Was the onset of grunge the best thing to happen to rock in a decade? Or do you miss the hairspray and spandex?

OMG! Jamiroquai Killed hair metal...you bastards!

oh, people are gonna go all in a froth on this thread.

at the time, i was happy grunge gave hair metal the boot.

i liked the fact that there was alternative or "thinking man's" hard rock becoming popular...whatever that means, or whatever that meant to me back when i was 20 or 21.

of course now, in retrospect, 99% of the "grunge invasion" was as silly and contrived as cinderella or krokus...it was just different outfits and hairdos.

and now it's like hair metal is to todays kids as disco was to me in the 90s...kitschy and fun and harmless and retro. and when hair metal retro revivalism gets old, then it's time to dig out the flannels, cuz retro grunge is next.

When you see Weezer frontman Rivers Cuomo's high school picture, you realize it wasn't even that different.

What is this hairspray and spandex nonsense? Tons of great bands were destroyed becuz of "grunge". Not to mention while the huge "hair metal" bands were no longer everyone's cup of tea, bands like Poison and Motley Crue still maintained large fan bases. Actually the death of grunge signaled the death of rock music in general after 94/95. Up til then a popular metal band like Pantera could move albums.

LittleSmedley said:

YES.

So many great albums (and singers!) came from the so-called "grunge" invasion. And no, I don't think it's moany, pissy, nihilistic music.. it's just darker and more down-to-earth that the spandex-filled, vomit-inducing cheese before it was.

Soundgarden's Badmotorfinger is a great example of what grunge had to offer. About a dozen different styles in one melting pot and a singer who was like Robert Plant with his balls on fire.

CinisterCee said:

pfft, emo is spayed hair metal.

Well like everything else once it becomes commercialized and labels cash in on it, it becomes stale. I mean Boyz II Men were the great RB group of the day, but then every label signed an RB male group and u got alot of shit like NEXT. With Grunge the same thing happend, but much quicker. The problem with Grunge was that it was based in depression, as good as some of the artists were people dont wanna hear how much life sucks 24/7, and Grunge had no "Light" in it. I do feel Pearl Jam were possibly the best band of the day from that, and not because they are the only ones to survive, but they are the best band, better than Nirvana,Soundgarden and many others. As for Hair Metal, it was a moment, just like Punk and Doo Wop and other things, but some bands survived it, like Bon Jovi, but i think the reason they survived was that they werent a part of that "LA SCENE" that many bands like GNR were, which is why they are no more.

I thought it was a good thing that turned cheesy like any other trend.

Actually, I think Guns 'n Roses started the move away from spandex, if not hair, towards a more raw & real punky rock & roll that grunge grew out of.

squiddyren said:

Soundgarden is/was a metal band. Just like most of those so called grunge bands.

I think that its sort of a 2 way street with this issue. Yes when the grunge scene came to be, the music and the rock genre in particular gained more credibility because these were guys who were looked at as being serious and important artists who had something to say. But on the other hand, I like what Vince Neil said about his dislike for grunge, saying that he did not know what the point was about making such depressing music about how f'd up the world is when we all know for a fact that the world is f'd up. He then said that what was great about the whole glam metal genre was that it offered people the chance to escape all of the turmoil of the world for just a little while. I have to say that I agree with him on what he said. Many of us do not listen to music to confront the problems of the world but to be able to escape them, if only for just a little while before we must return to the reality of them all.
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[Edited 2/28/07 14:38pm]

this is a great topic. there's no contest here folks. please bring back the hair metal. grunge was wack. who wants to see some dirrty depressed dude singing about his problems. fuck that, i want some spandex and hairspray!

lilgish said:

Exactly.

LittleSmedley said:

fuckers killed my hair metal and things havent been the same since (staying calm) actually i blame grunge but MTV totally fucked things up overnight they stopped playing the good stuff and went to an all grunge playlist

the hair metal bands seem to be doing much better the last couple years Poison had a very succesful tour last summer and a top 20 album debut,Bon Jovi remains popular,Def Leppard had a top 15 album and even Twisted Sister did very well with that Christmas album this past holiday season

Mazerati said:

I think that Bon Jovi was always and still is given much more respect and credibility than the vast majority of the other hair metal bands ever were given. Def Leppard was too, but to a lesser extent than Bon Jovi was and is I would say.