"Hollywood is hype. New York is talk. Chicago is work."

It’s a tough trick to pull off: a song so specifically rooted yet so generally relatable. I was too young at the time to understand what “Beds Are Burning” could have possibly been getting at, and to this day I still know so little of Australian history and politics that the full intention of most of that band’s (highly enjoyable) catalog is still lost on me. But you can hear something like “Forgotten Years” and at least get the idea. Would your average American listener, just hearing this for the first time in 2013, make any automatic assumption that Peter Garrett was singing about the depth of Australian loss in and after World War I? No, probably not. Does the underlying sentiment——that any personal sacrifice, big or small, should not be ignored or taken for granted——still resonate, regardless of context? Yes, absolutely. Hard-fought optimism in the wake of nation-altering despair: point taken.

Saying one thing which in turn says everything; if that’s not a sign of great art at work, I don’t know what is.

AMR
Chicago, IL / April 27, 2013

I. Nirvana as failed metal band.

This was the band that grafted a number of excellent, surprisingly heavy riffs onto what were otherwise pedestrian power-punk songs; this was the band that also, despite the countless personnel changes behind the kit and criminally underrated bassist, couldn’t find a groove to save its life, leaving its overt aggression nowhere to land but right up front, rather than any place heavier. This was the band that wrote “School,” “Breed,” “Scentless Apprentice,” and the like.

This was still a pretty good band.

II. Nirvana as above-average punk band.

This was the band that tried to pull off the oddball noise collage or semi-pretentious art rock but kept its foot rooted in the bellow angst anthems. This was the consciously abrasive “Milk It” or the exceedingly-relentless-for-being-90-seconds-long “Tourette’s.” This is the descision to layer the driving, four-on-the-floor chorus of “Mexican Seafood” atop a grating Black Flag-meets-Minutemen verse structure.

This was also still a pretty good band.

III. Nirvana as great pop band.

This was the band that squeezed every last drop of life out of its one- to five-minute jams not through overpowering riffage or conquering unexplored sonic frontiers, but rather through more basic and time-honored tricks: killer hooks, huge choruses, timeless melodies, and a relentless flood of power chords. This is the band that wrote all of the above and a whole lot more; this is a band that could turn that stew into something as elementally effective as “Lounge Act” or as unexpectedly moving as “All Apologies.”

This was not just a pretty good band. This was something else entirely, something better and more promising, and this was the band we lost that day. This day.

AMR
Chicago, IL / April 5, 2013