The Smashing Pumpkins hit mainstream success during the early 1990s grunge/alternative rock era. The rock band Bush came soon after.
Breakout bands and artists, especially when they offer something fresh, are soon followed by similar-sounding bands and artists. Bush, one could say, came in the slipstream of The Smashing Pumpkins and the first wave of grunge and alternative rock.
Billy Corgan of the The Smashing Pumpkins recently interviewed his counterpart, Gavin Rossdale of Bush, on Corgan's podcast.
I enjoyed the 90s look-back.
Corgan tried hard to sound admiring, tried to make a point of his respect for Rossdale. I thought he tried too hard.
During the interview, Rossdale said he wished the widely admired recording engineer and producer Steve Albini would have given him more direction on the songs while recording the second Bush album, "Razorblade Suitcase," instead of just engineering the sound.
I also learned that people think Bush's debut sounds like Nirvana's "Nevermind" and that the follow-up sounds like Nirvana's follow-up, "In Utero," which Albini also worked on before the label and Kurt Cobain pushed him out. This clearly led to insinuations at the time that Bush was aping the hot bands.
Throughout the interview, Rossdale seemed thoughtful and very normal. A family guy. And as they compared their lives as parents, Corgan admitted being selfish and disconnected.
Note:
- Breakout bands and artists being followed by similar-sounding bands and artists is the music and entertainment business. Look at all the country-themed albums coming out. Ridiculous.
- Rossdale still has Cobain's haircut. Bush was seen as sort of a mashup of Nirvana and Pumpkins.
- My memory is grunge predates "alternative rock" as a genre label.
Last night's rain fell into jarred monkey brains. This morning's flowering hands accelerate the mind and the grieving process.
The robot and the broken nucleus of his battery element
cure can demonstrate anger physically—its signals render you mentally unwell
and unfit to talk, incapable of articulating thoughts. Your mouth fills with
treachery.
In the lead-up to the hardcore band’s new release, Outright’s singer Jelena Goluza talks music,
inspiration, and elections
A melodious ferocity runs through the new album by
metallic hardcore band Outright. Keep You Warm will be released
July 15th through the Australian band’s own label, Rage and Reason Records. I took this release as an opportunity to hear directly from the
band’s vocalist, Jelena Goluza.
Damon:
Jelena, thank you for your time! I read that the band formed around 2010. Since
then, the band has released a couple of EPs and is about to release its second
LP. You have also toured with bands like Propagandhi, Refused, and Rise
Against. How has life since 2010 shaped you? How do you think experiences have
affected the band and the music?
Jelena Goluza:
I think playing in this band has provided a lot of catharsis over the years.
Having a voice and the energetic output has enabled us to express a lot of what
we’ve been through or feel. While this still comes through in our new music,
there’s also more reflection and introspection that comes with having the space
to push beyond the urgency to focus on other things.
Musically, and with many line-up changes over the
years, we’ve evolved to play a broader range of heavy punk that leans both to
metal and melody at times, faster in some songs and much slower in others. It’s
nice to stretch our legs. In the past 12 years, we’ve had the opportunity to
play anything from small art spaces to enormous arena shows, and we’ve learned
to fill each space differently and take our own special memories from them.
D: How has
the experience and work of being in a band changed?
JG: As a
band member and our label owner, I’ve definitely experienced the impact of
increasing digitisation, and it hurts. Normally, record sales would cover all
the costs for production so we can keep doing what we do, but online streaming
has taken all that away. There’s also the added burden of having to invest in
more video clips just to have that online presence. I mean, it’s fantastic to
be creative in more ways and to work with brilliant filmmakers to do that, but
the financial pressure is hard to manage.
We’ve noticed time management and touring gets harder
as we get older and carry other responsibilities in life, but we wouldn’t take
it on if it wasn’t fun and meaningful for us and important to back up what we
do in the studio.
D: The
album is remarkably focused—the songwriting and performances keep up a sense of
passion and enthusiasm. And I like how the aggression is balanced by guitar melodies.
For example, “Truth Teller” has a nice mix of urgency and drama, and I really
liked the parts that come at 1:07 on “Tied Through Time” and 2 minutes into
“Tyrants Vultures.” Please describe the song-writing process. How do you and
the band write songs? What comes first?
JG: Thanks
for being so kind. It’s nice when other people pick up the same bits we love in
those songs. The riffs come first. Always. Someone will come with an idea, we
workshop it together, and then when it finds some form, I’ll write lyrics to
match the mood and we go from there, adding layered guitars and backups. I
always love seeing what random changes get made at the last minute in the
studio, too, just to lift the track some more. We compile a library of ideas,
which is really useful for those times when we can resurrect a scrapped idea
that ends up being perfect for something else. It was interesting adapting to a
virtual song-writing process while our city was in lockdown for many months due
to COVID, but I’m proud of how we made it through.
D: What
non-musical works or forms of art and media influence you and the music?
JG:
Aboriginal artists like @coffinbirth teach us a lot about the First Nations
experience and inspire our solidarity and action. Our song “Tied Through Time”
is informed by reflections of the Bringing Them Home report on its 20th
anniversary. Forced removals in modern child protection policies are known to
cause what is now considered a second stolen generation event among First
Nations peoples in Australia, yet Aboriginal people remain the
longest-surviving civilisation in the world and should be celebrated.
The song “Silent Spring” is inspired by Rachel
Carson's book of the same name published in 1962. It taught us about the
environmental impact of pesticides, and we’ve since learned the risk and
tragedy when we don’t pay attention to science, even for our own survival.
Our video for “The Hammer” takes the premise
from Maleus Maleficarum and flips it with the influence of various films
and plays based on the history of witch hunts.
More generally, we’re influenced by intersectional
progressive literature and commentators, artists like Weiwei and Haring and
political documentaries and podcasts.
D: What
makes you feel good?
JG:
Personally, exercise and nature always makes me feel good. I think what makes
the band feel good is knowing we’ve tried our best and connected with others
who relate to what we do. Everything always comes back to community-building,
creativity, and catharsis.
D: In the
US, where I am, news of Australia’s most recent election was largely crowded
out by domestic stories and the war in Ukraine. What are your thoughts on
Australia’s election?
JG: I think
our recent federal election was a clear indication that our national community
is rising up and speaking for people and the environment. We’ve seen more seats
move away from the conservative party to greens and independents than ever
before. People have witnessed the crushing impact and disappointment of
conservative governments and become more engaged to set things right. I think
there was also a strong backlash against the former government for how poorly
it handled sexual assault in Parliament and industry, delayed vaccine roll
outs, homophobic and transphobic policies, flood and bushfire prevention and
relief, constitutional recognition for First Nations people, and corruption.
Women spoke out with their votes louder than ever. Young people spoke out with
their votes to make a difference when the older generations never acted on
their behalf. It’s been the change we’ve been waiting so long for, and we’re
invigorated to hold the new government to account to carry that change through.
D: What do
you think of compulsory voting and Australia’s version of it?
JG: I think
there are arguments for and against compulsory voting, but I’m satisfied with
my experience of it in Australia. I feel it is the best opportunity to engage
and capture the views of a wide population and get as close as possible to the
level of representation required to comprise a democracy. Even though we have
to deal with preferences, we can still vote to ensure our preferences also lean
in the direction we want leadership in. This increases legitimacy and
responsiveness more than other electoral systems can. Even though true
democracy relies on higher levels of education, compulsory voting is at least a
way to engage and inform more people about how policy and power affects them
and equalises them in the weight of each vote. Some people think it forces
people to vote, but there is nothing stopping someone from lodging a blank
paper if they choose to disengage. That said, voting policies aren’t the be-all
and end-all. Our entire political system needs to back that up, and its players
need to constantly be held to account with transparency and integrity.
I did my first interview for 60 Minutes 26 years ago, and Morley Safer said to me, “What direction do you think it’s all going in, and will it get any better?” And I said to him, “It’s going to get worse. A lot worse.” It’s like what you said before—you watch my program because there’s linear thinking. But there is an element of dumbing down that has been embraced by others, which suggests to me that these rules of civilization are being dulled.
This so-called conversation has a few interesting parts, but this statement stood out to me. The whole civility discussion. When she was a real judge working in New York City's child welfare system, Judith Sheindlin was accused of being insensitive. Real Judge Judy was trying to scold and scare lazy social workers, addict parents, and wayward kids into doing what she thought was right. But it was only going to get worse, so she took her chance to cash in.
The
people in Judge Judy's TV courtroom have histories and circumstances that
figure into why they are fuck-ups getting sued for $2000 in back rent
and $750 for caving in their landlord's car windshield with a brick.
Real Judge Judy and the law cannot factor in any of that. The fact that the
plaintiffs and defendants are mostly all fuck-ups is part of the formula to the show's
appeal.
