Is "Smells Like Teen Spirit" A Pop Song?

Def Leppard is known for spending years to record their albums. So when it came to recording guitars for their masterful "Hysteria" record in 1987, the guitar tracks were no different. Phil Collen and Steve Clarke's approach to a more 'MELODIC' guitar sound was unique for rock in the 80's, but was a main factor is "Hysteria" becoming one of the best selling rock albums of all time.

In the late 80's, the Red Hot Chili Peppers were on the search for a new drummer for the 4th time in their young history. During the audition process, you'd think they'd gravitate towards someone more like-minded in their high energy, punk-funk, wacky style. Yet, it was a guy that initially appeared to be the antithesis of everything they stood for, who blew them away with his chops and how he fit in with Flea on bass and John Frusciante on guitar.

In 2008, Slipknot was known as one of the heaviest bands on earth. But with heartbreak all frontman Corey Taylor could think about after a gruelling break up, they decided to stay true to themselves and not limit their sound to just "heavy and scary". The risk led to one of Slipknot's biggest hits and most enduring to this day.

By 2001, Blink 182 was know as the 3 goofy naked dudes from the "What's My Age Again" video. But it was then where Blink's songwriting went to the next level and they started writing about topics more authentic to their background. "Stay Together For The Kids" was singer Tom Delonge's lash out against a broken childhood. And evidently, it connected with a generation of kids who now felt like they weren't alone in that struggle.

It's hard to believe, but releasing an album that went top 5 in the Billboard charts didn't make Def Leppard any money. Hell, it didn't even pay off the recording debt to their record label. So about a year after releasing what normally would be a "smash hit" album in Hysteria, the British five-some were happy to hear the rumblings of one song in particular being requested in America. It wasn't one of their 3 previous singles released, it was a mid-tempo party song that was being "danced" to in Florida. This is the story of how those "dancers" would help that song become one of the 80's most defining hair-metal anthems.

As a Beatles fan, Kurt Cobain wanted to steer Nirvana's songwriting in a new direction ahead of their album Nevermind. Yet, he knew he couldn't completely move away from the big, brash, heavy guitars. That beautiful contradiction led to the Gen-X anthem, Smells Like Teen Spirit.

In 1980, Brian Johnson had only been in ACDC a few weeks before the band set off to write and record a new album. He had massive shoes to fill, fresh off the heels of the tragic death of previous frontman Bon Scott. What resulted would literally become the biggest selling rock album of all time, Back In Black. And in terms of songwriting, Brian made quite the first impression....

Nothing’s worse than when a band stops taking chances and puts out the same record 4 times in a row. But it’s scary to get out of your comfort zone, away from something tried and true. By 1990, Metallica was faced with that crossroad. They had built a solid following over the course of 4 albums, staying loyal to their mission of producing bone-crunching thrash metal. But it was very much the blueprint of Metallica up to that point. Apocalyptic lyrics layered over sophisticated music. For the 4 members of Metallica, just the fact people could put their music into a formula was upsetting.    In an era when it was felt that it had all been seen and heard before, there was one corner Metallica had never ventured into before. To make the one record, the one outrageous move – they had sworn as kids they would fight to the death never to make. Yet the one they were now swiftly coming to realize their musical lives might depend on. That is something so blatantly commercial no one could have seen it coming. Or as drummer Lars Ulrich put it “cram Metallica down everybody’s fucking throat all over the fucking world.”   With Metallica’s 1991 self-titled album, more popularly known as The Black Album, not only did it solidify them as thrash metal’s biggest band….but it catapulted them to become the world’s biggest rock band, period. Their 5th album transgressed every boundary they’d set for themselves, and every one set by the media and public expectation. They had proven that heavy, powerful music could come through more than one medium. Theyʼd added a more commercial dynamic to their music and opened their appeal beyond genre. It wasnʼt until theyʼd fleshed out all the 12 Black Album songs that they realized how far from their thrash roots they had progressed.   The message within the Black Album speaks to the leaps and risks the band members took in making it. It speaks to individualism, liberty, personal development, and the importance of getting out of your comfort zone. It’s an appropriate theme given the enormous amount of work and dedication the album took to produce. Nevertheless, they pushed through to create an album that would transform their lives. While making it, frontman James Hetfield summed up the band’s philosophy, saying, “I donʼt think we need to justify ourselves at all. Weʼre doing our shit our way. The integrity is there.”  The result speaks for itself, or to echo that statement more poetically, as James would write,   “So close, no matter how far, Couldn't be much more from the heart, Forever trusting who we are, No, nothing else matters”

David Bowie was not a fan of vacations and taking time off. Holidays to him are boring. So as the tireless workaholic went away to the south pacific in 1982, to cure the boredom he brought along his favourite blues and R&B records from when he was a kid. Little Richard, James Brown, Buddy Guy, Albert King. Little did he know, but that vacation would shape his whole future sound and direction. It shaped him deciding on 'Chic' hit-maker Nile Rodgers as producer, it shaped him bringing along an unknown Texas blues guitarist by the name of Stevie Ray Vaughan, and it shaped the enthusiasm and optimism of Lets’ Dance as a whole. Let's Dance was an attempt at recapturing that warmth he felt from that old stuff. As Bowie told MTV in 1983, “It’s fundamentally trying to regain the same kind of immediacy and excitement that one feels in one’s old record collection." Who says you can't recapture the good ol' days. Let's Dance sent Bowie into the stratosphere as a pop artist, attaining number 1 status in Britain, but also more crucially in the U.S., having largely ignored him since the mid-70's. Thanks to clever videos for the title track as well as "China Girl", Let's Dance was his biggest selling album up to that point (and since). Proof that the risky ambition paid off of exchanging all the mystery about him for mass connection. Let's Dance is Bowie being communal: it’s intended to be shared. Bowie embraced his own nostalgia, and with it achieved the same outcome as those old impressionistic artists from 50's.

When you hear Dave Grohl's name today, the first thing that might pop into your head might be rock star, or success, or incredible songwriter, or confidence. The reality is, his life had to fall apart in some sense before he could realize all of those traits. As the saying goes, when it seems your life is falling apart, it may actually be falling into place. The Colour and the Shape has been described as by Dave as a therapy album. The band went into the recording process unsure of how they would gel. And the weight of Dave's divorce hung particularly heavy over the album, even though he didn't realize the full extent of it until he and producer Gil Norton began sequencing the album's running order. Once they finally sequenced the songs, it ran like a therapy session. One man's quest to make sense of the world crumbling beneath his feet. The opening track "Doll" has Dave whispering "In all of the time that we've shared, I've never been so scared." From this point on it desends into a free-fall; Dave dealing with love and obsession,  insecurity and betrayal, childhood dreams and adult responsibilities. And throughout it, he flirts with rage. By the end Dave finds confidence and realizes he can make it though life's trials and tribulations. In "New Way Home", the album's closer, he repeats the phrase, "I'm not scared." Whatever Dave was scared about when the album started has been resolved, as he'd say after the album was released, "I go through this whole therapy session and I end up at the last track when I realize that it's ok, I can make my way through all of this and I'm not that freaked out at the end. We we were joking for awhile when we were thinking about artwork for the album I thought 'Why don't we get a picture of a therapists couch on it.' For the rest of my life, when I listen to this record, it will be the fall of 1996 and my journal entries, which is a little strange." While the Foo Fighters self-titled debut was more of an experimental Dave solo project, The Colour and the Shape proved to the world Dave could bring a group together to be a full-fledged rock-band. It debuted the Foo Fighters as an American rock group that would be a major presence over the next two decades and immediately dismissed skepticism over the band as a flighty over-ambitious second act for Dave. But maybe more importantly, The Colour and the Shape gave us Everlong...one of the best damn rock songs ever made.