People consistently have attitudes that are completely against their self interest and self preservation. I don’t know why people listen to and follow advice coming from corporations that don’t have their interests in mind. I mean, think about smoking. The Tobacco Industry for generations said it was fine and didn’t lead to cancer, and people believed it, “Ah, there’s nothing wrong with me smoking– fuck off.” But, whether you personally smoke or not, the act simply does not make sense and you must understand that. There’s no reason *to* do it. Even if it didn’t cause cancer, in what way could inhaling *smoke* be anything but bad for you? In all other situations where there is smoke, for example, when stuck in a burning building, inhaling smoke is bad. So why listen to a corporation that clearly has its own self interests in mind? Yet people did for generations.

The same goes with the environment. There’s no fucking reason to keep dumping shit into the environment. If it’s not hurting, then surely it’s not fucking helping. If the climate is cyclical, then surely we’re not making things any better. Yet people are sheep, and listen to those that clearly and obviously do not have their interests in mind. It’s a very bizarre part of the human condition. Psychologically, people just don’t like thinking for themselves. I mean, that’s such an easy thing to say. People are dumb. Easiest thing in the world to say. But the problem is, *it’s true*. Devastatingly so.

Seriously, it’s as frustrating as talking to somebody who still thinks George Bush is doing a good job. I mean, people say “everybody’s entitled to their own opinions”, which is a fact– everybody is also entitled to be *wrong*. I don’t see how looking at evidence that Dane Cook is a joke thief could make you defend the guy, just like I don’t see how the lack of WMDs still means Saddam Hussein had something to do with 9/11.

1) Don’t you think it would be silly if there was a review of The Vaselines that didn’t mention Nirvana? What would be the purpose in ignoring that? Have you ever heard of The Moldy Peaches? I’m assuming from your apparent knowledge of rock that you have, but if you haven’t, they’re a pretty obscure indie band that made simple, semi-retarded songs that got a huge cult following. Now imagine that a band like U2 decided to cover “Jorge Regula”. Obviously every other mention from that day forward of The Moldy Peaches is going to also mention U2. For fans and for the band, that’s kind of annoying. But for the rest of the universe who’s never heard of The Moldy Peaches, it’s a huge sell. I’ve never heard The Vaselines, but, being a huge Nirvana fan, I’m more than well aware of who they are, and I can tell you that there was a band called Eugenius that came from The Vaselines, and I believe it involved Eugene McKee? I can tell you all that not from Wikipedia, but because I wanted to know who this Vaselines band was and what made them relevent to my heroes. I agree that if the review talks more about the Kurt Cobain thing, then that’s annoying– but I would also point out that if you look, you’ll notice that bunches of lazy reviewers basically just re-publish the press release and add like, a new paragraph, and if a reviewer spent more time talking about Nirvana than The Vaselines, then I would say that writer was being lazy and had a word count he needed to fill.

2) A band member doesn’t need to die before critics posthumously come around to paying attention to a band. I’ll use The Pixies example. While Nirvana played them up a SHIT TON back in the early 90’s, it was still a decade before anybody but indie nerds that paid attention to them. Then they reunite and people go apeshit over them. I don’t even believe that when The Pixies were out and about Surfa Rosa was even that big of a deal– it certainly didn’t end up on the top of anybody’s lists when it came out. Yet if you were to mention The Pixies to anybody who cares anything about rock music, the tone used would be of reverence and importance.

3) You seem to imply that if Kurt Cobain hadn’t committed suicide, the adulation hurled on him wouldn’t be hurled on him the way it currently is. This is probably true. However, something I always tell people that are younger than me who don’t get Nirvana– and from the sounds of it, you’re about my age, so I’m not implying that you’re just a kid who doesn’t get it, I’m just saying this is something I remind people– Nirvana were the biggest things in the world at the time Kurt died. Kurt Cobain was on the cover of tabloids back then. How many real rock stars that gained relevence in the past 10 years have been on the covers of tabloids in the past 10 years? Hinder are one of the biggest rock bands in the world right now (much as it pained my fingers to type that), and they’re also known for partying and being bad boys (IE, tabloid behavior) yet I don’t even know what that deuche bag lead singer even looks like. My point is, Nirvana was so huge and so famous that even gossip stuff cared about real rock and roll (versus pop stars like Madonna or Prince) for that brief instant. Time makes it easy to forget how huge an impact this band was. If Kurt Cobain hadn’t died, but rather suddenly disappeared and became a recluse and there was nothing there to tarnish his image, Nirvana would be just as important now as then… Albeit without quite the saintly worship.

4) There are plenty of dead rock stars nobody has vigilized. INXS was pretty huge, and their lead singer meant so little they made a public attempt to replace him ala reality TV. Blind Melon had an iconic video in the 90’s that will come up in any conversation about the 90’s, yet nobody cared about it when they died. Alice In Chains, a band that still gets heavy airplay on hard rock stations, had a lead singer that died, and while people were upset, it was more of a “Hey, that sucks that Layne Stayley died. I wish he hadn’t.” kind of way. Granted, I think the list of dead rock stars people don’t care about is shorter than the ones that have been idolized, but that’s not my point

5) I’d like to say that yes, if somebody dies in an assembly line, people will in fact say he was the best damned assembly line worker in the world. Didn’t you have a kid in your high school that died while you were attending? Nobody gives a shit about that kid, but once he dies, you can’t escape other kids talking about how tragic it is. God forbid he actually be a football player. People who don’t even care about jocks will suddenly eulegize him at the drop of a hat

Again, I don’t want to be argumentative, because your argument is very valid for the most part, and I agree with some of your points. I feel exactly that way about Sublime, a band that, at the time of Brad Nowell’s death, had *not* sold millions of records, and was *not* on the covers of any magazines, and did *not* get play every hour on MTV, yet is treated like an erstwhile angel. I just kind of wanted to present the flip side of the particular band you chose to write this about. IE, I’m contributing to the conversation, even if it means playing the Devil’s Advocate a little bit. Also: NIRVANA RUUUUUUUUUUUULEZZ!!!! ALL HAIL SAINT KURT!!!!!!!!!!!!!

–Chris

Then of course the word “alternative”, which used to have meaning, got co-opted. It was being used to describe things like Matchbox 20 and Creed– what in the hell is “alternative” about that? How did this word, whose literal meaning is “to be different”, get stuck to shit that was the definition of mainstream?

The same thing will happen to “indie”. It’s frustrating, but already there are “indie” bands that aren’t really independent at all.

There’s two upsides to this.

1) The word “indie”, unlike “alternative”, actually describes the distribution method used to get you got the album. Nowadays things like “labels” are completely irrelevent. EVERYTHING is going to be “independent” sooner or later, meaning nothing will be.

2) Indie music, by definition, is underground. Underground music has a way of reflexively reacting against the mainstream. All these mid-tempo bands will become more and more mainstream, and reflexively, new bands will form that will be a reaction against it, meaning in a few years will have a few Dinosaur Jr. or Sebadohs making noise and causing earaches. And then when those bands have gone mainstream, we’ll have mid-tempo stuff again, then back to erratic noisefests, on and on until the sun goes burns out. As long as you keep your ear to the ground, you’ll always be happy.

1) Don’t you think it would be silly if there was a review of The Vaselines that didn’t mention Nirvana? What would be the purpose in ignoring that? Have you ever heard of The Moldy Peaches? I’m assuming from your apparent knowledge of rock that you have, but if you haven’t, they’re a pretty obscure indie band that made simple, semi-retarded songs that got a huge cult following. Now imagine that a band like U2 decided to cover “Jorge Regula”. Obviously every other mention from that day forward of The Moldy Peaches is going to also mention U2. For fans and for the band, that’s kind of annoying. But for the rest of the universe who’s never heard of The Moldy Peaches, it’s a huge sell. I’ve never heard The Vaselines, but, being a huge Nirvana fan, I’m more than well aware of who they are, and I can tell you that there was a band called Eugenius that came from The Vaselines, and I believe it involved Eugene McKee? I can tell you all that not from Wikipedia, but because I wanted to know who this Vaselines band was back in like 1995 and what made them relevent to my heroes. I agree that if the review talks more about the Kurt Cobain thing than of the music itself, then that’s annoying– but I would also point out that if you look, you’ll notice that bunches of lazy reviewers basically just re-publish the press release and add like, a new paragraph, and if a reviewer spent more time talking about Nirvana than The Vaselines, then I would say that writer was being lazy and had a word count he needed to fill.

2) A band member doesn’t need to die before critics posthumously come around to paying attention to a band. I’ll use The Pixies example. While Nirvana played them up a SHIT TON back in the early 90’s, it was still a decade before anybody but indie nerds that paid attention to them. Then they reunite and people go apeshit over them. I don’t even believe that when The Pixies were out and about Surfa Rosa was even that big of a deal– it certainly didn’t end up on the top of anybody’s lists when it came out. Yet if you were to mention The Pixies to anybody who cares anything about rock music, the tone used would be of reverence and importance. Not saying that the Pixies don’t deserve the attention, just saying it came well after the band existed as an entity.

3) You seem to imply that if Kurt Cobain hadn’t committed suicide, the adulation hurled on him wouldn’t be hurled on him the way it currently is. This is probably true. However, something I always tell people that are younger than me who don’t get Nirvana– and from the sounds of it, you’re about my age, so I’m not implying that you’re just a kid who doesn’t get it, I’m just saying this is something I remind people– Nirvana were the biggest things in the world at the time Kurt died. Kurt Cobain was on the cover of tabloids back then. How many real rock stars that gained relevence in the past 10 years have been on the covers of tabloids in the past 10 years? Hinder are one of the biggest rock bands in the world right now (much as it pained my fingers to type that), and they’re also known for partying and being bad boys (IE, tabloid behavior) yet I don’t even know what that douche bag lead singer even looks like. My point is, Nirvana was so huge and so famous that even gossip stuff cared about real rock and roll (versus pop stars like Madonna or Prince) for that brief instant. Time makes it easy to forget how huge an impact this band was. If Kurt Cobain hadn’t died, but rather suddenly disappeared and became a recluse and there was nothing there to tarnish his image, Nirvana would be just as important now as then… Albeit without quite the saintly worship.

4) There are plenty of dead rock stars nobody has vigilized. INXS was pretty huge, and their lead singer meant so little they made a public attempt to replace him ala reality TV. Blind Melon had an iconic video in the 90’s that will come up in any conversation about the 90’s, yet nobody cared about it when Shannon Moon died (wasn’t that his name?). Alice In Chains, a band that still gets heavy airplay on hard rock stations, had a lead singer that died, and while people were upset, it was more of a “Hey, that sucks that Layne Stayley died. I wish he hadn’t” kind of way. Granted, I think the list of dead rock stars people don’t care about is shorter than the ones that have been idolized, but that’s not my point

5) I’d like to say that yes, if somebody dies in an assembly line, people will in fact say he was the best damned assembly line worker in the world. Didn’t you have a kid in your high school that died while you were attending? Nobody gives a shit about that kid, but once he dies, you can’t escape other kids talking about how tragic it is. God forbid he actually be a football player. People who don’t even care about jocks will suddenly eulogize him at the drop of a hat

Again, I don’t want to be argumentative, because your argument is very valid for the most part, and I agree with some of your points. I feel exactly that way about Sublime, a band that, at the time of Brad Nowell’s death, had *not* sold millions of records, and was *not* on the covers of any magazines, and did *not* get play every hour on MTV, yet is treated like an erstwhile angel. I just kind of wanted to present the flip side of the particular band you chose to write this about. IE, I’m contributing to the conversation, even if it means playing the Devil’s Advocate a little bit. Also: NIRVANA RUUUUUUUUUUUULEZZ!!!! ALL HAIL SAINT KURT!!!!!!!!!!!!!

–Chris

And Juno was just appalling.

Nice blog!