Latest / The Dark Stuff Podcast: The Interviews / The Year Grunge Broke: Interview with Author Clive Barnes //90s Music

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The Year Grunge Broke: Interview with Author Clive Barnes //90s Music · The Dark Stuff Podcast: The Interviews

• 0:16
  SPEAKER_00: All right, everybody, my guest today is Clive Barnes.
• 0:19
  SPEAKER_00: He's the author of this uh book right here called The Year Grunge Broke.
• 0:23
  SPEAKER_00: He also runs the social media page on uh Instagram and Facebook that's wildly popular that features clips of all your favorite 90s rock bands.
• 0:31
  SPEAKER_00: And he sent me a copy of this book and asked if I was interested in reading it.
• 0:36
  SPEAKER_00: And of course I was, you know, for sure.
• 0:38
  SPEAKER_00: And then he said, uh I said, Well, you can send me the book, but how about you do an interview on the channel in exchange?
• 0:43
  SPEAKER_00: And he said, Okay, so this is the book outside of the uh hard shell.
• 0:48
  SPEAKER_00: It's basically 50 records.
• 0:51
  SPEAKER_00: Clive selected 50 records from the basically the 90s, the sort of grunge alternative rock period, and uh expanded on those.
• 0:59
  SPEAKER_00: And so that's the nature of the book.
• 1:02
  SPEAKER_00: We'll be getting into that a little bit more with with Clive.
• 1:04
  SPEAKER_00: Before we get started, I mean, let's just ask the basic question: what made you decide to write this book and what's your sort of grunge rock origin story?
• 1:13
  SPEAKER_01: So uh well, thanks for having me, Dave.
• 1:15
  SPEAKER_01: I love this channel is is so cool.
• 1:18
  SPEAKER_01: So thanks for having me on it.
• 1:19
  SPEAKER_01: Um look it, I mean, uh I think I have this theory that the music that you listen to from you know from your early teens up till about 2021 is stuff that really sticks with you for the rest of your life.
• 1:32
  SPEAKER_01: And it's been that case with me.
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_01: And I in the 80s, when I was a little kid, I I listened to a lot of rock, a lot of metal, and I loved it all.
• 1:42
  SPEAKER_01: I listened to a lot of punk.
• 1:44
  SPEAKER_01: But I think when this stuff started filtering through, like that alternative rock scene started crescendoing around 1991.
• 1:52
  SPEAKER_01: I was pretty much hooked, and it ended up being a pretty monumental time, I think you would agree, for anyone our age.
• 1:59
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, that music became it, it just got wrapped up in all our lives so much.
• 2:05
  SPEAKER_01: I it was just a part of everything that I did, all the social circles that I was involved in.
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_01: So it has stayed with me for for my entire life, and um I suppose how I I I never I didn't decide to write a book because you know I had never written a book before, but I suppose I was pushed into it subconsciously when the pandemic happened.
• 2:27
  SPEAKER_01: I I was doing a lot for the social media sites anyway, and um, you know, I I was writing pieces for the accounts that that are there, and uh, I just noticed that an album anniversary would come up for a band, and I would start expanding on that and and learning some stuff myself, and you know, and then I began to enjoy the process and um I eventually had a book.
• 2:50
  SPEAKER_00: Well, your your social media page, The Year Grunge Broke, is great.
• 2:53
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I I've been watching it for I don't know, year or two, or at least I don't know how long it's been out, but I love it because it has the great clips of all these bands and sort of like this band appeared on this TV show on this date, and it's like I'd kind of forgotten about that, you know.
• 3:06
  SPEAKER_00: But because I remember details about records, but other things I might forget.
• 3:11
  SPEAKER_00: And so it's always really useful to see that stuff because I I really enjoy your the stuff that you post.
• 3:16
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I probably see it every single day.
• 3:19
  SPEAKER_01: Well, thank you.
• 3:20
  SPEAKER_01: And I mean, there's a lot of effort goes into it.
• 3:23
  SPEAKER_01: It's it's not just slap things up there.
• 3:25
  SPEAKER_01: I kind of try to design the posts and give people a little bit more of an experience.
• 3:29
  SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, and I I I like to uh I like to make it look kind of like something like an event, you know.
• 3:36
  SPEAKER_01: And uh yeah, those things are hard to find sometimes.
• 3:39
  SPEAKER_01: Um, so it's good that people can enjoy them again, you know, those old TV shows and different live performances and things like that, you know.
• 3:47
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, absolutely.
• 3:48
  SPEAKER_00: Now, um, you mentioned off-air that uh you have been a touring musician for a long time.
• 3:52
  SPEAKER_00: So you've toured the states.
• 3:54
  SPEAKER_00: You said, now you've been to Seattle, of course, I'm sure.
• 3:57
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 3:57
  SPEAKER_01: I was there twice, yeah.
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_00: Twice.
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 4:00
  SPEAKER_00: Now just full disclosure, I lived there uh 1992 to 1994.
• 4:05
  SPEAKER_00: I left Seattle, yeah, right in the in the peak.
• 4:08
  SPEAKER_00: I I left Seattle probably about a month or two after Kurt Cobain died.
• 4:13
  SPEAKER_00: Wow, just coincidence because I had already booked that my leaving, but then that happened and it was like this is a sign.
• 4:20
  SPEAKER_01: Because you know, when you're a tour musician, you don't get much time really to spend in anywhere.
• 4:26
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, Paul Westerberg had this fantastic quote, it was like, I'm on tour, I'm not a tourist, you know.
• 4:33
  SPEAKER_01: And um, you know, I did, I like just being there was was amazing because you know, but I I played in Minneapolis too.
• 4:41
  SPEAKER_01: I played St.
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_01: Paul.
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_01: I like you know, those cities mean as much to me too.
• 4:45
  SPEAKER_01: And uh, you know, I'm I'm pretty much uh uh uh you know, when it comes to music, I'm a a historian, I like to read and I like to remember a lot of things.
• 4:54
  SPEAKER_01: And sometimes when I go to these places, I can't believe I'm in the city that this stuff happened in, you know, or it's pretty amazing.
• 5:01
  SPEAKER_00: No, I I like that you said Minneapolis is just as important because I think it is, and for me personally, that's I mean, I'm wearing a hooskerdo shirt, like that's my era, is you know, the 80s in Minneapolis is my absolute favorite, but I didn't live it because I wasn't in Minneapolis and I wasn't old enough to have seen the replacements and clubs and stuff like that.
• 5:21
  SPEAKER_00: I saw them as they got a little bit further along.
• 5:24
  SPEAKER_00: So Seattle was my sort of spot.
• 5:27
  SPEAKER_00: I was there when it happened, you know.
• 5:29
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, when I was there, I you know, I never saw Chris Cornell just wandering around or anything like that, but I would see some of the guys from Sound Garden or Nirvana at shows occasionally.
• 5:41
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I saw Kurt and Courtney at a Cebadot show one time.
• 5:44
  SPEAKER_00: I met Kurt Cobain at a record store where he was purchasing a copy of In Utero on vinyl two weeks before it came out.
• 5:52
  SPEAKER_00: Because you know, and I don't know if they did it in the UK, but in in America, they used to in the 90s they stopped making much vinyl, so they would just put out a thousand copies and sell it like two weeks in advance of the CD.
• 6:03
  SPEAKER_00: And I went into the store to go get it, and he was standing in front of me in line buying a copy.
• 6:09
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't want to bother him or anything, but I tapped him on the shoulder and he turns around and I said, Don't you get a free one of those?
• 6:15
  SPEAKER_00: And he just said, My record company never gives me anything, and then he paid and left.
• 6:20
  SPEAKER_00: That was that.
• 6:22
  SPEAKER_01: There's something cool about that, though.
• 6:23
  SPEAKER_01: I I love that story.
• 6:25
  SPEAKER_01: That's amazing.
• 6:26
  SPEAKER_00: Wow, it was just the total luck, and I he was where it was summertime, I think it was September, August, or something, and he's wearing the three-quarter length coat and uh you know, a hat.
• 6:36
  SPEAKER_00: It was like he just stood out, like he was trying to be incognito, but he absolutely uh stood out.
• 6:40
  SPEAKER_00: There was no question about that.
• 6:42
  SPEAKER_00: Um, okay, so how long did it take you to you know write and compile the information for the book?
• 6:49
  SPEAKER_00: You said you started basically during the pandemic, and then after you you say that, uh, how did you what was the criteria?
• 6:56
  SPEAKER_00: How did you select the 50 albums that you chose?
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_01: So, what happened was I had written 84 albums for 84 albums.
• 7:03
  SPEAKER_01: So I had basically written two books.
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_01: This was my this was my inexperience of writing books.
• 7:09
  SPEAKER_01: I overwrote, and um I landed a publishing deal in the UK with a company called Away with Media, who really were a dream publisher for me because they do these coffee table type books that are presented in these, you know, slip cases, they've all got a certain design to them, and it really feels like an event when I mean it's it's a gorgeous looking book, by the way.
• 7:33
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, they're very nice.
• 7:34
  SPEAKER_01: So they do books with you know Stuart Copeland from the police and John Leiden from The Sex Whistles and Pill, and you know, they have such a great roster of musicians on it.
• 7:44
  SPEAKER_01: So basically, the strength of the social media got me a publishing deal.
• 7:50
  SPEAKER_01: And when I presented the book to the publisher, he he took a look at it, and that combined with the the social media, he was interested in putting it out because they had never put out uh uh book by you know a relative, like a nobody really, you know what I mean.
• 8:07
  SPEAKER_01: Uh it was always names, you know, that they put things out.
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_01: So we got the the publishing deal, and the publisher said to me, you know, let's let's pair it down to 50 because 84 is is too much.
• 8:20
  SPEAKER_01: So um I got to work, and you know, there were some decisions made, you had to put in the big ones, you know, Nevermind had to go in there, um you know, some you know, Alice and Chains, all that had to go in there, but then I wanted to pick some stuff that people might have missed, you know.
• 8:34
  SPEAKER_01: There's some albums by bands like Truly, um, and then even kind of bands.
• 8:41
  SPEAKER_01: There's like a band that are friend of friends of mine from Ireland called Curb Dog, they're in the book, which a lot of people that may be the only one I didn't know.
• 8:52
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and the thing about Curb Dog, if you listen to them, I bet you would love them because it's right in that, and Jack and Dino produced that album.
• 9:01
  SPEAKER_01: Oh wow.
• 9:01
  SPEAKER_01: Um, yeah, it's it's it's that sound, and it's not like a pastige.
• 9:06
  SPEAKER_01: There is a certain element of Irishness to that album as well, which makes it quite unique, which you know, but it fits perfectly in that scene, you know.
• 9:15
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and I suppose there's something I just want to say as well about the name, the Year Grunge Broke.
• 9:21
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, it it comes from two fronts.
• 9:23
  SPEAKER_01: One, it was a play on the year punk broke, the Sonic Youth documentary.
• 9:26
  SPEAKER_01: So that's pretty obvious.
• 9:28
  SPEAKER_01: But in my mind, when I was coming up with the name, the year grunge broke to me means that like the year grunge broke alternative rock became mainstream.
• 9:38
  SPEAKER_01: So I say in the in this my introduction in the book that like I don't consider smells like teen spirit to be the beginning of that.
• 9:45
  SPEAKER_01: I that's that's the peak.
• 9:47
  SPEAKER_01: That's it was all coming from the 80s, it was like from the hardcore scene, the the alternative rock scene, Sonic Youth, Black Flag, all of that stuff.
• 9:57
  SPEAKER_01: And then its pinnacle was probably Smells Like Teen Spirit, and then you know what that did was open the floodgates, and as you know, because you were there and you were actually literally there, yeah.
• 10:09
  SPEAKER_01: You know what happened after that, and this is worldwide, and I'm testament to that, you know.
• 10:14
  SPEAKER_01: Um anywhere I go, I I tour with with a band now, the Year Grunge Brook Band, and we we tour all over, and people's experiences in different countries are the same.
• 10:24
  SPEAKER_01: It doesn't, you know, it doesn't have exclusivity to one area, or or you know, nobody's experience is really that far removed from anyone else's, you know.
• 10:33
  SPEAKER_01: It's it's an incredible time.
• 10:35
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it it truly was, and you're right about the buildup to Teen Spirit because you know, there's the replacements, there's Who's Kurdoo, there's the Pixies, there's Jane's Addiction, Faith No More, Sonic Youth, Black Fly.
• 10:47
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, all of those bands, and they were starting to get a little bit more popular, a little bit more popular, just barely on the edge there.
• 10:53
  SPEAKER_00: You know, Sonic Youth was a popular band, but they were maybe capping out at about a hundred thousand albums, and the mainstream industry only sees that a certain way, you know.
• 11:03
  SPEAKER_00: They they they want bigger, um, but it was a culmination of a lot of stuff, and I think people make the mistake often of thinking everything started in 1991, yeah.
• 11:15
  SPEAKER_00: And it was like Kurt Cobain had this mission to crush hair metal because he was sick of what was on the radio, and he decided to form this new thing, and it's like this just bullshit, you know, it's just completely not true.
• 11:26
  SPEAKER_00: I don't think he, I tell people I don't even think hair metal was even on his radar, I don't think he cared.
• 11:31
  SPEAKER_00: No, you know, he was doing his his absolute own thing, yeah.
• 11:36
  SPEAKER_01: It's so funny as well.
• 11:37
  SPEAKER_01: Like, I always enjoyed, or I always think one of the attractions of that scene in that time was the diversity and how eclectic it was.
• 11:46
  SPEAKER_01: Because it seemed like it took every this is why grunge is such a strange term, because what is it?
• 11:53
  SPEAKER_01: It it really isn't anything.
• 11:54
  SPEAKER_01: Now, you could call mud honey grunge because you know, technically they sound grungy, you know.
• 12:00
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, they talk of huge is kind of grungy, exactly.
• 12:03
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, but you know, to me, the grunge term means you know it's it's very good at um bringing people's mindset to a certain time, so say from 1990 to 1995, like that kind of umbrella era, right?
• 12:17
  SPEAKER_01: You know, grunge seems to be the thing, you know.
• 12:20
  SPEAKER_01: But um, yeah, it was just I mean, a fantastic time.
• 12:24
  SPEAKER_01: And uh I mean, if you lived this, yeah, I you know, it was just it was just it seemed like there was a lot of possibilities in music at the time because of the eclecticism that was happening among musicians like Soundgarten, God almighty, they were they were so you know different than every than Allison Chains or Pearl Jam or such a a great experimental time for music, you know.
• 13:04
  SPEAKER_00: It was punk rock, and then to make it more palatable, it was sort of became new wave or marketed as new wave.
• 13:10
  SPEAKER_00: And I sort of thought of grunge as like, yeah, it was a legitimate, sort of jokey term that the Seattle people kind of came up with, but it ultimately did become a new way of saying punk rock without saying punk rock.
• 13:21
  SPEAKER_00: If if that was somehow a term that you didn't like, uh grunge was maybe a little bit more uh acceptable or something.
• 13:27
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know.
• 13:28
  SPEAKER_01: Do you remember the hate for it back then?
• 13:30
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, that term, there was a lot of hate for it at word.
• 13:33
  SPEAKER_00: Well, and no band, no bands referred to themselves as a grunge band back then.
• 13:37
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, it's the same.
• 13:38
  SPEAKER_00: I I throw this back as the hair metal stuff too.
• 13:41
  SPEAKER_00: No band ever referred to themselves as hair metal, right?
• 13:44
  SPEAKER_00: They were just they were just metal.
• 13:45
  SPEAKER_00: It was a term that came afterwards.
• 13:47
  SPEAKER_00: In that case, it was more derisive, and then people kind of adopted it as a we'll take it as our own.
• 13:53
  SPEAKER_00: With grunge, I think it's just funny.
• 13:55
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I I know the the woman uh who was like the publicist at Sub Pop who sort of coined the the term or whatever, or maybe not the term, but I mean sort of came up with some of the funny definitions for it and stuff.
• 14:07
  SPEAKER_00: And it was only taken half seriously, but I guess you have to call it something.
• 14:11
  SPEAKER_00: If you could erase one cliche about grunge from music history, what do you think that would be?
• 14:17
  SPEAKER_01: That's uh all very dour and uh you know, very dark, like it is dark, okay, but it's like those guys are so funny.
• 14:26
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, from running the social media pages, I cannot find one interview with Allison Chains where they're not taking the piss constantly.
• 14:34
  SPEAKER_01: It's insane, even Nirvana, and I think um actually now that I say it, I've seen interviews in recent years with Dave Grohl and Chris Novosalic where they talk about that.
• 14:44
  SPEAKER_01: That you know, what's uh Kirk Obain was a really funny guy, you know.
• 14:48
  SPEAKER_01: But I I look at my when I listen to music, I I tend to veer towards a lot of darker music, and I find that that gives me a lot of it kind of lifts me a lot, you know what I mean?
• 15:00
  SPEAKER_01: So it's it's um, but it I I just don't see it as being as dark as people think, you know.
• 15:06
  SPEAKER_01: Um also there's certain elements uh of the musicianship that's considered a little bit um maybe not up to the uh to the standards of like say 80s hair metal or something, which I think is is crazy because the musicianship that era was just stunning, you know.
• 15:27
  SPEAKER_01: Um Soundgarden never played in 4-4, everything is always just in odd times area.
• 15:33
  SPEAKER_01: Their guitars are always in bizarre tunings, you know.
• 15:36
  SPEAKER_01: It's everything about it was was quite, you know, um uh you know, very, very powerfully done, you know.
• 15:44
  SPEAKER_00: No, it's a big myth.
• 15:45
  SPEAKER_00: It's the same with the myth about punk rock that that's what you you get into that music because you can't play, like it's just it's fun.
• 15:50
  SPEAKER_00: Hey, you know, but tell that to Tom Verlaine, like he's a pretty excellent guitar player.
• 15:54
  SPEAKER_00: So, I mean, I don't know what you're talking about, or Bob Mold, somebody like that.
• 15:57
  SPEAKER_00: These guys are Uber musicians, they can do anything.
• 16:00
  SPEAKER_00: They got moved by punk rock.
• 16:02
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, because it was the only thing going at the time that was remotely interesting, you know.
• 16:08
  SPEAKER_00: Um, what band from that period uh do you think has had its history rewritten the most over the last like 35 years?
• 16:18
  SPEAKER_01: Um I mean if you're looking probably at the top four, so you know, the big four.
• 16:26
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, it it that's a funny question for me because I'm trying to think of like, you know, retrospectively, and you would probably say, you know, I don't like the the fact that Kirk Cobain has been turned into some kind of a deity, you know.
• 16:40
  SPEAKER_01: So there is a certain rewriting of who the guy actually was, you know.
• 16:44
  SPEAKER_01: Um but then a band that really still exists, like Allison Chains, you know, they've gone and rewritten their own history with their new lineup, and they've you know continued.
• 16:55
  SPEAKER_01: Um I I'm not really sure.
• 17:00
  SPEAKER_01: Uh you know, I just the Nirvana thing is unfortunate because you know, Kurt was really cut down in his prime, and you know what they could have done was was pretty amazing.
• 17:10
  SPEAKER_01: Uh you know, the potential was amazing, and I think because of that, you know, um people have really put upon them there's some very unfortunate things about Kurt's death that that that keep getting brought.
• 17:23
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, you know, I still see occasionally on YouTube new conspiracy videos about, you know, Kurt was murdered and Courtney did it, and it's like I've dismissed that out of hand every time I've ever heard it, just because I just flat out don't believe it.
• 17:37
  SPEAKER_00: Um yeah, I I I like Courtney Love.
• 17:40
  SPEAKER_00: I don't think she's capable of murdering somebody, thinking, hey, I'm gonna get all this money and I'm gonna control these assets for the next like I just don't think she's that calculating and it's kind of ridiculous.
• 17:50
  SPEAKER_00: Say Allison Chains is kind of the band that I think has really rewritten its history over and over.
• 17:56
  SPEAKER_00: And the reason why is because when they first emerged on a national level, they were looked at as a metal band.
• 18:02
  SPEAKER_00: They went out on that Clash of the Titans tour with anthrax and and all of that, and they were going for that metal crowd.
• 18:08
  SPEAKER_00: And when people would call them grunge, I was kind of like, Yeah, are you saying that just because they're from Seattle?
• 18:14
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, the Alice and Chains was an amazing band, okay, and now I love them more now than I probably did at the time, but at the time I was sort of like, Well, I don't know, they're a metal band, and in Washington State has a history with metal.
• 18:26
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, um, they've had uh famous metal bands have come from that town, Queen Streich, and and some others have a history in that area, so it's not completely you know out of out of the the realm of possibilities that they would be looking for a metal band.
• 18:42
  SPEAKER_00: But now I think people see them as definitely part of that big four with Pearl Jam and Nirvana and Soundgarden and uh you know all of those.
• 18:49
  SPEAKER_00: So they've kind of changed their their their history too in that yeah.
• 18:54
  SPEAKER_01: I I definitely agree.
• 18:55
  SPEAKER_01: They were I saw them on April Fool's Day, 1991.
• 19:01
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 19:02
  SPEAKER_01: So you know, if you consider smells like Teen Spirit, which was September '91, especially over here, like you know, Nirvana were not known at all, you know, and um they came out, they were open for Megadeth um on that Rust in Peace tour.
• 19:17
  SPEAKER_01: And I didn't really know them, I had read their name, and then they walked out on stage.
• 19:21
  SPEAKER_01: I was 15 years old, and I I can to this day I still remember it so vividly.
• 19:28
  SPEAKER_01: Like Lane walked out with a black hood on his head and a pair of black sunglasses, and Jerry had the long hair shirt off, cut off cargo shorts, Starr was just beating the ground with his foot, and then Lane took off the hood and he had the dread still, and he was just shaking his head from side to side.
• 19:45
  SPEAKER_01: And I just I couldn't get over the visual of the band, and then these songs were just and I'll never forget, right in the middle of an opening set in front of a trash metal crowd, they played Love Hate Love.
• 19:57
  SPEAKER_01: If you're familiar with that song off of Facelift, it's this five and a half, six-minute dirge, and it was just like nothing I'd heard before.
• 20:08
  SPEAKER_01: And then Lane does that big vocal crescendo at the end, and I'm getting goosebumps even talking about it.
• 20:14
  SPEAKER_01: And that happened like in 1991, and it was it was life-changing, you know, and it was I mean, that kind of thing doesn't happen very often to you as a as a music fan, and they were a special band, but I do agree they have they changed because I think it was because just because they were from Seattle, they were put into that scene.
• 20:33
  SPEAKER_01: I have an interview with Mike Starr where he's on MTV in like nine, they had just recorded Dirt, and the the guy who's interviewing him says, uh, we've got one of Grunge's finest, and he just he's there going, We're not grunge.
• 20:48
  SPEAKER_00: I look back at it and I say, you know, the whole thing about some of the 90s bands that were that were successful, okay.
• 20:55
  SPEAKER_00: The grunge bands that that made it, in at least in the states, Pearl Jam, Soundgarden, Nirvana, Alice and Chains, they were with the except Pearl Jam is more just rock and roll, but they were the heavier sound of the of the genre.
• 21:08
  SPEAKER_00: You know, the posies didn't sell any records.
• 21:11
  SPEAKER_00: Great big, but they but it didn't help them.
• 21:14
  SPEAKER_00: It didn't help um a lot of other sort of smallish or twee kind of indie rock stuff that that still stayed kind of underground.
• 21:22
  SPEAKER_01: The heavier stuff rose to the top, which is unusual, really, if you think about it, you know, because uh the more abrasive aggressive stuff definitely did hit hit the mainstream, which wouldn't be how you would think it would be designed, you know.
• 21:37
  SPEAKER_01: Um but maybe people are ready for that, you know.
• 21:40
  SPEAKER_01: I think I think a lot of those guys who are into the 80s, I hate using hair metal as well.
• 21:46
  SPEAKER_01: It's it's a funny term.
• 21:48
  SPEAKER_01: I don't want it to be derogatory, you know, because there's some fantastic music that came out of that scene.
• 21:53
  SPEAKER_01: But if I yeah, if I say like hair metal, you know, like I think a lot of those people get quite.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_01: Angry and actually put blame on somebody like Kirk of Ben, as you said earlier.
• 22:04
  SPEAKER_01: Didn't I think he even thought about it once?
• 22:07
  SPEAKER_00: I don't think he ever mentioned it, no.
• 22:09
  SPEAKER_00: And in fact, he he liked Kiss and Zeppelin and Aerosmith and stuff like that.
• 22:14
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, as far as his personal taste goes, Black Sabbath.
• 22:17
  SPEAKER_00: I do a set a podcast called Rock of Aging, and it's about hair metal 80s, the 80s metal era.
• 22:22
  SPEAKER_00: So my co-host and I went to see a show with like four of those bands on the bill, and one of them was Pretty Boy Floyd, who was kind of a here today, gone later today band in like the late 80s.
• 22:33
  SPEAKER_00: And they get on stage and they're doing their thing, and then the guy stops to give this spiel about how he's still here, and he sort of went to mock Chris Cornell and Kurt Cobain for killing themselves, and that was when the show ended for me.
• 22:47
  SPEAKER_00: I'm like, number one, that's lame that you did it.
• 22:50
  SPEAKER_00: Number two, don't mock people that that do that.
• 22:53
  SPEAKER_00: And number three, like, you're about as talented as uh the pimple on Kurt Cobain's butt back in 19.
• 22:59
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, you had one half a song, and just because you're still alive doesn't mean you're like you've you're better off at the end.
• 23:06
  SPEAKER_00: But that was my little tirade.
• 23:07
  SPEAKER_00: I won't won't go into it too much, but yeah, those bands really do think that that Kurt Cobain sought to like end their career.
• 23:14
  SPEAKER_01: No, and what it was was that the audience was ready for something else, and this happens, music goes in cycles.
• 23:20
  SPEAKER_01: I mean disappeared very, very quickly, and then it was post punk and new wave, and you know, you can't you can't, you know, plus a lot of that stuff had become so it had run its own course, it became so cliched, it was the same ideas were being rehashed over and over, and that eventually happened to the grunge scene as well.
• 23:41
  SPEAKER_01: You know what I mean?
• 23:42
  SPEAKER_01: It just happens.
• 23:43
  SPEAKER_00: Well, and and my co-host on the Rock of Aging show says that she doesn't view Nirvana ending hair middle, she said Guns and Roses did.
• 23:52
  SPEAKER_00: Um after Guns N' Roses, those bands don't getting all dolled up and stuff, they just looked silly.
• 23:57
  SPEAKER_00: You couldn't even take them seriously after Guns N' Roses, yeah.
• 24:01
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I mean look at Duff, man.
• 24:04
  SPEAKER_00: I know, and they tie into Nirvana on the flight, Kurt's last night.
• 24:09
  SPEAKER_01: That's right, and he was in 10 Minute Warning in Seattle.
• 24:11
  SPEAKER_01: The farts 10 Minute Warning, an incredible band.
• 24:14
  SPEAKER_01: Greg Gilmore from Mother Love Bone was in 10 Minute Warning with him.
• 24:18
  SPEAKER_01: The two of them went to Los Angeles at the same time to make it.
• 24:22
  SPEAKER_01: Duff stayed around and joined a band called Guns N' Roses, and Greg didn't, so he went home.
• 24:27
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah to join Love Bone.
• 24:29
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, you know, these things there's you know, even though the even though the US is such a massive country, a lot of people were really well connected back in those days, you know, and it just kind of a lot of serendipity was going on, you know.
• 24:43
  SPEAKER_00: So, what's something you learned while you were researching your book that completely contradicted what you remembered happening at the time?
• 24:50
  SPEAKER_01: Wow, that's a great question.
• 24:51
  SPEAKER_01: I've never um I got I don't know, man.
• 24:57
  SPEAKER_01: You've stumped me there because there's not much that I, you know, because I was such an avid reader and and all of that, and I've probably, you know, my memory is really excellent for stuff like that.
• 25:09
  SPEAKER_01: There was nothing that really caught me off guard that I thought I knew, and I it was completely different.
• 25:15
  SPEAKER_01: There were many things that I learned that were new, you know.
• 25:18
  SPEAKER_01: I I, you know, different different things and people that were involved in recording albums and stuff like that, I found fascinating.
• 25:25
  SPEAKER_01: You know, if I picked individual albums, I'd be able to tell you, but uh yeah, you kind of stumped me there.
• 25:31
  SPEAKER_00: I'll take it.
• 25:32
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, um, I you know, for me, what was always that you've learned now later, and um is that there seemed to be this animosity between some of the bands.
• 25:43
  SPEAKER_00: There was a real stress point between some of them, as Nirvana and Pearl Gem and stuff.
• 25:47
  SPEAKER_00: And you kind of learn that I don't think there was a real hatred there.
• 25:50
  SPEAKER_00: I think they just, I mean, when they'd have gigs together, which was very rare, or they, you know, I don't think there was this animosity as much as people sort of made it out to be at the time.
• 26:02
  SPEAKER_00: I could be wrong on that.
• 26:03
  SPEAKER_01: Um I think you're right, okay, because I think Kirk Cobain came out later after that kind of stuff where he mouted off about Pearl Jam and all of this, and he said, you know what, it was not the band, it was their label that I should have been more suspicious of and that kind of thing.
• 26:20
  SPEAKER_01: But I think I think like one of the things is you know, people people always believe the Pearl Jam were the corporate band of the whole the whole scene, you know, maybe because they're they outsold Nevermind.
• 26:34
  SPEAKER_01: 10 outsold nevermind, which is which is nuts really because Nevermind is considered a more culturally impactful album, but 10 was the bigger album.
• 26:43
  SPEAKER_01: Um but up through that time, it's amazing because Mud Honey went on tour with Pearl Jam around the time of Save Versus and Vitology, and they went on tour.
• 26:56
  SPEAKER_01: Also, they're quoted as talking about this.
• 26:58
  SPEAKER_01: They went on tour with um Nirvana at the same time, and you would think that the Nirvana Mudhoney thing would gel, and they said it didn't because the backstage area was a mess, like they just the whole scene was dark, everything was falling apart for Nirvana at that time, and then they went on tour with Pearl Jam, and it was it couldn't have been treated.
• 27:19
  SPEAKER_00: I think Steve Turner referenced that in his book.
• 27:21
  SPEAKER_00: Who's the most important person in the grunge story that like hardly ever gets mentioned?
• 27:27
  SPEAKER_01: Susan Silver.
• 27:28
  SPEAKER_00: Susan Silver, okay, manager of Sun Garden, Alice and Chains.
• 27:33
  SPEAKER_01: She also had a lot to do with so sub didn't do didn't do contracts with bands, apparently.
• 27:39
  SPEAKER_01: And Chris Novoselic has talked about this.
• 27:41
  SPEAKER_01: That when Nirvana signed with Subop, the only reason they signed a contract with him is because Susan Silver wrote up the contract and made Chris Novoselic go over to their house, and you know, Bruce and uh the Pavadan, what was uh what's the other guy's name, but Poniman.
• 28:02
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, so you know, she she seems to be like this kind of force, kind of helping to guide everyone underneath.
• 28:09
  SPEAKER_01: She seems like a really good person as well.
• 28:12
  SPEAKER_00: Um SubHop got paid because of that, because they had that next record.
• 28:17
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, if they hadn't had that contract, they'd have gotten nothing from Nevermind.
• 28:20
  SPEAKER_01: And I talk about it in the book.
• 28:22
  SPEAKER_01: Um, uh there's a part on Every Good Boy Deserves Fudge by Mud Honey, that album is in there, and apparently the label was like I mean, gone, you know, uh, and really only because of Nevermind and that album.
• 28:37
  SPEAKER_01: So that album sold a couple of thousand copies when it came out, basically kept the lights on until Nevermind happened, and then as you said, that contract that they had meant that Geffen had to pay them off, and then everybody everybody went to the bank.
• 28:52
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I don't know if you remember a band called Best Kissers in the World, I think they were from Portland in that same time.
• 28:58
  SPEAKER_00: They did an EP on subpop, and the back cover was nothing but canceled checks or for non-sufficient funds from subpop.
• 29:05
  SPEAKER_00: Like that was the back cover of the album.
• 29:07
  SPEAKER_00: So that was real.
• 29:08
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, they were burning bands left and right because they had literally no money.
• 29:13
  SPEAKER_01: You know what, in retrospect and all of that, it reads great, it's so funny, and it seems like again, it's going back to like what I was saying that like my misconception of that scene, or or what people misconceive about the scene is that it wasn't kind of hilarious, and it just seems so a part of the scene now that you know the major record label in the area will be burning everything.
• 29:36
  SPEAKER_01: It's funny.
• 29:37
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it is kind of I mean, it makes for a good story now.
• 29:41
  SPEAKER_00: If I were was on the receiving end of one of those checks and I really needed it or something, I'd have probably been pretty pissed.
• 29:46
  SPEAKER_00: But at the same time, there's not a story of a Seattle band that didn't get burned by subpop.
• 29:50
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, at least at one point.
• 29:52
  SPEAKER_01: You know, before the internet, the cultural divides were, I think, a little wider.
• 29:56
  SPEAKER_01: Now the internet has actually made us all understand what's happening in in different parts of the world and things like that, and our outlook has changed.
• 30:04
  SPEAKER_01: But before then, it's like, you know, somebody from Ireland, somebody from England, somebody from the US, you know, we all felt like we were, you know, a little bit less connected.
• 30:14
  SPEAKER_01: But really, our I suppose as human beings, the way we interpret this music essentially was all the same, you know.
• 30:21
  SPEAKER_01: I I don't think there was that much of a cultural, you know, uh the acceptance all seemed to be the same.
• 30:28
  SPEAKER_01: We all just got and became enthralled with this stuff, you know.
• 30:32
  SPEAKER_01: It was it was just magical.
• 30:35
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I don't know if over in uh like Ireland and England and stuff, they have rural dudes that wear flannel t-shirts and that like, but you know, because like these guys, these were guys that like looked like dudes I knew.
• 30:47
  SPEAKER_00: Like a lot of them when they first started emerging, Nirvana, especially, and Tad and some of these they looked like people that you would just see at the shows.
• 30:54
  SPEAKER_00: They didn't, there was no difference between the way they you know came off versus the people in the crowd.
• 31:00
  SPEAKER_00: And I, you know, I don't know if there's people in the in around the world that that uh uh to fit that too, but that was the big thing that stood out for me was that you know, I could see two, three Kurt Cobains in a crowd at an average show when I would go see a punk show in like 1990 or something like that.
• 31:18
  SPEAKER_01: Well, Ireland was, I mean, Ireland at that time, you know, the Celtic Tiger hadn't happened yet, you know.
• 31:25
  SPEAKER_01: The the economy wasn't, you know, it wasn't it wasn't terrible, but it wasn't, you know.
• 31:29
  SPEAKER_01: So like we didn't we didn't have like this is the thing with you know, a lot of things like the hair scene and the hair metal scene and all, even though it did filter through over here quite a bit, it just seemed so something we could never be, something we could never attain to.
• 31:44
  SPEAKER_01: It was all glitzy, it was all Hollywood, and that kind of thing we could see on the TV, but we could never be that.
• 31:50
  SPEAKER_01: And and then when the grunge thing happened, I'm saying grunge as the whole scene, that alternative rock scene became so prevalent.
• 32:00
  SPEAKER_01: We looked like those guys because we didn't have anything, so it's like you're saying there was we were, you know, it was cool, there was no barrier anymore.
• 32:08
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, we could do we could look like that, and we were part of a scene, you know.
• 32:12
  SPEAKER_00: Is there a band that gets unfairly blamed for what grunge sort of turned into by the mid to late 90s?
• 32:18
  SPEAKER_01: Oh man, Stone Temple Pilots, hands down.
• 32:21
  SPEAKER_01: Now, look at the people are still I will die on this hill, right?
• 32:25
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 32:26
  SPEAKER_01: Stone Temple Pilots are probably, probably the most talented band to come out of that era.
• 32:33
  SPEAKER_01: They're not obviously they're not from Seattle, but we're not talking about all bands from Seattle anyway.
• 32:39
  SPEAKER_01: Um, they're a classic American rock band, but they are a sophisticated rock band.
• 32:44
  SPEAKER_01: And you know, they had a frontman who is in the greatest traditions of a Bowie, you know, of all of the greatest frontmen of all time.
• 32:52
  SPEAKER_01: Scott Wheland on his day was untouchable, you know.
• 32:56
  SPEAKER_01: And again, put his personality aside or any kind of thing that that you know you may not like about him.
• 33:02
  SPEAKER_01: The guy could sing, he could write.
• 33:04
  SPEAKER_01: Those two De Leo brothers are just no, they're talented guys, yeah.
• 33:08
  SPEAKER_01: They're talented guys, and Eric Kretz is just a stunning drummer.
• 33:13
  SPEAKER_01: They delivered all the time.
• 33:14
  SPEAKER_01: And what was really interesting about them, Core was a fantastic album, and again, yeah, you could accuse it of you know being a it did come out in September '92, so it's not like they came later, and you know, um, it came out the same day as Dirt by Allison Chains.
• 33:30
  SPEAKER_01: Actually, yeah, and and but they developed Purple.
• 33:36
  SPEAKER_01: The next album, you would you instantly notice that there was something changing here, and then they made Tiny Music, which was a glam album, like it was, but not the glam we're talking about, right?
• 33:46
  SPEAKER_01: Like it was this kind of glitter, and like nothing else sounded like it, you know.
• 33:51
  SPEAKER_01: They were they were quite a miscon, but it was the it was the press.
• 33:55
  SPEAKER_01: The press needed a whipping boy.
• 33:57
  SPEAKER_00: And well, I one thing I remember about Stone Temple Pilots was once they emerged and the obvious similarities to Pearl Jam and some others, but I think that they tried a little bit too hard, or at least Scott Wyland did.
• 34:11
  SPEAKER_00: I remember seeing him do this interview where he said that the band members met at a black flag concert, and that's just not true.
• 34:19
  SPEAKER_00: Black flag ended in 1986 and they did not form in 1986, so that's not when they met.
• 34:25
  SPEAKER_00: And I thought that was you trying to shove credibility in there because maybe you're catching hell for like looking like somebody.
• 34:31
  SPEAKER_00: I I think they should have just written it on because you're right, they were a really good band.
• 34:35
  SPEAKER_00: You know, what I'd like to do right now is to talk about a couple of records.
• 34:39
  SPEAKER_00: So there's 50 in the in the book, so we don't have time to talk about all 50, but I selected five that I'd like to have Clive uh talk about as to why they were um added to this to this particular book.
• 34:51
  SPEAKER_00: And let's start with this one: Dinosaur Jr.
• 34:54
  SPEAKER_00: Where you've been from 1993.
• 34:57
  SPEAKER_00: I just saw Dinosaur Jr.
• 34:58
  SPEAKER_00: about two weeks ago, and they played this album in its entirety.
• 35:02
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, look at you.
• 35:03
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so I'm I'm very, very familiar with it at this point.
• 35:07
  SPEAKER_00: But um, why that one as opposed to say uh the one that came after it with Feel the Pain or Green Mind?
• 35:14
  SPEAKER_00: Or what was the thinking behind where you've been?
• 35:16
  SPEAKER_00: Why did you want that one?
• 35:18
  SPEAKER_01: So I had written, I think, four Dinosaur Jr.
• 35:21
  SPEAKER_01: albums, written about four of them.
• 35:23
  SPEAKER_01: And um I did this album has a little bit of nostalgia for me, in that I think it was probably definitely in the 90s, it was my favorite one.
• 35:34
  SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, there was something about that.
• 35:38
  SPEAKER_01: Plus, it's the it I'm writing remembering it's the first album when uh they they're kind of a band again.
• 35:45
  SPEAKER_00: Uh Green Mind Mike Johnson played on it, yeah.
• 35:49
  SPEAKER_01: And I I think I felt that, you know what I mean?
• 35:52
  SPEAKER_01: Green Mind is a great album, but I think this felt like they were a band again, you know.
• 35:56
  SPEAKER_01: And um there's some classic songs on this, it's just a it's just a beautiful album from start to finish.
• 36:03
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it was interesting seeing them play it uh not too long ago.
• 36:07
  SPEAKER_00: It was uh I'd forgotten some of the songs on that one because uh I do if I pick a dinosaur, I'm I'm usually going for You're Living All Over Me or Green Mind, those tend to be my two favorites.
• 36:17
  SPEAKER_00: I love the newer stuff too.
• 36:18
  SPEAKER_00: I think their post-reunion stuff is very good, but I was just curious about where you've been, why that was the one that you uh had chosen.
• 36:25
  SPEAKER_01: I know, and it's probably not you know, of those uh early 90s albums, I'm not sure what kind of reception does it usually get.
• 36:32
  SPEAKER_01: Is it do people love their I mean?
• 36:34
  SPEAKER_00: Um, you know, I was just at a show and most of the people there were like into it, but it was kind of like with me, they were like, Well, that's not my favorite dinosaur album, but I still really like it.
• 36:43
  SPEAKER_01: But it's a beautiful album.
• 36:44
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, look it.
• 36:45
  SPEAKER_01: Here's something that I could ask you.
• 36:47
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, are you are you similar to me in that you would hear these albums?
• 36:51
  SPEAKER_01: And sometimes you hear an album, and it might not be the best album, but because you heard it at a certain time of your life, it means an awful lot more to you, you know.
• 37:00
  SPEAKER_01: And then maybe this is what I'm feeling with where you've been over because I did love all of those albums in that area, you know.
• 37:06
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, no, I I hear you.
• 37:07
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, a lot of times your favorite is just what you heard first, and that was the way that it got to you.
• 37:13
  SPEAKER_00: Um, what was going on in your life?
• 37:14
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, of course.
• 37:15
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, those are all these factors.
• 37:17
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, because you get somebody who was like, How could how could Diver Down be your favorite Van Helen album?
• 37:22
  SPEAKER_00: Well, it's like, I don't know, I was a kid, I was this or that.
• 37:25
  SPEAKER_00: You know, it's like, well, it's it depends on when you get into it, you know.
• 37:28
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, is the way I would look at it.
• 37:30
  SPEAKER_00: And Dennis Or Jr., this was on the on the path.
• 37:33
  SPEAKER_00: I was, I mean, I was such a fan at this point.
• 37:35
  SPEAKER_00: It's not like when this came out, I thought, oh, this, I mean, this isn't very good.
• 37:38
  SPEAKER_00: No, get me was incredible, start chopping, incredible.
• 37:53
  SPEAKER_00: Out there, I mean, lots and lots of great stuff.
• 37:56
  SPEAKER_01: So I think I think out there, get out there and start chopping are probably they're anthems in my head, you know, and that that would have been a reason that would have swung me into adding this album.
• 38:09
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, so the next one I want to ask you about is Helmet Meantime.
• 38:16
  SPEAKER_00: And this album from 1992, Great Record.
• 38:20
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I have a funny story about this record in that um you no doubt you're familiar with the uh well, it's a book and a movie, but the John Cusack movie where he worked in a record store.
• 38:32
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I can't believe I'm blanking on the name of this.
• 38:34
  SPEAKER_00: High Fidelity, right?
• 38:36
  SPEAKER_00: So I know most people like the book better, but I haven't read the book.
• 38:39
  SPEAKER_00: I've only seen the movie.
• 38:40
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm gonna refer to a movie scene where they're in the record store and John Cusack goes, All right, I'm gonna put this beta band CD on and watch, we'll sell like five copies or whatever within minutes.
• 38:50
  SPEAKER_00: And he puts it on, and instantly everybody comes up to the counter, like, what is this?
• 38:54
  SPEAKER_00: What is this?
• 38:54
  SPEAKER_00: I used to do that with helmet before it broke big.
• 38:57
  SPEAKER_00: The second in the meantime came on, just that you know, people start running to the front of the record store.
• 39:04
  SPEAKER_00: Like, what is this?
• 39:04
  SPEAKER_00: How can I buy this?
• 39:05
  SPEAKER_00: What is it?
• 39:06
  SPEAKER_00: It was my high fidelity moment with that record.
• 39:08
  SPEAKER_00: It was so instantaneous.
• 39:10
  SPEAKER_00: The second people heard it, they were just like, What?
• 39:13
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I have to go get that.
• 39:15
  SPEAKER_00: It was shocking.
• 39:15
  SPEAKER_00: I've never seen anything like that.
• 39:17
  SPEAKER_01: Isn't that so cool?
• 39:18
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I uh that was my introduction to album, it was very similar to that.
• 39:23
  SPEAKER_01: It could have been meantime the song or on song, I can't remember which song I heard first.
• 39:28
  SPEAKER_01: But this album, and again, look at people people say things to me like, Oh, this is not grunge, but like we're talking about an era, we're not, you know, this album.
• 39:37
  SPEAKER_01: The people who liked grunge liked this.
• 39:40
  SPEAKER_01: It was, you know, it was the same audience, right?
• 39:43
  SPEAKER_01: And then they got signed because of grunge, they got signed to a what was it, a million-dollar deal.
• 39:49
  SPEAKER_01: It was in it was absolutely amazing to put out this thing, and this album was a juggernaut.
• 39:56
  SPEAKER_01: I think nothing sounded like this.
• 39:58
  SPEAKER_01: This was so uh heavy and rhythmic that nothing had come like it.
• 40:04
  SPEAKER_01: It was like a machine, but it had rhythm.
• 40:06
  SPEAKER_01: And um Page's guitar playing and his guitar chord choices, and the structure of the songs were just again, it went to that eclecticism that was happening at that time in music.
• 40:19
  SPEAKER_01: There was noise rock in there, there was metal in there, there was alternative rock in there, groove in there, it was just it was something else.
• 40:27
  SPEAKER_01: I actually saw them do this album in full, and I saw them in Bristol in England, and they played it backwards, which I thought was genius because you know the album isn't really front-loaded, but the big songs are are are at the front of the album, but you know, the later songs are equally as brilliant.
• 40:47
  SPEAKER_01: So but what they did was they came out and played like five, six songs from other parts of their career the minute they started Mean Time.
• 40:56
  SPEAKER_01: It was just the album just is so powerful, it just sounds so you know, even within their own catalog, it sounds so powerful, powerful.
• 41:05
  SPEAKER_01: And I love Betty.
• 41:06
  SPEAKER_00: What came out of the sounds great today?
• 41:08
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, Betty's a great record, too.
• 41:09
  SPEAKER_00: I agree with you.
• 41:10
  SPEAKER_00: I agree with you.
• 41:11
  SPEAKER_00: Still sounds good today.
• 41:12
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, it doesn't sound dated or like 290s or whatever, it sounds still very fresh, in my opinion.
• 41:19
  SPEAKER_01: Uh would you agree?
• 41:20
  SPEAKER_01: I think a lot of 90s production still sounds good today.
• 41:24
  SPEAKER_01: Um I agree, yeah.
• 41:26
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I think there was there were a handful of really, really great engineers that worked on a lot of this stuff that seemed to be working on a lot of the same records.
• 41:35
  SPEAKER_00: Um, maybe if you didn't even notice it or whatever, but like, yeah, they came out.
• 41:39
  SPEAKER_00: There was a lot of stuff that sounded really good.
• 41:41
  SPEAKER_00: I'm hard pressed to think of, except for bands that were intentionally lo-fi, like a guided by voices or cebado or something, which that was their shtick.
• 41:50
  SPEAKER_00: Most of the stuff sounded really good.
• 41:51
  SPEAKER_00: Once they could afford to get some decent studio time, they went for it.
• 41:56
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely, yeah.
• 41:57
  SPEAKER_01: I agree.
• 41:58
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, there's some phenomenal albums there.
• 41:59
  SPEAKER_01: There's there's albums like the Butchvig, Sime's Dream, not to change from Helmet for a minute, but Sime's Dream by Butch Vig.
• 42:06
  SPEAKER_01: I just cannot understand how that album sounds so incredible with that amount of fuzz on the guitars.
• 42:12
  SPEAKER_01: The bass sounds amazing on that album, even though the guitars are just so fuzzy.
• 42:17
  SPEAKER_01: You listen to a sound like Hummer, it keeps getting bigger and bigger with more fuzz and it just blooms.
• 42:22
  SPEAKER_01: But like, I hear albums trying to achieve that now and they can't do it.
• 42:26
  SPEAKER_00: No, you know, no, and that maybe has something to do with the analog recording or something to do with what you know, whatever it was at the time.
• 42:33
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I lived in Madison after I left Seattle.
• 42:35
  SPEAKER_00: I moved to Madison, Wisconsin, which was the home of Butch Vig and Smart Studios.
• 42:41
  SPEAKER_00: So I I wasn't, it was just a grungy, dingy little building.
• 42:44
  SPEAKER_00: It's like so small.
• 42:46
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but yeah, I was very familiar with Butch early on because of the fact that he played in local bands and then started producing Killdozer and uh Urge Overkill and some other stuff.
• 42:57
  SPEAKER_00: I think I think he did Urge Overkill, I might be wrong on that.
• 43:00
  SPEAKER_00: But uh started working on a lot of bands and then Nirvana.
• 43:03
  SPEAKER_00: Um, he did uh the demos or something, some some with when he's still at Chad Channing, right at Smart.
• 43:09
  SPEAKER_00: So speaking of Butch Vig, let's move to this one here, which is L7 Bricks Are Heavy, which I chose largely because Jennifer Finch passed away recently, and I thought that was just really sad.
• 43:20
  SPEAKER_00: And um, I loved L7.
• 43:23
  SPEAKER_00: I saw them numerous times in the 90s from their peak, you know, bricks are heavy kind of period, all the way till the end when they were kind of back to playing clubs shortly before they broke up.
• 43:35
  SPEAKER_00: Ah, there you go.
• 43:36
  SPEAKER_00: I've got it too.
• 43:39
  SPEAKER_00: Got my bricks are heavy.
• 43:41
  SPEAKER_00: I think this is the UK version, actually, or international version because it has some giant poster in it.
• 43:46
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, okay.
• 43:47
  SPEAKER_01: I don't have that one, so maybe I'll have the US version.
• 43:50
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know.
• 43:50
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I don't know.
• 43:51
  SPEAKER_00: I don't because they were vinyl in the US, it was so hard to find in the 90s.
• 43:56
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, record stores would bring in like one copy, and if you weren't the guy there at the day the day that it got there like someone else would buy it the other vinyl guy you know besides me or whatever so so l7 bricks are heavy a great band absolutely grunge i would i would say closest comparison is nirvana they still get compared a lot to to nirvana um you chose you you included this book i i agree with this inclusion it's a fantastic record what were your thoughts on it so bricks are heavy yeah i could look i could have picked i could have picked any l7 album because i even think the later albums and the even the couple that jennifer wasn't on i i still really love you know um but bricks are heavy it was their breakout moment and it was you know pretend we're dead is obviously an absolute classic but the song the the songs in that album they don't give up they just they're they're relentlessly kind of powerful but the great thing about l7 too they were feel good i i always got this really good feel feel good vibe off of L7 they were just a kick ass band like they just played hard they seemed like the coolest people ever and um they were they were groundbreaking as well you know and um nobody did it like them I don't think anyone has done it like them since there's been many similar bands but I just think they were way ahead of their curve on on all of this stuff um but getting with book butch big on this album seemed to really kind of bring it into focus um it was just like Smell the Magic is is an amazing it's a compilation album really isn't it um that's an amazing album too um but bricks are heavy really you know it can't be beat really for for that aggressive fun good time you know early 90s rock it's it's not at all complete agreement it's fantastic I love this record I love L7 you're right they did they seem like they were fun people to hang out with they always had a great attitude about pretty much everything they didn't take themselves too seriously but yet they were a seriously rocking band and um I like that they have multiple singers you know that's always a cool thing in bands going back dating back to who's crew I like when they have multiple singers uh and I did get to see L7 in 2019 when they did their Scatter the Rats album and they came to where I live in Omaha and uh I'm glad I got to see Jennifer Finch one last time because um I would be really kicking myself right now if I hadn't gone to that show.
• 46:34
  SPEAKER_01: So here's the thing right and Jennifer began spending a lot in the last six months spending a lot of time on the Airgrounds broke socials.
• 46:42
  SPEAKER_01: So she would she would share stuff and she would comment and and I was so excited about that right so I've actually written the second book believe it or not um which will be out next year maybe and I got Dave Abruziz from the original well one of the original Paradigm drummers but Dave phenomenal he did the foreword to the first book and my intention was to ask Jennifer to do the foreword for the second book and you know a couple of weeks ago as we all saw it they put out the the news that she had the brain cancer and then a couple of days later they started to GoFundMe and it just seemed like the GoFundMe was was on fire.
• 47:25
  SPEAKER_01: It was people were you know and and then they just announced like she she had passed away which really was so sad you know and if we don't have a personal relationship with these people like I you know as friends they're such a part of our lives because they were there at moments in our life you know they they soundtracked our lives so it does mean something to us when when somebody like Jennifer passes away you know yeah it definitely it definitely hit me we're roughly the same age and you know it was just I mean she might be a year older than I was but either way it was just somebody that you you grew up with.
• 48:01
  SPEAKER_00: Like I didn't know her but I still felt really sad when it happened and I feel that way about a lot of you know rock stars that die but especially if you die in your 50s it's just like it's too young.
• 48:13
  SPEAKER_00: You know but um moving on from L7 let's do this one here.
• 48:18
  SPEAKER_00: This is Babes in Toyland Fontenelle now this is a band that I I you know I'm a minority in my friends' groups who who loves babes in toyland I love this band and sometimes they're a little too abrasive for some people I guess I mean I I don't know I I loved it I saw babes in toyland in I think 1990 for the first time in a club in Wisconsin and when they walked on stage I'd never heard them before this is I'm just going off they're from Minneapolis they record for twin tone the same label that the replacements did so that's all the information I knew I see them and I'm standing right where Kat would be approaching the stage and she comes out in a little baby doll dress and doing her thing and within 30 seconds of them starting I was so floored.
• 49:05
  SPEAKER_00: I could not believe because I was similar I mean it's gonna sound a little sexist but I was simultaneously frightened and excited by Kat at the same time because she was very pretty but she's also very scary at the same time and just so intense on stage I love them from the second I heard them yeah I mean I saw so it was difficult for me to see a band like Beds in Thailand Live because they didn't play here that often um but I did see them in 95 in the Reading Festival and that was a huge stage and and I remember I remember the intensity was insane.
• 49:45
  SPEAKER_00: Who was playing bass when you when you saw them was it Michelle or no I didn't uh the first time was Michelle then Maureen was the all the other times after that yeah it was Maureen when I saw them and uh it was later and I I got to meet them afterwards but it was at a sign intent so it wasn't like you know we didn't have a conversation it was just you know I think I got them to sign my bandana or something like that but it was you know but look going back to the music again I I I had that same visceral reaction to them when I heard them you know and I I mean it's not being as you said it's not being sexist but there was something sort of primal about the band like you didn't know whether you were you know um horny or scared it was like this is true this is true it was amazing they were so visceral it was like and listening to that and you know it makes so much sense that that Lee Ronaldo produced this album from Sonic youth you know um because you can't contain that kind of thing and I think any other producer would have gone in and tried to shave off the those um feral edges that were that Bayes and toilet had Gibbs and Toyland uh as far as an original sound like I can't think of who they really sound like that much either I mean yeah they're they're an amazing concomitation of of a few different things but even it's very hard to pinpoint what what it was you know like Lori's drumming who who drummed like that there's two drummers that I think drum in a non-traditional and there might be more but sort of tribal sort of sound Stephen Perkins of Jane's addiction and Lori Barbero of Babes in Toyland and they're the only two that are completely unique and drummers don't know how to approach their stuff because it it's so different the way they just the beats that they do and the the way I mean the way that they carry the band I see those two as very very similar.
• 51:41
  SPEAKER_01: That's interesting.
• 51:42
  SPEAKER_01: I've never thought of that yeah that's that's but I see that I see the reason why you would think that and it is quite interesting.
• 51:49
  SPEAKER_01: Lori used to turn the sticks backwards apparently really stick you know it was it was cool.
• 51:58
  SPEAKER_00: Okay and then the final record that we're gonna talk about is this one here Verucca Salt American Thighs and this one um I love this album and I do remember them also they were from Chicago I was in Wisconsin I saw them do a a show a club show before the album came out and uh again there was just a picture of of Nina and Louise on the on the flyer looking cute you know young 20 something girls and said Veruca Salt playing at the chamber Friday night or whatever this tiny little club holds about 75 people I went based just on that.
• 52:33
  SPEAKER_00: I never heard a song I never heard of nothing I was like the picture looks good I'm gonna go I mean I'm a 20 something guy I'm gonna check this out and then it turns out they were so great incredible I mean and see there we used to joke around that you could change the chorus to sounds like the breeders you know because it did sort of a little bit but the rest of the record doesn't really no and I have a quote I think in the book from Kim Beal where she talks about that and she has no problem she doesn't really even think they sound too much like but I I adore this album I can't remember what when or why I got this but I got it when it came out but I I can't remember what drew me to it.
• 53:14
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe it was Louise and Lina you know what I mean I uh you know it's okay to admit it now you know but I mean the songwriting oh boy though those songs are just and they were you know they were heavy they were a heavy band and they they sounded great the production was amazing the songwriting was killer riffs the guitar riffs are all there everything that you want is in that album and then it's kind of soothing in parts and I love songs like Spider-Man 79 it's just this slow beautiful sort of dirge and then they've got the the more rocky tunes and it's just it's perfection I actually think that album is pure perfection they were a great band.
• 53:58
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah pretty freaking phenomenal I like the second one too the eight arms to hold you I thought was really good too uh that's probably that's I I used to think Cedar was their best known song but most people think it's the Volcano girls is sort of their maybe best known I don't know I put up an anniversary performance of Volcano girls like two days ago and it just it's it blew up but you know so I do think volcano girls but unlike you I think Cedar Cedar is colossal it still is you know people seem to still love that song.
• 54:28
  SPEAKER_00: And there's a band I don't know if you're if you're familiar with the band called Mama that's a current band.
• 54:33
  SPEAKER_00: They sound a lot they've definitely been listening to their Verrucca Salt albums and it's not in a derivative way it's like it's sort of like it seems like they heard them and they were like wow let's do some you know and they just sort of got inspired but they're called Mama M-O-M-M-A and uh they're from the states and they I've commented on the radio numerous times that no that was not Verucca Salt that was the new single from from Mama because they're they're definitely a different sort of band.
• 54:57
  SPEAKER_01: I mean while we're talking about bands like L7 and Verucca Salt I think probably the greatest band I've heard in the last five years is Dice Fitz.
• 55:06
  SPEAKER_00: Yes agree with you 100% I'm obsessed with that band they're incredible.
• 55:12
  SPEAKER_00: Me too I saw them uh three years ago maybe open for aim on the sniffers and I went there to see you know the sniffers but like I left being like I'm a die Spitz fan I don't even care about that other band.
• 55:44
  SPEAKER_00: You know I bought I bought the EP off the the the bass player Kate and like I never looked back to do yeah they have the same eclectic spirit that I think a lot of the music was created in back in those days it's it's brilliant.
• 55:57
  SPEAKER_00: It's just brilliant and they're they're just they also have that like L7 attitude where they they seem like they're just fun and they're they're cool about everything you know they always and they put on great shows i I'm obsessed with them on YouTube.
• 56:09
  SPEAKER_00: I see almost every single concert video that people post because they're so good.
• 56:14
  SPEAKER_00: I played a show in a venue in Milton Keynes in England a couple of months ago and they had just like two days before they played their and I was looking at all of their clips of their show and I just played my show it was like God I just missed them you know so I haven't seen them live but I I can't wait till till they come around here so I can okay well we've been talking over an hour so let me get to you the maybe two final questions and then we'll we'll call it if Kurt Cobain had lived do you think Nirvana could have survived the late 90s I don't uh I don't think they would have I I think Kurt I think they were going to split up probably um and it may have been in purely speculation on my behalf a survival thing tactic from Kurt to split the band up he could have gone off and done something more acoustic or something.
• 57:05
  SPEAKER_01: I think there was there was talk of that you know but I I do think I do think the band could have been ultimately doomed.
• 57:12
  SPEAKER_00: I they probably would have reformed then like all these old bands do you know but but yeah I I I get the feeling they burn so bright things like that don't really they don't last but they come back sometimes but you know no I agree with you um I I don't think they could have survived much longer than they than they did I don't think late 90s mid 90s whatever I I think they lasted as long as they were supposed to last and if you like you know Dave Grohl you can continue on with the Foo Fighters they've been going for 30 years and they're still going really strong.
• 57:47
  SPEAKER_00: They're very popular um I'm not as much of a Foo Fighters guy as a as Nirvana obviously but I did see them opening and I I think you might have meant referenced it sort of in the book or maybe I'm getting it confused but nobody took Dave Grohl all that seriously when he first when Nirvana ended so myself included.
• 58:07
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah so here's the thing like I saw them in the summer of 95 at that reading festival the same festival that I saw babes in toiland at and I saw my other one of my other favorite bands from the era that gets no love Paw.
• 58:21
  SPEAKER_00: Oh yeah I remember that's a second album but Foo Fighters were playing in a tent and the tent probably whole maybe 2000 people no joke six thousand people were trying to get in they were climbing up the tent poles to the ceiling and then Grohl had to keep stopping the show and people were jumping off the top of the tent pole you know but people were just screaming at him to play Nirvana at that show it was a little yeah a little different experience when I saw him in the States uh Foo Fighters opened for Mike Watt and um then they became like Watt's band a little bit after that yeah Eddie Vetter and that with hovercraft Eddie Vetter with hovercraft was there too yeah again nobody that show Mike Watt used to play clubs and he would fill 250 people at that point he played a theater that held like 1100 and it was because people knew Eddie Vetter was coming.
• 59:15
  SPEAKER_00: It had nothing to do with anyone else it was like Eddie Vetter's gonna be there so guess what I'm going to and that show was sold out.
• 59:21
  SPEAKER_01: I put them in the book actually I put the first Foo Fighters album in the book because or sorry yeah because I do think look it's an important transition out of maybe the whole grunge thing really because you know it's for Grohl kicked off the next phase you know um and I do you know their first album was pretty good I I I do think to he had a recording before that and if you can look it up online it's called Pocket Watch which is basically Foo Fighters before Foo Fighters and that thing is I mean it's insane.
• 59:54
  SPEAKER_01: I let a friend of mine hear that not too long ago he couldn't believe what he was hearing it's it's this perfect amalgam of hardcore and like that melody but a lot more abrasive than foo fighters so pocket watch pocket watch that first album you know it is good and I love the story where he came to Ireland to get away from everything after Kirk died and he's traveling in a place called Kerry which you probably heard of it's down in the west of Ireland and it's like you know it's remote and he's there with his mother and his sister I think and they're driving around a ring of Kerry which is this beautiful like but it's like Ireland and it's you know it's the wild you know it's wild Atlantic weather and stuff like that.
• 1:00:37
  SPEAKER_01: And he said he was far away from civilization and he just saw this kid hitching a ride on the side of the road and when he got up close to him he was wearing a Kirkabane t shirt and he he came to Ireland to get away from all of that and he said he just realized that he's gonna have to embrace this and do something with his life because he'll never be able to get rid you know to to get away from it.
• 1:01:01
  SPEAKER_01: So he went to Dublin stayed in a hotel and I think he wrote this is a call in the Dublin hotel room.
• 1:01:07
  SPEAKER_00: Oh wow that was the start of kind of him getting ready to do the Food Fighters album I like the first couple of Food Fighters records you know I'm not certainly not a hater.
• 1:01:16
  SPEAKER_01: I mean I I I like Dave Grohl and respect him immensely but um yeah I just as they got into the 2000s maybe I didn't like it quite as much but that's neither here nor there um so let's wrap it up here by saying you know 35 years later is there anything that we've collectively gotten wrong about the story of grunge I think well there is a couple of things I mean uh grunge is responsible for nickelback maybe like look it it is I mean everything's responsible for everything else it's just a load of dominoes that keep falling you know what I mean I don't know I don't know I don't know I do know what I don't like I don't like the Kirk Cobain narrative I don't like the Courtney Love narrative about you know Kurt's death and stuff like that because I don't think there's there is no truth to it you know I mean the Mike Bloomfield documentary Curtin Courtney just did so much damage to that legacy it's really unfortunate Courtney is not liked because Courtney is an outspoken amazing performer and she's a rock and roll star and you know people don't like women to be like that she was she was polarizing even back then when when Kurt was still alive and it it just is you either dig it which I did I thought she was cool as hell and I loved whole uh or you know you're sort of turned off by it but I think a lot of the people are turned off by it is also kind of a a 90s reaction to feminism at least in the states I know that there was a lot of people who were just like you know why don't you just shut up and just you know play your guitar or something I mean it just but that was so much of her appeal and also that she was you know that that lived through this tour after Kurt died and she went right out on the road which is ridiculous because in her considering her mental state and she would just go off almost every show and you know fly man I saw that and you know what at the time I thought this is the biggest train wreck of a performance I've ever seen but to this day it's one of my most memorable shows and there was flashes of brilliance the songs were incredible and then absolute chaos like chaos everywhere she went there was chaos.
• 1:03:23
  SPEAKER_00: I mean everywhere she I saw her at the Seattle airport one time flying into a rage at the ticket counter because she wanted a first class ticket to bump up with her mileage and they were trying to not let her have a first class ticket and she was freaking the fuck out at the gate I'm like that's Courtney for you you know never gives an inch you know that's the best you wouldn't have her any other way man I wouldn't want her to be any other way.
• 1:03:48
  SPEAKER_00: So let's uh wrap it up here with Clive.
• 1:03:51
  SPEAKER_00: This is his book The Year Grunge Broke and it's also a Instagram and Facebook page this book is really really cool.
• 1:03:58
  SPEAKER_00: It's 50 Essential grunge and alternative rock albums of the 90s and beyond it does dip into the 2000s a pinch it has Queens of the Stone Age and um so this is a really really great book.
• 1:04:08
  SPEAKER_00: I appreciate you taking the time to talk to me.
• 1:04:10
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you so much for sending me the book in the first place and uh just keep doing what you're doing.
• 1:04:15
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks a lot man and it's just an honor to be on your channel I love your your your channel I love the other things you talk about.
• 1:04:21
  SPEAKER_00: I love Husker do replacements all of that stuff too so I'm I'm trying to become the online source for replacements information I'm I'm trying to be that guy I I love that band.
• 1:04:32
  SPEAKER_01: So I'm going to keep watching for all your replacement stuff so it's it's amazing.
• 1:04:36
  SPEAKER_00: Okay well I appreciate it very much uh look for Clive online of course with the year grunge broke you can find it on Instagram Facebook of course and you can find the book is it in bookstores or do you have to order it online?
• 1:04:47
  SPEAKER_01: It's online it's on the Away with media or theyeargrungebroke dot com.
• 1:04:51
  SPEAKER_00: So it's it's an online book I'll put that on the screen.
• 1:04:54
  SPEAKER_00: So theye grungebroke dot com.
• 1:04:56
  SPEAKER_00: All right well thank you very much I appreciate you taking the time and uh good luck.
• 1:05:02
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks a lot Dave