Surveying the state of alternative rock

Published: Wednesday, November 30, 1994

What's that Noise?

Michael Tatum

Tim Riley points out in Tell Me Why, his excellent examination of the music of the Beatles, that a new generation of rockers emerges every seven years: the glam rockers of 1970-71, the punks of 1977-78, the indie label post-punks of 1984-85. Statistically, the time would seem ripe for a whole new gang of rabble rousers armed with electric guitars to take over.

That explanation sounds fine by me. But Riley fails to acknowledge that every movement needs a catalyst something needs to break the dam before there can be a deluge. In 1964, that catalyst was the Beatles, in 1977 it was the Sex Pistols. In 1991, it was two albums by two seemingly disparate artists: Nirvana's Nevermind and R.E.M.'s Out Of Time.

No doubt, this assertion will elicit a few guffaws from cynical avant-bigots out there in Readerland. While universally admired by alternative rock's constituents, Nirvana has, perhaps unfairly, been given the blame for inspiring not a movement but a bandwagon: dozens of toothless corporate wolves dressed up in alternative rock clothing (Stone Temple Pilots, Blind Melon you're well familiar with the worst offenders). R.E.M., meanwhile, has been branded by many as impotent sellouts who lost the small ability they had to rock after they left indie label I.R.S. for Warner Bros., the evil conglomerate.

This strikes me as typically stupid, indie-rock chauvinism, pure and simple. R.E.M. could have placated their audience well past the millineum had Michael Stipe kept mumbling, and guitarist Peter Buck has noted that he could have pumped out endless variations on "Driver 8" had he so chosen. Instead, the band opted to mess with the mainstream, whether by putting a mandolin into the Billboard Top Five for the first time since Rod Stewart's "Maggie May," or by recording an anti-radio song with KRS-1 of the hip hop outfit Boogie Down Productions (thus assuring the song would be the only Out Of Time single that racist middle-of-the-road stations like STAR wouldn't play STAR of course being the station that plays the "greatest hits of the '80s and '90s and no negros," oh, excuse me, I mean "no rap").

Granted, Out Of Time is more immediately accessible than, say, the magical, mystical Latin Playboys (a side project by two members of Los Lobos) or Beck's certifiably bizarre Mellow Gold, two of the finest albums released this year. But there's little doubt that R.E.M.'s left field success has created an environment where major label executives feel comfortable giving their charges more artistic freedom, as well as giving the go-ahead to relatively esoteric projects. Would Warner Bros. have given Latin Playboys the green light, say, five years ago, during the height of Whitney Houston and Faith? It's doubtful.

While R.E.M.'s success has loosened up record label executives, the success of Nirvana's Nevermind has affected artists and the way they approach music. Compare Nevermind to Nirvana's first record, Bleach, and you'll see what I mean. For all practical purposes, their approach on both records is more or less the same, your standard power trio.

But what's fascinating about Nevermind is that it achieves its accessibility without forsaking the band's original sound. By merely tightening up the songwriting and putting more money into the production, Cobain and company "sold out" in the best way possible: by recording a direct, immediate rock 'n' roll record that, despite its slight bending to the mainstream, still kicked the proverbial ass of everything on the then-comatose Billboard Top 40.

Since then, both L7 and Sonic Youth have worked with the producer of Nevermind, Butch Vig, aiming for the same strategy: to fine tune their sound without homogenizing it.

This development in the evolution of alternative music can't be underestimated. How else to explain Sebadoh's excellent new record Bakesale, which finds the band finally eschewing the bargain basement production and self-indulgence of their previous records? Or how about Soundgarden's even better Superunknown, in which the band trades in the arena rock sludge of its past for the sharpest Led Zeppelin rips, since, well Led Zeppelin IV?

In both cases, the band stayed true to its sound, but took more time with the songwriting and the production. And in both cases, the extra effort takes each band a quantum leap closer to greatness.

To give indie-rock bigots credit, I have to admit sometimes this strategy doesn't always work there really is such a thing as watering down your music for the masses. I'm thinking of two of this year's highest profile records, Liz Phair's Whip-Smart and Freedy Johnston's This Perfect World.

Johnston's record is the follow-up to his critically lauded Can You Fly, released on the small Hoboken label Bar None. Since then, he was signed to Elektra records, and to celebrate his new contract, he brought on board Butch Vig to produce his new record.

But while Nirvana needed fine-tuning, Johnston's highly effective folk rock didn't. As a result, This Perfect World finds Vig sanding down the edges of Johnston's music more conventional arrangements, tidier production, that sort of thing. Predictably, Johnston follows suit, taking less risks vocally and simplifying the complexity of his lyrics (as on the pro forma Lolita homage "Dolores" or the pseudo-tragic "Across The Avenue," a teen tragedy song only slightly more sophisticated than "Patches").

Liz Phair's record is an entirely different matter. Phair told Billboard that one of her objectives for 1994 was to hang a gold record on the wall of the studio in the Bahamas where she recorded . A great objective, but on Whip- Smart she resorts to the kind of two-dimensional studio gimmickry that she steered clear of on her brilliant Exile In Guyville (like the cheesy synth on the insufferably bathetic "Support System"). Elsewhere, her lyrics are depressingly two-dimensional, as on the empty devotional song "Nashville" or the deliberately obscure "The Dogs Of L.A." and "Alice Springs," both not as meaningful as her clique would like to believe.

Don't get me wrong despite their shortcomings, these are both good records. If you've heard and admired "Bad Reputation" and "Supernova" on the radio (Johnston's and Phair's new singles, respectively), you'll do fine by the records from which they're culled. But you'll do even better by their predecessors.

So who knows, maybe other bands will ride the wave that Nirvana and R.E.M. have created I certainly hope so. Who knows, maybe today's alternative rockers will begin the inevitable downward spiral towards bloatedness and uselessness, like the generations of before them. After all, a whole new generation of rockers is due to take over around 1998. Myself, I can't wait.

Tatum's ideal Christmas present would be for Sting to permanently retire from the music business. His column will return in January.