Why Grunge Was a Musical Plague That Destroyed Actual Talent

Grunge is a delicate topic among metal fans. A lot of fans blame this movement for the commercial decline of metal in the 90s… and it sort of makes sense. There was never any real grunge movement in a musical or organic sense. There were several bands from Seattle with different sounds that were grouped together to mark them, leading to what people now know as this “genre”.

Regardless of tags and genres, the impact of grunge throughout the years is mostly negative. While bands like Soundgarden and Alice in Chains have mostly aged well, the same can’t be said about the rest. Nirvana‘s legacy has been seen from a different lens in recent years as well. Ultimately, this event didn’t have a lot of positive ramifications in the music scene, which is shown by the lack of bands influenced by them and legacy acts these days.

First of All, What Is “Grunge”?

Grunge was a term coined by marketing and commercial entities to refer to several bands from Seattle that started to gain prominence in the late 80s. Groups such as Soundgarden, Screaming Trees, and Mudhoney, released their first records in the late 80s. They also displayed a variety of sounds. This “genre” is often treated as a mixture of alternative, punk, and classic rock.

Nirvana propelled this movement to the stratosphere with the success of their 1991 record, “Nevermind“, pushing hard rock and metal to the side. Most forms of rock and metal were pushed to the wayside and flannels and dark, depressing tunes became the norm. However, most people who actually paid attention to the music knew there was no real artistic patterns between these groups.

“By the time the scene was internationally known,” Soundgarden vocalist Chris Cornell explained when alive. “It didn’t really exist in that way anymore.”

An Inconsistent Message

A common pattern of the grunge movement, which went beyond music, was the message. A lot of bands in that category often treated themselves as anti-establishment, commerce, etc. They tried to market themselves as such while enjoying all the perks of being promoted by the establishment. This is perfectly exemplified by the likes of Pearl Jam, Alice in Chains, and others getting the benefits of MTV while trying to pretend they didn’t make money thanks to this promotion.

While alive, Kurt Cobain posed for Rolling Stone Magazine with a shirt that said “Corporate Magazines Still Suck”, highlighting his supposed anti-commercial attitude. However, he was still posing for the magazine and gaining exposure and possibly monetary gain because of it. This is something that Chris Cornell highlighted.

“There was a little bit of an uncomfortable transition for all of the Seattle bands, which was that it was anti-commercial,” Cornell said. “It was an anti-every institution that supported commercial music as well. Kurt was wearing a T-shirt that said ‘Corporate Magazines Still Suck.’ I thought that’s great that he wore that and that they put that on their magazine, but he also showed up for the photo shoot and did the interviews and agreed wholeheartedly and happily to be on the front cover so how is it that he’s not sort of tearing himself apart? We all kind of had that crisis of mind and Kurt shooting himself was probably that to the extreme.”

It was the attitude of people who claimed to not want the rock star lifestyle but still seized it. This was a pattern that would become a lot more notorious throughout the years and it all started with grunge.

Opinions on the Impact of Grunge

Musicians have been quite vocal about the negative impact of grunge, such as Yngwie Malmsteen and Dave Mustaine. Following their career paths, they didn’t hold back about it.

“When this whole grunge style came, I thought it was so pathetic that a rockstar (was) wearing too big pants and an old torn shirt and sock on his bald head,” Yngwie Malmsteen said in Hardrockens TV. “I mean, what the hell is that? This is so contradictory. If I were a rock fan then I would like to see a guy on stage ‘Bigger Than Life’. One who got clothes which I cannot buy, one who got things which I do not have. One who does things which I can’t do.”

“They thought the yuppies would listen to alternative music while drinking their Stella Artois (Laughs),” Megadeth frontman Dave Mustaine said in 2023 when talking to Guitar World. “The types who don’t drink Miller High Life and definitely don’t listen to metal. And the advertisers who handled brands like Lexus, BMW and s… like that would advertise on alternative stations, which f… metal.

“So, these metal stations went the way of the great white buffalo. We had to decide, ‘Are we going to be alternative? Are we going to change like every other band?’ Metallica cut their hair off, put makeup on and all that stuff, and I got little haircuts during that time, but I never chopped it off. We decided we wouldn’t change to fit the trend and would tough it out.”

It Ended a Lot of Commercial Opportunities for Other Bands

It is also worth pointing out that labels and other companies didn’t promote grunge bands out of the desire to make them famous. After all, these labels already had a ton of 80s hard rock bands that had proven track records of success. It wouldn’t make sense to ditch them and focus on unproven commercial acts. However, there is a very significant variable and that is the new contracts.

At the beginning of the 80s, bands such as Motley Crue signed contracts with big labels with no real leverage. However, the notorious group, by 1991, was one of the biggest in the world and managed to get a $25 million deal from Elektra Records for a new deal. Aerosmith, a much more seasoned and influential band enjoying a resurgence at the time, signed a $30 million contract for four records with Columbia Records/Sony Music in 1991. This is without mentioning royalties and other perks.

Therefore, hard rock bands were getting more expensive for these labels. So, it made sense to move away from the so-called “glam” groups and create a new movement. That is why grunge was treated as a “response” to the excesses of the 80s. Bands like Nirvana or Screaming Trees were also cheaper in terms of stage elements and even clothing. 

While the music business obviously has a commercial angle, this proved to be a very short-term decision. It hampered a lot of proven acts from a commercial and marketing perspective, which hurt them for a long time. In fact, there were even bands like Winger who were ridiculed despite having notorious musicianship, which goes to show the unfair nature of this situation.

The Lack of Musicianship

It is quite telling the lack of staying power that most grunge bands had throughout the years. While they enjoyed a lot of promotion and backing, the movement was pretty much dead by 1994. All things considered, they had a total of four years of mainstream glory, which is quite telling. Moreover, it is also worth pointing out how very few of these bands persisted for a longer period of time.

Regardless of what anyone can say about glam metal bands, the best ones managed to weather the storm and continue with their careers. Some of them, such as Dokken or Winger, managed to pull off great material further down the line. On the other hand, while not a glam metal band per se, Stryper has delivered a lot of great records since their 2000s reunion. Barring Alice in Chains, led by the talented guitarist Jerry Cantrell, most bands under the grunge banner can’t make that claim.

“When a musical genre becomes just a point of sale, that’s kind of the beginning of the end for the genre, ’cause they’ll sign a million bands that kind of sound like a band, and then it just dilutes everything,” Skid Row‘s Rachel Bolan said to Sonic Perspectives in 2022. “So that’s what was kind of happening right around when grunge came out. And then when grunge came out, it was the next big thing, and then it happened to them too. Every band that kind of resembled Nirvana got signed, and they were nowhere near as good as Nirvana. So it dilutes the market and eventually just poisons it.”

It Doomed the Music Scene Moving Forward

Grunge, for all intents and purposes, was the last time that any form of rock music dominated the mainstream. However, it also marked a strong divide from what came before, thus ending a long period of mainstream attention for that genre and metal. That last part is important since a lot of non-glam metal bands were also affected by the arrival of this movement.

“Grunge put a lot of bands like us out of business,” Bolan said in 2014 to the Dallas Observer. “You just have to wait it out. We came back because people wanted to have fun again. There were some grunge bands that I liked, but it was such a different vibe and a different scene. People started to miss bands from our era. There was a certain nostalgia involved.”

As mentioned earlier, this was premeditated and ended a very fruitful period for heavy music. Most people accept by now that mainstream media never gave rock and metal the same attention ever since. There were some groups that managed to thrive, but it was a very different market. This highlights how grunge was, in many ways, a nail in the metaphorical coffin of mainstream rock and metal music.

“I don’t like the stuff we did in the ’90s,” Slayer guitarist Kerry King said to Metal Blast in 2024. “I was very disenchanted by music because bands that were getting popular I didn’t understand. And I still don’t understand. I never liked bands of that era. It just bummed me out and turned me off.”

Conclusion

All in all, grunge is a movement, genre, or fabricated change that had everlasting ramifications in the rock and metal scenes. It changed a lot of people’s perceptions of music and influenced an entire generation. However, there is no denying that the changes, for the most part, were quite negative. The market for the rock and metal bands diminished greatly, which is something they never recovered from. Yes, great music still came out after these years, but not with the same mainstream reach.

On the other hand, it is also worth pointing out that some bands took this as a challenge. A good example of that was Stryper‘s guitarist and singer, Michael Sweet, who stated to enjoy Nirvana when the band came out.

“I’ll never forget when I first heard Nirvana,” Sweet said through his personal Instagram account in 2022. “I actually loved it and immediately went out and bought the record. I played it for the guys and they didn’t seem quite as excited about it as I was but I thought to myself – times are definitely changing, and they did very quickly!”

“Personally, the grunge movement helped me to work harder and try harder. I dug a lot deeper within myself from that time forward to be a better writer, performer, musician and producer. So, I say thank you to Grunge for turning things around.”

There is always going to be a debate surrounding the grunge movement and what it was. Furthermore, there always going to be bands with something to say on the matter, especially those who lived it. In that regard, and regardless of personal opinions, no one can deny the historical importance that these bands had in the music business.