Any of you guys Pearl Jam fans?

[Alex]

I'd say the Canadians and Scots had some of the best 90s bands....Barenaked Ladies, Sloan, Rheostatics...Teenage Fanclub, Belle and Sebastian, BMX Bandits...  Us yanks had some good stuff, too. Weezer, Flaming Lips, Magnetic Fields, That Dog, Neutral Milk Hotel, Apples In Stereo, Pavement, Yo La Tengo, Gin Blossoms, Presidents of the United States of America, Spin Doctors, Nada Surf, Primitive Radio Gods, Beat Happening... And of course the UK stuff...Stereolab, High Llamas, Super Furry Animals, early Radiohead, early Oasis, Blur, etc. The 90s was a great decade for music if you ignore the Shania Twains, Mariah Careys, and the endless refried post-grunge and nu-metal bands.

[Newguy562]

Mods please lock this thread because this has gotten ridiculous

[lance]

Too many folks judge the Brit scene by Oasis. The real deals were Pulp, Spiritualized, Suede, Blur, etc.

With the exception of Spiritualized, don't you think they are kind of backwards looking?

 In the end, I'm just not very moved by a lot of that stuff,  though Spiritualized and Blur are great. I guess it's just personal taste(as always.)

[I. Spaceman]

Well, maybe some of it is backwards looking, but a lot of the greatest rock and roll is. It has gone downhill since the end of the 70's, and most of the originality moved to the dance and hip-hop fields. Now, those genres are fairly played out as well.
But, a good song will always be a good song, even if it is a ripoff.

[Newguy562]

GUYS STAY ON SUBJECT DAMN IT!!

[SMiLE Brian]

With the crappy economic conditions currently worldwide, I am surprised punk/ alternative hasn't gotten big on the charts again. I think this way because the young people should be rebelling against the crappy overproduced top-40 radio/ government conditions.

[the captain]

With the crappy economic conditions currently worldwide, I am surprised punk/ alternative hasn't gotten big on the charts again. I think this way because the young people should be rebelling against the crappy overproduced top-40 radio/ government conditions.

By the time a real trend hits the charts now, it's been co-opted. Check youtube or bandcamp (or whatever other) hits instead.

Ian's point about the shift in creativity away from natural instruments beginning some 35 years ago is important, too: a lot of young, musical minds don't pick up a guitar, but rather a computer.

[Chocolate Shake Man]

90s American music is much better than 90s British music, I think.

Well, 90s American music had one major achievement which was to remove every rebellious element of the genre.

There is some truth to that I think but I hardly think that Brit-Pop was breaking much new ground, either. Some of them did have some bratty snottiness, but so did Billy Corgan or whoever. As far as the music goes, I thought that there was a little more originality in the American scene than the British one, although I'll admit it was maybe not the best decade for music overall anywhere.  It was really interesting how fast the underground thing got commodified and started sucking.

I am not particularly interested in what broke new ground or what was original - neither are particularly important factors to me when evaluating art. British music in the 90s though cultivated an enormous culture - it brought the youth back to music and it did so with a major political force. It was a reaction against years of conservative rule and reflected and, perhaps, even inspired, a major sea change in mainstream thinking that had been for years reducing the English working class to little better than the criminal element and the shame of the nation. Britpop not only gave the crowd that had been virtually silened during Thatcherism a voice, they also gave them songs of hope. The American music movement during the same period was nowhere near as culturally relevant. While British musicians were reviving a silenced element of the population, American rock stars were busy trying to prove that the genre in which they worked really was dead while hip hop artists embarrassed them every single day when it came to being culturally relevant and motivating the youth.

[lance]

So what is an important factor? Whether or not the youth of a particular nation respond positively to it? I mean, I see what you're saying and it's a good case. It's just that I'm not really interested in 'movements' and 'trends' as a means to judge music-- we are just coming at it from different points of view, I think.
Also, I would guess that it is nearly impossible for a musical trend to be as culturally significant in the States as it could be in the UK, anyway The culture in the States was just too fractured back then. Within their various subcultures the music of the US was relevant, but yeah, didn't mean much in the vast scheme of things.
 

[I. Spaceman]

GUYS STAY ON SUBJECT DAMN IT!!

Be quiet. This convo is far more interesting that some stupid thread about Pearl Jam.

[Newguy562]

GUYS STAY ON SUBJECT DAMN IT!!

Be quiet. This convo is far more interesting that some stupid thread about Pearl Jam.

Start your own thread and get off of mine!

[Mike's Beard]

90s American music is much better than 90s British music, I think.

Well, 90s American music had one major achievement which was to remove every rebellious element of the genre.

There is some truth to that I think but I hardly think that Brit-Pop was breaking much new ground, either. Some of them did have some bratty snottiness, but so did Billy Corgan or whoever. As far as the music goes, I thought that there was a little more originality in the American scene than the British one, although I'll admit it was maybe not the best decade for music overall anywhere.  It was really interesting how fast the underground thing got commodified and started sucking.

I am not particularly interested in what broke new ground or what was original - neither are particularly important factors to me when evaluating art. British music in the 90s though cultivated an enormous culture - it brought the youth back to music and it did so with a major political force. It was a reaction against years of conservative rule and reflected and, perhaps, even inspired, a major sea change in mainstream thinking that had been for years reducing the English working class to little better than the criminal element and the shame of the nation. Britpop not only gave the crowd that had been virtually silened during Thatcherism a voice, they also gave them songs of hope.

Really? I must have been living in a different UK at the time. Britpop was mainly middle class twits like Blur/Pulp pretending they were working class. Honestly, I think Blur were one step away from covering "My Old Man's a Dustman"!
The 'Baggy' scene from a few years earlier was the last time Britain had anything decent to offer the music scene - Britpop was just bands blatantly recycling The Beatles and The Kinks.

[Chocolate Shake Man]

I never saw Pulp pretending to be anything they weren't but, yeah, Blur I can see. But anyway, what would be wrong with Blur covering "My Old Man is a Dustman." I don't know why English musicians revere American musicians in touch with their roots and simultaneously deny their own. You don't think The Stone Roses and The La's weren't just the earliest examples of what ultimately became Britpop?

[Chocolate Shake Man]

I'd say the Canadians and Scots had some of the best 90s bands....Barenaked Ladies, Sloan, Rheostatics...

Erm...thank you for mentioning the Rheostatics! We need to talk about this! I'm about to start a Whale Music thread in the General Discussion.

[the captain]

I never saw Pulp pretending to be anything they weren't but, yeah, Blur I can see. But anyway, what would be wrong with Blur covering "My Old Man is a Dustman." I don't know why English musicians revere American musicians in touch with their roots and simultaneously deny their own. You don't think The Stone Roses and The La's weren't just the earliest examples of what ultimately became Britpop?

I don't think that's a uniquely British phenomenon: how many generations of American musicians decided everything great came from the UK and practiced their British accents? (Answer: a lot.)

Perhaps part of that adolescent angst / spirit that makes the right kind of kid pick up a guitar (or paintbrush or pen or whatever) is precisely that lack of identification with their own roots. What 17-year-old thinks, "you know, my parents and grandparents have it just right. Society is perfect. I'm going to join a rock band!"? Rather, that dissatisfaction probably often turns the kid's attention elsewhere, and he sees the ideal as being outside his own circumstances.

Rock and roll has always been largely escapist, so middle-class kids pretending to be working class, that's no shock (any more than flat-broke kids pretending to be millionaires in a certain type of hip-hop) is. As much as we may not want the music to be anything but itself, it is definitely created from or in, and heard in, a bigger context. A scene, I suppose. And the one thing that I'd say is rarely or never the case is that the scene is literal reality: it's always a projection of some kind.

GUYS STAY ON SUBJECT DAMN IT!!

Be quiet. This convo is far more interesting that some stupid thread about Pearl Jam.

Start your own thread and get off of mine!

This is how message boards work sometimes. Tantrums won't make people stop having a conversation they're enjoying. You're just going to have to calm down and handle it.

[guitarfool2002]

(any more than flat-broke kids pretending to be millionaires in a certain type of hip-hop)

Or the opposite, as famously (semi-autobiographically) shown in Eminem's final rap battle at the end of the film 8 Mile when he lays out the phony rapper. There was just a fairly new rapper shown on TMZ this week who was accused of claiming street roots when he came from money.

And I'd say the most famous charge of trying to lower one's financial status was those who would point out that John Lennon's roots and background was more upper-middle class (which is a bit different in UK than US) than the image some felt he was portraying.

You're correct, it's not just a trait among rockers or a certain style of music to try shifting levels of status for more credibility with your fan base. To single out individual bands doesn't serve a purpose at this point, because it's been somewhat standard in all of entertainment for decades.

If not, the concept of a "stage name" in entertainment would not be necessary.

[Ron]

I really liked their version of "Last Kiss" when I was in the 2nd grade, which I bought as a cd single at Borders. It also had a version of, IIRC, "Soldier of Love". I haven't listened to it in at least a decade, and can't imagine I'd like it nearly as much, but I do still have it!

I'm a big pearl jam fan, nirvana fan, grunge fan.  It was what was cool when I was in school.  Also a girl i really liked was into it, so as she went so did I.  When "Last Kiss" came out, though, I had to draw.the.line.  I mean I love Eddie Vedder, but when you take a song that was pretty cool originally, and then sing it off key and turn it into this dreary nonsense like he did, I can't get down with it.  Probably my LEAST favorite Pearl Jam song. 

Who wants to hear a great band do a shitty cover completely out of their style?  I don't. 

[Ron]

A comment about Nirvana. 


- It's my opinion that Nirvana the band, and Kurt Cobain the songwriter/singer, have gone completely misinterpreted by not only most casual fans, but also by history (lol), and by the bands that followed and were influenced by Nirvana.

You can trace a ton of the modern 'rock' bands back to Nirvana.  I think Cobain's influence was seismic. 

He had a pathetic, hurt, pitiful style.  I don't believe, however, that he intended it that way.  I don't think he always took himself so seriously.  I have a bit of evidence to back that up.  First, the way he wrote his music: He would literally write poems, then just scramble the sh*t up and record it that way!  I think he knew that what he was singing about wasn't important and didn't make much sense, he was just making his type of music.  He didn't see himself as deep, I don't think he was as pretentious as he's made out to be.

Second, a famous story about him and Axl Rose.  Kurt and Courtney are backstage at an awards show... Courtney mouths off to Axl Rose, Axl says "Kurt, you better tell your bitch to shut up!".  So Kurt turns to Courtney, and says "Shut up Bitch!".... and they walk off leaving Axl to think about it. 

This was a guy who wasn't caught up in what people thought of him, didn't particularly think anything he said was very important or deep, and had a serious drug problem.  That was Kurt Cobain. 


I also think he was extremely talented, one of the most talented songwriters of the past 30 years.  He couldn't help but influence the young ears around him, and after his death of course became a martyr which just magnified it all. 

What you're left with, though, is A. people giving him a bad rap because of the perceived pretentiousness of Grunge music which he helped create, B. a nation full of bands making pussified, wimpy music because they think that's what Kurt was doing. 

If you listen to all these modern rock bands whine like little babies, that's their best Kurt Cobain impression.  I can't tell if they're doing it subconsciously or what.  They should lock all these lead singers in a room with "Bleach" and don't let them out until they drop all the pretention and apologize for what they've done to misrepresent Kurt's legacy. 

[Ron]

And I'd say the most famous charge of trying to lower one's financial status was those who would point out that John Lennon's roots and background was more upper-middle class (which is a bit different in UK than US) than the image some felt he was portraying.

Not directed at you, but I think that's ridiculous.  I never heard of John representing himself as anything insincere.  He was a very mallable, impressionable person, imho, but I see him a lot like the above mentioned Cobain, a guy with problems who didn't take himself as seriously as others did.  I mean 'baggism' and all that stuff, he knew how silly it was, that was the whole point.  Or his explanation of "the Beatles are bigger than Jesus"... very down to earth, common sense guy in my opinion.  Lennon was refreshing to me... a hippy who was against ALL war, not just the ones his least favorite president started.  No hypocrisy.  "You may say I'm a dreamer" indeed.  He knew how he looked, and was fine with it. 

Best example of John's honesty: in the Imagine movie when he tells that bum that jumped the fence that all of his songs were about himself, or maybe Yoko.  He told the guy if he woke up that morning and had a good sh*t, he might write a song about it. 

I jsut can't get down with saying John Lennon misrepresented himself. 

[♩♬🐸 Billy C ♯♫♩🐇]

They aren't bad. They had three or four good songs. I have fond memories of seeing them on Unplugged. Hard to believe that was damn near twenty years ago.

Highly disagree. Weiland's voice was better back then, but STP's best stuff came after the hooplah died down. They never recorded a bnad song, well, up until their reunion album (which fucking sucked). It's funny, but so many people only know of STP for Core , and that was their worst album (again, until the reunion).

Kind of like Pearl Jam, and Ten , come to think of it....

[Ron]

I'd agree.  I'm not super versed in the ways of the Jam and the Pilots, but my very favorite STP stuff was the later stuff.  I know a lot of people hated Lady Picture Show, but I thought it was fucking awesome.  I saw STP with Weiland in about 2003, they were A.W.E.S.O.M.E f*cker put on one hell of a show.  The whole damn band was awesome, not just him, they were all a really tight cohesive band.  Reminds me of Alice in Chains more than Pearl Jam. 

[Ron]

Oh and for Pearl Jam, my favorite was Vitalogy.  Very creative imho, I liked that song Immortality, where they've got the damn guitar so detuned you can hear the strings slapping the neck.  Crazy.  Courduroy, even Better Man.  Awesome songs, awesome memories.  I could listen to that whole album front to end.  It's probably a little poppy for most people but I love pop. 

[♩♬🐸 Billy C ♯♫♩🐇]

A comment about Nirvana.  


- It's my opinion that Nirvana the band, and Kurt Cobain the songwriter/singer, have gone completely misinterpreted by not only most casual fans, but also by history (lol), and by the bands that followed and were influenced by Nirvana.

You can trace a ton of the modern 'rock' bands back to Nirvana.  I think Cobain's influence was seismic.  

He had a pathetic, hurt, pitiful style.  I don't believe, however, that he intended it that way.  I don't think he always took himself so seriously.  I have a bit of evidence to back that up.  First, the way he wrote his music: He would literally write poems, then just scramble the sh*t up and record it that way!  I think he knew that what he was singing about wasn't important and didn't make much sense, he was just making his type of music.  He didn't see himself as deep, I don't think he was as pretentious as he's made out to be.


Second, a famous story about him and Axl Rose.  Kurt and Courtney are backstage at an awards show... Courtney mouths off to Axl Rose, Axl says "Kurt, you better tell your bitch to shut up!".  So Kurt turns to Courtney, and says "Shut up Bitch!".... and they walk off leaving Axl to think about it.  

This was a guy who wasn't caught up in what people thought of him, didn't particularly think anything he said was very important or deep, and had a serious drug problem.  That was Kurt Cobain.  


I also think he was extremely talented, one of the most talented songwriters of the past 30 years.  He couldn't help but influence the young ears around him, and after his death of course became a martyr which just magnified it all.  

What you're left with, though, is A. people giving him a bad rap because of the perceived pretentiousness of Grunge music which he helped create, B. a nation full of bands making pussified, wimpy music because they think that's what Kurt was doing.  

If you listen to all these modern rock bands whine like little babies, that's their best Kurt Cobain impression.  I can't tell if they're doing it subconsciously or what.  They should lock all these lead singers in a room with "Bleach" and don't let them out until they drop all the pretention and apologize for what they've done to misrepresent Kurt's legacy.  

sh*t., bro, to me Cobain was at his best pre-Nevermind, which nevertheless was a great album. Anybody who tries to say otherwise is just one of those hipster bullsh*t jobs who loves something until it become popular. I don't care what kind of revisionist bullsh*t is out there, that was a damn good album.  Really, though, what finally broke Nirvana through IMHO was Dave Grohl on drums, because that was the one weak spot of Nirvana before he joined. When you're a trio, and you have a dodgy drummer, you aren't going to cut it. With that in mind, though, the stuff off of Incesticide was my favorite.



Ron, who hated Lady Picture Show? Were they deaf and just hated a sign language version or something?!

[guitarfool2002]

And I'd say the most famous charge of trying to lower one's financial status was those who would point out that John Lennon's roots and background was more upper-middle class (which is a bit different in UK than US) than the image some felt he was portraying.

Not directed at you, but I think that's ridiculous.  I never heard of John representing himself as anything insincere.  He was a very mallable, impressionable person, imho, but I see him a lot like the above mentioned Cobain, a guy with problems who didn't take himself as seriously as others did.  I mean 'baggism' and all that stuff, he knew how silly it was, that was the whole point.  Or his explanation of "the Beatles are bigger than Jesus"... very down to earth, common sense guy in my opinion.  Lennon was refreshing to me... a hippy who was against ALL war, not just the ones his least favorite president started.  No hypocrisy.  "You may say I'm a dreamer" indeed.  He knew how he looked, and was fine with it. 

Best example of John's honesty: in the Imagine movie when he tells that bum that jumped the fence that all of his songs were about himself, or maybe Yoko.  He told the guy if he woke up that morning and had a good sh*t, he might write a song about it. 

I jsut can't get down with saying John Lennon misrepresented himself. 

It's in the deeper histories of the Beatles, specifically in the early days, those pre-stardom days which only a few individuals can describe with any sense of honesty or authenticity. Not directed at you either, but I'd suggest giving those accounts another look or a first look if you've not read them.

For one, the Beatles scouse accents. John's upbringing was not with that working class dialogue, and his Aunt Mimi who raised John was your typical proper English lady. And it would make her angry when she would hear John talking that way, even as a Beatle and with his fame and money, when she felt it wasn't him.

Another was Paul McCartney. McCartney was an admitted cheapskate, a spendthrift even as a kid, and he'd never go into debt buying things like exotic Rickenbacker guitars on hire purchase and preferred to buy the cheaper models he could afford. He also commented more than once about the money John would come into as a kid among the starving artist crowd, and to John's credit he did share it with his friends. But the notion of John taking a sum of money and inviting Paul to travel around France blowing through that money - as young men - was startling to Paul who at that time did not enjoy those luxuries.

John's upbringing was not with a scouse accent, nor was it the starving art student who he was photographed as an art student living in squalor. He had access to literature, was comfortable through his aunt and his extended family with money, and that family also afforded him some connections which simply do not get written about.

You cannot choose who you are or how you were raised, even though obviously the choices made after a certain point become your own. But at least from Paul and from his Aunt Mimi, John's outward appearance, accent, mannerisms, behaviors, etc. were not in line with the kind of financial stability he was raised around.

Obviously the fact that both his parents weren't there was the ultimate factor in what and who he became, but the atmosphere he was in as a kid was not a hard-scrabble, "working class hero" kind of Liverpudlian life which would have been fitting of that kind of accent, for one.

So hearing McCartney bristle a bit after so many proscribe that working class hero tag to John isn't surprising considering the John he knew from age 16 and the John who had thrown money around which Paul certainly couldn't afford was not that working class John.

I don't claim Lennon was acting a phony or whatever, but I do know how his aunt and musical partner knew him as regular John the non-celebrity Beatle and reacted to him doing or saying certain things which they knew wasn't from his background, and may not have been 100% authentic in their eyes.

But it worked for John, and that 1970 song only added to the fire for those who would idolize him as that same working class guy.

And if you listen to or read the Rolling Stone or Playboy interviews with him, post-Beatles,  note how he describes himself, too.

[guitarfool2002]

Really, though, what finally broke Nirvana through IMHO was Dave Grohl on drums, because that was the one weak spot of Nirvana before he joined. When you're a trio, and you have a dodgy drummer, you aren't going to cut it.

I remember exactly the first time I listened to Nevermind on CD, a copy someone had loaned me when it was new, and it was on headphones, loud. The thing that left the biggest musical impression on my ears at that time was the drums, and I had no idea who or what Dave Grohl was or where he came from. But those drums were solid as hell, sounded great, and glued the songs together.

I thought there are not many who could rip off, note for note, a drum fill from Boston's "More Than A Feeling" and use it as an intro for a song like Teen Spirit. And to this day, I don't know if it was homage, a total joke, a put-down, or simply a drummer re-purposing a good rock drum fill without a trace of irony or sarcasm, or idol worship or tongue-in-cheek stuff. All I knew was the drums on that song and that whole album were terrific, and it is 100% true that none of the other drummers would have been as good for that kind of studio album, and Nirvana wouldn't have broken.

You can see what an impact Nirvana's popularity had on music by watching them appear on MTV's "Headbangers Ball", which was a metal and hard rock showcase, and obviously they did not know how to "sell" Nirvana, they had no idea where to categorize them or their music, and Cobain being the sarcastic S.O.B. which he was played it up in grand style by mocking the whole scene and appeared in a ball gown.

Ask someone who was around music at that time what "hard rock" meant to see just how funny all of that actually was.

One of the few times I questioned Nirvana was when I heard they had to ask permission to smash their instruments on SNL.