the early 90s, you're from the NW, playing rock with distorted guitars, have an irreverent/damaged vibe, have punk/classic rock influences, wear flannels and resale shop clothes, play tunes not focused on sex or partying, THEN you are in the Grunge Sphere, although maybe not 100% Grunge. More music was labeled alternative back then as opposed to grunge, and in the early 90s alternative basically meant rock that did not arise to fame in the 80s. People were more hung up on decades back then and killing the 80s was a real thing.
I do think what is and isn't grunge is always a little bit of a headache. As you've demonstrated with this discussion and within almost every discussion I have had in my life on this topic, there never ever seems to be a clear consensus. To me, I am conflicted. On one hand there is the argument to be made for the definition Jason gave - which I think is really the best and closest definition but then Joe also has a good point, since most the artists that come from the scene themselves don't consider it a real thing. I read a fantastic oral history on the topic called Everyone Loves Our Town by Mark Yarm (not to be confused with Mark Arm lol) and what I remember from reading that was there was no clear conclusion on this topic but it discussed many of these debates. Still I'd recommend that book regardless. At the end of the day, I definitely agree Smashing Pumpkins are not grunge. The influences are different and it's just the wrong vibe for me. Other bands mentioned like Soul Asylum also aren't grunge because they belong more to the scene that Husker Du and The Replacements came from and actually pre-date grunge anyway. Sonic Youth is for sure not grunge but I think they made a couple albums in the early 90s when they may have been a bit inspired by the movement while putting their own spin on it. Anyway, even though I am super conflicted on this topic I obviously love to discuss it anyway. 😅
The best grunge band has to be Tad. Their first couple of albums nail the essence of grunge, with their second one, 8-Way Santa (1991), standing as easily the best grunge album ever made. They also weren’t “pretty” and marketable like Nirvana.
According to the so called "grunge" bands, grunge was never a thing. Just a word used by the media to describe what was happening. But if you absolutely have to define it, Joe is the closest. But he has to add Mudhoney and Screaming Trees.
It makes sense too because a lot of those bands hung out and collaborated together. And Cobain was inspired by Soundgarden’s early success, that led to some of those bands breaking through. It’s more of a scene I think, I don’t consider it an actual style or genre of music. But if I wanted to get technical with it I’d say it’s punk and metal influenced. Some early Soundgarden tracks are just straight up hardcore punk or metal songs. There’s also a definite classic rock aspect as well. Soundgarden mixed Zeppelin with Sabbath. PJ’s Ten almost functions as a classic rock album. And it’s true that AIC isn’t really punk influenced yet they could be the “grungiest” band of them all, and very influential for what came in the 2000’s. I would just call it alternative rock. It’s hard to pin down exactly what all these different bands did and lump them all into one genre. That’s why the whole post-grunge label bothers me as well, except those bands from that scene were a lot less unique.
That whole post Grunge era, was kind of embarrassing. I thought of Bush and Coll. Soul right away, and acts who shamelessly jumped on that wagon. Or Hollywood film stars on the red carpet, with a flannel shirt tied around the waist LOL. Grunge was more a scene of the audience and fans. Any band that is halfway decent will have some kind of integrity, and identity. So they will right away want to distance themselves from the pack. P. Jam and Nirvana; Faith no More was adamant about not being grunge. Especially once M Patton took over. Same with P Jam. I remember reading an interview with Billy Corgan, where he said 'Fuk everyone. I love Zep, and I love strings. I'm going to do what I like". And this was way before, it was cool to say this. The pre Grunge bands are IMo the most interesting - early Nirvana, MLBone, Kyuss.
Highly subjective. About half of the Singles soundtrack was grunge. Cornell added an edge, but now matter how kickass, say, Jesus Christ Pose was, it sure didn't say grunge the way Hey Hey, My My (Into the Black) did. Vedder's "yawling" was at one point so copied that the Seattle bar scene got tedious.
Love this topic!! Grunge has become a word just as dirty as its guitars..which is a shame because good music is good music no matter what box or category we are trying to put it in. If you want to define grunge as a "scene" only, as Joe suggests, and not dirty guitars, less consonance and major chords/keys vs more dissonance and minor chord/keys use, certain vocal styles, then Nirvana would be the quintessential example of a grunge "scene" band. Putting the music aside, the clothing alone and lifestyle and anti-establishment sentiments and acceptance of things that are "different" to the mainstream, echoed all over America and beyond.. Some of those voices, Layne, Kurt, Eddie, Cornell, etc.. helped define a generation..and influenced many other artists.. Cough, CREED, you lame fakers lol I agree Alice in Chains are definitely metal at their core, but what separates them from most other metal of the time, is their use of minor keys dissonance etc.. So it bleeds into alternative.. Great discussion.. I could rant on all day, but I won't..lots of music, err, food for thought.. XO
Grunge isn't a genre of music. It is term describing a decade of fashion, a renaissance of aesthetically punk adjacent messages and comes off more as an umbrella marketing term used to create hype. These people pushed the boundaries of the establishment of genre in music with slick multi-layered multi-genre rock and pop songs. It was just a fresh coat of paint revival of the music they grew up on with modern sentiments. PS: From my knowledge nobody from Hole is from Seattle.
Nirvana was punk, Alice in Chains were metal, Pearl Jam were classic rock. Grunge was a made up term defined outside of the scene that record labels and mainstream media used to sell "products". Labeling music is dumb anyway ("this is a big issue in punk as well). I love all of those bands, but always hated the term "grunge".
I know this isn’t entirely on topic but something nefarious happened to American “alternative” rock radio stations in the mid to late 90s. First of all, these were not truly college radio stations but corporate conglomerates. 💰 The post-grunge bands did not appeal to me at all. Everyone trying to do a bad impression of Eddie Vedder or Layne Staley. Just think of many of the bands that played at Woodstock ‘99. I listened to a lot of 80s music in this time period. It was better to go backwards at that point. The “NYC” scene of the early 2000s, garage, post-punk revival, dance punk etc. bands freshened things up a bit after that. It would be interesting to see you guys cover some of those bands. Again, a faux scene of bands lumped together for marketing purposes, just like grunge. And later this happened in the 2010s with “indie” bands. I understand that we have to categorize music in some way with these labels, but when you boil it down, it starts to mean nada. It is interesting to think back on the different eras and follow the trends in music, fashion and movies. Loved this discussion.
I had a long discussion with my friend Jon ( Digital Gramophone ) & pretty much everything bad about music in the 90's was " highlighted " at Woodstock 99. What a terrible bill. Poor Elvis Costello got stuck on one morning 🌄. 105 today ! 🔥 🥵
@@bengalgangster 😆 .. " It's A Dry Heat " No humidity. It's normally in the 80's where I live further up north. That Heat Dome is smothering the Southwest.
@@michelewiese48 he can suck it up , he is in the cool part of the state lol kidding it sucks what they are both going thru i dont know how david or deb put up with that!! been going on for weeks!!
Grunge/indie bands never made much money , and filled rented community hall basements in cities and towns with playing discrepancies in the one-off acts and lack of melody structure with free for all segueing along with too much volume peeking,smoking,fighting and intoxication(s). I've been to a basement hall in the winter of 1991 with rolled tissues for ear protection and still covering the ears while probably 90% there didn't bother, to be fashionable in the occasion, they've had to have the beginning of premature hearing loss by the end; coughing and spitting out brown smoke inhalation into the snow ,considering the large room was completely fogged out with the floor covered with splintered drum sticks ,cigarette ashe and empty square liquor bottles on the steps of the entrance stairs,but most of all couldn't recall one supposed song and care less. *BillyCorgan* can replicate the sound of grunge but has strong musical theory and production talent to be a true grunge act.
Grunge imo was a sonic ambiance with some fashion overtone. Mudhoney early Soundgarden etc 1989 and before. Seattle area. It was location. Akin somewhat to the 1960s west coast Haight Ashbury groups Everywhere else in the USA, local music scenes was influenced by neo hippie folk pop and funk rap.
Here's another cover The Replacements did that may have influenced grunge bands. I think that whole '80s Minneapolis scene is the petri dish for what would come out of Seattle in the '90s. th-cam.com/video/S4RyjwIdwxc/w-d-xo.html
Grunge is Alternative Rock with influences from Punk Rock, Hard Rock, and Heavy Metal. Post-Grunge, on the other hand, is not Grunge. These artists were influenced by 90s Grunge acts like Nirvana, Pearl Jam, Soundgarden, etc., but Post-Grunge is not a sub-genre or offshoot of Grunge.
I felt like the term “grunge” was just a marketing term by labels and the media for the wave of music coming out at the time. None of the “grunge” bands referred to themselves as such. You have “grunge” music with the “grunge” fashion. In some ways the sound of those bands reflected the term: Fuzzy, distorted, nasty, dirty, and raw sounding. But we can’t just say that any band that had a distorted, heavy or raw sound around the late 80s/early 90s was “grunge”. Otherwise you could say stuff like: The Jesus Lizard, Helmet, Unsane, Melvins, Rollins Band, Dinosaur Jr., Sonic Youth, Meat Puppets, Sunny Day Real Estate (a Seattle and SubPop band too btw) or the riot grrrl stuff (Bikini Kill, Babes in Toyland, L7, 7 Year Bitch etc.) and countless others fall into that catch-all term too. I don’t think there is a right or wrong answer- I just view it as mainly a marketing thing.
Too many genres. Personally, I prefer fewer genres, although I understand their appeal and utility in trying to describe artists who share somewhat similar sounds. I put anything considered remotely grunge into the not-very-helpful-but-still-helpful genre of hard rock. Not quite metal. Not quite punk. But borrowed sounds and attitudes from both as well as from rock bands like Led Zeppelin, the Rolling Stones, the Stooges, the Doors, and a lot of other staples of classic 60s and 70s rock. I don't consider lyrical themes at all, because if grunge is indeed a thing, Mudhoney is most certainly one of the original grunge bands. But all their angst, if they even have any, is tongue-in-cheek and ironic. They were jokers and clowns more than depressives. So put me down in the grunge-isn't-a-thing category. Also, I have never and will probably never consider alternative and indie as genres. I know I'm tilting at windmills here, but those two terms originated in the 80s to describe non-metal rock bands who couldn't get on the radio (except college radio), couldn't get on MTV (except on 120 Minutes), or couldn't get record deals with major labels. They were alternative to mainstream rock or independent in that they were on independent record labels rather than Warner/Elektra/Atlantic, CBS/Columbia/Epic, RCA, EMI, Polygram, and MCA. Sonic Youth, Replacements, R.E.M., Throwing Muses, Dead Milkmen, Beat Happening, Minutemen, Fishbone, Dream Syndicate, Violent Femmes, these were all considered independent or alternative bands, not because they sounded similar, but because they were all more or less equally obscure and part of a nationwide network of clubs, labels, and rock rags that focused on these left of the dial artists. More scene than sound, so maybe Joe's onto something with his definition of grunge. He wins today, naturally. 🤘
Grunge is such a grungy word. “Grunge” sounds like it should be muddy and not trying super hard to me commercial. Screaming Trees seems like a decent example of grunge. By the end of your discussion I couldn’t help but laugh. Being a purist is generally a pointless exercise.
I think you've missed one major characteristic of grunge: the lyrics. The whole Gen X post-Reagan depression and the personal struggles around it. Imagine Kurt Cobain would sing about babes at the pool drinking pina colada. Would it still be grunge? Looking back at it, I think it's just what heavy punk rock sounded like in the early 90s in and around Seattle, the one honest & grimy alternative to the glossy hairspray mainstream of the time. There are bands from other times and other places that have a similar vibe, but in these cases you usually hear the influence of the individual bands rather than that of grunge as a whole.
In my opinion grunge was a thing. But now there are numerous sub-genre names. So grunge only applies to older bands from the late 80's and 90's. I dunno. Btw I got into Mark Lanegan's acoustic music in the 90's, only later actually listening to Screaming Trees
For me, personally (I was born in 1972) Grunge, if it was a musical style it had to have a punk attitude, it's anti style and anti fashion. Alice In Chains and Pearl Jam were too radio friendly and ambitious, remember Man In The Box had decent radio play and was in regular rotation on MTV in late 1990. If I had to choose what the essential Grunge recordings are I would pick Mudhoney's early singles, Superfuzz Bigmuff EP and the S/T LP, Melvins-Ozma, Tad-God's Balls and Nirvana-Bleach. As for Green River, Screaming Trees and Soundgarden they are (to me at least) adjacent to the Paisley Underground scene (but quite heavier}, they evoke bands like Cream and Led Zeppelin, whereas Grunge was more Sabbath meets The Stooges via post hardcore. Which isn't to say they weren't great. I think that by the time the term gained popularity the fans had tired of labels. Good times, god I'm old.
It's a tough line. Jane's Addiction are def not grunge. I'd say "alt-metal"? STP are a tough one. Def the first two albums fit the tag but after that they go big into glam/psych. Live's Throwing Copper? Debatable but prob still closer to alt rock. Early Soundgarden/Silverchair/Mudhoney, def grunge. And idk how anyone could NOT call Bleach grunge. To me that's pretty much THE sound of the genre
I guess i'll just comment on the biggest "grunge" bands. I agree with the punk/70s rock/metal component, but not the Seattle-centric one. 1. Nirvana: "Nevermind" is grunge but I don't think any of their other albums are. 2. Pearl Jam: not grunge. zero punk in their music. 3. Soundgarden: definitely started out as grunge, but by "Louder Than Love" it was fading and by "Badmotorfinger" it was gone. 4. Alice in Chains: not grunge. no punk elements either. 5. Mother Love Bone: see AIC and PJ 6. Screaming Trees: I came in at "Uncle Anesthesia" and never went back in their discography, unfortunately. I don't think there's enough punk there. But again, I know very little about their early material. 7. Mudhoney: are there any 70s rock or metal elements here? pretty much just punk/alternative. 8. Hole: see Mudhoney 9. Stone Temple Pilots: don't see a lot of punk here either. 10. Blind Melon: no punk, no metal, no grunge
According to Joes' defn then UK bands can't be called punk cause their not from the New York? It's really all just alternative/indie with some styles originating in Manchester/Seattle.
janes addiction hair metal? i really hate labels lol!! can the bands visit seattle? is there time limit? i never thought of candlebox as grunge ever, but i do love them!! babes in toyland good call !! pj harvey to out there for grundge!! Mad season? whatever it is , its at the top of its class!!🐯🐯
Maybe the classic Seattle bands not all sounding like they have the exact same influences is a strength... grunge as a process or as a reaction rather than some cookie-cutter thing. Nirvana is the least chopsy and the most arty and pixies-ish, Alice In Chains has the most metal influnece sound while Soundgarden takes Black Sabbath and downtunes it even further. Poor old Pearl Jam end up being the band that all the wannabes aped.
Kinda my 2¢ on grunge, or many other sub genres for that matter, is that this is a discussion for gatekeepers. As far as I try to use genre is to describe a bands tendencies rather than a hard finite set of rules or sounds. The problem is the initial standards for most genre is/was set by programmers and the industry for marketing purposes. Anything before that is an unorganized scene with like minded musician feeding off each other. By the time any of it gets to mainstream airplay it has already been homogenized and becomes the standard of the genre, which is why bands like Nirvana, Pearl Jam, AIC, and STP became the idea of grunge in the early 90s. Joe may be right in only two band carried the initial DNA of grunge, but it would never had made it to a brief cultural phenomenon if the bands that became the names of grunge didn't tweak their sound for a wider audience. Off my soapbox and time for lunch.
Definitely not grunge, although from Seattle, and not on Sub pop, but Popllama instead (initially). But am I alone in 'earing' some traces of the grunge 'sound' in part of the Posies' - clearly a power pop band - catalog? A song like 'Dream all day ('Frosting on the beater', '93), some songs in 'Amazing disgrace'('96), and above all 'Success' ('98), to me at least, sound grungy-like.
Grunge was a scene and not a sound.. Washington state bands playing in Seattle in the late 80’s to early 90’s was Grunge. STP were from San Diego. They don’t even classify themselves as a Grunge band. Smashing Pumpkins: Chicago represent. They were on the Singles soundtrack but not a Grunge band. Jane’s Addiction: college radio and California alternative all the way. Alice in Chains: started as hair metal on the club scene but evolved into quintessential grunge by the time they had a record deal. Nirvana: absolutely Post Punk and Grunge. Bikini Kill: Riot Grrrl and also Grunge. Hole: despite the connection to Nirvana, they are not a Grunge band Foo Fighters: not a Grunge band even though they were formed in Seattle- too late. And so on….. Lots of bands influenced Grunge. Even contemporaries like Pixies, Sonic Youth, Redd Kross, Butthole Surfers, Jane’s Addiction, were influences. Grunge bands frequently influenced one another. One of the things that is unique about Grunge is that, although we try to label them together, none of the Grunge bands really sounded that much alike which itself is why the Seattle club circuit back then was so fricken cool.
I think many bands were Grunge for an album or two, like Pearl Jam, Soundgarden, Nirvana or Alice In Chains or even Neil Young. Pure Grunge bands are rare. Temple Of The Dog, Green River, okay, Screaming Trees, yeah. Sonic Youth never. They were idols to Grunge bands. How about rating Sebadoh sometimes?
The first PJ Harvey album was initially released on Indie label Too Pure ( Home Of Stereolab ) The second one was on Island 🏝 but was definitely " Grunge " & Produced By Steve Albini.
If the category of "Grunge" were based on soley location, how could we NOT include Jimi Hendrix on that list? From 1967? Not even close!! Hendrix is at the start of the genre called "Classic Rock" instead. Soul Asylumn of 1993 would be at the end of the "Classic Rock" era. Neither would be considered part of the Grunge era in rock music.
If any of you feel that Nirvana didn't begin the grunge movement .. you are out of your minds. Smells Like Teen Spirit totally kicked off that entire shift in direction.
Sorry guys, but this is one of the silliest conversations treated with absolute sincerity you’ve had on the channel, and certainly pointless. Listing bands and arguing whether they’re grunge or not? Come on, it depends on your own perspective on just what ‘grunge’ represents, and what does it matter? It’s so specifically related to a time and place it has little relevance beyond that. Either you like the kind of music a band makes or you don’t, the label doesn’t matter.
Pumpkins were absolutely grunge on their first two albums. They had much sleeker guitar tones than the grunge mainstays, but their whole brooding nihilistic approach fit in very well. With Mellon Collie, they absolutely transcend the subgenre. Nirvana was certainly more edgy and alt than AIC, Soundgsrden, Pearl Jam, but there was a lot of classic metal (in the ‘70s sense) on their two big label albums.
I like Joe's definition that grunge is more of a Seattle scene than anything else! 😊
Can't say I disagree. When I hear the word grunge, I think of Seattle and the Sub-Pop label.
Grunge was an early 90’s hard rock scene from Seattle that was anti-fashion. Pearl Jam and Alice and Chains don’t sound alike at all to a rock fan , but they’re both Grunge. Stone Temple Pilots “ sound “ grunge, but they’re not, Smashing Pumpkins, Janes Addiction are certainly not, because these bands are not anti fashion, or from Seattle
It’s not just the Seattle scene it’s a genre
Grunge like the term punk before it was a catch all term developed by journalists who feel safe when they've labeled and categorized things. Therefore, they lumped bands like Nirvana and Alice in Chains into the same genre even though Nirvana was clearly more from the punk aesthetic and Alice from metal. Therefore a grab bag of bands were thrown into that category although their sounds and influences were quite varied.
Superfuzz bigmuff is grunge but by 1991 every good boy deserves fudge mudhoney had already left it behind. So the term was obsolete even at the time it was first coined
Loved this week in general! Sorry for the book I'm about to write, just inspired by the topic!
Turning 13 in 1991, Grunge and Alt took over exactly as I became a teen and the term Grunge was definitely bandied about as much as Alternative and seemed to have a wider definition back then. I think a missing element to this discussion is SONG LYRICS and ANGST which are just as much part of the DNA of grunge as any musical elements.
From a perspective of lyrical themes, the Seattle top 4 of PJ, SG, AIC and Nirvana had more in common than they did musically, and I really think THIS is one of the cores of what we saw as Grunge back in the day: The ANGST man! All 4 had it, in different ways. Pearl Jam's Ten always seemed cleaner than the rest and not that grungy to me (other than the vocals, which certainly defined the post grunge sound and the dark tortured lyrical themes)... VS however I thought was much more grungy in its messier guitar attack. Nirvana shared little with PJ musically, but from a lyrical perspective seemed obviously similar back then. Alice in Chains were more metal yea, but the detuned guitars, slower tempos, sour Beatles harmonies added up to Grunge in some inherent way. The lyrical obsession with working out negative addiction and relationship stuff again seemed similar enough to PJ and Nirvana to count them as similar. Finally Soundgarden's more Led Zep type vocal attack from Cornell set them apart a bit from the others but they and Alice and Chains on the other hand seemed to both have the metal/hard rock influence in a similar way. Nirvana came from a more punky almost power pop jangle space and I liked them much less then the other three, but I'm more of a Classic rocker. So, those are bands that I think are still considerably Grunge, along with Screaming Trees and Mudhoney. All these bands share some musical qualities, but most of all ANGST.
Mother Love Bone: We definitely all thought they were more in the alt/metal zone a bit. Like a more trad rock Jane's Addiction, but from Seattle. Really for those of us moving from tween to teen who were listening to mainstream metal one year and then alt and grunge the next year, we really noticed all the steps between and were into anything that rocked, so the shift was initially welcomed without concern of genre changing. When AIC's Man in the Box came out it definitely felt comfortably enough metal, but with a more visceral soulful angsty energy from the vocals and riffs, as did Alive from PJ's Ten honestly. And to be honest, Smells Like Teen Sprit really did smash the status quo in ways that those other songs didn't once it hit radio but we could see the same chromatic minor key harmony catchiness that AIC was using. If anything Soundgarden felt the least grunge and the more similar to the Jane's Addictions and Smashing Pumpkins of the world.
That said, in the time before Siamese Dream I very much lumped Smashing Pumpkins into a similar space as Jane's Addiction, probably because they both shared a psychedelic/groove influence. And neither as Grunge. Once Siamese Dream came out, because of the sculpted guitar tone, SP seemed very much in their own rarified wall of sound genre of alt rock, which sounded totally new to me, because I didn't really know anything about Shoegaze! BTW a band not mentioned here but to me incredibly tied to the lineage of SP is Weezer. When the Blue album came out, we all thought the guitars sounded a lot like SD. Clearly they were not as majestic or complex but the overall guitar sound that took over the "non post grunge alternative" (I just coined that ha) seemed to come from SP and then Weezer.
STP: maybe THEY are the first post grunge? Since they were a band from San Diego mining a sound that literally managed to combine ALL 4 of the Seattle top 4, it seems like that Core could be considered the first post grunge album... or the grandaddy of post grunge?
Agree I thought Man in the box was metal at the time (I think it predated Teen spirit so nobody even talked about grunge or seattle scene at he time). Agree on STP as post grunge. I remember thinking that Plush was by PJ at the time
The 3-legged dog AiC album is one of the grunge classics. It's a sound. STP's first 2 albums too.
Swervedriver are surprisingly often considered grunge by a lot of people in America usually, mostly because of their muscular guitar, but they have elements of that, shoegaze, post-britpop, space rock, dream pop, etc. throughout their career. All of those things fall under the category of simply ‘alternative rock’, so let’s just leave it at that!
Not this American! haha
@@retlaw190Thank fuck!
@setiii5854 they might just be my favorite band, maybe..but here’s my ranking of their albums:
1. Raise (1991); 5/5 stars
2. I Wasn’t Born to Lose You (2015); 5/5 stars
3. Mezcal Head (1993); 5/5 stars
4. Ejector Seat Reservation (1995); 4.5/5 stars
5. Future Ruins (2019); 4.5/5 stars
6. 99th Dream (1998); 4/5 stars
I’ve often seen people classify Helmet as Grunge. Not Grunge. More connected to the east coast noise rock scene and post-hardcore.
In my head, grunge peaked in 91 with Nevermind, and was always more of a punk thing than a metal thing. To me Pearl Jam and AIC and even most everything Soundgarden did after Louder than Love is radio rock and metal by ex-grunge musicians. Actual Grunge, as a genre, is early Melvins, Green River, Tad, Skin Yard, Mudhoney and Nirvana being the last of that sound. Screaming Trees early stuff has moments but they were also really psychedelic influenced and had more in common with bands like Husker Du and Puppets.
Grunge I’ve always thought of as more of a scene. Prevalent in the early 90s
the bands were central to the scene
@@MadailinBurnhopeNone of these bands share any similarities though. Nirvana doesn't sound like Alice In Chains. For it to be a genre, there have to be some defining qualities.
Tad and The Melvins epitomise grunge to me.
Yeah definitely a Seattle scene thing but to me what always separated "grunge" is that the bands really didn't like being rock stars or celebrated it they were just more focused on the music and rocking out. I have a love/hate relationship with this because I absolutely love 80s rock/metal and think the music was a lot more fun but I also love a lot of the grunge stuff as well/the lyrics were deeper but I feel that Nirvana did try to alienate listeners which I don't like. I prefer Alice in Chains and Soundgarden over Nirvana for sure but I do like Nirvana too. Being a young kid in the 90s Smashing Pumpkins was in that same grouping with the "grunge" bands because they rocked hard but were also alternative/edgy. I think Nirvana fits loosely into grunge but not strictly. They have had a muddy/slimy/grungy sound on a lot of their songs but there is a heavy punk influence too. I agree AIC is more metal than grunge but they do have a very vulnerable/emotive sound which fits more with grunge than metal.
It’s as tricky to pin down as what constituted a Mod band here in the UK…
I don't think grunge is anything musical but I do believe there's a link to all these bands lyrically. A lot of self reflection and self hatred. Very raw and emotional. It's the only thing that links all these supposed grunge bands
If you made it on the “Singles” soundtrack………
there certainatly some good soundtracks then
Yes my favorite grunge band the Jimi Hendrix experience
I agree with Joe, grunge is more of a scene than a genre or style.
Did you guys read Everybody Loves Our Town by Mark Yarm? That book nails the definition of Grunge.
Same, grunge brought more of a culture than a new type of music.
It's all about the scene or, where you were swingin' on the flippity-flop in wack slacks as the kids used to say back in the day.
Grunge was the Seattle sound, much like how Manchester had its sound. I would not consider any bands outside of Seattle to be grunge, although many like STP jumped on the grunge band wagon. But a band like STP was also definitely California in tone. Bands that vibed allot more with the Seattle sound were other indie bands from more industrial cities such as the Afghan Wigs, and Built to Spill. Grunge was a sludgy heavy dark dank mix of punk, 70s rock, and metal, with a ton of abrupt chord switches. Mudhoney, Melvins, Screaming Trees, SoundGarden, SkinYard. Nirvana, Hole, Hammer Box, The Gits, Seven Year Bitch were all part of this. I would consider Pearl Jam and Alice in Chains grunge just because their music was a part of what we consider to be the whole of the Seattle sound even if those two bands - in very different ways - were different than the majority of the other band's sound. Would also say that Alice n Chains were reluctantly grunge and switched up their sound from edgy LA hair metal to the more heavy sludgy and dark sounds of Seattle once the scene exploded. One more thing, the top 5 were Nirvana, Soundgarden, Pearl Jam, AIC and HOLE. Without a doubt you cannot not observe how important Hole was to the scene, and how many records they sold. Also on another note ,you had the nearby Olympia riot grrrl scene at the same time with Bikini Kill and Sleater Kinney which was also influencing the Seattle sound.
Sleater-Kinney is grrreeeaaaat, but they didn't come along until the grunge scene was basically over with.
Smashing Pumpkins were never grunge. As a young guy in college when Siamese Dream came out nobody i knew thought of them as "grunge". STP not at all either. They were way too melodic for "grunge"
I always thought Grunge Bands were the big 4 from Seattle(Nirvana, PJ, AIC, Soundgarden) and Screaming Trees and Mudhoney. Basically the Seattle bands. The media tried to lump in Smashing Pumpkins and STP but they never really were. Maybe a case could be made for Core being Grunge. I realize Grunge was just a label basically for bands wearing flannel and blue jeans and writing a lot of downbeat and depressing lyrics. The big 4 from Seattle didn't all have that much in common musically. It was just a way to market the bands and sell clothing basically.
I think that if it was agreed upon that grunge is a style of music, rather than a scene, the bands I'd most closely associate with it are Soundgarden and AIC. A kind of slowed down metal, with classic rock influence, and a bunch of distortion.
I'm not convinced Nirvana or Pearl Jam would even qualify! The former blending punk and pop melodies, and the latter, at least the first 3 records, having far more of a classic rock influence, with Jimi McMready.
Early Dino Jr., and early STP are sonically similar. Most of the bands mentioned when grunge is discussed; Smashing Pumpkins, Blind Melon, are definitely not grunge. While certain albums, like Metallica's Black Album, Pablo Honey by Radiohead, and Sixteen Stone by Bush, share similarities.
There's a lot of variety even within the Seattle bands. As a teenager I was obsessed with Nirvana, and liked Superunknown, Jar of Flies, and Vitalogy, but wasn't a fan of any of the bands; although PJ was the first band I saw live.
I think any band that appeared on the Singles soundtrack has to be at least considered grunge for however brief a piece of their career. Grunge was a few things at the time. Sometimes more low key and sensitive like Lemonheads, who were thought to be part of the grunge scene
STP IS GRUNGE, SMASHING PUMPKINS IS NOT
I don’t consider Alice In Chains to be grunge. They opened for Megadeth and Van Halen. I consider them more in the metal category.
I go with Green River, Mudhoney, Alice in Chains, Soundgarden, Pearl Jam, Nirvana, Screaming Trees, and Temple of the Dog. I also include Hole's Live Through This. Outside of those (and in some cases, later albums by the artists listed above), IMHO most acts lumped in with grunge fit more neatly into indie rock, riot grrrl, sludge metal, noise rock, and alternative rock genres. The artists listed have some attachment to a place, attitude, and very generally speaking, sound (that classic rock/punk/metal hybrid). They also share similarities in subject matter. My two cents.
Great topic! Everybody made great points. I do agree that Silverchair and Bush are post-grunge. Imo post-grunge is defined by alt-rock bands who released their major label debut albums after Kurt's death. Silverchair, Spacehog, and Bush definitely fit the post-grunge definition. I agree that Collective Soul isn't grunge but are lumped in it due to their many hits on Alt-Rock radio in the 90s.
Like you (3) so much going back a few months to comment. Grunge - dirty flannels and jeans😂Smashing Pumpkins, a fav certainly more new wave - rock than others mentioned
Perry Farrell has roots as a goth post punk kid. Listen to Psi Com - Xiola or any of the 5 songs on Psi Com’s self-titled EP from ‘85. Triple X Records reissued it in ‘93 and I played that cassette until the tape unraveled. His creative vision was one of America’s saving graces in the 80s, 90s and early 2000s. Happy to hear Jane’s Addiction mentioned in this discussion as part of the musical landscape of the 90s.
I’d agreed that smashing pumpkins are not a grunge band, but they did have a few tracks that I would categorise as grunge. “Siva; “Quiet”; “Today”. Grunge is such a loose term though.
Huge fan of Pumpkins but those are three songs I can live without, I'll put Disarm, Thirty Three and Tristessa in that box as well.
I see grunge as a movement and not as a style of music. Those bands all have different sounds and influences, yet they share that honest (can't find a better word), back to loud guitars/bass/drums, no-frills approach.
Some people try to dismiss grunge as just a regurgitation of '70s hard rock/metal/punk. To some extent, it is, but I also think it recombined them in new and interesting ways.
Soundgarden’s “Hunted Down”
“Little Joe” and “Tears To Forget” are grungy gold nuggets. When I made my top singers list, Mark Lanegan’s is the voice I chose to represent this era on the timeline.
will always be layne staley for me as i had you listen to the mad season album you loved
I got Facelift when I was 11. Alice was always a metal band that was just able to branch out rather than a grunge band. Also, I know Buzzo would likely hate the association but nobody even brought up The Melvins?
Definitely The Melvins and Tad,
I think Grunge was just a movement…..it was just a timing thing. Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers were considered a new wave band at one point and they were far from being new wave
in 1976?
Grunge is not really a thing. It’s a marketing word. Maybe it was a scene for like, three days. At a push. And the bands I would put in it are Green River, Soundgarden and Alice in Chains. Maybe L7. This isn’t based on quality. There are lots of Washington based bands that I prefer and think are more interesting that I don’t think fit that aesthetic. Nirvana being one. I don’t consider Nirvana grunge. Too much of an arty, noise rock influence from underground bands like The Jesus Lizard and Butthole Surfers for that.
Pearl Jam are about as far from Nirvana as you can get, within the real of hard rock (not geographically, maybe). Pearl Jam are a classic rock band twenty years removed, without a shred of punk or art rock or even metal in them. So they don’t fit. They’re like a band that should be on surfer t-shirts. That’s their vibe. The ten album cover is a surfer’s wet dream. They’re also a bit jocky, and just a million miles from Nirvana. Mother love bone fit that vibe too. I could see MLB, Pearl Jam and Soul Asylum being a genre, as they share some aesthetic similarities, but it wouldn’t be called grunge (“spunge” maybe?). The very idea that bands as disparate sounding as Pearl Jam and Nirvana are both supposedly grunge tells you that the concept of grunge is meaningless. lol
Then you’ve got Mudhoney, who sound like none of the above. They’re way more dry, and garagey, and totally indebted to bands like The Sonics. Though the term grunge allegedly originated from one of the Green River members, who would go onto form Mudhoney. Maybe Mark Arm. Don’t quote me on that. I don’t think it’s for sure.
And the boys are right. Smashing Pumpkins are way too washy and pretty to be grunge. Sonic Youth were art rock, noise rock. Way too experimental. Oh and I can’t believe Kramzer brought up Jane’s Addiction. 🧐
Also, Hansen are probably more authentically grunge than Silverchair lol (even though it doesn’t exist).
Hope that clears things up for you boys. I like the channel. 😋
Grunge includes elements of punk rock and heavy metal and often expresses a bleak or nihilistic outlook and often comes out of Seattle bands and comes with a grungy fashion style. Grunge can be a subgenre of alternative rock. Might be best to use it as a loose label.
You guys have me thinking there may be no true grunge band. I don't feel much grunge in Smashing Pumpkins (as Joe says "too pretty") but in songs like "Today". I do feel it in Soundgarden, Nirvana, maybe PJ Harvey in a song like "Rid of Me", Mother Love Bone, Alice in Chains, and a couple of songs by Dino Jr (my favorite borderline grunge band or best among all these contenders). Maybe Dead and Bloated or Sex Type Thing or even the pretty but deadly 'Plush' by STP is grunge? Maybe Soundgarden's Spoonman. Blacks Days could be and is such a great grungy song.
Keanu Reeves and Angelina Jolie could be our most acclaimed grunge actors. Brad Pitt was a wanna-be grunger.
I always interpreted Alice in Chains as a grunge band because the sounded so dirty even though the first album was almost metal. maybe it was the detuned guitars. I always used them as the base along with early soundgarden and worked outwards from there.
I think some of the post punk stuff that Bad Brains did was essentially Grunge. Gretchen goes to Nebraska King's X was Grunge.
Gretchen is a classic album 👌 ..Best album of 1988. Musicians know.
I think of Grunge as the stuff I was into around '89-'91. It was the sound of bands from the early Hardcore and Indie Rock scene that started adding the influence of Classic Rock and Metal into their sound. Mudhoney, TAD, The Melvins, L7, Dinosaur Jr, 7 Year Bitch, Screaming Trees, Green River, Laughing Hyenas, Big Chief, Paw, Willard, and Love Battery are some examples. If there is one quintessential Grunge band it's Mudhoney.
Sonic Youth were hugely influential to that scene but are ultimately too much their own thing to be included. I do agree that Goo and Dirty could be considered Grunge albums. They're certainly Grunge adjacent.
Nirvana and Soundgarden came from that scene and are definitely part of it, even though Soundgarden's sound evolved away from it by Superunknown. Alice In Chains were pretty much just a Metal band (except that some of their acoustic stuff is almost like a darker version of the kind of college Rock bands like REM and 10,000 Maniacs did.) Pearl Jam is kind of part of it because the members were in Green River but other than a few songs on Vitalogy and No Code they didn't have the sound.
Jane's Addiction used to be lumped in with RHCP, Primus, Faith No More, Living Colour, and Fishbone as something called "Funk Metal".
Stone Temple Pilots, Smashing Pumpkins, Blind Melon, and Live are not Grunge.
Toadies actually to my ears have the sound, but I don't know enough about them to say if they fit or not.
I think it's easy... just classify pretty much every band you mentioned as "alternative rock: or "alternative metal". In reality that's what it all was... an alternative form of rock/metal (a reaction) to the vapid glut of glam/hair bands at the time. The term "grunge" was a scene term for that Seattle area by the media, thats how it started, and then somehow stuck when Nirvana broke nationally, not only bringing attention to those Seattle bands/peers but all of the alternative bands in that wake that were jumping from indie to majors. MTV at that time had "Alternative Nation" hour everyday, not Grunge Nation. It's only lazy fans and journalists over the years who lumped in bands like Smashing Pumpkins, Live, STP, etc...
The Smashing Pumpkins are not grunge band but a song like 'Here is No Why' is very grungy. If grunge is a music and not a scene, some records of STP, Live, Bush, Hole (etc) are legit grunge. Alice in Chains have grunge lyrics and melody with metal guitar works. It's like listing nu-metal bands, only the fans know what is grunge
I’m definitely in the camp that thinks that Grunge is both a music genre and a scene/subculture. I was a junior in high school when Grunge hit its nation-wide zeitgeist.
I DO consider Alice In Chains, STP, Bush and Candlebox as Grunge, though the former two if you want to call post-grunge, I’m ok with that. Same with Foo Fighters.
I agree that Gish and Siamese Dream sound a bit grungy, but I don’t classically put Smashing Pumpkins in that genre, but I don’t care enough to fight that battle.
Amongst the most quintessential Grunge Bands:
Nirvana
Pearl Jam
Soundgarden
Alice In Chains
Screaming Trees
Mudhoney
Temple of the Dog
Hole
Bands that are NOT grunge:
The Presidents of the United States
Radiohead (obvious now, but wasn’t as clear to some in 1993)
I agree with you on everything aside from Candlebox being fair to consider post-grunge since they started the same year as Pearl Jam and AIC. Bush is absolutely post-grunge though since they are a British band who's first album came in 1995, same as Foo Fighters.
It´s not that complicated. There simply is no such thing as grunge in terms of a music genre. It was just a handy marketing term for lazy music journalists and A&R people. And yes, that´s kind of a lazy depiction from my part but still quite accurate.
I seem to recall a couple of weeks ca. late 1991 when Teenage Fanclub fell into the grunge slipstream. Hard to believe it today, I know.
Grunge is a fashion best term , as in they look ‘grungy’, which is why the term when used to describe the music is iffy at best, and is a never ending discussion. It’s fashion.
Gonna have to agree with Jason. Alice in Chains are pretty grungy. But this video definitely made me reexamine what I consider to be the criteria for grunge rock.
Good topic considering its Pumpkins week. Genre labels are always difficult.
I’m from Seattle and lived throughout this era. I was part of it. I keep talking to the TV, so I’ll add this: it’s a very limited range of bands who fall under “Grunge” - I agree with some of the panel, but you left out a BIG one, literally, TAD!! and Gruntruck, and MUDHONEY! (who formed from the ashes of, yes, good call: GREEN RIVER) and failed to mention Sub-Pop Records (!!). Alice In Chains were adrift from this scene, they were metal band from the East Side - “Grunge “ was also a term no one bought into and wasn’t really a thing until after Nevermind came out, but as a sensibility was strictly limited to Seattle indie clubs and venues.
As a guy that was in high school in the early 90s, I'd say if it's the early 90s, you're from the NW, playing rock with distorted guitars, have an irreverent/damaged vibe, have punk/classic rock influences, wear flannels and resale shop clothes, play tunes not focused on sex or partying, THEN you are in the Grunge Sphere, although maybe not 100% Grunge. More music was labeled alternative back then as opposed to grunge, and in the early 90s alternative basically meant rock that did not arise to fame in the 80s. People were more hung up on decades back then and killing the 80s was a real thing.
I do think what is and isn't grunge is always a little bit of a headache. As you've demonstrated with this discussion and within almost every discussion I have had in my life on this topic, there never ever seems to be a clear consensus. To me, I am conflicted. On one hand there is the argument to be made for the definition Jason gave - which I think is really the best and closest definition but then Joe also has a good point, since most the artists that come from the scene themselves don't consider it a real thing. I read a fantastic oral history on the topic called Everyone Loves Our Town by Mark Yarm (not to be confused with Mark Arm lol) and what I remember from reading that was there was no clear conclusion on this topic but it discussed many of these debates. Still I'd recommend that book regardless.
At the end of the day, I definitely agree Smashing Pumpkins are not grunge. The influences are different and it's just the wrong vibe for me. Other bands mentioned like Soul Asylum also aren't grunge because they belong more to the scene that Husker Du and The Replacements came from and actually pre-date grunge anyway. Sonic Youth is for sure not grunge but I think they made a couple albums in the early 90s when they may have been a bit inspired by the movement while putting their own spin on it. Anyway, even though I am super conflicted on this topic I obviously love to discuss it anyway. 😅
well said as always🤝🤝
The best grunge band has to be Tad. Their first couple of albums nail the essence of grunge, with their second one, 8-Way Santa (1991), standing as easily the best grunge album ever made. They also weren’t “pretty” and marketable like Nirvana.
But most importantly, they weren’t that good which is why no one remembers them. - Joe
According to the so called "grunge" bands, grunge was never a thing. Just a word used by the media to describe what was happening. But if you absolutely have to define it, Joe is the closest. But he has to add Mudhoney and Screaming Trees.
It makes sense too because a lot of those bands hung out and collaborated together. And Cobain was inspired by Soundgarden’s early success, that led to some of those bands breaking through. It’s more of a scene I think, I don’t consider it an actual style or genre of music. But if I wanted to get technical with it I’d say it’s punk and metal influenced. Some early Soundgarden tracks are just straight up hardcore punk or metal songs.
There’s also a definite classic rock aspect as well. Soundgarden mixed Zeppelin with Sabbath. PJ’s Ten almost functions as a classic rock album. And it’s true that AIC isn’t really punk influenced yet they could be the “grungiest” band of them all, and very influential for what came in the 2000’s. I would just call it alternative rock. It’s hard to pin down exactly what all these different bands did and lump them all into one genre. That’s why the whole post-grunge label bothers me as well, except those bands from that scene were a lot less unique.
That whole post Grunge era, was kind of embarrassing. I thought of Bush and Coll. Soul right away, and acts who shamelessly jumped on that wagon. Or Hollywood film stars on the red carpet, with a flannel shirt tied around the waist LOL.
Grunge was more a scene of the audience and fans. Any band that is halfway decent will have some kind of integrity, and identity. So they will right away want to distance themselves from the pack. P. Jam and Nirvana; Faith no More was adamant about not being grunge. Especially once M Patton took over. Same with P Jam. I remember reading an interview with Billy Corgan, where he said 'Fuk everyone. I love Zep, and I love strings. I'm going to do what I like". And this was way before, it was cool to say this.
The pre Grunge bands are IMo the most interesting - early Nirvana, MLBone, Kyuss.
Highly subjective. About half of the Singles soundtrack was grunge. Cornell added an edge, but now matter how kickass, say, Jesus Christ Pose was, it sure didn't say grunge the way Hey Hey, My My (Into the Black) did. Vedder's "yawling" was at one point so copied that the Seattle bar scene got tedious.
Love this topic!! Grunge has become a word just as dirty as its guitars..which is a shame because good music is good music no matter what box or category we are trying to put it in. If you want to define grunge as a "scene" only, as Joe suggests, and not dirty guitars, less consonance and major chords/keys vs more dissonance and minor chord/keys use, certain vocal styles, then Nirvana would be the quintessential example of a grunge "scene" band. Putting the music aside, the clothing alone and lifestyle and anti-establishment sentiments and acceptance of things that are "different" to the mainstream, echoed all over America and beyond.. Some of those voices, Layne, Kurt, Eddie, Cornell, etc.. helped define a generation..and influenced many other artists.. Cough, CREED, you lame fakers lol
I agree Alice in Chains are definitely metal at their core, but what separates them from most other metal of the time, is their use of minor keys dissonance etc.. So it bleeds into alternative..
Great discussion.. I could rant on all day, but I won't..lots of music, err, food for thought..
XO
Grunge isn't a genre of music. It is term describing a decade of fashion, a renaissance of aesthetically punk adjacent messages and comes off more as an umbrella marketing term used to create hype. These people pushed the boundaries of the establishment of genre in music with slick multi-layered multi-genre rock and pop songs. It was just a fresh coat of paint revival of the music they grew up on with modern sentiments.
PS: From my knowledge nobody from Hole is from Seattle.
I kinda think of the guitar having to be sludgy. I'm surprised that the Melvin's never came up once by any of the guys.
Nirvana was punk, Alice in Chains were metal, Pearl Jam were classic rock. Grunge was a made up term defined outside of the scene that record labels and mainstream media used to sell "products". Labeling music is dumb anyway ("this is a big issue in punk as well). I love all of those bands, but always hated the term "grunge".
The true definition of grunge was bands from Seattle, downstrokes, dirty flannels and ripped jeans. Singers that mumbled.
Janes Addiction were not part of the Hair Metal scene in LA.
No, but it’s pretty easy to see how being around it rubbed off on them
Kind of thought of them as being Heroin Rock.
I know this isn’t entirely on topic but something nefarious happened to American “alternative” rock radio stations in the mid to late 90s. First of all, these were not truly college radio stations but corporate conglomerates. 💰 The post-grunge bands did not appeal to me at all. Everyone trying to do a bad impression of Eddie Vedder or Layne Staley. Just think of many of the bands that played at Woodstock ‘99. I listened to a lot of 80s music in this time period. It was better to go backwards at that point. The “NYC” scene of the early 2000s, garage, post-punk revival, dance punk etc. bands freshened things up a bit after that. It would be interesting to see you guys cover some of those bands. Again, a faux scene of bands lumped together for marketing purposes, just like grunge. And later this happened in the 2010s with “indie” bands.
I understand that we have to categorize music in some way with these labels, but when you boil it down, it starts to mean nada. It is interesting to think back on the different eras and follow the trends in music, fashion and movies. Loved this discussion.
I had a long discussion with my friend Jon ( Digital Gramophone ) & pretty much everything bad about music in the 90's was " highlighted " at Woodstock 99. What a terrible bill. Poor Elvis Costello got stuck on one morning 🌄. 105 today ! 🔥 🥵
@@davidellis5141 its 103 now where deb is , dont get why either one of you live there lol i live pretty close to woodstock
@@bengalgangster 😆 .. " It's A Dry Heat " No humidity. It's normally in the 80's where I live further up north. That Heat Dome is smothering the Southwest.
@@davidellis5141🍧🧊🕶️
@@michelewiese48 he can suck it up , he is in the cool part of the state lol kidding it sucks what they are both going thru i dont know how david or deb put up with that!! been going on for weeks!!
Being from the Seattle area during the era grunge wasn't really a thing. The music was more garage/punk.
Grunge/indie bands never made much money , and filled rented community hall basements in cities and towns with playing discrepancies in the one-off acts and lack of melody structure with free for all segueing along with too much volume peeking,smoking,fighting and intoxication(s). I've been to a basement hall in the winter of 1991 with rolled tissues for ear protection and still covering the ears while probably 90% there didn't bother, to be fashionable in the occasion, they've had to have the beginning of premature hearing loss by the end; coughing and spitting out brown smoke inhalation into the snow ,considering the large room was completely fogged out with the floor covered with splintered drum sticks ,cigarette ashe and empty square liquor bottles on the steps of the entrance stairs,but most of all couldn't recall one supposed song and care less. *BillyCorgan* can replicate the sound of grunge but has strong musical theory and production talent to be a true grunge act.
Grunge imo was a sonic ambiance with some fashion overtone.
Mudhoney early Soundgarden etc 1989 and before. Seattle area. It was location. Akin somewhat to the 1960s west coast Haight Ashbury groups
Everywhere else in the USA, local music scenes was influenced by neo hippie folk pop and funk rap.
This entire conversation just proves that Grunge isn't a genre. You can't even agree on a defining sound.
Here's another cover The Replacements did that may have influenced grunge bands. I think that whole '80s Minneapolis scene is the petri dish for what would come out of Seattle in the '90s. th-cam.com/video/S4RyjwIdwxc/w-d-xo.html
Grunge is Alternative Rock with influences from Punk Rock, Hard Rock, and Heavy Metal. Post-Grunge, on the other hand, is not Grunge. These artists were influenced by 90s Grunge acts like Nirvana, Pearl Jam, Soundgarden, etc., but Post-Grunge is not a sub-genre or offshoot of Grunge.
I felt like the term “grunge” was just a marketing term by labels and the media for the wave of music coming out at the time. None of the “grunge” bands referred to themselves as such. You have “grunge” music with the “grunge” fashion. In some ways the sound of those bands reflected the term: Fuzzy, distorted, nasty, dirty, and raw sounding. But we can’t just say that any band that had a distorted, heavy or raw sound around the late 80s/early 90s was “grunge”. Otherwise you could say stuff like: The Jesus Lizard, Helmet, Unsane, Melvins, Rollins Band, Dinosaur Jr., Sonic Youth, Meat Puppets, Sunny Day Real Estate (a Seattle and SubPop band too btw) or the riot grrrl stuff (Bikini Kill, Babes in Toyland, L7, 7 Year Bitch etc.) and countless others fall into that catch-all term too. I don’t think there is a right or wrong answer- I just view it as mainly a marketing thing.
Well, glad you cleared that up. 😟
Was eddie vedder from seattle?
Too many genres. Personally, I prefer fewer genres, although I understand their appeal and utility in trying to describe artists who share somewhat similar sounds. I put anything considered remotely grunge into the not-very-helpful-but-still-helpful genre of hard rock. Not quite metal. Not quite punk. But borrowed sounds and attitudes from both as well as from rock bands like Led Zeppelin, the Rolling Stones, the Stooges, the Doors, and a lot of other staples of classic 60s and 70s rock. I don't consider lyrical themes at all, because if grunge is indeed a thing, Mudhoney is most certainly one of the original grunge bands. But all their angst, if they even have any, is tongue-in-cheek and ironic. They were jokers and clowns more than depressives. So put me down in the grunge-isn't-a-thing category.
Also, I have never and will probably never consider alternative and indie as genres. I know I'm tilting at windmills here, but those two terms originated in the 80s to describe non-metal rock bands who couldn't get on the radio (except college radio), couldn't get on MTV (except on 120 Minutes), or couldn't get record deals with major labels. They were alternative to mainstream rock or independent in that they were on independent record labels rather than Warner/Elektra/Atlantic, CBS/Columbia/Epic, RCA, EMI, Polygram, and MCA. Sonic Youth, Replacements, R.E.M., Throwing Muses, Dead Milkmen, Beat Happening, Minutemen, Fishbone, Dream Syndicate, Violent Femmes, these were all considered independent or alternative bands, not because they sounded similar, but because they were all more or less equally obscure and part of a nationwide network of clubs, labels, and rock rags that focused on these left of the dial artists. More scene than sound, so maybe Joe's onto something with his definition of grunge. He wins today, naturally. 🤘
Grunge is such a grungy word. “Grunge” sounds like it should be muddy and not trying super hard to me commercial. Screaming Trees seems like a decent example of grunge. By the end of your discussion I couldn’t help but laugh. Being a purist is generally a pointless exercise.
I think you've missed one major characteristic of grunge: the lyrics. The whole Gen X post-Reagan depression and the personal struggles around it. Imagine Kurt Cobain would sing about babes at the pool drinking pina colada. Would it still be grunge?
Looking back at it, I think it's just what heavy punk rock sounded like in the early 90s in and around Seattle, the one honest & grimy alternative to the glossy hairspray mainstream of the time. There are bands from other times and other places that have a similar vibe, but in these cases you usually hear the influence of the individual bands rather than that of grunge as a whole.
I agree with Kram, Alice in Chains is more metal than anything else.
In my opinion grunge was a thing. But now there are numerous sub-genre names. So grunge only applies to older bands from the late 80's and 90's. I dunno. Btw I got into Mark Lanegan's acoustic music in the 90's, only later actually listening to Screaming Trees
For me, personally (I was born in 1972) Grunge, if it was a musical style it had to have a punk attitude, it's anti style and anti fashion.
Alice In Chains and Pearl Jam were too radio friendly and ambitious, remember Man In The Box had decent radio play and was in regular rotation on MTV in late 1990. If I had to choose what the essential Grunge recordings are I would pick Mudhoney's early singles, Superfuzz Bigmuff EP and the S/T LP, Melvins-Ozma, Tad-God's Balls and Nirvana-Bleach.
As for Green River, Screaming Trees and Soundgarden they are (to me at least) adjacent to the Paisley Underground scene (but quite heavier}, they evoke bands like Cream and Led Zeppelin, whereas Grunge was more Sabbath meets The Stooges via post hardcore. Which isn't to say they weren't great.
I think that by the time the term gained popularity the fans had tired of labels.
Good times, god I'm old.
It's a tough line. Jane's Addiction are def not grunge. I'd say "alt-metal"? STP are a tough one. Def the first two albums fit the tag but after that they go big into glam/psych. Live's Throwing Copper? Debatable but prob still closer to alt rock. Early Soundgarden/Silverchair/Mudhoney, def grunge. And idk how anyone could NOT call Bleach grunge. To me that's pretty much THE sound of the genre
When I think grunge, I think of grimey heroin addicts. Low energy personalities playing chords with rusty strings. Cigarette holes in everything.
grunge is the 2022 "the batman"
I guess i'll just comment on the biggest "grunge" bands. I agree with the punk/70s rock/metal component, but not the Seattle-centric one.
1. Nirvana: "Nevermind" is grunge but I don't think any of their other albums are.
2. Pearl Jam: not grunge. zero punk in their music.
3. Soundgarden: definitely started out as grunge, but by "Louder Than Love" it was fading and by "Badmotorfinger" it was gone.
4. Alice in Chains: not grunge. no punk elements either.
5. Mother Love Bone: see AIC and PJ
6. Screaming Trees: I came in at "Uncle Anesthesia" and never went back in their discography, unfortunately. I don't think there's enough punk there. But again, I know very little about their early material.
7. Mudhoney: are there any 70s rock or metal elements here? pretty much just punk/alternative.
8. Hole: see Mudhoney
9. Stone Temple Pilots: don't see a lot of punk here either.
10. Blind Melon: no punk, no metal, no grunge
According to Joes' defn then UK bands can't be called punk cause their not from the New York? It's really all just alternative/indie with some styles originating in Manchester/Seattle.
Punk has no home. - Joe
@@TastesLikeMusic Well yep. Congrats on your new addition 🎉
I’ve always thought Rage is grunge
Kind of loose, hard to define genre. I associate Grunge with the early Sub Pop label releases: Nirvana, Soundgarden, Mudhoney and Tad
janes addiction hair metal? i really hate labels lol!! can the bands visit seattle? is there time limit? i never thought of candlebox as grunge ever, but i do love them!! babes in toyland good call !! pj harvey to out there for grundge!! Mad season? whatever it is , its at the top of its class!!🐯🐯
Maybe the classic Seattle bands not all sounding like they have the exact same influences is a strength... grunge as a process or as a reaction rather than some cookie-cutter thing. Nirvana is the least chopsy and the most arty and pixies-ish, Alice In Chains has the most metal influnece sound while Soundgarden takes Black Sabbath and downtunes it even further. Poor old Pearl Jam end up being the band that all the wannabes aped.
Kinda my 2¢ on grunge, or many other sub genres for that matter, is that this is a discussion for gatekeepers. As far as I try to use genre is to describe a bands tendencies rather than a hard finite set of rules or sounds.
The problem is the initial standards for most genre is/was set by programmers and the industry for marketing purposes. Anything before that is an unorganized scene with like minded musician feeding off each other. By the time any of it gets to mainstream airplay it has already been homogenized and becomes the standard of the genre, which is why bands like Nirvana, Pearl Jam, AIC, and STP became the idea of grunge in the early 90s. Joe may be right in only two band carried the initial DNA of grunge, but it would never had made it to a brief cultural phenomenon if the bands that became the names of grunge didn't tweak their sound for a wider audience.
Off my soapbox and time for lunch.
Neil young with crazy horse
Definitely not grunge, although from Seattle, and not on Sub pop, but Popllama instead (initially). But am I alone in 'earing' some traces of the grunge 'sound' in part of the Posies' - clearly a power pop band - catalog? A song like 'Dream all day ('Frosting on the beater', '93), some songs in 'Amazing disgrace'('96), and above all 'Success' ('98), to me at least, sound grungy-like.
Grunge was a scene and not a sound.. Washington state bands playing in Seattle in the late 80’s to early 90’s was Grunge.
STP were from San Diego. They don’t even classify themselves as a Grunge band.
Smashing Pumpkins: Chicago represent. They were on the Singles soundtrack but not a Grunge band.
Jane’s Addiction: college radio and California alternative all the way.
Alice in Chains: started as hair metal on the club scene but evolved into quintessential grunge by the time they had a record deal.
Nirvana: absolutely Post Punk and Grunge.
Bikini Kill: Riot Grrrl and also Grunge.
Hole: despite the connection to Nirvana, they are not a Grunge band
Foo Fighters: not a Grunge band even though they were formed in Seattle- too late.
And so on…..
Lots of bands influenced Grunge. Even contemporaries like Pixies, Sonic Youth, Redd Kross, Butthole Surfers, Jane’s Addiction, were influences. Grunge bands frequently influenced one another. One of the things that is unique about Grunge is that, although we try to label them together, none of the Grunge bands really sounded that much alike which itself is why the Seattle club circuit back then was so fricken cool.
Posies you think is grunge? Interesting band, frosting on the beater is an underrated album 🔥
Great band. Not grunge.
Joe forgot Mudhoney - they're definitely grunge.
And the Melvins! Although, I suppose Melvins could be categorized as proto-grunge.
@@AbbeyRoadkill1 They're still putting out cool music too. I saw a concert they did in someone's living room on TH-cam recently and it was great.
Dont ever call Smashing Pumpkins grunge. SP could play all of nevermind. Nirvana cant play Gish or SM if they had another 5 years to practice.
I think many bands were Grunge for an album or two, like Pearl Jam, Soundgarden, Nirvana or Alice In Chains or even Neil Young. Pure Grunge bands are rare. Temple Of The Dog, Green River, okay, Screaming Trees, yeah. Sonic Youth never. They were idols to Grunge bands. How about rating Sebadoh sometimes?
The first PJ Harvey album was initially released on Indie label Too Pure ( Home Of Stereolab ) The second one was on Island 🏝 but was definitely " Grunge " & Produced By Steve Albini.
had a real hard time liking pj harvey!! glad your back safe from your road trip!!
@bengalgangster 😎 .. I exchanged a few words with your New Mexico friend. Nice person 👍
@@davidellis5141 yah she told, you both are , !!
@bengalgangster Thanks Bengal 🐅
If the category of "Grunge" were based on soley location, how could we NOT include Jimi Hendrix on that list? From 1967? Not even close!! Hendrix is at the start of the genre called "Classic Rock" instead. Soul Asylumn of 1993 would be at the end of the "Classic Rock" era. Neither would be considered part of the Grunge era in rock music.
Jimi Hendrix embraced fashion, part of Grunge is a look. Also he was over 20 years earlier
@@painless465 Also, The Experience were technically an English band.
@@painless465 Also, Bing Crosby was from Seattle, not a part of the Grunge era by any means!!
Temple of the dog, mad season, aic, screaming trees and soundgarden are grunge. Nirvana, pearl jam, pumpkins not grunge. End of.
If any of you feel that Nirvana didn't begin the grunge movement .. you are out of your minds. Smells Like Teen Spirit totally kicked off that entire shift in direction.
Grunge was alive and well before Nirvana but they made it a national deal.
Napalm Beach?
Grunge grew out of the Punk scene.
True
Partially, yes. But grunge took a lot from '70s hard rock and metal, too.
@@AbbeyRoadkill1 Metal took a lot from Punk also.
@@vinylrichie007 Black metal and grindcore, maybe. Certainly not power metal.
@@echosmyron1278 Thrash.
Mudhoney is the only grunge band
What about Meatpuppets?
Bros. You forgot TAD
Always forget about TAD. - Joe
Sorry guys, but this is one of the silliest conversations treated with absolute sincerity you’ve had on the channel, and certainly pointless. Listing bands and arguing whether they’re grunge or not? Come on, it depends on your own perspective on just what ‘grunge’ represents, and what does it matter? It’s so specifically related to a time and place it has little relevance beyond that. Either you like the kind of music a band makes or you don’t, the label doesn’t matter.
Everything matters.
Pumpkins were absolutely grunge on their first two albums. They had much sleeker guitar tones than the grunge mainstays, but their whole brooding nihilistic approach fit in very well. With Mellon Collie, they absolutely transcend the subgenre.
Nirvana was certainly more edgy and alt than AIC, Soundgsrden, Pearl Jam, but there was a lot of classic metal (in the ‘70s sense) on their two big label albums.