Britpop vs. Grunge
It’s the 20th Anniversary of Nirvana’s Nevermind and though I can’t say that I rememeber early 90’s culture as much as Generation X must, I can appreciate the music scene at the time. My cousin in Canada may possibly be the biggest Nirvana fan of all time and had a vigil for him the day he died. But something about grunge never quite rang true to me. The 90’s were a time of economic prosperity and general optimism what with the fall of the Berlin wall and all. I didn’t then and still don’t understand where the melancholia of Nirvana and the grunge scene came from, really. People are generally worse off today than they were then and maybe Kurt Cobain had some issues, but why did the culture at the time relate to it so well? It was the same prognosis I suppose as James Dean’s appeal during one of the most prosperous decades in American history.
Across the pond, the Brits had been working on something of their own all through the 80’s but it wasn’t until the early 90’s with the parallel of grunge that Britpop truly emerged as a genre of its own and a force to be reckoned with on the music scene. To me, it’s the perfect representation of a peaceful clash of civilizations and an expression of why I love the Brits so much. While America was unhappy and not sure why, looking for “answers” in lyrics that nobody understood (nobody really knows exactly what the lyrics to “Smells Like Teen Spirit” mean except Kurt), the Brits were creating a sonic revolution around the very British mentality of optimism and a stiff upper lip. This was music about enjoying life through adversity, about calling others out hypocrisy and telling it like it is with a smile on your face. Look at the Stone Roses, Pulp, early Oasis, Suede, The Verve, solo Morrissey… the list goes on, but you get the point. In my mind, Britpop never got the respect it deserved. Kurt Cobain’s unfortunate death cemented his legacy along with grunge as a generational symbol of the confusion and disparity of generation X in America at least. There was never a figure in Britpop to compete with that image and Britpop ultimately fell apart for the same reasons as gunge. It was just something that happened. Nobody cared about it then as a “thing”, but I’m hoping something like it makes a comeback. Today’s culture is starved for talent and identity along the line of rocking Britpop optimism again.
