It was the cliche, life changing experience

September 1, 1991. The date doesn't ring many bells does it. And I am sure that unless your great Aunt Petunia had a 90th B-day or it's some kind of anniversary in your everyday life(like a wedding anniversary or even your B-day)the day would slip past without much thought past something like "Thank God the kids are almost back in school" or "Damn the summer just slipped by".

But to this music geek(or snob)September 1st 1991 had a significance that would change my outlook on things. You see if was 15 years ago today that a watershed moment happened in the world of music. 15 years ago Nirvana's "Nevermind and Pearl Jam's "Ten" were released onto the public. And really..Changed the face of rock music, and the way people looked at rock music. It was the start of a musical revolution that Poison, Guns'n'Roses and Motley Crue never wanted to see come and people my age (14 at the time) didn't realize they were waiting for.


When released the albums didn't hit big right away, like any good revolution it took awhile to get going. It needed MTV to show the videos in heavy rotation to get things really going, but once "Smells like Teen Spirit" hit, it was all over for the hair bands that,at the time ruled the music charts. I was a big Guns'n'Roses fan at the time, and I remember the first time I saw the video for Teen Spirit I didn't watch it because it was new and "didn't sound like something I would listen to" but then I watched it and got sucked in to the world of Kurt Cobain. It was a world very much different from the one I knew but I liked it. Nevermind became my favorite album and to this day still holds a high ranking of my all time favorite albums.

But there was competition. And without getting into the whole "Seattle sound/grunge" thing people started looking for the next big thing from Seattle. Pearl Jam was the obvious choice.The First single from "Ten' was "Jeremy", again the video hit big and you were hearing about this kid who was picked on enough at school that finally he brought a gun to school and well... you know the rest. Other bands didn't talk about this stuff.It was amazing. You were now either a Pearl Jam guy or Nirvana guy. I played both sides. I couldn't resist the music. To this day Pearl Jam is still one of my favorite bands, still as infectious and as interesting as when I first heard "Jeremy"

Now of course this lead to the whole grunge movement and record companies tried to sign any band from Seattle cause it was the thing to do, it was the new Nashville or New York. But it went away, but the music didn't. You listent o any Nirvana or Pearl Jam album, and it still holds up. When people look at music history there are those albums that people will talk about as "masterpieces" or "important" like "Abbey Road", "Exile on Main St.""Revolver" well these two albums will be in that discussion.

today's playlist in honor if the these two bands: I would just list everysong on every album..go out and justy listen to anything you come across from either band....

and the Youtube clip of the day: A Pearl Jam clip

A Nirvana Clip