MovieChat Forums > Nirvana Live! Tonight! Sold Out!! (1994) Discussion > This vid makes me think, man...

This vid makes me think, man...

posted 20 years ago by chief33
4 replies | jump to latest

This video took me back to my senior years in high school – just when Nirvana was starting to get popular. The raw, uncouth live performances remind me of seeing live punk footage from the 70’s. And I reckon this is for a good reason. Teenage children of the baby-boomers were starting to demographically bulge in great numbers around this time. The flaccid pop/rock scene of the 80’s was on the wane as well. Even mainstream hard rock had sold out to commercial interests. A telling story the band tells is of hard-rock band Extreme demanding extra security and clearing the floor as they departed from their plane and headed for their limos – really playing up to the `Rock-God’ treatment. Nirvana didn’t represent that. They acted the voice for youth both angry and apathetic at the same time.
And herein lies the unoriginal conundrum that many an edgy band face. In this film they decry the rich and the mainstream bands that are commercially successful. But faster than they could recognize let alone admit, Nirvana was becoming both mainstream and rich. One could argue that even if Kurt Cobain had lived, the band would’ve died because of these reasons. Kurt seemed far to determined, Krist much the same, while David Grohl has since embraced commercialism through The Foo Fighters.
Nirvana Live!… provides a unique insight into a band creatively feeding off their own songs out of boredom. There most popular song `Smells Like Teen Spirit’ was a perfect platform for them to parody themselves - ie: Kurt holding his guitar like Roy Orbison and singing like an early 80’s New Wave crooner. Sometimes they’d play the first few notes and then refuse to play it. The evolution of a band with a lifespan akin to the fuse of a bomb makes for interesting viewing. When Kurt Cobain tips over a speaker onto his guitar, jumps on top and rides it surfboard style to the sound of it’s own glaring feedback, he’s encapsulating that whole era. Noise feeding on noise until something breaks. I can’t think of a better analogy. And I can’t think of a better way to spend those hot, rebellious teenage years.

long live Nirvana… 1988-1994

reply to this if you have any thoughts about it

[–] Charlse_Lee_Ray 20 years ago

It's been forever since you posted this so I don't even know if you'll check it. I was glad to see you say it reminded you of PUNK from the 70's. Grunge wasn't real. It was an illusion. Kurt didn't set out to create a "new wave" of popular music. The bands making those kick ass songs in seatle were playing their punk rock. New Jersey's emo scene is considered a form of punk rock. Unfortunately, the major label monopoly marketed "grunge" to sell shitty clothes, great songs, and the souls of the artists performing them. Kurt Cobain wasn't a visionary. He was a lost soul caught in a tight spot. A wife that didn't love him. Finances that were going to *beep*. Record labels forcing his band to bend over. His band was on the verge of calling it quits. A stomach problem that had ailed him since childhood. The stresses of taking care of a child, and almost having his child legally taken away from him. Not least of all a horrible addiction to one of the most addictive drugs imaginable. It is sad that his great music was not enough to outweigh those problems and he made the decision that made the world a more dismal place. I love Kurt Cobain. I love his music. I love punk rock and the freedom is stands for. I think Kurt was the zenith of that freedom. I was glad to see a band with enough balls to tell Guns and Roses they sucked. I was glad to see a band with enough integrity to make the albums they wanted to make. Most of all, I was sad to see the death of musical freedom and the birth of "viable commodities" when Kurt Cobain ended it all. Peace Love Empathy.

Simply because you can breath
Doesn't mean your alive
Or that you really live.

[–] Kurt_Cocaine 19 years ago

Watching this made me think of The Sex Pistols' old live videos back from th '76-'77 period of time, it's noisy, stuff gets broken, and it has crazed, ridiculous behaviour,
Porps to Charlse Lee Ray for this post, it's the *beep* truth,

Kagome's #1 Fanboy, Crazier than thou art,

[–] 19 years ago

[deleted]

[–] oobie-1 9 years ago

It makes me think that they were really just getting started...imagine what they would have put out after in utero; "you know your right" was probably an unfinished b-side!