The turning
point, from rock to grunge and metal came very slightly around the end of 1991,
heavily influenced by the “Smells like teen spirit” airplay. While I was still
mainly listening GNR, AC/DC and Iron Maiden, in 1992 some marvellous albums
rose to fame.
To start,
the Rage against the Machine debut album. The use of the mf word, Zack´s great
vocals the splendid lyrics and the devious distortion of the guitar made you
just want to grab your bike, rush to the record store and buy the album, even
if it would cost you half your paper delivery salary.
The debut
album of Pearl Jam, Ten, was also very popular. Not that I´d consider myself a
fan, but many Saturday nights spent at the discotheque with the blokes from my
hometown and a few beers to many, the Alive song, or Even Flow, Jeremy or Black,
it were tracks that belonged in that place at that time.
But somehow
I searched and found even DARKER grunge, around 1993 I became very fond of
Alice in Chains. And around this time I started listening to Anthrax with their
new Sound of White Noise album that has some excellent songs, e.g. the sinister
Black Lodge.
My
neighbour E., who was in his mid-twenties then, borrowed me his Spreading the
Disease cd so that I could tape it.
Then
suddenly, Spoonman from Soundgarden came around and wow, how fabulous the 1994
Superunknown album and it still sounds great after 24 years.
Around this
time I started digging in the past of rock music and found a Deep Purple
compilation, singing Smoke on the Water and Child in Time during a session of
cleaning the dishes. My neighbour told me he listened the new Megadeth album
Youthanasia whenever it was his turn to do the dishes.
Eventually he told me that Megadeth would come to Arnhem for a concert and I
joined him. We both knew that Anthrax would give a concert a couple of months
later that year in Zwolle, and we went there too. It was nice, but Anthrax
changed their style a lot with the Stomp 442 album.
During a
library CD borrowing visit (1 buck = 1 CD) I found the 1971 L.A. Woman album by
The Doors. At the Pere Lachaise in Paris in September ´95, Riders on the Storm
sounded from my Walkman while standing at our friend Jim´s grave.
B., my
dad´s niece found out that Deep Purple would perform in Rotterdam in the early spring
of 1996 and of course I went there too, but I had to go to school the next day,
so I didn´t sleep much and went to class with my Purpendicular shirt.
Between
summer and autumn of ´96 I discovered the Sex Pistols and with them, the punk.
Because of the popularity of grunge, apparently the punk got “reinvented” in
the USA and in the Netherlands, the Offspring became very popular, therefore I
started to research on the real punk from 1976. Technically, punk was not that
beautiful as a style, but it did make a statement and it brought another
fabulous band, The Clash.
In March
1998, I was done with studying and started to search for a job to earn some
dough. Quickly I visited half a dozen “temporary job agencies” in the lovely
small city of Zutphen. Then I went to a fabulous bar and had a coffee and later
a beer while M., the owner stashed a Stranglers CD in the player. The
Stranglers, famous 1974 UK based punk / new wave style band, known from smash
hits like No More Heroes, Golden Brown and many more. With a French bloke on
the bass and a very talented keyboardist.
At the end
of the millennium, new vintage style record stores opened their doors, for
example in the city of Deventer. Little by little I started collecting LP´s,
some of them rare (picture discs and purple or blue vinyl) and now my brother
is keeping all those records in his house because I could not bring it with me
to Spain.
Musically,
the years 2000 and further were even crappier than the nineties but I left my
country and learned about Spanish music. My “ex” brother in law listened to
Estopa, 2 brothers from north west Barcelona. Finally I moved to that city and
my new “brother” was from Russia. We listened to Zemfira with her song “Skazki”
(animated fairytales).
A new
revolution arrived with my new “homie” from Pamplona, Navarra. He listened more alternative music, reggae
and stuff from basque groups. At that time I only knew the group Hertzainak
thanks to some boys from Vitoria who lived with us for a couple of months.
Oh well, if
you like Hertzainak, you must listen other basque groups, such as the 5 K´s:
Kortatu, Kuraia, Ken Zazpi, Kerobia and Kauta, Berri Txarrak, Betagarri, Zea
Mays and singer-songwriter Ruper Ordorika…
All of this
music you need to listen with the lyrics on your screen and afterwards
translate those lyrics because Basque is a very difficult language.
Around the
same time I remembered having read an article about Jerry Garcia from the
Grateful Dead and started listening to it. But then, French hardrock band Trust
came along cause I bought the Répression album in Perpignan in north Catalonia
(French territory obviously) and later a live album in Grenoble. If you have read
my blog from the start, you will recall that it started in the French language
because j´adore le français. Happy Quatorze Juillet everyone!
