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Watch a very tired Nirvana being interviewed just a few weeks after ‘Nevermind’ came out
04.19.2016
12:25 pm
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I find it difficult to imagine what the final months of 1991 and the first months of 1992 could possibly have been like for the members of Nirvana. Nevermind came out on September 24, 1991, and has been a staple of “top albums of all time” lists ever since. It must have been a supreme mindfuck to go from believing that it would be an improbable long shot that your band would ever achieve a status comparable to their buddies the Melvins to being hailed as something akin to a Beatles for the Generation X. In a space of a few weeks, Nirvana went from a band admired by a passionate coterie to the band on everyone’s lips, and suddenly absolutely everyone wanted a part of them.

As a result, Kurt Cobain, Krist Novoselic, and Dave Grohl were busy little beavers that winter, as this crowded chronology suggests. A couple days before the album release, on September 20, they commenced a fast tour of North America, starting in Toronto and hitting some 30-odd locations by the end of October. On November 2, the same day that Nevermind entered the top 40 (at a humble #35), the band flew to England for a European tour, the first show happening in Bristol on November 4. They hung out in England for a few dates, then played Germany, Austria, Italy, Belgium, and the Netherlands, returning to the British Isles for the last week in November and the first week of December. By this time Nevermind‘s status as an authentic phenomenon was sealed, as the album was certified gold and platinum simultaneously, on November 27.
 

 
During that second visit to Great Britain, Nirvana taped an appearance on Top of the Pops on November 27 and a day later taped an extensive interview with Antoine de Caunes of Rapido, which at the time had attained some status as a cult music/interview show of the type that future readers of Dangerous Minds adore.

Nirvana was in some kind of historico-cultural zone during this stretch, and the band’s appearance on Top of the Pops is an excellent case in point. The band could do no wrong by this time, somewhat like the Beatles in the U.S. in 1964. This appearance is well known as the one in which TOTP demanded that Kurt lip-sync his vocals on “Smells Like Teen Spirit,” but the band demurred, leading to a compromise in which only the vocal track would be taped live. So in protest, Kurt sang his vocal in an unnaturally (hilariously) bass register that had nothing to do with how the song’s supposed to go, while all three guys ostentatiously “non-played” their instruments with outsize gestures in which their hands were never remotely close to where they were supposed to be.

Keep reading after the jump…

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Posted by Martin Schneider
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04.19.2016
12:25 pm
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Joe Strummer: Two TV interviews from 1988

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Deux interviews avec le Joe Strummer filmed for French television’s Rapido from 1988. Each clip has different interview footage with Strummer, but the same archive and performance material.

Strummer enthuses about Shane MacGowan and The Pogues (and is seen performing with the band in concert on “I Fought the Law” and “London Calling”); explains why he writes (like Paul Simon) for his generation; why each young generation should have their own musical revolution; and why Hip-Hop / rap is for “yuppies”.
 

 
Interview part deux avec Mnsr. Strummer, after le jump…
 

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Posted by Paul Gallagher
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06.12.2012
10:24 am
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