The genre Kurt Cobain always wanted to be known for: “I’m tired of saying it”
There was nothing that could have possibly prepared Kurt Cobain for what Nirvana was going to become.
The entire world had grown tired of what was happening in Los Angeles, but even after becoming one of the biggest bands in the world, Cobain was the first person to say that he never wanted to be the leader of a generation. All he wanted was to make songs that could hang with the best underground anthems in the world, and he was the last person who wanted to jump on the grunge bandwagon.
In fact, I’m going to drop a little nugget of wisdom here for you: grunge never actually existed. Oh, the genre itself does have plenty of fans and even a few distinct sounds, but when you talk about where the genre originated, it wasn’t necessarily out of Seattle. All of the bands that were categorised under that label only saw the movement as a massive PR stunt, and when you look at every single band that got famous, you can pretty much see where they are coming from whenever they disown the label.
Soundgarden were technically a grunge band in name, but when looking through their discography, they are a lot different from whatever Mudhoney was doing. Even when looking at the other members of the Big 4, Pearl Jam was just another classic rock-style band that happened to have one of the more incomprehensible singers of all time in it, and Alice in Chains just so happened to be a heavy metal band that came from Seattle and had a bit of an alternative edge to them.
So, how the hell does Nirvana fit into this situation? Are they punk? Are they hard rock? Are they a pop band? The real answer is all of the above, but when looked at through Cobain’s eyes, he felt that a lot of their songs had a lot more in common with what the early new wave bands were doing after punk.
Then again, it’s not like Cobain would have gone on to make Are We Not Men? We Are Nirvana or anything, but you can definitely hear what he’s talking about in the band’s deep cuts. He didn’t like the idea of being strictly commercial, and when you see their semi-ironic take on pop on each of their singles, it isn’t all that different from how bands like Blondie and The B-52s acted whenever they were talking about their music.
That genre gets buried under mountains of guitar pedals whenever people talk about Nirvana, but Cobain always felt that new wave was the missing link that tied their music together, saying, “I’m kind of getting tired of saying it, but we’re a new wave band, and that’s what happens with new wave. Punk rock was the revolution.”
Adding, “It was the groundbreaking thing, and then all these punk rock bands started making really palatable music with punk rock fashion. I’m not saying we’re a punk rock band; I’m saying we’re a new wave band.”
By that definition, though, Cobain’s argument does check out a little bit more. Some of Dave Grohl’s biggest heroes growing up were bands like The B-52s, and even if Cobain wasn’t going to cut his hair and wear skinny ties like the old new wave acts, he had the same mentality. He still liked the idea of writing simple pop songs, but the last thing that he wanted to do was try to compete with the likes of Michael Jackson and Madonna whenever he made a new record.
Like all of his new wavers before him, he carried himself with a bit more grace than the average pop star, and while the rest of the world called it something else, Cobain was happy to be bringing that sound to the rest of the world. There are still a lot of people who are scratching their heads at the idea of Nirvana being anything but alternative rock, but when you listen to the deep cuts off of Incesticide, it will all start to make a little more sense.
