Music Spotlight & A-Z letter "N" - Nirvana (the band)

Well, I know I talked about Music in general last time, but I think it's only fitting I dedicate an entire post to Nirvana this time. This is a band that really did change my life, and I can't listen to any of their stuff without getting all nostalgic. Mostly it's the first album of theirs that I bought, Nevermind, that takes me back. It was the first CD I ever bought, and I had saved up for a fair while to get it. I was eleven years old when I bought it, and I didn't have a CD player, so I had to use my aunty's CD player to record it to tape. The tape I put it on was denoted by a shiny sticker (in those days I still bought a lot of stickers, the closest I probably ever got to being crafty. hehe) on one side.

I admit that one of my great influences in getting to like Nirvana was the guy I had a crush on in my last year of primary school. He was a huge fan of this album, and though I had already known and got to like "In Bloom", I think I can thank the crush's influence for me actually purchasing the album. Ha.

I also remember that I around the time I bought the album, Weird al Yankovic's version of "Smells Like Teen Spirit" was out on all the music shows. That may even have been my first exposure to Nirvana. Of course, I prefer the original tune, but I do totally respec' Weird al's take on it. Especially the sheep. I loved the sheep.

Nirvana get a lot of flack for being completely and utterly overrated. And maybe they are. I don't particularly care about that. What I care about is the music, and what it means to me. Nirvana, for me, were the beginning of a dramatic change in my life. They led me to Silverchair (who were teased and called "Nirvana in Pyjamas" in their early days), who in turn led me to Helmet and Primus and Soundgarden and Alice in Chains and all sorts of other bands that are today amongst my favourites.

Nevermind reminds me of primary school. Bleach (Nirvana's first album) reminds me of high school. It also reminds me of video games. For the letter D I focused on Donkey Kong Country, my favourite video game of all time. Well, Bleach and in particular Incesticide remind me of other games, mostly the Mario All Stars game that I had on Super NES. Bleach also reminds me of being down south with my best friend and coming down with chicken pox. Yay? ;) In Utero is an album that has less nostalgic value, but still features some amazing songs. And I still remember the funny moment when my friends and I accidentally discovered the secret song. Over twenty minutes of silence, and then BOOM! Not what we'd expected at all. (I have the Nevermind singles box set too. There are a few great b-sides, including the beautiful "Marigold", sung by Dave Grohl.)

Anyway, I'm done talking about Nirvana and the major impact they had on my life. But I'm not done listening, or loving, this band. In closing I'll say that right now, Nirvana are at number 7 on my Last.fm overall charts. They've got 1,271 scrobbles, but of course that doesn't count the hours of listening I got done during primary and high school. If only I could go back and count up those listens. ;)

THANK THE LIGHT tomorrow is Sunday. Ha.