Thank You ALL of YOU..............
Hello there and a big thumbs up to anyone of you for responding to this thread.
One of the reasons I opened this one yesterday was an announcement I heard on the radio, while I had my breakfast.
Another reason is that around June last year I open up a thread in the guitarforum about the "suicide" of Kurt, I closed that one because it was going funny [but I was new to the whole idea of forums so..............]
Yesterday I just wanted to see what I wrote: "Do we still listen to Nirvana, have thoughts about the music ect.
So partly I am surprised to see that Nirvana is still "alive" but then I am not and here is the reason:
My guess is that most people who responded so far are in the agegroup 18-40. Well so what Eddie? Kurt died in 1994, he was 27 at the time, anyone who is now around 18 was about 7 or 8 at that time, at an age where you are easily impressed. Did Nirvana impress young people? Yes they did, as Nirvana was probably the band who impressed the parents of the children I am talking about.
Children.................what do you mean Eddie? Well I teach guitar and I see a lot of the younger children being into Nirvana, just as their parents, but then their parents are also into the Ramones ect. But I think a lot of kids will go from liking Nirvana to the Ramones and other Punk or Rock acts. It is just a natural progression eh?
So the younger ones did get Nirvana from their parents, the ones who are now in their late 20s and 30s and up "grew" up with Nirvana, so obviously Nirvana spoke more to them as they came from a "similar background" timewise.
I myself am 38, same age as Kurt, and I did not get it when Nirvana hit the big time. At the time I was living in a shared house with people who were same age as me or just a little younger. The younger ones all like Nirvana [yes there was nothing close to them which sounded similar or tried to to same thing-----------------G 'n' R are not the same eh? they are conservative retro Rock act. Nothing wrong with that, but Guns did not speak to a generation about livestyles or...............like Nirvana did. Guns did open up Radio for harder Guitarbands to play loud again. Please let us not get to far into the comparison Guns/ Nirvana, because we cannot, they were both doing something different at the time]
Now I was 29 when I started listening to Nirvana, and did I like it................okay I listen to anything and appreaciate anything for its own value, because this is what you need to do as a musician, but Nirvana....................
I thought,:"Why did I not like this earlier?" If fact, I borrowed the two studio albums of one of my pupils, and she really liked them, I could see why-----the rebelious attitude, the sounds, the whole idea what it was about.
So I listened, but I thought again: "Kurt boy, why are you sooo sad, so messed up, so confused...................." I did not get that, you see, him being same age as me, there must have been so many opportunities for him for things to do and...........................yes the break up of his parents, it is a modern disease: I do not know anyone who has not parents who are not divorced, so yes there is something there, but still.....................
As Rokket said [he is 38 as well!!] the drugs did a lot, it influenced his state of mind and..............................
Really for anyone trying to understand Kobain [can we really ??] you could read his diaries and you will learn a LOT! The guy was obsessed with "making it" and also he was in LOVE with music..................it has been said before by some of you, if he would have lived longer we would have seen very different things from him, I even read a comparisson to Badly Drawn Boy, and yes I can see that....................again he is in his thirties and...............must be
a generation X thing. But Bady has very different take on things.
Anyway, think we can all agree that Nirvana did a big shake up to the industry. Now in a way, that says more about the state of the industry than the quality of Nirvana. I also feel that generations after Nirvana [or Kurt] do not have that "rebellious" thing in them. The very fact that children grow up, and love the same music as their parents has something to do with that. My parents disliked anything Pop or Rock, they come from the 1940s 50s background [although they should have been into Elvis, but they just missed that!] whenever I listened to some music they asked me to turn it down, I also noticed that my friends had similar things with their parents...............of course, there is more going on eh? Background and...............a lot of other things, but again, I think the generation born in the mid to late 60 grew up with different norm and values: "Have to fight to whatever it is you want" ect. ect.
Have to be careful now, as it will get to long and too much into social and cultural issues, also a lot of younger people may feel I am getting against them because I feel they lack a certain kind of attitude. Well this is not the case, what is the case is that the tech. is responsible for changes in our attitudes and the choises we make, and since music is part of our lives, this all has an impact.
So once again Thanks so far, no I do not mean this is it, but I felt just writing a sort of round up so far, a summary if you like [playing teacher again ..............................

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Eddie
