The closest thing I can think of to any sort of alt-rock hero right now would probably be Beck. He's never afraid to re-invent his sound and puts out many good records. But he's not David Bowie, let alone Kurt Cobain or Layne Staley or Joey Ramone or Joe Strummer or Johnny Rotten or Morrissey or Bob Dylan or Bono or anyone who made a big musical/political difference.
And... if someone *DID* want to be the next Kurt they would have to do it..... wait for it..... on the INTERNET.... for FREE..... to bi-pass the labels and the radio and simply ust expose themselves in the NOW because things move so FAST now. They would have to tour and tour and tour and tour and sell their tickets really really cheap. They would have to fight and fight and fight and never get anything out of it except the joy of making something HAPPEN and making people CONNECT to an idea again. But people need to eat, so it isn't going to happen.
The best thing we have now is each other. The best thing we have now is the ability to blog. The best thing we have now is the power of the WORD. So sing with your keyboards, and sing loud.
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Article comments
1 - Jim Carruthers
The only time I ever saw Nirvana live was at a club in Montreal. It was a weeknight, and I had to work the next morning, I was grumpy, and told the friend who invited me to see this band I didn't really want to see another Seattle knockoff Black Sabbath hair band (grunge not being invented in those days, though I do have a Mother Love Bone t-shirt).
Sure enough they were just another Seattle Black Sabbath hair band so I went home after three "tunes". And you know what, I still think they suck. But a teevee show with Kurt 'n' Courtney would be pure gold.
Now Blue Oyster Cult, there's a band.
2 - jason
Or better yet, Sid n Nancy
3 - Jim Carruthers
Sid and Nancy was, after all, the inspiration for Spike and Drusilla.
4 - Rob
Kurt Cobain was like that kid in high school who really loved a little-known band and talked about them, but as soon as they became popular, he couldn't stand them anymore, and disparaged all their new fans. The trouble was, it was his band that it happened to.
I loved "Nevermind", it came along at a time when radio needed songs you'd turn up when they came on.
It was sad that Cobain took his own life, but I doubt think the music world lost all that much.
5 - Veronica
People now a days are too into hip-hop for there to be any space for good rock on the radio. Let's face it *good* rock, is dead. All we have now is Simple Plan and Good Charlotte, and if you want a hardcore chick to look up to you have Avril Lavigne.
People don't like to hear the raw truth, the like to hear the happy parts because life is so hypocritical that they need something fake in it to make themselves happy. That's the meaning of this generation: fake happyness. No one wants to turn on the radio and hear someone with (in their opinion) senseless lyrics. It's almost like poetry, most people don't understand it, so why bother to read it? If it's loud it's kinda scary so I don't want to listen to it because people will think I'm crazy.
But I do have faith that in a couple of years, not so close, there will be another band that will change rock history and if they are women, maybe they'll even change the view of how women can't rock or be remembered in rock history.
All in all, these shitty so-called artists will be forgotten.
6 - R.P.
I know fuck all you see now are a bunch of kid who can't have there own opinions and you go with the flow for fame and cash. All you see now is a music industry owned by CORPORATE BULLSHITTERS. the early nineties where the best i can actually relate to it.