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  • FRIDAY DECEMBER 8 2006 2:00 AM

Can Life After Death Be Any More Painful?

Submitted by greekdevils

Edited by erin_broadley

Tags: nirvana

Ok, so you make a new album, hope it sells a few thousand copies, go on tour, become the biggest band for the next two years, get married, have a baby, kill yourself, get even more famous, have years of legal battles over the rights to your songs, and then get voted to have the most popular pop song in the past twenty years. Can it get any worse?

To this day, nearly 15 years after its release, "Smells Like Teen Spirit" remains MTV Europe's most played video and continues to strike a chord with angst-ridden teenagers everywhere.


Kurt always criticized the idea of making the top-twenty through interviews and through his songs ("I'd rather be dead than cool"—Stay Away). Yet Nirvana continues to appeal to the mass media, twelve years after their demise. Isn't there anything about this band that will make them less popular?

As for the article, I don't think I've had an easier time identifying a bunch of bullshit. How can a song released in 2006 make the top-twenty (and I'm not criticizing the Arctic Monkeys)? Well, we all know what happened to the King of Pop since he earned that title. At least Cobain can't choose his path.

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Comments
lilcupcake

lilcupcake

Kitchener, ON
June 2006

DEC 08, 2006 06:33 AM

Pop Song??? puke

Keith

Keith

Hooker, OK
August 2002

DEC 08, 2006 06:39 AM

Popular music is music belonging to any of a number of musical styles that are accessible to the general public and are disseminated by one or more of the mass media. It stands in contrast to classical music, which historically was the music of elites or the upper strata of society, and traditional folk music which was disseminated orally. It is sometimes abbreviated to pop music...

JonnyJonnyH

JonnyJonnyH

Seattle, WA
June 2003

DEC 08, 2006 08:16 AM

Don't you know? Kurt Cobain is the new Jim Morrison.

Murrey

Murrey

Denmark
May 2005

DEC 08, 2006 12:59 PM

Word Keith!

Why are there so many snobs who sneer at the word pop when they in fact listen "pop music" themself? Bugs me.

pmonkeyEsquire

pmonkeyEsquire

I'm lost
May 2004

DEC 08, 2006 03:46 PM

Cobain never touched the little boys!! That was a ru-mour, peo-ple!!

pmonkeyEsquire

pmonkeyEsquire

I'm lost
May 2004

DEC 08, 2006 03:47 PM

Also. its in teh top 20 for a reason. Team Spirit is a really fun song to masturbate to! wink

lilcupcake

lilcupcake

Kitchener, ON
June 2006

DEC 08, 2006 06:22 PM

Thanks for calling me a snob...you dont know me...whose the real snob? and I stand by my original comment

JessykaAddams

JessykaAddams

Australia
April 2006

DEC 08, 2006 06:26 PM

Wow-one wonders if the formula for success is to want to not be successful.

greekdevils

greekdevils

Greece
December 2006

DEC 08, 2006 08:36 PM

Keith said:

Popular music is music belonging to any of a number of musical styles that are accessible to the general public and are disseminated by one or more of the mass media. It stands in contrast to classical music, which historically was the music of elites or the upper strata of society, and traditional folk music which was disseminated orally. It is sometimes abbreviated to pop music...



I find that to be a very accurate definition of 'pop music'. I also find that like the word 'gay' used to just mean happy, the word 'pop music' means Brittany Spears and NSYNC in todays society.

Having said that, I did not intend to argue 'Teen Spirit' being called a pop song. I brought this whole thing up because the above article is just another one of about a hundred or so since the death of Cobain, that labels him as something he spoke out against in his music. Things like spokesman for a generation, or greatest songwriter of his generation, top twenty albums of all time etc. etc. "teenage angst has paid off well, now I'm bored and old." I know its the 'easy' conclusion to come to, but it just seems that these editors only put him on the cover page to sell magazines, which even that I'm not arguing with. I'm just perplexed and more curious than anything, at how a movement that started sixteen or seventeen years ago, and ended only three years later, can still be popular in the media today. I don't believe that Teen Spirit is even a good representation of Nirvana's music anyway. Songs like ' Big Long now' or 'I hate myself and want to die' I think are more accurate.

Maybe Led Zeppelin fall in the same category. Is 'Stairway to Heaven' still one of the most requested songs of all time? I never heard the song until ten years ago and I love it. But the difference with Led Zeppelin is that they have far more songs than Nirvana does. Maybe its just a matter of time? After all, Zeppelin didn't have that many hits during the time they were a band did they? Wasn't All of My Love one of the only songs they wrote that made it to the top ten? Yet when you mention Zeppelin today, Stairway, Kashmir, Black Dog, Whole Lotta love, Immigrant Song, all come to mind. With Nirvana, its either Teen Spirit, or Come As You Are.

Studio-wise, I don't think Teen Spirit is that great. Yet whenever I hear that fucking song live, I get the chills.

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