From Drum Wolf Sent Wed, Nov 26th 1997, 01:17
From Drum Wolf Sent Wed, Nov 26th 1997, 01:17
> My hope is that some of the kids who see Keith-The-Clown on MTV will get > into the music itself, and branch into more of the truly incredible, less > known stuff out there. I will never villify an act for making excellent > music known - after all, if nobody knows about it, what good is it? I understand the sentiment, but I also disagree with it. This is exactly the same sentiment that I had back in '91 when Nirvana hit big, opening the floodgates for indie/punk/alternative rock to enter the mainstream. Just as you hope the Prodigy will lure kids into more adven- turous IDM sounds, I hoped that Nirvana would lure mainstream listeners into more underground punk/indie rock - by that, I mean bands like Unsane, Mudhoney, or Bikini Kill, on labels like Matador or Kill Rock Stars. I'm sure that did happen with a few people, but for the most part it didn't work like that. Here's what did happen instead: The major labels went on a feeding frenzy, snatching up every indie rock, punk, grunge and noise band they could snag, and a lot of the bands in the indie scene did indeed take the bait. Unfortunately for these bands, for the most part the majors had no clue as to how to market or promote them. A lot of them were subsequently dropped when they didn't sell, leaving their careers in ruins. In the meantime, the majors were also looking for Nirvana, Pearl Jam and Green Day clones. And they found them - Stone Temple Pilots, Silverchair, Bush, Everclear, and others, which replicated Cobain and Vedder's flannel shirts, loud punk chords, and Prozac-fueled songs about teen angst. As a result, the whole meaning of "alternative" got completely perverted. Where before it was about making exciting, adventurous rock, "alternative" was now associated with the superficial cliches Nirvana and Pearl Jam brought in, like flannel, long hair, grungy power chords, and self-pitying lyrics. Just because the general public liked Nirvana and Green Day, that didn't mean they had the initiative to go beyond the glossy MTV facade. It was the corporate Nirvana clones which ultimately became more successful than the indie bands snatched up by the majors. Bush, No Doubt and Silverchair went multiplatinum, while the ones with genuine indie roots - Sonic Youth, Mudhoney, Dinosaur Jr. - failed to see similar success. Indeed, most of the people who sang along to "Smells Like Teen Spirit" were no more open- minded after the dust settled than before Nirvana hit. Yeah, they liked Nirvana, Green Day and Offspring, but they also stuck to their classic rock, Hootie, Snoop Doggy Dogg, Sheryl Crow, and Marilyn Manson. The moral of this story is, don't kid yourself into thinking that just because a particular artist from a certain genre makes it big, that this one artist's success will translate over to the rest of the genre. I think that the people in the techno/rave/dance could learn some lessons from what happened to alternative rock in the early '90s. Now, as for Prodigy themselves, I don't think it's fair to say that they are to IDM was Nirvana was to alternative, for the simple reason that Prodigy are just not as big as Nirvana were. Look at the numbers - Nirvana sold 7 million copies of NEVERMIND, while Prodigy hasn't even hit 2-mil yet. And from my own observations, Prodigy just aren't taking the US public to the same extent Nirvana did - I don't see too many jocks, frat boys, yuppies, cheerleaders, preppies, rednecks or homeboys buying Prodigy CDs. I'd agree with "Invalid Opcode" that many of Prodigy's fans are at least casualy familiar with Autechre and Aphex Twin. For the record, I'll admit to owning THE FAT OF THE LAND - which sits in my CD collection along with Coldcut, FSOL, Squarepusher, Muslimgauze and Scorn. Well, that's my two cents... - John Lee