I Found My Friends by Nick Soulsby

Author:Nick Soulsby
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
ISBN: 9781466867215
Publisher: St. Martin's Press

13.0

Corporate-Rock Whores

January to July 1991

Nirvana had benefited from benefactors and mentors throughout their career—the give and take of the music community. Now it was the patronage of Sonic Youth that took them to DGC Records.

DON FLEMING: I think it was very meaningful to them to be a part of the Sonic Youth party at the time. Everyone in Sonic Youth liked them a lot … when they [Sonic Youth] got their Geffen deal they got a deal to bring bands in—which is usually, or almost always, a deal thrown in there to make the band being signed feel like they’re the “big cheese” and they can get stuff going and have a lot of power there; many more bands than Sonic Youth get that kind of deal. But typically, what happens is the label doesn’t give a fuck about the bands you bring in—they’ll sign one to appease you but there’s a whole game in every major label—Geffen is a good example—there’s power within the label and to get any band really noticed you have to get every division behind it and there’s usually few people in a label who can do that. Most A&R guys don’t have enough clout within their label to get everyone—Marketing, Promotion and so on—to really come out and work the record, so typically records get a little bit of work from one or two people who really like the band and like the A&R guy, but only like 1 or 2 percent get this huge push from the label. So when Sonic Youth got Nirvana signed to Geffen, it was kinda like that.

Nirvana began to make a point of playing for causes they respected; 1991 started with a No More Wars benefit.

JELLO BIAFRA: I was pleasantly surprised when I realized a lot of the grunge-era bands who initially appeared to be a full-on revival of sex, drugs, and rock ’n’ roll in the lyrics and attitude department turned out to be pretty politically active and aware … It seemed like Green River on down was a deliberate response against the more dogmatic areas of political hardcore—they weren’t going to play that sound and those lyrical angles got tossed out the door.

PAUL KIMBALL: Evergreen was a very socially conscious environment, sometimes to a fault. But we and the other bands were really feeling it. It was an intense moment. Krist Novoselic spoke at length from the stage that night, and though I remember it being less than entirely eloquent, it was definitely right-on … The big difference at this one was Dave Grohl. All of a sudden what Nirvana had been trying to do finally became undeniable. The songwriting, the time on the road … The fact that Dave could harmonize with Kurt is something that pushed the songwriting way upfront, and his drumming—well, c’mon!

TIMO ELLIS, Nubbin: That antiwar show should have been a “peak,” but I remember it as one of our worst shows ever, performance-wise—also made that much more cringe-worthy by the fact

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