Grunge

Superfuzz Bigmuff, Mudhoney's 1988 debut EP

### Stylistic origins

Punk rock, hardcore punk, early heavy metal, indie rock, noise rock, alt-rock, garage rock, sludge metal

### Subgenres

Post-grunge, Nu metal

Grunge is a subgenre of punk and alternative rock that developed in the mid to late 1980s and FUCKING EXPLODED into mainstream culture in the early 90s.

## Beginnings (1985-1989)

Grunge's origins can be traced back to hardcore punk acts such as Black Flag, who by the time they had reached the pacific northwest region, had become full on sludge metal rather than the fast hardcore style they had become known for. Punks in other regions were pissed off that Black Flag had slowed down, but the Seattle people loved it, and soon began forming bands that followed in that style of playing slow and heavy riffs, such as the Melvins, formed in 1983.

In 1985, the band Green River put out their EP Come on Down, considered to be the very first grunge record. This was soon followed by the compilation Deep Six, released on C/Z Records in 1986, which featured appearances by Green River, the Melvins, Malfunkshun, Skin Yard, Soundgarden, and the U-Men; for many of them, it was their first appearance on record.

Many of the early grunge records were DISGUSTINGLY LO-FI because the bands had jack shit money on them; this was mostly due to Seattle being a poor shit hole at the time, so it was cheaper for grungers to just blast out their amps than sound perfect. This also had an effect on the stereotypical grunger fashion of flannel shirts and converse, because it was the cheapest option for members of the scene.

The main appeal of grunge to the burnout kids of Seattle was mostly that they were punk and DIY and rebelled against bloated self indulgent mainstream hair metal superstars and the PLAY IT AS FAST AS U CAN attitude prominent in the hair metal scene, which reminded all who attended grunge shows that anyone, even they, could start a band.

This is not to say that grunge completely killed the guitar solo FOREVER as is often claimed, as there were quite a few grunge bands that did in fact solo, just as there were grunge bands who did the LEGIT POP PUNK BRO thing and only used 3 chords and the truth.

In 1987 in the town of Aberdeen, Washington, a group consisting of Kurt Cobain, Krist Novoselic, and Chad Channing was formed, under the name Nirvana. They released their debut, Bleach, in 1989, after which Chad was fired from the band in 1990, to be replaced by Dave Grohl. The new revolution was about to begin...

## THE UPRISING (1991-1994)

Nirvana released it's followup to Bleach, Nevermind, in September 1991. Initially a decent success, it quickly FUCKING **EXPLODED** in popularity, and by January 1992, Nirvana had de-throned Michael Jackson's Dangerous at number one on the charts, signalling a shift in mainstream musical tastes.

Grunge nearly overnight had ABSOLUTELY **DE-STROYED** the hair metal scene and brought the focus from LA to Seattle. All through 1992 all you heard on the radio and MTV was Nirvana, Alice In Chains, Soundgarden, and Pearl Jam. With success, however, also came imitators who wanted a piece of the pie. Several of the aforementioned hair bands suddenly shifted their sounds to grunge in an attempt to stay relevant and failed **H-A-R-D**, there were suddenly bands who weren't even from Seattle joining the grunge movement such as Stone Temple Pilots (who were from San Diego), and that all the high fashion shitstains started marketing grunge fashion at disgustingly high prices, litcherally selling flannel shirts you could buy at a thrift store for one buck for $99999.99999.

Grunge quickly started turning into the very thing it once rejected, the bloated mainstream superstars. Kurt Cobain felt the pressure from this and intentionally made Nirvana's next and, as it would turn out, final album In Utero way less polished than Nevermind and far more abrasive in order to scare off the normies he had attracted with Nevermind.

## Fall, post-grunge, and the boy-bandification of grunge (1994-2001)

On April 5, 1994, Kurt Cobain was found dead from a shotgun suicide. This event effectively ended the original grunge revolution, and Nirvana ended immediately afterwards. Dave Grohl however founded the Foo Fighters almost immediately after Kurt's death in order to cope with the loss, and summarily became one of the biggest rock stars in the world with the new group.

Grunge itself would split off into offshoots such as post-grunge and nu-metal. Post grunge was essentially a reflection of not what grunge was but rather what it ended up becoming. You take the core elements of grunge but remove the experimental elements original grunge was known for, then slow it down BUT NOT to the level of doom metal, keep the aggressive BUT NOT TOO AGGRESSIVE OR THE RADIO AUDIENCE WON'T LIKE IT riffing, and you've got the perfect formula for stale, bloated, generic meandering radio rock that all sounds the same. When people use the term "radio rock" or "butt rock", they're talking about post grunge.

Nu-metal was a genre that dominated radio and MTV from the late 90s to early 00s, which featured down tuned guitars, lack of guitar solos and hip hop elements. Nu-metal was essentially one of the last (as of the time of this writing, wink wink) major rock movements to sweep America, but it ultimately did more damage to the larger genre of rock than good. Because nu metal was an edgy angsty genre (just as original grunge was) it became the go to genre for angry white boiz all over, and thus, along with emo music, it became THEE music associated with whiny suburban kids, so this inevitably caused many younger people today to associate ALL ROCK with angry suburban white boys, regardless of whether it's actual edgy angsty nu metal or beautiful uplifting power metal, and this caused people to leave rock in DROVES. This is a blow to the genre that only now a decade later we're beginning to recover from.

The boy-bandification of grunge was completed, according to YouTuber Music Critic ToddInTheShadows, on May 21, 2001, when the Calling released their massive one hit, Wherever You Will Go, and that's why it's not a thing anymore, the Calling killed it.

## Conclusion

Although grunge ended up turning into what it sought to rebel against, it left a massive legacy on modern rock in that it showed that you the reader can in fact RISE UP and destroy all the gay shit of your time just as the grungers rose up and destroyed the shit they hated in their time.

Perhaps one day, a new band will RISE UP and incite a backlash against the now-dominant mumble rap scene and make rock music culturally relevant again. Only time will tell.