SLAIN BY BLISS

As per a reader’s request, here are ten bands whose careers were absolutely ended by Nirvana. I’m departing from my usual M.O. and listing these bands in ascending rather than descending order.

(For the record, “Smells like Teen Spirit” was released at the same time as the Nevermind album: Sept. 24, 1991. Nevermind hit the top of the Billboard charts on January 11, 1992. And these are ten bands whose careers were effectively over when it did.)

1. Guns N’ Roses. After absolutely owning the rock world in the late 80s, Gn’R released their epic but flawed 2-disc set Use Your Illusion the same month as Nevermind. The single “November Rain,” boosted by an old-school video, did well (it peaked at #3) and helped move the albums up the charts. But the Gunners never got above #55 on the Hot 100 again. Their next album was a quick punk-rock cash-in called The Spaghetti Incident?. It hit #4, and then everything dried up. This is not unlike the Beatles vanishing from the charts after the Rolling Stones showed up. It’s too soon to close the door on Gn’R–they may yet release Chinese Democracy, although I doubt it–but of all the careers Nirvana ended, none was more dramatic than this.

2. Wilson Phillips. I’ll pause a moment while you pick your jaw up from the floor. I’m serious. Three #1 hits in 1990-91, a couple minor successes in early 1992, then absolutely ding-dong nothing. A lot of that was due to weak material, but you can’t rule out the fact that Nirvana turned a significant portion of Wilson Phillips’ audience (college-age females) on to rock.

3. Bryan Adams. Yes, I know he had several hits in the 90s–with schmaltzy ballads, most of which were commissioned for movie soundtracks. Bear in mind that at one time, he was considered a rock artist. Maybe he just sold out, I don’t know, but I do know that “Smells Like Teen Spirit” described infinitely more Gen-X childhoods than “Kids Wanna Rock” or “Summer of ‘69″. (By the way, Bryan Adams was eight years old in the summer of ‘69, so throw away any thoughts of that song being autobiographical.)

4. Warrant. Another band rendered instantly old by Nirvana. Managed to hit #83 on the Hot 100 with a cover of “We Will Rock You” in ‘92; never saw any kind of charts again, except when visiting the eye doctor.

5. Damn Yankees. Ted Nugent’s hair-metal supergroup hit #3 with “High Enough” in ‘91; fizzled out completely by ‘93.

6. Van Halen. Stop it. It’s true. Their albums sold well, but their radio play vanished as rock stations began to embrace the “alternative” sound. The haven’t seen the Hot 100 since 1995; their last appearance in the top 10 (with the reprehensible “When It’s Love”) came in 1988. Numbers don’t lie.

7. Black Crowes. Oh, they kept releasing albums all through the 90s; it’s just that, after 1992, nobody really bought them, and the Crowes lost their status as the Next Big Thing. And in case you’re wondering, they never had a top 20 hit except on the irrelevant Mainstream Rock chart.

8. Midnight Oil. It wouldn’t be fair to name hair bands all day, even though they’re the ones who lost the most to Nirvana. Midnight Oil still had some Modern Rock hits in the mid-90s, but for the most part, Nirvana also ended their (US) career.

9. Concrete Blonde. Spare me your comments about the Cure–this is what “alternative” music meant to the mainstream in 1990. Concrete Blonde lost their fringe appeal, which was about the only appeal they had, so by 1995, they weren’t even a band anymore. More’s the pity.

10. The Pixies. Irony–the band Nirvana was most often compared to wound up being a victim of their doppelgangers’ success. Things were already coming apart by the time Nevermind was released; however, the Pixies went on hiatus after opening on U2’s 1992 Zoo TV tour and never returned.