Oh, how time flies. In two years, this will be the tenth
\nanniversary soundtrack for a landmark time in rock. Indeed,
\nSingles<\/i> was just as powerful a statement in music as the
\nSaturday Night Fever<\/i> soundtrack. The Seattle music scene
\nliterally changed the way some music executives thought of the
\nmusic industry for a couple of years. Now, as Kim Deal of the
\nBreeders says, “It’s all about ass again.”<\/p>\n
True, and many of the fans who flocked to the flannel bandwagon
\nimmediately dove off when Hootie and the Blowfish offered its own
\n“back to rock” movement. While the ’60s counterculture had their
\n‘Summer of Love,” the hyper-rate of information of the ’90s barely
\ngave the Seattle music scene a chance to prosper. It was less than
\na year-and-a-half between the time
\nBadmotorfinger<\/i> hit the stores and a crowd-surfing commercial
\nfrom Budweiser hit the air.<\/p>\n
But enough about the “movement,” lets focus on the music.
\nSurprisingly,
\nSingles<\/i> ages pretty well. For all of the movie’s faux-coffee
\nhouse pompus bluster, the soundtrack did provide an excellent
\nsnapshot at what was going on musically at that time.<\/p>\n
Chart-toppers Alice in Chains, Pearl Jam and Soundgarden all
\nprovide strong songs and show bands who were still in their hungry
\nyears. Alice in Chains’ “Would” hooks you with a nimble bass line
\nand powerful lyrics to boot. “State of Love and Trust” shows Pearl
\nJam at their most ideologic, still thinking they could take over
\nthe music world and hold on to their integrety.<\/p>\n
Cult-favorites Mudhoney and the Screaming Trees also contribute
\nto the soundtrack. Screaming Trees had a minor hit with “Nearly
\nLost You” and Mudhoney gave their opinion on the overexposure with
\nthe snotty, “Overblown.” I remember sitting in the coffee house,
\nplaying chess and trying to talk philosophy as best as I could for
\nan 18-year-old when I could literally see the unsettling looks of
\nmost of the patrons when this song came on. Typical line, “All of
\nthe bands from Seattle rock, except for Mudhoney.” Oh well, that’s
\nwhat true punks do: agitate.<\/p>\n
Perhaps the most heartfelt moment of the album comes from the
\nepic ballad from Mother Love Bone. “Chloe Dancer\/Crown Of Thorns”
\nmay have been a tad over-dramatic, but it was a dream of a song to
\nlisten to in your car when you broke up with that special someone
\nwho you knew you would never get over after high school. Hearing
\nAndy Wood’s voice along with the other voices of
\nSingles<\/i> shows what might have happened if Wood would have
\nsurvived his overdose. Pearl Jam and Soundgarden may not have even
\nmade it to the soundtrack.<\/p>\n
To balance things out, Paul Westerberg, about 3\/4 sober at the
\ntime in 1992, contributes some poppy tunes with “Dyslexic Heart”
\nand “Waiting For Somebody.” Though these are a far cry from his
\nsolo debut and his work with the Replacements, Westerberg’s voice
\nis inspiring to hear on this collection, especially since he had a
\nprofound impact on many of the bands in college rock.<\/p>\n
And for real classic rock fans, Jimi Hendrix’s “May This Be
\nLove” and The Lovemongers’s (read: Ann and Nancy Wilson of Heart)
\nalmost too-perfect cover of Led Zeppelin’s “Battle Of Evermore” are
\nfeatured. Finally, the album closes with “Drown,” by the Smashing
\nPumpkins. No, the band did not come from Seattle, but its inclusion
\nshowed that it didn’t have to take a band from Seattle to make a
\nsplash in “alternative” music in the early 1990s.<\/p>\n
So, fast forward to the 2000s. Soundgarden is no more, Smashing
\nPumpkins barely made a dent with their last album and lord only
\nknows where Alice in Chains are. You would think that this would
\nmake the soundtrack horribly dated, but it remains surprisingly
\nfresh, which is more than I can say about the movie. The exclusion
\nof Nirvana doesn’t need to be dwelled on terribly.
\nSingles<\/i> did well on the charts because the audience was
\nthere to hear something new.<\/p>\n
And though some albums of the “grunge” movement haven’t aged
\nwell at all,
\nSingles<\/i> still has that intangiable element that make it a
\ngreat soundtrack: most of the bands on it had a youthful optimism
\nand a hunger that they could in fact, make a difference. And for
\nnearly two years, most of the bands on the soundtrack made a great
\ndeal of difference.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":25387,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"tags":[],"artist":[],"rating":[5613],"class_list":["post-36593","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","rating-rating-a-minus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/36593","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=36593"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/36593\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25387"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=36593"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=36593"},{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=36593"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=36593"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}