BOC/OFF: Repercussion of a bad musical trip

[Stephen Swann]

Carl E. Anderson writes:
>
>         Yeah.  _Bastards_.
>
>         On reflection, I think I end up liking a lot of music
> which drives other people nuts largely because I've escaped
> the original context.

As Andy Gilham and I have hashed out a thousand times, w.r.t.
_Live Chronicles_ for instance.  ;-)

> Boys, BOC's "Godzilla", HW's "Silver Machine", etc. since
> I never was there when they were big.  I was discussing
> something like this with a German friend the other day--we
> both like _Steeleye Span_ f'r Chrissakes, which is instant
> street cred death in Britain.  But for us there was never
> an association with twee 70s folkies, it was just some
> music.

For me, this would be Jethro Tull.

>         And other side of the coin, this is probably exactly
> Nirvana, etc. grate so much on me.  That scene became huge
> right at the end of my highschool career, and I was suddenly

I guess it *is* all in the context...  At the time that grunge broke,
I already had some previous familiarity with the Seattle music scene
and the grunge crowd through my pal Jon Hilgreen.  He ran the "Mighty,
Mighty Grunge List" from the same listserver at SUNY Buffalo that
BOC-L originally ran on.  In fact, it was because of the existence of
GRUNGE-L that I managed to convince the sysadmin to let me create
BOC-L.  I had been on GRUNGE-L briefly, and really liked the people
and the discussion, but I had signed off because I had basically never
heard any of the bands they were talking about

So, there I was at the turn of the decade in that absolute wasteland
of crappy pop-rock and LA-style big hair metal that totally dominated
"rock" radio.  Musically speaking, I had hated all of the mid and late
80s.  Aside from a couple of albums (Imaginos being an obvious
example, but that was 2 years previous, and we'd found out since then
that there wasn't going to be a reunion or followup) the whole music
scene was just a waste of time to me.  I was actually starting to lose
my interest in new music, because it had been so long since I'd heard
anything that really shook me.

Then I heard this incredible, fire-breathing, kick-ass tune on CFNY
Toronto.  I thought it sounded like what I'd imagined "grunge" to be,
so I signed back onto GRUNGE-L and asked everybody what it was.  It
was "Smells Like Teen Spirit", which was already old hat to them,
because it had climbed the college charts and sat itself at the #1
position so long ago that only their grandparents remembered a
different album at #1.  ;-)

I ended up staying on GRUNGE-L for years, and became a big fan not
only of the music, but the attitude of he fans.

> faced with loads of rich suburban kids from LI's north shore
> slopping around in boots, scruffy jeans, and a flannel shirt
> around their waists (which they had spent the previous 6 years
> taking the piss out of me for dressing like) saying "Dude,
> I my life is so crap and I so identify with this music". And
> I could only think, "If you're life is miserable it's only
> because your latest girlfriend dumped you, you aren't getting
> the car you wanted as a graduation present, and you got busted
> for skipping out of PE.  And 12 months ago you totally identified
> with Madonna and dressed like INXS.  What the hell?"

Those are the people who eventually destroyed GRUNGE-L, by turning it
into the Eddie Vedder teen-angst fan club.  That was never, EVER,
what Grunge was about.

>         That and a "Smells Like Teen Spirit" video with
> loads of cheesy moshing high-schoolers may have biased my

Did you notice how burned out and disinterested the "moshers" and the
cheerleaders are?  And how dingy and depressing the whole thing is,
despite the effort to everyone all rah-rah?  There's some serious
social satire going on in that video.  It was the perfect answer
to the 80's.

> opinions slightly ;)  So, apologies to big Nirvana fans.
> I liked the riffs despite myself, because they _were_ good,
> but Ye Gods the whole scene just hit me wrong.

And it hit me like a breath of fresh air when I was suffocating...
I guess it's just all in the context.  :)

Steve
swann at plutonia.com