rambles

flyinhigh9500 - smells like teen spirit

ok....here's the story ames....you're going to like my essay and you're going to put it on the website!!!  hehe...j/k ames...you can do whatever you want...just thought you might like to put it on the site cause you're always saying how you want stuff...so here it is...

"I was talking to a friend of mine the other day when I reminded her about this guy she used to know. She met him out on a beach in Upper California surfing. She said that his name was Ed but that he didn’t really fit the description of your typical surfer. He was a really shy guy that just liked music and surfing, nothing else. In the fall of 1990, Ed got a demo tape from this guy he knew named Jack Irons. It was a simple three-track tape that was just music, no lyrics. Jack thought that if Ed had the time he should really try and write lyrics for it cause he thought that he had a good shot of actually getting in the band. But Ed didn’t really think anything of it. He thought that he didn’t have the time to write them and if he did that they wouldn’t be any good. But one day while he was surfing, a thought came to him. So he got out of the water and started writing what became lyrics. He took the time out to record them on the demo tape and sent it back to Seattle. Well the guys back in Seattle loved it. They called Ed up and told him that he had the job but that he would have to move to Seattle if he wanted to be in the band. Ed thought that it was worth it and said goodbye to my friend. He wrote every so often, but after a while the letters stopped coming. So she thought that he had forgotten her forever. A year later she was in her car listening to her radio and heard a familiar song on but she couldn’t remember where she had heard it before. Then the announcer came on. “That was the latest single from Eddie Vedder and the guys from Pearl Jam. The song’s called Alive and it’s off of their debut album, Ten.” It was her Eddie. He has become famous. But he hadn’t forgotten about her. They still talk to this day. Just because he’s a “grunge” icon doesn’t mean that he doesn’t have room for a personal life. But what exactly is “grunge”? Why did people like it so much? And why did it die?

In 1991, a small group out of Seattle, Washington released their second CD Nevermind. Their first single “Smells Like Teen Spirit” was a smash hit, but not until 1992 did Nirvana make it to the big time. It was then that the so-called “grunge” scene exploded and Seattle became the city hailed as the grunge capital of the world. At the helm at this revolution, so to speak, were two men. Kurt Cobain who was the lead singer and guitarist for Nirvana and Eddie Vedder who was the lead singer of Pearl Jam. They might have both been the leaders of the movement, but it was Kurt who was seen as the real mentor and father figure in the music scene. He wore plaid flannel shirts and torn blue jeans. He had ratty long hair and didn’t care about what other people thought about him. It could have been his lifestyle and it could have been his compelling and sometimes controversial lyrics that made people admire him. “Here we are now, entertain us…I feel stupid and contagious…Yay, a denial”. Those lyrics were from the song “Smells Like Teen Spirit”. The Nirvana song was seen as the anthem for grunge and all of its followers. Young kids around the country tuned into what Kurt was saying. This great music said what every teenager was thinking but never had the guts to say. But what is grunge? The dictionary describes it as heavy metal rock music expressing alienation and discontent. But a person living in this lifestyle wouldn’t call it that. They would just say that it wasn’t really anything. The musicians in that were in the scene did this new thing cause they were unhappy with their lives and people just started tagging along. It wasn’t about the clothes and it wasn’t about the money. It was about the music and nothing else. That is grunge.

Grunge music and its style became a way of life. The musicians playing the music, the roadies touring with them, and most importantly the fans. It’s a normal lifestyle for them like going to work everyday is for someone else. They wake up everyday and concentrate on music while another person wakes up thinking how they have to get their 60 million-dollar proposal done. The people in this community are all there for one reason and one reason only. The music. But somehow it seems to go beyond that. Once you hit it big you have a lot of responsibilities that need to be filled. Going on tour, making television appearances, and giving interviews. “The thing is,” Ed Vedder said, “you’d think your ego would be massive, playing for all these people, having all these people sing your songs. The fact is, you never think you’re that good. You don’t feel like you deserve this kind of attention or adulation. And so what you end up feeling instead of this large ego is, you feel like you’re worthless. You can’t live up to the glorification and it makes you feel small and it makes you feel real crappy.” That quote Ed gave to Melody Maker Magazine in 1994 describes what most of the musicians in the grunge world were thinking. They got big but they’re ego’s didn’t. Sometimes that not so big ego was too big for some of their fans. Bands like Pearl Jam were often ridiculed about being sell outs to the MTV crowd. “If somebody wants to say, ‘ You guys used to be my favorite band, but you got too big’— to me,” Stone Gossard said, “the problem with getting too big is not, innately, you get too big and all of a sudden you stop playing good music. The problem is, when you get too big, you stop doing the things you used to do. Just being big doesn’t mean you can’t go in your basement and write a good song.” That quote Stone gave to Melody Maker Magazine in 1994 made a good point. Just because you have a record deal and you’re on tour and you’re making lots of money doesn’t mean that you can’t still find inspiration to write a good song. Any person can write a song. Whether it’s the lyrics that were once just a poem or a bunch of chords off of a guitar. Anyone that put their mind to it could do it. Money and stardom doesn’t make the music, it’s the people behind it that does. Sure there have been quite a few “one hit wonders” out there. But it doesn’t mean that their stardom made them lose their creative abilities to write a song. Something inside of them just couldn’t. But these musicians could. And because of it, it drove some of them to their death. In April of 1994, Kurt Cobain shot and killed himself. In his suicide note he talked about how his life became not so much for himself as it was for other people. “Sometimes I feel as if I could have a punch-in time clock before I walk out onstage. I’ve tried everything within my power to appreciate it, and I do. God, believe me, I do. But it’s not enough. I must be one of those narcissists who only appreciate things when they’re gone. I’m too sensitive. But I still can’t get over the frustration, the guilt and the empathy I have for everyone. There’s good in all of us, and I simply think I love people too much.” He kept saying how he loved people but somehow, it was those people that drove him to his death. When Kurt ended his life, he somehow seemed to start the end of the grunge scene as well. Kids who clamed to worship him committed suicide just because he did. Everyone was just so sad about his death; the whole movement went down the drain. Kurt was the heart and soul of grunge and without him, the others didn’t seem to survive.

In conclusion, the revolution that was grunge may be “dead”, but its memories still linger. Bands like Pearl Jam, Stone Temple Pilots, The Smashing Pumpkins, Candlebox, Jane’s Addiction, and Foo Fighters that were part of the grunge scene still make music today. Eddie Vedder is still connected with the scene today as well. With his strong backing of Nader in the last presidential election and his many collaborations with The Who, he is still making music today. My friend gets together with him every once and a while cause she is one of the few people that knows, along with Ed, that grunge music will never die."