NathanG

Grunge The then. The now. The future......

Grunge Questions: 1. How has grunge evolved? 2. Can you related grunge and African music? 3. Can you related grunge to the U.S Census?

The Then Grunge is sometimes called Seattle rock because it was originally from Seattle. It was a mix of heavily distorted guitars, contrasting song dynamics, and angst-filled lyrics. Grunge was inspired by hardcore, metal, and indie rock music. One sample of music I would like to share with you is from Sonic Youth (1988) and is called Teenage riot. If you listen close you can here how distorted and unorganized the music is. It is kind of throw together. The guitars have an edge to them. This is a lot different from todays grunge music.

media type="file" key="1987_sonic_youth_teen_age_riot.mp3" Sonic youth Teenage riot 1987

The Now If we take a look at today’s sonic youth you will see that they are a lot different then they were in the 1980’s. Here is a song called incinerated. The music is a lot more organized and can be better understood. The guitars are a lot less distorted but, you have to keep in mind this is still the same band just a few years later. So, you can tell that grunge is evolving into a cleaner music.

media type="file" key="sonic_youth_incinerate.mp3" Sonic Youth Incinerate 2006

The Future My ideas for future grunge would be that it evolves into all of the rest of the rock culture and it is no longer a sub - genre of rock. In other words it will disappear. Today's, grunge is more cleaner anyway so easily is can be classified as emo rock or another category.



U.S. Census My time period for the U.S census is the 1990’s because this is the time period where grunge was most popular. I feel that it is important to look at education in the 90’s because a lot of the grunge music was about how teens viewed their world and being adjusted this or that. It is important to recognize how education plays a role in that. If you look at the chart you can see that white teen were the most educated in the 90’s. Being that grunge is a mainly white music this does not support the idea that education plays a role in grunge.



Another institution that needs to be looked at is religion in the 1990’s because yet again all the music is about teens. One major part of being happy can be your religious status. If you look at this chart you can tell that there was a high number of catholics but also people of other religions. I think that when you have so many religions to chose from as a teen you can become frustrated by they world and music can be your outlet.



My final institution that I think needs to be looked at is economic. When there is a money problem at home teens can become very angry and this can be expressed in their music. As you can see most of America’s jobs were in tourism at the time but if you live in a place with no tourism or little then less and less people have jobs. This can really upset a teen to see.

African Music If I were to compare African music and grunge I could say that not only do a lot of grunge songs use poly-rhythm but they have heavy drum beats. Also, they seem to be very made up, like they just throw something together.

Conclusion My conclusion is that grunge music has changed in it’s short time. Grunge changes with how America’s youth changes and with how the economy, education, and religion changes. Grunge would be nothing without it’s teen angst and African music style.