Music: Is Bush grunge?

[Roo Returns]

I was never really into them but saw them play in the fall of 2011 when a friend gave me a free ticket (was his ex's originally lol). It was an excellent show and they gave their all (by this point Chris Traynor was already playing guitar for them after stints in Orange9mm and Helmet).

 

[GKJ]

Feel like Silverchair wasn’t as big as you guys think, at least not in the US. I know they did better in Canada.

 

[#37]

Feel like Silverchair wasn’t as big as you guys think, at least not in the US. I know they did better in Canada.

They were big for a minute, my local alt-rock radio station wore it out, and then people got over 'Tomorrow'.

But I don't think anyone here is saying they were BIG. I think it is more like we are saying that comparing them to 'grundge' is akin to comparing The Knickerbockers ('Lies') to the 'British Invasion'. Derivative... like Bush.

 

[Hippasus]

I like the alternative rock description more than grunge, but I can see how they're influenced by grunge with Gavin Rossdale's voice, for instance. That first album, Sixteen Stone, was chock-full of singles and then they sort of faded away from the radar.

True grunge has to sound a bit dirty, like Melvins, Nirvana, Screaming Trees, Stone Temple Pilots, and Pearl Jam.

 

[#37]

Just as a footnote, this happened right before grunge...



To me, it paved the way... just saying. Without this, maybe we heard the Seattle bands maybe we didn't... I kind of feel like the importance of Jane's Addiction gets lost once Nirvana break. They were important back in the day. Perry Farrol was important for a brief minute. A brief minute.

 

[#37]

My honest opinion? There is only one 'grunge' band....everything after is alt-rock.



What a f***ing genius Kobain was.

 

[#37]

Taking the piss out of himself... I'm sorry, but this is the grundgiest thing ever. Game over.

 

[luiginb]

Heroin in the rock scene was commonplace since the 50’s and 60’s. Even Ray Charles was using.

Imagine the trouble he had finding the vein

 

[The Marquis]

Imagine the trouble he had finding the vein

I laughed very very hard. I feel a touch of remorse for it, but this… just funny… props.

 

[Hierso]

Grunge is just bad post-punk.

 

[VMBM]

Soundgarden was metal. End of story.

 

[#37]

Soundgarden was metal. End of story.

Not sure if serious, but I like it.

 

[The Marquis]

Grunge is nothing. Every “grunge” band played a different style of music. Soundgarden and Alice In Chains were/are metal bands, Nirvana and Mudhoney were/are punk bands. Pearl Jam, Stone Temple Pilots, Bush, Silverchair, etc were rock bands, Sonic Youth was a post-punk band. Love Battery was a borderline Psychedelic rock band… Etc etc etc. It was just all in the evolution of those genres but they all had some similarities at the time. I was in the NW music scene at the time and none of the bands up here considered themselves Grunge bands… lol, except maybe Candlebox. I’m kidding. Just another rock band.

 

[Hippasus]

My honest opinion? There is only one 'grunge' band....everything after is alt-rock.



What a f***ing genius Kobain was.

Alice In Chains is comparable in quality to Nirvana for a grunge band. The former have the vocal harmonies and probably better vocals in general.

 

[Babe Ruth]

Alice In Chains is comparable in quality to Nirvana for a grunge band. The former have the vocal harmonies and probably better vocals in general.

Yeah.. Layne Staley was my favorite vocalist from that era. I like him in Chains and Mad Season..

 

[#37]

Alice In Chains is comparable in quality to Nirvana for a grunge band. The former have the vocal harmonies and probably better vocals in general.

We are getting into the weeds now. I liked them. However, I am not sure the two work as comparable's as well as, say, Alice in Chains vs. STP. Those two seem easier to group together, at least for me. Like, if I make a list: Nirvana, Alice in Chains, and Stone Temple Pilots... Which one do you think is the least similar to the other two? For me? If we pretend the word 'grunge' was never coined... 2 are hard rock bands and one is radio friendly punk.

Here is a fun question: Had the Ramones happened right after Nirvana, would we be calling them grunge? I kind of see Cobain as a hybrid of Joey and Johnny Ramone, but with a sicker sense of humor.

 

[Hippasus]

Grunge is nothing. Every “grunge” band played a different style of music. Soundgarden and Alice In Chains were/are metal bands, Nirvana and Mudhoney were/are punk bands. Pearl Jam, Stone Temple Pilots, Bush, Silverchair, etc were rock bands, Sonic Youth was a post-punk band. Love Battery was a borderline Psychedelic rock band… Etc etc etc. It was just all in the evolution of those genres but they all had some similarities at the time. I was in the NW music scene at the time and none of the bands up here considered themselves Grunge bands… lol, except maybe Candlebox. I’m kidding. Just another rock band.

Calling things this or that is just par for the course. Categorization is part of the experience.

We are getting into the weeds now. I liked them. However, I am not sure the two work as comparable's as well as, say, Alice in Chains vs. STP. Those two seem easier to group together, at least for me. Like, if I make a list: Nirvana, Alice in Chains, and Stone Temple Pilots... Which one do you think is the least similar to the other two? For me? If we pretend the word 'grunge' was never coined... 2 are hard rock bands and one is radio friendly punk.

Here is a fun question: Had the Ramones happened right after Nirvana, would we be calling them grunge? I kind of see Cobain as a hybrid of Joey and Johnny Ramone, but with a sicker sense of humor.

Radio-friendly punk is just another name. All of these bands are first rock/blues and then some sort of regional/sound distinction, like grunge. At the moment, I actually agree that Nirvana is the best of the bunch, in terms of songs/albums in toto. I just think they're narrowly the best of the bunch.

 

[NyQuil]

STP only really released one “grunge” album, Core.

With Purple, they established their own sound that was more rooted in the California rock scene IMO. Unlike the true grunge bands, the California bands introduced elements of pop, soul and funk that diluted the pure rock aesthetic.

I liked some Nirvana songs but I always put them behind Soundgarden, Pearl Jam etc.

The Smashing Pumpkins came about during the grunge era but had more progressive rock and metal elements IMO.

I tend to prefer more melodic and produced music to the “stripped down” low-fi sound. Punk to me was always musicians not using their abilities to their maximum potential in favour of volume which doesn’t impress me. I don’t really believe in “authenticity” or deliberately sounding unpolished.

A good friend of mine and I were always on the opposite sides of the common dualities like the Stones and Beatles, Nirvana and Pearl Jam etc.

Ironically, the Beatles are more melodic and innovative than the Stones but I just never liked them.

So I’m a big hypocrite or something.

 

[VMBM]

Calling things this or that is just par for the course. Categorization is part of the experience.

Sure, but in the case of grunge, the categorization has always felt pretty superficial to me. (Mainly it's about location... and flannel shirts, heh.)

Maybe I feel this way also because I found and fell in love with Soundgarden just before they started to talk about a thing called grunge. I heard "Jesus Christ Pose" on MTV Europe's Headbanger's Ball in 1991 (mid/late summer? Early autumn?) and was totally blown away by it. Actually, I do vaguely remember the host Vanessa Warwick mentioning something about Seattle's "lively" (?) music scene. But when a little later the very same MTV Europe started to show the video for Nirvana's "Smells like Teen Spirit" regularly, I didn't make any musical connection between those two songs/bands. The same goes with Pearl Jam's "Alive" whose video was also getting a lot of air time around the same time.

Out of all the Seattle bands, I still basically dig only Soundgarden. I had the first two Alice in Chains albums (plus an ep) back in the day but later sold them... (Hmmm, maybe I should revisit those, since I used to like 'em quite a lot.)