3 Bands From the 1980s That Were Crucial to the Rise of Grunge in the 1990s

Music scenes don’t happen overnight, and while grunge seemed new to most listeners in the early 1990s, it was nothing new to the bands that launched it into the mainstream. Nirvana, Soundgarden, Pearl Jam, and Alice In Chains may have been influenced by rock and punk music from the 1960s and 1970s, but the following three bands from the 1980s were crucial to the rise of grunge.

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Pixies

If you had to name only one song to define grunge, most would choose Nirvana’s “Smells Like Teen Spirit”. And you don’t get to “Smells Like Teen Spirit” without the Pixies. Even Kurt Cobain admitted he was just trying to write a Pixies song. Black Francis had perfected the quiet verse and loud chorus format that later became the default arrangement for many alternative rock hits in the 1990s. Francis drew from The Beatles, Buddy Holly, surf, and punk. Cobain, too, wrote compact songs like Holly, with the melodic instincts of The Beatles, all presented in punk spirit. And Cobain’s main guitar was a Fender Jaguar, a first choice for surf and punk musicians.

Dinosaur Jr.

When J Mascis and Lou Barlow left their high school hardcore band Deep Wound, they wanted to slow things down. Inspired by the gloomy grooves of Black Sabbath and the country rock of Neil Young, Mascis began writing what he called “ear-bleeding country.” And if you want to crank up the volume of country music, look no further than Young’s work with Crazy Horse. (Listen to “Down By The River” and you’ll understand why they call him the Godfather of Grunge.) Additionally, Mascis’s fuzz guitar tone—perhaps inherited from Young—influenced the noisy riffs of Nirvana, Mudhoney, and others. This combination of classic rock, heavy metal, country, and punk was essential to the sound of grunge.

Meat Puppets

Nirvana covered three Meat Puppets songs during their performance on MTV Unplugged. Brothers Curt and Cris Kirkwood joined the band onstage as guest musicians for renditions of “Plateau”, “Oh, Me”, and “Lake Of Fire”. The fact that three of the 14 tracks on MTV Unplugged In New York are Meat Puppets covers tells you how much they meant to Cobain. But the Meat Puppets’ psychedelic country and punk had already provided the DNA for Dinosaur Jr.’s “ear-bleeding country”, highlighting the importance of both bands to grunge. The Kirkwoods’ psychedelia can also be heard in Soundgarden, and check out “Ty Cobb” from Down On The Upside. A twangy punk descendant of Meat Puppets, with a loud and raucous take on American roots music.

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