In 1991, pop music was stale and predictable, with pop staples like Michael Jackson and Madonna putting out familiar music and glam hair bands like Warrant and Winger getting their videos played in heavy rotation on MTV. My sister, on the other hand, was sending me tapes with music from bands I had never heard of like School of Fish, King's X, Smashing Pumpkins, and Nirvana. I liked everything she sent me, but I wasn't prepared for the Nirvana tape she gave me in Fall of 1991.
I was working on the layout for the latest issue of Stir magazine, the Mizzou student creative magazine founded by my friend Mike Tucker. I was working in the student organization offices in the basement of Brady Commons, and this afternoon, I was alone as far as I could tell. I had just received the new Nirvana tape from my sister, but I hadn't listened to it yet. I dropped it into the boom box tape deck and heard this:
If you weren't there at the time, I can't really describe the effect that this song and its attendant album had on music at the time. I stopped working midway through the first chorus and just listened to the song. When it was over, I rewound it and listened to it again, then I listened to the rest of the album. Then I put the tape back in and listened to it again.
Nirvana is such a part of American culture now that it's difficult to exaggerate how much influence they had on us. They almost single-handedly killed hair metal. Bands like Poison and Warrant, which had been selling out arenas, found themselves playing county fairs and small clubs again, if that. Nirvana opened the door to make other grunge and alternative bands not just marketable but dominant, especially on MTV. They even affected fashion, and young people rushed out to buy flannel shirts and Birkenstocks.
Of course, a supernova experience like this couldn't but help to burn out too soon and too quickly. Frontman Kurt Cobain couldn't handle the pressures of fame, and he fell into drug addiction, despair, and eventually, suicide. But their legacy lives on with the genius of drummer Dave Grohl, who went on to form the Foo Fighters, a great band in their own right.
There are few artists who can really be considered world-changing: Elvis Presley; Bob Dylan; The Beatles...who else is there? Who else had such an impact on our culture that things changed in a way that they would never change back again? Certainly Nirvana is to be counted among these others, not to mention just how unbelievably good "Nevermind" is, and continues to be almost 25 years later.
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