Not Metal Monday, Kurt Cobain's Sweater Edition

It's hard to disagree with this list of the 25 most influential Grunge albums:

Even though nearly every alternative act of the day, especially those from Seattle, were all lumped together as grunge bands, the truth is that they each had their own style and sound. But at their core was some mixture of ‘70s hard rock and ‘80s punk, two genres that been at odds with each other and had different legions of fans. In other words, grunge made it safe for people to like both Black Sabbath and the Replacements, who, by the way, liked Black Sabbath.Its two biggest bands, Nirvana and Pearl Jam, served the same roles in the grunge movement as the Beatles and the Rolling Stones did during the British Invasion. One made the immediate impact but burned out quickly with a member still going strong

For younger reader(s) the four most important Grunge acts in order of import were Nirvana, Pearl Jam, Sound Garden and Alice Chains.

Ironically this is also the reverse list of musical talent. Nirvana was basically just a punk band while Pearl Jam sounded like a metal band that changed its sound just as metal was dying off. I think Sound Garden's Chris Cornell had the best vocals and musically was the most interesting. Alice in Chains is still around and produced the most diverse music.

Now, nothing Pearl Jam did after Ten and Animal matter to Grunge, I've never bought another one of their albums except the I got id single. Listen to those tracks and tell me these guys weren't influenced by metal.

I never liked Nirvana, man, but their MTV Unplugged performance is probably the most memorable of any Unplugged performance.

I'm glad the list mentioned Smashing Pumpkins as a top Grunge act. To be honest Billy Corgan insists they were always a prog rock band and he does love him some Rush, but those early albums were heavy on the power chords. Go listen to Rocket, it just rocks. 25 years after the fact I still get chills from the song.

Courtney Love and Hole of course make this list, and not just because they needed a girl.

To my knowledge there's never been a Grunge doc made except for the Grunge segment of Metal Evolution. None of these guys would admit to metal influence and a lot of that snobbery from the early 90's was still there. Come on guys, you're grown men. Other kinds of music are good too, even if you don't like it.