Nirvana album ‘Nevermind’ and the unique connection to Chic
When one thinks about Nirvana, disco is not a word that instantly comes to mind. However, according to drummer Dave Grohl, we’ve all been listening to their magnum opus, Nevermind, in the incorrect way, and his inspirations for the album were bands like Chic.
Before the release of Nevermind, Nirvana were a cult phenomenon that had no aspirations of breaking into the mainstream. When they signed with Geffen, the Seattle band had no idea they would capture the minds of a generation. Suddenly, they’d gone from playing dingy clubs to headlining festivals and being the most important group on the planet.
Their exponential growth following the release of Nevermind was MTV getting behind ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit’ and placing it on constant rotation on the broadcaster. The album has sold over 30 million copies, making it one of the highest-selling records of all time.
It brought grunge into the mainstream and changed the face of popular culture. Nevermind was the perfect tonic for the decade of hair metal that preceded it and also made Kurt Cobain become the poster boy for Generation X.
In a conversation with Pharrell Williams for the Paramount+ series From Cradle to Stage, Grohl opened up about making the seminal record and made a surprising revelation. Although the Foo Fighters frontman considers John Bonham the greatest drummer of all time, he looked at the disco scene rather than rock for inspiration on Nirvana’s second offering.
“If you listen to Nevermind… I pulled so much stuff from the Gap Band and Cameo and [Chic’s] Tony Thompson on every one of those songs,” Grohl explained as the pair began to listen to ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit’. Prior to the drums kicking in on the classic track, he added: “All that [mimes drumming]… that’s old disco!”
“Nobody makes the connection,” Grohl said of the influence of Chic on his style. Even Thompson was none the wiser until he was invited to the former Nirvana man’s home for a barbecue. Grohl recalled: “I was like, ‘Man, I just want to thank you because I owe you so much I’ve been ripping you off my whole life.’ He goes, ‘I know.'”
In 2020, Grohl talked up the influence of Chic’s Nile Rodgers on his career again. At the time, he was working on Foo Fighters’ Medicine At Midnight and told the L.A. radio station ALT 98.7 FM: “The record is so good, we’re so excited for people to hear it, we’re so excited to go out and play it. It’s filled with anthemic, huge, sing-along rock songs. It’s kind of like a dance record but not an EDM, disco, modern dance record. It’s got groove. To me, it’s our David Bowie’s ‘Let’s Dance’ record. That’s what we wanted to make, we wanted to make this really up, fun record.”
Admittedly, I still struggle to hear the influence of Chic on Grohl’s work, especially on Nevermind. However, that’s a testament to how he used their inspiration subtly rather than overtly replicating Tony Thompson.
