measi's Diaryland Diary ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Ahead of their time In 1991, I was an everyday high school sophomore, enjoying life with my friends, taking a year off of dance classes, and finding a new love of music as a pep-band wannabe. I loved 80's rock and pop music, dressed in clothes from San Francisco that stuck out just a bit from my Rocky Mountain counterparts, and pretty much was your average teenager in the crowd. That was the year that a really odd song started playing on the radio by a freaky band from Seattle. I'll put this upfront-- I've never liked Nirvana that much. I never was into the grunge scene. I didn't go all apeshit when Kurt Cobain killed himself. I didn't see what all of the uproar about this band was. In 1991, I was still not sure what I thought of Guns 'N Roses, even though "Sweet Child O' Mine" was a four year old song at that point. Now, the song's harmless to me. Compared with some of the crap that's come out in gangster rap and metal since then, not to mention the enigma that is Eminem, Guns 'N Roses is harmless. But at the time, the "You're gonna Die!" line alone in "Welcome to the Jungle" was enough to send parents into uproar. Axl Rose scared the crap out of me. And then there was the cigarette poking out of a black mop of curls, identified as Slash (who I was shocked later actually did have a head under there). Nirvana was this scary undercurrent band, and the band members looked like they all needed to be soaked in a tub for a while to scrub out the grime. Call me prissy, but I wasn't (and still am not) into grimy, stringy hair. If there's one thing Whitesnake had going for it, it was the hair. :) Nirvana's music was gritty, angry, and depressing. It was just too fast a change, too soon. Flash forward to present, and I'm listening to WAAF on the radio to and from work, allowing some hard rock and metal music to keep me up and alert as I drive. The "sorta new" (as it's being called) Nirvana song, "You Know You're Right" is on the radio this morning. I've heard it a few times in the last couple of weeks, since WAAF has it on the heavy rotation list right now. This morning, it was in a mix of other songs from 2002, and I realized how ahead of its time Nirvana really was. What was frighteningly out of place then is now the norm. Grunge is an undercurrent flowing through metal these days, and it took me really listening to the lyrics and the way the chords are formed to realize it. The lyrics of this latest song are chilling, when put into perspective with how close it was to Cobain's death, was he trying to communicate a plea for help in the only way he felt comfortable doing so? I still don't like grunge, but I'm getting the impact of their music now, and getting why so many people idolize them. Damn. 11:33 a.m. - 24 October 2002 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
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