Nirvana, 30 years of Nevermind, the manifesto of Generation X - Lifestyle

The thirtieth anniversary of

is the anniversary of a revolutionary record that changed the rules of the musical game, taking the industry by surprise and, above all, becoming the definitive manifesto of Generation X.

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the new frontier of youth music is precisely the crossover between the Grunge riffs and the codes of the "Urban" genre.

"Nevermind" is a perfect example of a masterpiece that intercepts the spirit of the time, gives voice to youthful codes and torments, moves the clocks of time forward, transforms the reference elements into something new, closes an era and opens one. new.

Thanks to Nirvana and this album, Seattle, which at the time was the most fertile laboratory of artistic ferment on the planet, became the world capital of new rock and Grunge became not only the musical code of the 90s but a sort of empirical philosophy of life, as well as a style.

Proof of its formidable innovative power is the fact that Geffen, the major that had signed Kurt Cobain, Krist Novoselic and Dave Grohl, aimed to sell 250,000 copies, considering it a niche product.

On its way to the top of the world charts, "Nevermind" was selling 300,000 copies a day.

A resounding, unstoppable success, born from below, from word of mouth and driven by the expulsive force of "Smells Like Teen Spirit",the first single.

Just as it had been printed in a number of copies sufficient to support a niche product, a massive promotion had not been organized: even the big media (among the first reviewers there is more than one who will have tried to make his judgments) were taken aback by the music of a trio guitar, bass, drums and vocals, with declared punk ancestry, with a singer who was the antithesis of the glamor of rock stars and who, in certain passages, even made the pronunciation almost incomprehensible of his texts, a dry and essential production, texts that expressed anxiety, pain, an incurable restlessness. Symbolically, the album reached # 1 in the US ousting Michael Jackson's "Dangerous".

In the year of grace 1991 Indie Rock became a global phenomenon: a real revolution, bloodless, but a revolution: REM's "Out of Time" was released in March, Pearl Jam's "Ten" was released in August, and in September " Nevermind ".

The effect was devastating and electrifying at the same time: indie music from a marginal phenomenon became the driving force of the music scene, creating a new and very rich market but bringing to the fore characters and figures who had grown up in the rejection of the establishment and industry.

As with all masterpieces, "Nevermind" is a collection of stories in history.

The most current concerns the cover, with the naked four-month-old baby immersed in a swimming pool with a dollar bill tied to a fish hook in front of it. Just this summer Spencer Elden, the child in question today in his thirties, sued the heirs of Cobain and Novoselic and Grohl, demanding $ 200,000 in compensation on charges of violating federal laws on child pornography. Evidently he noticed it several years late since he had already had himself re-photographed, albeit in Bermuda shorts, for the cover of the ten-year, twenty-year and twenty-five year editions.

Between 1991, the year of publication, the cover was censored, arousing the fury of Cobain who, for the back, had created a collage of photos of pieces of raw meat, illustrations of Dante's Inferno, photos of vaginal infections. Among the images of raw meat there is also a photo of Kiss.

For example that of the "Sound City Studios" of Van Nuys, a suburb of Los Angeles, where under the orders of producer Butch Vig, "Nevermind" was recorded.

Back then it was a studio with a glorious history behind it and a disastrous present but with the legendary Neve console.

Among the various consequences of the success of "Nevermind" was that Sound Studios returned to experience a new golden season.

It is no coincidence that in 2013 Dave Grohl directed and produced an extraordinary and super recommended documentary, entitled "Sound City": when the studio closed its doors Grohl bought the legendary Neve console.

Kurt Cobain's suicide and Nirvana's inevitable demise helped add to the mythical aura that envelops the album and everything related to the Seattle trio.

But "Nevermind" has the strength of works that, although so closely linked to an era, are timeless