June 17, 2026 • 46 mins
Bobby counts down his Top 10 alternative rock songs of all-time and shares the stories, memories, and reasons behind every pick. From R.E.M. and Nirvana to Radiohead, Green Day, Weezer, Pearl Jam, and The Verve, he explains what made each song stand out and why that era of alternative music still hits so hard. Along the way, he talks about seeing the Red Hot Chili Peppers more than 10 times, meeting Weezer on American Idol, and the song he believes changed the music industry forever. Plus, he brings Eddie in to go over the list and get his thoughts!
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:06):
Everybody Bobby here, and we're now going to count d
ten greatest alternative songs of all time for the most
part of their nineties songs.
Speaker 2 (00:16):
Also for the most part, this is.
Speaker 1 (00:18):
Not my real hair, and this could probably be confused
as an eighties wig too. But now for the sake
of this, think of like nineties alternative Seattle grunge.
Speaker 2 (00:29):
I haven't washed this thing in a month.
Speaker 1 (00:30):
Don't think about the fact that I just ordered it
from Amazon and open up the package and put it
on my head right now, although probably equally as grungy.
Speaker 2 (00:38):
All right, here we go.
Speaker 1 (00:39):
Now, before I get into the biggest alternative songs, I'm
gonna tell you that I did.
Speaker 2 (00:44):
Kind of create.
Speaker 1 (00:47):
Statistics, and so I based these songs off of thirty
five percent cultural impact, twenty five percent influence, meaning did
other bands almost say copy, but did they build from it?
Twenty percent longevity, ten percent critical acclaim, and then ten
percent quality. Is it simply a great song? And we're
(01:08):
gonna start at number ten, which I think is simply
a great song. Now, they didn't have a lot of
other massive songs, especially here in the States, but the
band is the verve and this song is Bittersweet Symphony.
If you watched I Don't Know Cruel Intentions with Sarah
Michelle Geller, you were like, dang, two girls just kissed.
Speaker 2 (01:30):
That's a big part of that movie. Especially as a teenager,
you're like, what the heck? That's awesome. And then also
this song plays bitter sweet symphony. What a jam And
this song belongs mostly because alternative music had gotten really
will go grungy and hard, but this song kind of
(01:53):
shifted a bit. Let music be a little more cinematic,
a little more massive sounding.
Speaker 1 (01:58):
That the song is or stroll. The lyrics are personal.
It's also like just whiny enough to be alternative because
it's winding about being trapped in modern life. I mean,
it was everywhere in nineteen ninety seven, and so I
put this song at number ten because it was an
awesome song and it was in a movie where the
girls kiss, and I thought that was awesome when I
(02:20):
was seventeen years old. Fun fact about this song, The
Verve lost nearly all the songs royalties for years because
they got into a dispute about the orchestra that sampled
in it with the Rolling Stones. Decades later, the rights
were returned to the band. That's a lot of missed
out money. So that's a number ten at number nine
(02:41):
Pearl Jam. Jeremy Jeremy with Pearl Jam's third single, Alive
was number one Jam, even Flow who was number two Jam,
but Jeremy was number three and the song was played
on MTV lot and because it was played on MTV
(03:03):
a lot, it helped the band get to.
Speaker 2 (03:05):
A new level of success. Now the story about this song.
Speaker 1 (03:09):
There was a kid named Jeremy Wade Dell, fifteen years
old from Texas. He died by suicide in front of
his classmates in nineteen ninety one, and Eddie Vedder read
an article about that and wrote this song. And so
a lot of people still confuse this song is a
song about school shooting.
Speaker 2 (03:29):
It's not. It's about another tragedy.
Speaker 1 (03:32):
And Eddie Vedder did an experience it himself, which is
another confusing part of the song. But he read about
it was so moved that he wrote the song. Fun
fact about Pearl Jam, they were already named before Eddie
Vedder joined the band. The band had several different names
before settling on Pearl Jam. And maybe you've heard of
Mookie Blaylock. If you haven't look it up ballplayer and
(03:55):
former band name at number eight the Red Hot Chili
under the Bridge. Remember those ads back in the day
that said get ten CDs for a penny, man I
do for anyone under thirty five years old. This is
gonna sound completely made up, but it was real. Back
(04:15):
in the eighties and the nineties, companies like Columbia House
and BMG Music Club would advertise these deals where you
could get.
Speaker 2 (04:24):
Ten CDs for one penny.
Speaker 1 (04:27):
You'd fill out the form, you picked the albums you wanted,
You mailed the four men, and a few weeks later,
a box full of CDs would show up at your house,
all bound by three really strong rubber bands.
Speaker 2 (04:44):
It was amazing. So what was the catch.
Speaker 1 (04:47):
Well, when you signed up, you agreed to buy a
certain number of additional CDs over the next couple of years.
Usually it was around five or six more albums, and
those albums weren't cheap. They were often more expensive than
buying them at a regular store. But again, that wasn't
the sneaky part. The sneaky part was the album of
the month. Every month, the club would send you a
(05:08):
catalog if you wanted that month's featured album. You did nothing.
If you didn't want it, you had to mail back
your card saying nah, no thanks. If you forgot to
send the card back, they automatically ship you the CD
and then charged you for it. So a lot of
people accidentally ended up with a lot of albums they
never really wanted to begin with. But here's why everybody
(05:30):
loved it anyway, including myself, because I had so many
CDs from this thing. For a teenager in the nineties,
it was the way to build a music collection. If
you did not have any money.
Speaker 2 (05:40):
One day, you.
Speaker 1 (05:41):
Struggled to have two CDs in your collection. A few
weeks later, you had like twelve. You couldn't even listen
to all of them because you had so many. And
of course people figured out the loophole pretty quick. People
started signing up under their mom's names, the dad's names,
the brothers' names, fake names, dogs' names. You just wanted
to get that deal over and over again for an
entire generation. Columbia House and that massive box being delivered
(06:06):
felt like Christmas.
Speaker 2 (06:08):
It was the coolest thing.
Speaker 1 (06:09):
It was basically the Spotify free trial of the nineteen nineties,
except instead of streaming music, it was this really cool
rubber band bound box of CDs that you really couldn't afford,
and that's where I got this CD, Blood Sugar, Sex Magic.
With this song the Red Hot Chili Peppers under the Bridge,
(06:32):
I think there are probably three artists that I have
seen double digit times, John Mayer, Food Fighters, and the
Red Hot Chili Peppers. Now, before Under the Bridge, the
Chili Peppers were just that funk rock energy band, wild performances.
Speaker 2 (06:52):
The song kind of changed it for them.
Speaker 1 (06:53):
Anthony Keatis he had written a poem about loneliness and
feeling disconnected from the people around him in Los Angele List.
Another thing that I really didn't know about until I
watched the documentary on Netflix.
Speaker 2 (07:04):
The original guitarist, whose.
Speaker 1 (07:06):
Name was Halel, died from a heroin overdose in nineteen
eighty eight. So there was another kid who ended up
joining the band. He was eighteen years old, and so
John Forshanti joined the band. He had been a Chili
Peppers fan. He had even studied Hallel's playing style for
years since he was a young kid. So with this
song and You're Gonna see where it all comes together,
(07:28):
he had this poem. Rick Rubin, who produced the record,
and Rick Rubin of Beastie Boys. Rick Rubin of Well
named just about anyone jay z Fame got with the
Big Beard. He said, Okay, read this poem to the band.
So Anthony Ketis kind of read, kind of sang the poem,
which ended up being the lyrics, and then John for
(07:49):
Shanti created the guitar chords in that part ended up
being the real backbone of the song. You do see
that in the Netflix documentary as well, which is really great.
Speaker 2 (07:59):
So that's why the.
Speaker 1 (08:00):
Red Hot Chili Peppers Under the Bridge makes the list.
One shout out to Columbia House and then two shout
out to the Chili Peppers. At number seven, Weezer Buddy Holly.
If I were just going off a personal taste alone,
if that was a large percentage, the song would have
definitely been on the top three.
Speaker 2 (08:18):
But I'm not totally biased. I'm only somewhat biased.
Speaker 1 (08:22):
But Buddy Holly was a song on an album that
freaking rocked my face off, that Blue album, the Weezer album.
When I was able to see that like nerdy guys
could be cool too, that changed it for me, and
Buddy Hawley showed that alternative rug didn't have to be
dark or angry or serious, and.
Speaker 2 (08:43):
Weezer was able to kind of be funny.
Speaker 1 (08:45):
And MTV launched this song as well, because not only
was it a good song, but the music video was
inside the World of Happy Days, and there was even
some footage of the original.
Speaker 2 (08:55):
Cast, So Weezer, Buddy Holly.
Speaker 1 (08:59):
You can't see it, but I got a poster right
over there of the Blue Album. I have a blue
album album. It's a little repetitive there, but it is
the vinyl and Weezer was coming to play American Idol,
and I was on the show for a few years.
And I never want to bother celebrities when they come
(09:19):
to do anything work wise. But this is one of
my favorite bands of all time. It's why I wear
my glasses like I do. These are sunglasses, but my
normal glasses are very much Rivers Cuomo inspired glasses. Weezer's
tour bus is outside the sound stage. We're all going
on in a matter of hours. There was a record
store in Los Angeles near the sound stage, so I
(09:40):
go over and I buy the Blue Album, thinking I
might see them backstage. I see one of the producers
and they say, hey, you should go over and just
knock on the bus door. They seem nice, all right,
So that's what I do. I take my blue vinyl
and I walk over and I knock on the bus
door and the guitarist looks out and says hey, And
(10:01):
I was like, hey, I work on the show, like
I'm one of the on camera talent.
Speaker 2 (10:06):
Is there any chance I can get this signed? And
he's like, yeah, come on in. Like crap, that was easy.
Speaker 1 (10:11):
So I got the vinyl and I walk in and
there are three guys in there, three Weezers, but Rivers
Cuomo is not in there, and I'm like, oh no,
I don't want to get this record signed to not
have Rivers Cuomo signed the record.
Speaker 3 (10:24):
He's the lead singer of Weezer.
Speaker 1 (10:26):
And so they sign it, and I'm just hanging out
still see no Rivers, and I see in the bus
there's this door that opens and closes, and I see
the door just slowly open and a little eye looks
out and then the door closes again.
Speaker 2 (10:40):
But the little eye had the glasses on. I knew
that was Rivers.
Speaker 1 (10:44):
And he said, hold on, I'll go back and say
if I can get Rivers to sign this, and so
he takes the record and he goes back and he
opens it, and the door opens, and Rivers looks and
he goes, hey, he signs it, hands it back, door shuts.
That was my Rivers Cuomo experience on a tour bus.
Very little, but exactly what I would have hoped for.
(11:04):
And number six, Green Day basket Case. I would have
thought this album came out before nineteen ninety four. Honestly,
this album feels to me like it's been out for
one hundred years. And you could say to yourself, well,
Green Day's punk, yeah, but kind of everything's alternative that
wasn't mainstream at the time. And I think this record Dukie,
which is sold over twenty million albums. I think that
(11:27):
pop punk that ended up being radio friendly kind of
opened some doors for some other alternative music. But you
gotta think Nirvana was like earlier than this. To me,
Green Day Dukie has always existed. It's kind of like
Stone Hinge. There just wasn't a time where this music
didn't exist. But I'm putting this at number six. And
I went back to this album Longview, Welcome to Paradise, Basketcase.
(11:52):
She When I Come around Basketcases, the song we're focused
on here, but so.
Speaker 2 (11:58):
Many massive songs longview. All I remember is the baseline
boom bom b.
Speaker 1 (12:05):
Welcome to Paradise, basket Case. Obviously she tunes in silence
when I come around, When I come around. Awesome record.
But not only that, if you let it play long enough.
Speaker 2 (12:21):
Like one of the.
Speaker 1 (12:22):
Real great things about having CDs back in the day
is sometimes they would put a hidden track on a CD,
meaning when that last song finished, if you just let it,
it would just play in silence. We'd just play in silence,
in silence, in silence, in silence, until all of a
sudden four or five six minutes later, a hidden track
(12:46):
would start to play. And I do believe that all
by myself, sang by Trey Coole of Green Day, was
the greatest hidden track.
Speaker 2 (12:55):
Of all time. I was alone, I was all by myself,
no one was looking.
Speaker 1 (13:01):
I was thinking of you. It was perverted, and you
know how Green Day are. But I think that's the
greatest hidden track of all time. But at number six
is Green Day. Basket Case at number five, And this
is a band that I would say that I was
never really a fan of. I understood why people were
fans of them, but it just wasn't for me.
Speaker 2 (13:23):
It's Lincoln Park.
Speaker 1 (13:23):
In the end, I put that out at number five
of the Greatest alternative Songs because what made this song different,
and what made the band different, is that.
Speaker 2 (13:33):
They ignored all the rules.
Speaker 1 (13:36):
Rock bands weren't supposed to rap rap songs, weren't supposed
to have huge rock choruses. You were supposed to have
one lead singer, not two. But they both weren't lead singers.
One was a rapper, one was a singer. The one
that could rap actually did rap stuff by himself after
he was good enough to do that. Chester Bennington a
(13:57):
great freaking vocalist. Rest in peace. So linkoln Park had
it all, but you weren't supposed to have that much,
because that means it was anti any music that already existed.
When this song came out, everybody knew it even if
you didn't love it, and rock fans liked it, rap
fans liked it, kids liked it, adults liked it. It
was one of those songs that kind of crossed over
(14:18):
to everyone, and they did a whole album like an
MTV with Live with Jay Z. It's awesome. It's still
one of the better live MTV performances. The other thing
is if you go back and you listen to it,
which I did, it doesn't sound like it's trapped in
two thousand and one. A lot of songs from that
era feel and sound dated. I feel like this one
(14:41):
still holds up. Also, this is one of the only
songs from the two thousands on my top ten list,
but Lincoln Park in the end at number five. Fun fact,
Lincoln Park originally called Zero before they changed their name
and signed a record deal number four. One of the
big ones here Radiohead Karma Police come. A lot of
(15:07):
bands have a sound, especially successful bands, a really cool sound,
and they keep making versions of it, changing a little here,
changing a little.
Speaker 2 (15:18):
There, but they kind of know where their moneymaker is.
Speaker 1 (15:22):
Radiohead always seemed like they were trying to figure out
what was next before everybody else got there, even for themselves,
like they would switch it up hard, they would have
their own fans yelling at them, but that's how revolutionary
Radiohead was. Karma Police is probably the easiest Radiohead song
for the average person to listen to for the first
time and get into it, but it's also the song
(15:44):
that hinted that they probably weren't going to make straightforward
rock music forever.
Speaker 2 (15:49):
They were going to experiment a bit.
Speaker 1 (15:51):
It was weird enough to be interesting, it was still
catchy enough to be a hit and.
Speaker 2 (15:55):
Make people want to hear it again.
Speaker 1 (15:57):
And the thing that I always come back to is
how many bands from that era had a couple of
really big songs and then people really love those songs.
Radiohead had songs that other bands studied. The other bands
that got really big studied Radiohead and their songs, and
not even just the hits, and so fans didn't just
(16:19):
listen to them. They kind of obsessed over them if
they loved them or if they hated them, and if
they hated them, they studied them until they actually love them. Now,
this came from Okay Computer, which is one of those
albums that shows up on pretty much every list of
greatest albums ever made.
Speaker 2 (16:36):
And so you can agree with that or not. And look,
I'm not a massive Radiohead head. Here we go again.
Speaker 1 (16:44):
I'm not a massive radio Head head, but I do
understand their cultural significance. Karma Police fun fact started as
an inside joke within the band. Whenever somebody was acting out,
they'd be like, hey, I'm gonna call the Karma police
on you. Somehow that joke turned into one of the
other important alternative songs of the nineteen nineties. A second
fun fact about Radiohead. They took their name from the
(17:07):
song Radiohead by the Talking Heads, So Radiohead respect.
Speaker 4 (17:12):
Let's take a quick pause for a message from our sponsor.
Speaker 1 (17:23):
I would think, as we're getting to the top three
songs here that a lot of people feel that I'm
going to pick Nirvana smells like teen Spirit at number one.
That'd be the easy one, right, kind of what launched
it all massively. You'd be wrong, because I have it
at number three. That's right, Nirvana smells like teen Spirit.
You could argue it's number one, most do. It did
(17:44):
completely change the music industry. Within months, grunge replaced hair
metal as the dominant force in rock music, and then
eventually pop music record labels scrambled to find the next Nirvana.
It's like they all moved to Seattle to find well,
all the bands that had hair like this. Very few
songs ever can honestly claim they changed the direction of
(18:08):
popular music. This is one of those songs that completely
changed pop music, and it's weird to call Nirvana pop music,
but you have to remember pop music is just popular music,
and in the nineties, alternative music ended up being very popular.
So Nirvana Smells Like Teen Spirit is at number three.
(18:29):
The title of the song is from a joke a
friend wrote, Kurt smells like Teen Spirit on a wall,
referring to the deodorant brand. Kurt Cobain thought it was funny,
kept it and thought it felt like a revolutionary slogan,
so I wrote a song about it later. Weird Al
did Smells Like Nirvana and mostly just sang where you
(18:50):
couldn't understand what he was saying. And that was the point,
because through a lot of this song you don't really
know what Kurt's saying unless you look it up. I think,
as a kid, I think I just sangho hind in
gott oh. I just kind of did the melody thing forever, which,
by the way, I was a massive Nirvana fan. Not
my favorite Nirvana song because I don't really feel like
you can be a massive fan of a band and
(19:12):
have their biggest song be your number one song.
Speaker 2 (19:15):
Kind of a loser theory.
Speaker 1 (19:17):
But one of my top five albums of all time
is Nirvana Unplugged and mostly I'm a guy too that goes,
you can't have a greatest hits is a favorite album,
and that's not really your greatest hits.
Speaker 2 (19:28):
It's an acoustic.
Speaker 1 (19:29):
Album where they did David Bowie, meat Puppets, their own songs,
et cetera.
Speaker 2 (19:34):
But a little bit. If I'm picking that as one
of my favorite albums, I'm kind of a poser. That's okay.
Speaker 1 (19:39):
I love Nirvana And number three smells like teen Spirit
I think about it, I only have two songs left.
Before I even started this, one of the guys in
the room said, I hope you have some.
Speaker 2 (19:53):
Nine inch nails. Who'd you, guys.
Speaker 1 (19:54):
Say, Allison Chains?
Speaker 2 (19:59):
Oh yeah, hmm not the Rooster did not make the list, sorry.
Speaker 1 (20:06):
And number two Coldplay Yellow What a song? Really one
of the greatest songs in my lifetime period. You can
be a Coldplay hater if you want. I'm not gonna
be a Coldplay hater. I'm gonna be a Coldplay respector.
It's kind of hard to remember how big this song
was back then because Coldplay has become one of the
biggest bands on the planet. They've become so big that
(20:29):
their backlash is big. Like that's how you know somebody
is so big. Backlash only happens when you get so
popular that it's cool to not say you like someone,
and that's what happened with Coldplay. When Yellow came out
and that music video hit, my life changed. I was
living in a little rock Arkansas. I could not believe
(20:49):
it. It was the greatest song and the greatest empty video
because you kind of just saw him walking on the beach,
but you didn't really know.
Speaker 2 (20:55):
But the song doesn't try too hard.
Speaker 1 (20:57):
There's no big trick, there's no crazy production, there's no
complicated lyrics. It's just a great melody. It's a great
vocal and a feeling that almost everybody could relate to.
I mean, I think that's why it connected so much.
A lot of alternative music in the nineties was built
around angst and frustration and being on the outside. To me,
Yellow felt very different than that because it was hopeful.
(21:21):
It was also very vulnerable. It wasn't trying to be
cool at all. It was just honest. And when the
song hit, it just didn't launch a band, it kind
of launched the next era of alternative music. I mean,
suddenly there were a lot of bands that were willing
to be more emotional, more melodic, a little less concerned
with looking tough and flannel and hair like this.
Speaker 2 (21:43):
I mean.
Speaker 1 (21:43):
The other thing that stands out to me is how
many massive Coldplay songs came after this one. I mean,
most bands would love to have one song as big
as Yellow. For Coldplay, it was basically their introduction. I
love Coldplay. I did a science experiment with myself on
their second album, or Russia, Blood to the Head. I
would listen to it every night as I was going
(22:03):
to sleep to see if I heard it random times
during the day would make me sleepy.
Speaker 3 (22:07):
It didn't.
Speaker 1 (22:09):
I heard it at Kroger once in the meat aisle,
and I did not think about going to sleep. The
title kind of came by accident during recording. The band
was looking at the sky at night, and a nearby
object that happened to be yellow inspired the name, and
so they said, let's let's.
Speaker 2 (22:26):
Do the song Yellow with all the same meaning and emotion.
We're now at number one.
Speaker 1 (22:32):
I'm gonna go to my guys sitting behind the table here.
I've listed a lot of songs. What do you think
my number one song is going to be?
Speaker 3 (22:42):
How You Remind Me nickelback.
Speaker 1 (22:45):
Almost It came in at seven hundred and nineteen. Bummer,
what do you think is mine?
Speaker 2 (22:52):
Or what would you put it? One?
Speaker 3 (22:56):
Oh man, that's a tough one. That is a really
tough one.
Speaker 2 (23:01):
Mmm, he's thinking about it. He got his finger over
his lips.
Speaker 3 (23:11):
The Green Day, the Green Day one was was up
there for me.
Speaker 2 (23:18):
Like too high?
Speaker 3 (23:19):
No, I was Green Day was like number one for me.
So you hit you hit that one on the on
the head for sure.
Speaker 2 (23:26):
What about the argument that it's punk not alternative.
Speaker 3 (23:28):
No, there's It was just as mainstream as all the
other stuff at the time. So what is your number one?
Speaker 1 (23:37):
So you're not gonna guess anything else. Dylan's too young.
Dylan was born like four years ago.
Speaker 5 (23:42):
And I feel like you guys have known each other
for a decade.
Speaker 2 (23:45):
Yeah, that's true. I thought the number one song is
from nineteen ninety one my list.
Speaker 1 (23:55):
The number one song is not a repeat of any
band that I have listed so far. The number one
song focused on an instrument that isn't often focused on
in alternative music. I would say this instrument is more
focused on in bluegrass music.
Speaker 3 (24:15):
Oh wait, talking about.
Speaker 1 (24:17):
The mandolin, I'm talking about the mandolin, mandolin. My number
one song is focused on the mandolin, and it is iris.
Speaker 5 (24:26):
No.
Speaker 2 (24:27):
No, if it was Google Doll's Iris, its not like
that song.
Speaker 3 (24:29):
You should just turn this off. I was gonna say
this off and go. That's only what I can think
of right now that that had mandolin in it.
Speaker 1 (24:37):
Think about a band from Georgia. Think about a band
that other alternative bands look at as their inspiration. Kurt
Cobain even credited this band with being an inspiration to
never changing who you are and to continue experimenting. Think
about Athens, Georgia. I'm shocked, Brandon that you even when
(25:06):
I say Athens Georgia, it's not coming to you.
Speaker 2 (25:08):
Widespread. They were not widespread. Panic. No.
Speaker 1 (25:12):
This band had so many hits, but this one is
the one that launched them because it was played on
MTV so much. This band had a guy that I
really didn't know is having hair, but had hair in
the video and didn't have hair the rest of his career.
Speaker 2 (25:27):
To me, keep going, keep going. The band is rim
The song is losing my religion.
Speaker 3 (25:44):
Oh that's such a good one.
Speaker 1 (25:46):
Nineteen ninety one. If you're trying to explain alternative music
to somebody in one song. It gets no more alternative
than this because this was before alternative music really became
so easy to package is grunge and you know, guitar tones.
This should not have worked. It was built around a mandolin.
Losing My Religion helped make popular alternative music popular. And
(26:10):
again this video, Michael Stipe had hair that was crazy
to me because I really only know Michael Stipe other
than this video and maybe shiny happy people looking at
it back in time as being bald. And the song
is not actually about religion. If you're from the South,
you may have heard that before Losing my Religion. It
is very much a Southern expression meaning you're kind of
at the end of Europe, you're losing your patients that
(26:31):
type thing. So number one is the most alternative, yet
least alternative based on what we've learned. It is ram
losing my religion.
Speaker 3 (26:41):
Yes, Brandon, I can't believe I didn't connect those dots.
Speaker 2 (26:46):
I feel like I walked it to it.
Speaker 3 (26:48):
You did, And I have to admit I was very
I was so I was born in like eighty seven, Okay,
so first time I saw this video I was probably five,
and it's scared me for some reason when he was like,
that's me in the corner, that's me on the spot,
and he's like kind of like in the dark, and
like like, I don't know.
Speaker 1 (27:10):
I'm not gonna let you use your age as an
excuse because you are one of the better musicians that
I know, and you've written with pretty much. Have you
written Michael Stipe? I wish have you written with Bill Barry? No, okay,
I'll let it pass, okay.
Speaker 3 (27:26):
But what I love about Arium as I grew as
I grew up, and I didn't even realize it focused
around the mandolin. That's so funny.
Speaker 2 (27:40):
That's a mandolin.
Speaker 3 (27:41):
I don't even think about that. But as I got older,
I respected Arim so much more, you know, like, uh,
it's the end of the world as we know it.
Like they they I realize, like, oh, they're like capable
of everything.
Speaker 1 (27:56):
A very culture driven song, which you know that song
incorporates a lot of Andy Kaufman, you know, Andy Coffin dying.
Speaker 2 (28:04):
They use that in the movie that Jim Carrey did.
Speaker 1 (28:08):
About Andy Kaufman. What was that called my favorite movie ever?
Man on the Moon, Man on the Moon, Thank you
very much. The name of the song too, Thank You.
Speaker 3 (28:14):
Athens, Georgia.
Speaker 2 (28:15):
Did I say that? I think I said Adams Losing
my religion?
Speaker 1 (28:19):
Everybody hurts. Who's crawling on top of all the cars
on the highway when the day is gone?
Speaker 2 (28:25):
And then I.
Speaker 1 (28:25):
Played that song so much when I was like alone
and a loser, which is most of my life.
Speaker 2 (28:29):
Shiny happy people, man on the moon. Yeah, it's the
end of the world.
Speaker 1 (28:34):
This one goes out to the one eye Jam Drive
Orange Crush.
Speaker 2 (28:43):
Once.
Speaker 1 (28:43):
I went to an r em ACL live taping, so
it was back whenever. They had it on the campus
at the University of Texas, so there were probably eighty
people in there, and they only played their brand, brand,
brand new album at the time, and they played no hits.
I wanted to stab my eye out with a fork.
They were also playing the ACL Music Festival and I
(29:03):
went to that and they only played their new album
no hits. If I'd had eyes left after the first stabbing,
I would have stabbed my eyes out with a fork
for the second. But my number one alternative song of
all time ram Losing My Religion. Now I did have one.
It was honorable mentioned.
Speaker 3 (29:22):
Is this right here?
Speaker 2 (29:23):
Let me show you this for those that aren't watching
on Netflix. This is a It's a canvas and on
it looks like a smushy circle and it's signed at
the bottom. Can you guys see that in the frame.
Speaker 1 (29:39):
So this is the music file of County Crows mister Jones,
smushed up into a circle, and then Adam Durrett signed it.
And I have this because I bought it because I'm
such a Counting Crows fan. I never really hung it anywhere,
so it's just kind of square and weird, but I
put County Crows mister j It's a number eleven, just
(30:00):
because I love the count grow so much.
Speaker 2 (30:02):
That's right.
Speaker 1 (30:03):
And google Doll's iris since you guys thought that could
possibly be the number one alternative song because of Mandlin.
Speaker 2 (30:09):
That's the only reason that's it. Thank you everybody. Those
are my top ten alternative songs ever.
Speaker 1 (30:16):
And if you're new and you're watching this for the
first time, this is not my real hair. I suggest
you go back a couple episodes and see what my
real hair looks like, because it is a treat. I
got good hair. I just thought i'd wear this for
this show today. I could also repurpose this for ever
do like, whoa big thunder. We're about to have a storm,
So I'm gonna get out of here. That was my
name in college, by the way, Big Thunder. Yeah, all right,
(30:38):
big Thunder and little Thunder. We're out of here.
Speaker 4 (30:41):
Let's take a quick pause for a message from our sponsor,
and we're back on the Bobby Cast.
Speaker 1 (30:55):
Okay, we're off Netflix now, and so now we'll talk
about the list. How did you feel about my selection
of Rim Losing my Religion is the number one greatest
alternative song of all time?
Speaker 5 (31:06):
Yeah, I mean that's definitely your thing, Like, that's yours.
I mean, it's not the greatest of all time, but
it's yours.
Speaker 2 (31:14):
But there is no greatest of all time.
Speaker 5 (31:16):
You're kidding me, of course there is.
Speaker 2 (31:18):
But there is no greatest of all time. Meaning that's
not a trophy that you can give something based on
any sort of hard factor data. It's all right, opinion, right.
Speaker 5 (31:28):
It is.
Speaker 2 (31:28):
It is.
Speaker 5 (31:28):
And I think RAM would be in the back of
a lot of people's minds because I don't know. I
just feel like there are diehard Rim fans, but I
don't think anyone immediately goes to Ram as being the
number one all time alternative.
Speaker 2 (31:46):
I think because people don't understand the root of alternative music.
Speaker 5 (31:49):
You're right, You're right, yeah, And I don't think I
do either. Like to me, alternative music, I don't even
know where it started, Like, is grunge alternative? Yes, so
anything before grunge have been or guns n' Roses is
guns and Roses alternative?
Speaker 1 (32:04):
That was metal, Yeah, that was actual metal. Like they
only named things after they became popular, so they didn't
have a name for it, and then people fit into it.
A sound becomes popular and.
Speaker 2 (32:15):
Then for example, yacht rock, yeah, and that happened way later,
but that sound existed with all that music, and then
way later they were like, we'll just call this yacht
rock now without as big a time gap. The same
thing happened with alternative music.
Speaker 5 (32:30):
And then where does it end in your mind? Because
like I feel like it could keep going all the way.
Speaker 1 (32:35):
To it also has to be alternative from what the
mainstream is, which is why that name existed. It was
alternative from the guitar rock that was happening, the hair
band and it was absolutely alternative from any sort of
pop music for sure.
Speaker 2 (32:49):
So that's where the label came from. And I think alternative. Probably,
I think.
Speaker 5 (32:54):
It's still do you think it's still there?
Speaker 1 (32:57):
I think now though, it is just so ever present
that if you're just a little different, it can be
called alternative. There's even country music that's alternative.
Speaker 4 (33:05):
H h.
Speaker 5 (33:06):
It's just funny because my kids call it like Dad's music.
Speaker 2 (33:09):
Oh yeah, Like we talked about dad rock in another.
Speaker 1 (33:11):
Episode alternative is Dad's music. I thought some people would go,
h I am. And I like putting it at number
one because I think even Kurt Cobain credited Michael Stipe
for not like the guitar tone, but for the idea
of how different you can be and to stay committed.
Because never Mind wasn't their first album like I had
(33:34):
all so, I wasn't a Nirvana fan prior to never Mind.
Speaker 2 (33:39):
I was a child. I was eleven and then I
came out.
Speaker 5 (33:41):
And it was hard to discover music like that on
your own.
Speaker 1 (33:43):
But I became a massive Nirvana fan of the music
prior to Nevermind. After I learned Nirvana and would listen
to the Bleach all those records, I'd find them, yeah,
or we download them on Napster.
Speaker 5 (33:54):
Were you ever part of the bootleg culture.
Speaker 2 (33:58):
The culture of Napster where you could get every eating
bootleg on a download.
Speaker 5 (34:01):
See this was before I was part of the male bootleg.
Oh no, I wasn't like I will trade you my
bootleg for your bootleg of what bands? Pearl Jam and
they were all live, live shows from their very first
show in Seattle in nineteen ninety one, nineteen ninety to
all the way to you know, like two thousands.
Speaker 1 (34:17):
What would you have put as the number one alternative song?
I should say the greatest alternative song of all time.
Speaker 5 (34:26):
I would put it have to be Pearl Jam for me.
Speaker 2 (34:29):
You're not going to be wrong, I.
Speaker 5 (34:31):
Know, but there's a lot of pressure because a lot
of really good alternative songs out there. I would put
Jeremy A live Pearl.
Speaker 1 (34:38):
Jam so alive didn't make my list, but I love
that Pearl Jam major list, but Jeremy did.
Speaker 5 (34:43):
Yeah, And I loved how you described Jeremy. You were
spot on. You nailed it. Did you have to do research?
Did you know that was af from the dome?
Speaker 1 (34:51):
It was only partly from the dome. If you were
to ask me, I think I would have messed up
with some of those facts. I knew it wasn't a
school shooting.
Speaker 2 (34:57):
I think a lot of people thought it was I
think I only didn't know that because you told me
that at one point.
Speaker 1 (35:02):
But everything was research. So I go from the dome
on my list, and then I just want to make
sure I'm saying things right through research.
Speaker 5 (35:10):
So it's crazy because like when I first started listening
to Pearl Jam, I listened to all these songs and
just loved them for what they sounded like. It wasn't
ntil later and then I just kind of did research
on like, well, what does that even mean? Like Jeremy
spoke in class today, and then you started, you know,
really kind of deep diving into it, and like, dang,
that's deep stuff. Alive is deep, but well, I don't know.
Speaker 2 (35:30):
I didn't go into that.
Speaker 5 (35:31):
Live is not knowing his real his dad that he
thought was his dad is not his real dad?
Speaker 2 (35:36):
Is that true?
Speaker 5 (35:37):
Yeah? And then and then once finding that out, deciding
whether you're gonna you want to still live?
Speaker 2 (35:45):
I'm still is it still a life? I'm still alive?
Speaker 5 (35:48):
Yeah you should.
Speaker 2 (35:49):
You should go back and listen to it knowing that, Yeah,
I think it would hit different.
Speaker 5 (35:53):
It would definitely hit different. And then daughter too, I
mean daughter is no call.
Speaker 2 (35:58):
Me daughter, don't daughter. I never know words, so it's
don't call me daughter, not fair too, not fair? Oh
that's what it says. Yeah, yeah, why what's that about?
Speaker 5 (36:08):
So it's about a dad who's sexually assaulting his own
child and the child saying like, you don't deserve to
call me daughter.
Speaker 2 (36:18):
I did not know that, did you know that?
Speaker 5 (36:21):
No idea? So much of Pearl Jam. There was even
one that's like a later song. It's called I Got Id,
I Got ID and I Again And I just found
this out through a TikTok video of that song was
written in the perspective of one of his stalkers, one
of Edievedder stalkers. Dude, I mean the writing is so good.
Once you understand that, it's like, oh this is a
different Wow, this is a deep song.
Speaker 2 (36:44):
Yeah, you're a massive Pearl Jam fan.
Speaker 5 (36:45):
I love Pearl Jam. I love Eddie Vedder. I loved
just the way he writes and how he sounds when
he sings. I love the whole thing for you to.
Speaker 2 (36:52):
Put Pearl Jam alive alive at once.
Speaker 1 (36:56):
Yeah, and I talked about it, but their first single
ever from that album was.
Speaker 5 (37:02):
The very first single was alive. I feel like I
think too alive, then jorm me and then even flow.
Speaker 2 (37:13):
No even second.
Speaker 5 (37:14):
Okay, because you did say this in the video.
Speaker 2 (37:16):
Yeah I did, and that yeah yeah yeah.
Speaker 5 (37:19):
Because dude, we were so young when all that happened. Like,
as far as singles come, when they came out, I
had no idea.
Speaker 2 (37:24):
Hey, Mike, how'd you feel about putting Green Day and
uh like I have a basketcase in the top ten
as one of the greatest alternative songs ever. You're a
punk guy, though.
Speaker 6 (37:32):
Yeah, I see it more as a punk song. I
don't see them as an alternative band.
Speaker 2 (37:36):
Don't you feel that their brand of pop punk, though,
was so alternative because it went mainstream. Yeah, I guess.
Speaker 6 (37:42):
Since it went so mainstream and they adds up on
the radio, I could see where you classify it as alternative.
But to me, they're a punk rock band through and
through me too, by the way, I think they are
a pun Agreed.
Speaker 2 (37:52):
I think they're a punk band as well.
Speaker 1 (37:53):
But I guess with my whenever I was like making
my list, if you did music to guitar, you made
rock songs and they became wildly popular. It was alternative
of what was being played that to me was alternative.
It really wasn't a vocal style, a guitar tone from Seattle.
(38:15):
So but I can understand when people will go, well,
green Day not alternative. I guess for the requirements of
my stupid list. How they did it and what they
did felt like alternative, and it was played alternative radio.
Speaker 5 (38:27):
Yeah, And then you look at the name alternative, right,
it's an alternative to what was being played.
Speaker 2 (38:33):
In pop music and metal and guitar music. Sure, because
it was alternative hair metal.
Speaker 5 (38:37):
At the beginning, yes, but even like later on, because
even talking about Coldplay, it's like Coldplay was an alternative
sound to what was happening at that time. Because Green
Day was an alternative sound.
Speaker 1 (38:48):
People will look at Coldplay and go, that's alternative. That's
like hot a C that's like easy listening.
Speaker 5 (38:54):
Now.
Speaker 2 (38:54):
At the time when Coldplay came out, it was definitely
more say like symptomatic even I want to say orchestral,
but they had a lot of instruments.
Speaker 5 (39:06):
It was hard to describe it was.
Speaker 1 (39:07):
It was soft at times, so it almost was if
you had more than three soft songs, you can't be
alternative because every alternative record just I had like one ballance, right.
Speaker 2 (39:17):
You couldn't really do it more maybe two? But yeah,
Coldplay was an alternative band.
Speaker 5 (39:21):
I remember listening to the radio and I was in
like Houston at the time, and they were playing the
Strokes last Night, and then right after that was Yellow
and I remember specifically thinking, what what is this?
Speaker 2 (39:34):
Like?
Speaker 5 (39:35):
Hold on like whatever this sound is, it's different and
I like it.
Speaker 2 (39:40):
It was a whole shift.
Speaker 1 (39:42):
Yeah, it was like de verve bittersweet symphony, same deal,
complete shift. Does it sound soft now? But it was
rock but done again with orchestral instruments, and.
Speaker 5 (39:56):
And that's how I felt too. Mike with Green Day,
same kind of feeling. When I heard basket Case for
the first time, it was just like, what that's so different?
What is that? You had?
Speaker 1 (40:04):
The hidden try with their harmonies. I was not by myself,
no one was looking. I was thinking of you did.
Speaker 5 (40:11):
You discover this is my favorite on those because people
don't understand, like the kids don't understand hidden tracks on CDs,
which it's cool that they still have them on streaming.
So if you do stream that last song on the hidden.
Speaker 1 (40:22):
First seventeen minute songs, yeah, you mean on greene eighth
you mean artists aren't making them now you're saying if
you go back, correct.
Speaker 5 (40:28):
If you go back and listen to the original. It
was the end of our CD, and you sometimes you
would discover it because saying like, oh wow, that's seventeen
many we just.
Speaker 2 (40:37):
Let it play. You forget to turn at all, or
that thing would start.
Speaker 5 (40:41):
Do you remember if you discovered I was all by myself,
or did somebody.
Speaker 2 (40:44):
Tell you My cousin had my older cousin, I didn't
know that well, remember being in his house and he
had the album and he said, there's a song on
after the last song, and he would like push fast
forward down halfway, not full way, so you could fast
forward to CDC, wish it all the way, skipped the
next track, and if you sold it down a little bit,
it would hear the go fast forward and then it
(41:06):
came on same.
Speaker 5 (41:07):
I had a friend of mine tell me about it.
Speaker 2 (41:09):
Mike, would you have put a number one on the list?
Speaker 6 (41:11):
I had to put Foo fighters ever long?
Speaker 2 (41:14):
And I love food fighters. Yeah, and that wouldn't be wrong.
Speaker 5 (41:18):
That's they're so impressive because just the idea of that.
Dave Groll was part of the beginning of alternative and
is now still part of alternative, still making music to
the highest level. It's pretty impressive.
Speaker 2 (41:34):
Why would you have picked that song, Mike?
Speaker 6 (41:35):
I think that's the best alternative rock song ever made.
Like every time I hear that song, it puts me
in a good mood. And they play that like every night,
and they crush it every single night.
Speaker 2 (41:45):
Yeah, you know, it was like the sixth drummer for
I didn't know that really. I think turnover was high
in those bands. Yeah, first when you're making no money
and you're driving.
Speaker 5 (41:56):
Around Parljium had had a drummer problem. They still have
a rummer problem. They just fired their drummer, or didn't
fire him, he quit And they're now in the process
of hiring a new drummer. At age what are how
old are they they're almost sixty.
Speaker 2 (42:08):
Foo Fighters drummer Taylor Hawkins died.
Speaker 5 (42:10):
I know who is their current drummer.
Speaker 1 (42:12):
Well, they got a guy and then he ended up
quitting too, like a prolific drummer that played with a
lot of other bands.
Speaker 5 (42:16):
Josh Free.
Speaker 1 (42:17):
Oh Josh, he's not with them anymore right now, he's
out too.
Speaker 2 (42:21):
But I didn't put any smashing bunkins.
Speaker 5 (42:22):
In that's so such a big part of alternative music.
Battled it.
Speaker 1 (42:26):
I was watching an interview with Billy Corgan where he
was talking about the first time that he heard that
album never Mind and smells like teen Spirit because the
producer of that album is I want a Garbage which big?
Speaker 2 (42:41):
But no?
Speaker 3 (42:42):
The other guy?
Speaker 1 (42:43):
Yeah, it's a Butch though, right, he's won a garbage
Charlie Manson, he.
Speaker 2 (42:50):
Is Butcher big. Who's the other Buch? I'm thinking of
the Dea Punk. I'm sure you're right.
Speaker 5 (42:59):
I don't know, guys, who's it.
Speaker 2 (43:01):
Like s R seven to one? Who's that? But it
doesn't matter.
Speaker 5 (43:05):
What's our seven to one SR se one? That sounds
like a microphone?
Speaker 2 (43:08):
Hold on, let me look at garbage garbage the band
you're you're You're probably right? It probably what's your big garbage?
The band it is Shirley Manson and Butch Big. You're right,
I play right, Butcher big, but big, Butcher big.
Speaker 5 (43:22):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (43:23):
So he produced the record and he also was a
big Smashing Pumpkins guy. M Billy Corgan said, the first
time I heard it, I knew he stole my guitar
like it sound Oh no, but Billy Corgan thinks everybody
took everything from him.
Speaker 5 (43:37):
Yeah, he seems like an interesting fella.
Speaker 2 (43:38):
Yeah, but I wonder if I'm tired, I'm stupid one
of the two. Do you ever like garbage?
Speaker 5 (43:44):
Never got into garbage?
Speaker 2 (43:48):
Stupid girl?
Speaker 5 (43:49):
Yeah I know.
Speaker 2 (43:50):
Yeah, I'm only happy when it rains. Yeah, I mean yeah, No,
what else the Butcher Big produce?
Speaker 5 (43:58):
Did you get into?
Speaker 3 (43:58):
Hole?
Speaker 1 (43:59):
No?
Speaker 2 (44:00):
I felt like I knew like celebrities, celebrity skin. That's
pretty good. Not really, Courtney Corney Corney love, that was
that good?
Speaker 5 (44:11):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (44:12):
She was good in the movie Handler.
Speaker 5 (44:14):
Moon, Oh man in the Moon. No, you didn't think
she was good?
Speaker 2 (44:18):
A man in the Unleah, she's fine. But she was
in the movie but Hustler, the guy that started Whustler.
She played like prostitute.
Speaker 5 (44:23):
Oh Larry Flint, Yeah yeah, yeah yeah, the world America
versus whatever.
Speaker 2 (44:27):
I guess she was a pretty good actress. Butch Big
produced albums. Let's see what he's got here, Nirvana's never Mind,
Smashing Pumpkins, Siamese, Dream Food, Fighters, Wasting Light. It just
goes to it. It's a ton sonic youth.
Speaker 5 (44:42):
That's crazy.
Speaker 2 (44:42):
Yeah, he did it all, all right, Anyway, I just wanted.
Speaker 5 (44:46):
Your feedback on that was fun.
Speaker 2 (44:48):
What I didn't want to said, I war wig the
whole time.
Speaker 5 (44:50):
I head hitched, dude. Honestly, it was almost like I
couldn't take you serious, but it didn't look bad like
it worked like you could off as someone to where
that's just your hair.
Speaker 2 (45:02):
You haven't seen the wig, go to Netflix and you
can watch me do it on Netflix. Where for the
one we did last week where we did duets and
the one before that we did Garth Brooks, I wore
cowboy hat, which I don't wear cowboy hats. I also
don't have long hair.
Speaker 5 (45:14):
I'm not a bad luck either.
Speaker 1 (45:15):
But yeah, I felt like people that were seeing it
and not knowing it was a joke were saying, you're
not a cowboy? Why are you posing?
Speaker 5 (45:23):
Is it cut up? It's a joke. It's a joke.
Speaker 2 (45:26):
I don't wear cowboy hat.
Speaker 5 (45:27):
So are they saying that about the wig too?
Speaker 2 (45:30):
Right now? I haven't posted one.
Speaker 5 (45:31):
You don't have long hair, man, you're not a metal head.
Speaker 2 (45:35):
They haven't posted one yet.
Speaker 5 (45:36):
I don't know if you look more like Howard Stern
or like if you were in Bon Joviet. Haven't decided
it yet.
Speaker 2 (45:41):
I wanted to look alternative. It did end up kind
of looking like White Snake.
Speaker 5 (45:46):
It was wild like those dude all right.
Speaker 2 (45:48):
Thank you guys for checking out the list, Thanks for listening,
Thanks for watching on Netflix, and we got another Good
Way coming up next week.
Speaker 4 (45:55):
Thanks for listening to a Bobby Cast production.
Everybody Bobby here, and we're now going to count d
ten greatest alternative songs of all time for the most
part of their nineties songs.
Speaker 2 (00:16):
Also for the most part, this is.
Speaker 1 (00:18):
Not my real hair, and this could probably be confused
as an eighties wig too. But now for the sake
of this, think of like nineties alternative Seattle grunge.
Speaker 2 (00:29):
I haven't washed this thing in a month.
Speaker 1 (00:30):
Don't think about the fact that I just ordered it
from Amazon and open up the package and put it
on my head right now, although probably equally as grungy.
Speaker 2 (00:38):
All right, here we go.
Speaker 1 (00:39):
Now, before I get into the biggest alternative songs, I'm
gonna tell you that I did.
Speaker 2 (00:44):
Kind of create.
Speaker 1 (00:47):
Statistics, and so I based these songs off of thirty
five percent cultural impact, twenty five percent influence, meaning did
other bands almost say copy, but did they build from it?
Twenty percent longevity, ten percent critical acclaim, and then ten
percent quality. Is it simply a great song? And we're
(01:08):
gonna start at number ten, which I think is simply
a great song. Now, they didn't have a lot of
other massive songs, especially here in the States, but the
band is the verve and this song is Bittersweet Symphony.
If you watched I Don't Know Cruel Intentions with Sarah
Michelle Geller, you were like, dang, two girls just kissed.
Speaker 2 (01:30):
That's a big part of that movie. Especially as a teenager,
you're like, what the heck? That's awesome. And then also
this song plays bitter sweet symphony. What a jam And
this song belongs mostly because alternative music had gotten really
will go grungy and hard, but this song kind of
(01:53):
shifted a bit. Let music be a little more cinematic,
a little more massive sounding.
Speaker 1 (01:58):
That the song is or stroll. The lyrics are personal.
It's also like just whiny enough to be alternative because
it's winding about being trapped in modern life. I mean,
it was everywhere in nineteen ninety seven, and so I
put this song at number ten because it was an
awesome song and it was in a movie where the
girls kiss, and I thought that was awesome when I
(02:20):
was seventeen years old. Fun fact about this song, The
Verve lost nearly all the songs royalties for years because
they got into a dispute about the orchestra that sampled
in it with the Rolling Stones. Decades later, the rights
were returned to the band. That's a lot of missed
out money. So that's a number ten at number nine
(02:41):
Pearl Jam. Jeremy Jeremy with Pearl Jam's third single, Alive
was number one Jam, even Flow who was number two Jam,
but Jeremy was number three and the song was played
on MTV lot and because it was played on MTV
(03:03):
a lot, it helped the band get to.
Speaker 2 (03:05):
A new level of success. Now the story about this song.
Speaker 1 (03:09):
There was a kid named Jeremy Wade Dell, fifteen years
old from Texas. He died by suicide in front of
his classmates in nineteen ninety one, and Eddie Vedder read
an article about that and wrote this song. And so
a lot of people still confuse this song is a
song about school shooting.
Speaker 2 (03:29):
It's not. It's about another tragedy.
Speaker 1 (03:32):
And Eddie Vedder did an experience it himself, which is
another confusing part of the song. But he read about
it was so moved that he wrote the song. Fun
fact about Pearl Jam, they were already named before Eddie
Vedder joined the band. The band had several different names
before settling on Pearl Jam. And maybe you've heard of
Mookie Blaylock. If you haven't look it up ballplayer and
(03:55):
former band name at number eight the Red Hot Chili
under the Bridge. Remember those ads back in the day
that said get ten CDs for a penny, man I
do for anyone under thirty five years old. This is
gonna sound completely made up, but it was real. Back
(04:15):
in the eighties and the nineties, companies like Columbia House
and BMG Music Club would advertise these deals where you
could get.
Speaker 2 (04:24):
Ten CDs for one penny.
Speaker 1 (04:27):
You'd fill out the form, you picked the albums you wanted,
You mailed the four men, and a few weeks later,
a box full of CDs would show up at your house,
all bound by three really strong rubber bands.
Speaker 2 (04:44):
It was amazing. So what was the catch.
Speaker 1 (04:47):
Well, when you signed up, you agreed to buy a
certain number of additional CDs over the next couple of years.
Usually it was around five or six more albums, and
those albums weren't cheap. They were often more expensive than
buying them at a regular store. But again, that wasn't
the sneaky part. The sneaky part was the album of
the month. Every month, the club would send you a
(05:08):
catalog if you wanted that month's featured album. You did nothing.
If you didn't want it, you had to mail back
your card saying nah, no thanks. If you forgot to
send the card back, they automatically ship you the CD
and then charged you for it. So a lot of
people accidentally ended up with a lot of albums they
never really wanted to begin with. But here's why everybody
(05:30):
loved it anyway, including myself, because I had so many
CDs from this thing. For a teenager in the nineties,
it was the way to build a music collection. If
you did not have any money.
Speaker 2 (05:40):
One day, you.
Speaker 1 (05:41):
Struggled to have two CDs in your collection. A few
weeks later, you had like twelve. You couldn't even listen
to all of them because you had so many. And
of course people figured out the loophole pretty quick. People
started signing up under their mom's names, the dad's names,
the brothers' names, fake names, dogs' names. You just wanted
to get that deal over and over again for an
entire generation. Columbia House and that massive box being delivered
(06:06):
felt like Christmas.
Speaker 2 (06:08):
It was the coolest thing.
Speaker 1 (06:09):
It was basically the Spotify free trial of the nineteen nineties,
except instead of streaming music, it was this really cool
rubber band bound box of CDs that you really couldn't afford,
and that's where I got this CD, Blood Sugar, Sex Magic.
With this song the Red Hot Chili Peppers under the Bridge,
(06:32):
I think there are probably three artists that I have
seen double digit times, John Mayer, Food Fighters, and the
Red Hot Chili Peppers. Now, before Under the Bridge, the
Chili Peppers were just that funk rock energy band, wild performances.
Speaker 2 (06:52):
The song kind of changed it for them.
Speaker 1 (06:53):
Anthony Keatis he had written a poem about loneliness and
feeling disconnected from the people around him in Los Angele List.
Another thing that I really didn't know about until I
watched the documentary on Netflix.
Speaker 2 (07:04):
The original guitarist, whose.
Speaker 1 (07:06):
Name was Halel, died from a heroin overdose in nineteen
eighty eight. So there was another kid who ended up
joining the band. He was eighteen years old, and so
John Forshanti joined the band. He had been a Chili
Peppers fan. He had even studied Hallel's playing style for
years since he was a young kid. So with this
song and You're Gonna see where it all comes together,
(07:28):
he had this poem. Rick Rubin, who produced the record,
and Rick Rubin of Beastie Boys. Rick Rubin of Well
named just about anyone jay z Fame got with the
Big Beard. He said, Okay, read this poem to the band.
So Anthony Ketis kind of read, kind of sang the poem,
which ended up being the lyrics, and then John for
(07:49):
Shanti created the guitar chords in that part ended up
being the real backbone of the song. You do see
that in the Netflix documentary as well, which is really great.
Speaker 2 (07:59):
So that's why the.
Speaker 1 (08:00):
Red Hot Chili Peppers Under the Bridge makes the list.
One shout out to Columbia House and then two shout
out to the Chili Peppers. At number seven, Weezer Buddy Holly.
If I were just going off a personal taste alone,
if that was a large percentage, the song would have
definitely been on the top three.
Speaker 2 (08:18):
But I'm not totally biased. I'm only somewhat biased.
Speaker 1 (08:22):
But Buddy Holly was a song on an album that
freaking rocked my face off, that Blue album, the Weezer album.
When I was able to see that like nerdy guys
could be cool too, that changed it for me, and
Buddy Hawley showed that alternative rug didn't have to be
dark or angry or serious, and.
Speaker 2 (08:43):
Weezer was able to kind of be funny.
Speaker 1 (08:45):
And MTV launched this song as well, because not only
was it a good song, but the music video was
inside the World of Happy Days, and there was even
some footage of the original.
Speaker 2 (08:55):
Cast, So Weezer, Buddy Holly.
Speaker 1 (08:59):
You can't see it, but I got a poster right
over there of the Blue Album. I have a blue
album album. It's a little repetitive there, but it is
the vinyl and Weezer was coming to play American Idol,
and I was on the show for a few years.
And I never want to bother celebrities when they come
(09:19):
to do anything work wise. But this is one of
my favorite bands of all time. It's why I wear
my glasses like I do. These are sunglasses, but my
normal glasses are very much Rivers Cuomo inspired glasses. Weezer's
tour bus is outside the sound stage. We're all going
on in a matter of hours. There was a record
store in Los Angeles near the sound stage, so I
(09:40):
go over and I buy the Blue Album, thinking I
might see them backstage. I see one of the producers
and they say, hey, you should go over and just
knock on the bus door. They seem nice, all right,
So that's what I do. I take my blue vinyl
and I walk over and I knock on the bus
door and the guitarist looks out and says hey, And
(10:01):
I was like, hey, I work on the show, like
I'm one of the on camera talent.
Speaker 2 (10:06):
Is there any chance I can get this signed? And
he's like, yeah, come on in. Like crap, that was easy.
Speaker 1 (10:11):
So I got the vinyl and I walk in and
there are three guys in there, three Weezers, but Rivers
Cuomo is not in there, and I'm like, oh no,
I don't want to get this record signed to not
have Rivers Cuomo signed the record.
Speaker 3 (10:24):
He's the lead singer of Weezer.
Speaker 1 (10:26):
And so they sign it, and I'm just hanging out
still see no Rivers, and I see in the bus
there's this door that opens and closes, and I see
the door just slowly open and a little eye looks
out and then the door closes again.
Speaker 2 (10:40):
But the little eye had the glasses on. I knew
that was Rivers.
Speaker 1 (10:44):
And he said, hold on, I'll go back and say
if I can get Rivers to sign this, and so
he takes the record and he goes back and he
opens it, and the door opens, and Rivers looks and
he goes, hey, he signs it, hands it back, door shuts.
That was my Rivers Cuomo experience on a tour bus.
Very little, but exactly what I would have hoped for.
(11:04):
And number six, Green Day basket Case. I would have
thought this album came out before nineteen ninety four. Honestly,
this album feels to me like it's been out for
one hundred years. And you could say to yourself, well,
Green Day's punk, yeah, but kind of everything's alternative that
wasn't mainstream at the time. And I think this record Dukie,
which is sold over twenty million albums. I think that
(11:27):
pop punk that ended up being radio friendly kind of
opened some doors for some other alternative music. But you
gotta think Nirvana was like earlier than this. To me,
Green Day Dukie has always existed. It's kind of like
Stone Hinge. There just wasn't a time where this music
didn't exist. But I'm putting this at number six. And
I went back to this album Longview, Welcome to Paradise, Basketcase.
(11:52):
She When I Come around Basketcases, the song we're focused
on here, but so.
Speaker 2 (11:58):
Many massive songs longview. All I remember is the baseline
boom bom b.
Speaker 1 (12:05):
Welcome to Paradise, basket Case. Obviously she tunes in silence
when I come around, When I come around. Awesome record.
But not only that, if you let it play long enough.
Speaker 2 (12:21):
Like one of the.
Speaker 1 (12:22):
Real great things about having CDs back in the day
is sometimes they would put a hidden track on a CD,
meaning when that last song finished, if you just let it,
it would just play in silence. We'd just play in silence,
in silence, in silence, in silence, until all of a
sudden four or five six minutes later, a hidden track
(12:46):
would start to play. And I do believe that all
by myself, sang by Trey Coole of Green Day, was
the greatest hidden track.
Speaker 2 (12:55):
Of all time. I was alone, I was all by myself,
no one was looking.
Speaker 1 (13:01):
I was thinking of you. It was perverted, and you
know how Green Day are. But I think that's the
greatest hidden track of all time. But at number six
is Green Day. Basket Case at number five, And this
is a band that I would say that I was
never really a fan of. I understood why people were
fans of them, but it just wasn't for me.
Speaker 2 (13:23):
It's Lincoln Park.
Speaker 1 (13:23):
In the end, I put that out at number five
of the Greatest alternative Songs because what made this song different,
and what made the band different, is that.
Speaker 2 (13:33):
They ignored all the rules.
Speaker 1 (13:36):
Rock bands weren't supposed to rap rap songs, weren't supposed
to have huge rock choruses. You were supposed to have
one lead singer, not two. But they both weren't lead singers.
One was a rapper, one was a singer. The one
that could rap actually did rap stuff by himself after
he was good enough to do that. Chester Bennington a
(13:57):
great freaking vocalist. Rest in peace. So linkoln Park had
it all, but you weren't supposed to have that much,
because that means it was anti any music that already existed.
When this song came out, everybody knew it even if
you didn't love it, and rock fans liked it, rap
fans liked it, kids liked it, adults liked it. It
was one of those songs that kind of crossed over
(14:18):
to everyone, and they did a whole album like an
MTV with Live with Jay Z. It's awesome. It's still
one of the better live MTV performances. The other thing
is if you go back and you listen to it,
which I did, it doesn't sound like it's trapped in
two thousand and one. A lot of songs from that
era feel and sound dated. I feel like this one
(14:41):
still holds up. Also, this is one of the only
songs from the two thousands on my top ten list,
but Lincoln Park in the end at number five. Fun fact,
Lincoln Park originally called Zero before they changed their name
and signed a record deal number four. One of the
big ones here Radiohead Karma Police come. A lot of
(15:07):
bands have a sound, especially successful bands, a really cool sound,
and they keep making versions of it, changing a little here,
changing a little.
Speaker 2 (15:18):
There, but they kind of know where their moneymaker is.
Speaker 1 (15:22):
Radiohead always seemed like they were trying to figure out
what was next before everybody else got there, even for themselves,
like they would switch it up hard, they would have
their own fans yelling at them, but that's how revolutionary
Radiohead was. Karma Police is probably the easiest Radiohead song
for the average person to listen to for the first
time and get into it, but it's also the song
(15:44):
that hinted that they probably weren't going to make straightforward
rock music forever.
Speaker 2 (15:49):
They were going to experiment a bit.
Speaker 1 (15:51):
It was weird enough to be interesting, it was still
catchy enough to be a hit and.
Speaker 2 (15:55):
Make people want to hear it again.
Speaker 1 (15:57):
And the thing that I always come back to is
how many bands from that era had a couple of
really big songs and then people really love those songs.
Radiohead had songs that other bands studied. The other bands
that got really big studied Radiohead and their songs, and
not even just the hits, and so fans didn't just
(16:19):
listen to them. They kind of obsessed over them if
they loved them or if they hated them, and if
they hated them, they studied them until they actually love them. Now,
this came from Okay Computer, which is one of those
albums that shows up on pretty much every list of
greatest albums ever made.
Speaker 2 (16:36):
And so you can agree with that or not. And look,
I'm not a massive Radiohead head. Here we go again.
Speaker 1 (16:44):
I'm not a massive radio Head head, but I do
understand their cultural significance. Karma Police fun fact started as
an inside joke within the band. Whenever somebody was acting out,
they'd be like, hey, I'm gonna call the Karma police
on you. Somehow that joke turned into one of the
other important alternative songs of the nineteen nineties. A second
fun fact about Radiohead. They took their name from the
(17:07):
song Radiohead by the Talking Heads, So Radiohead respect.
Speaker 4 (17:12):
Let's take a quick pause for a message from our sponsor.
Speaker 1 (17:23):
I would think, as we're getting to the top three
songs here that a lot of people feel that I'm
going to pick Nirvana smells like teen Spirit at number one.
That'd be the easy one, right, kind of what launched
it all massively. You'd be wrong, because I have it
at number three. That's right, Nirvana smells like teen Spirit.
You could argue it's number one, most do. It did
(17:44):
completely change the music industry. Within months, grunge replaced hair
metal as the dominant force in rock music, and then
eventually pop music record labels scrambled to find the next Nirvana.
It's like they all moved to Seattle to find well,
all the bands that had hair like this. Very few
songs ever can honestly claim they changed the direction of
(18:08):
popular music. This is one of those songs that completely
changed pop music, and it's weird to call Nirvana pop music,
but you have to remember pop music is just popular music,
and in the nineties, alternative music ended up being very popular.
So Nirvana Smells Like Teen Spirit is at number three.
(18:29):
The title of the song is from a joke a
friend wrote, Kurt smells like Teen Spirit on a wall,
referring to the deodorant brand. Kurt Cobain thought it was funny,
kept it and thought it felt like a revolutionary slogan,
so I wrote a song about it later. Weird Al
did Smells Like Nirvana and mostly just sang where you
(18:50):
couldn't understand what he was saying. And that was the point,
because through a lot of this song you don't really
know what Kurt's saying unless you look it up. I think,
as a kid, I think I just sangho hind in
gott oh. I just kind of did the melody thing forever, which,
by the way, I was a massive Nirvana fan. Not
my favorite Nirvana song because I don't really feel like
you can be a massive fan of a band and
(19:12):
have their biggest song be your number one song.
Speaker 2 (19:15):
Kind of a loser theory.
Speaker 1 (19:17):
But one of my top five albums of all time
is Nirvana Unplugged and mostly I'm a guy too that goes,
you can't have a greatest hits is a favorite album,
and that's not really your greatest hits.
Speaker 2 (19:28):
It's an acoustic.
Speaker 1 (19:29):
Album where they did David Bowie, meat Puppets, their own songs,
et cetera.
Speaker 2 (19:34):
But a little bit. If I'm picking that as one
of my favorite albums, I'm kind of a poser. That's okay.
Speaker 1 (19:39):
I love Nirvana And number three smells like teen Spirit
I think about it, I only have two songs left.
Before I even started this, one of the guys in
the room said, I hope you have some.
Speaker 2 (19:53):
Nine inch nails. Who'd you, guys.
Speaker 1 (19:54):
Say, Allison Chains?
Speaker 2 (19:59):
Oh yeah, hmm not the Rooster did not make the list, sorry.
Speaker 1 (20:06):
And number two Coldplay Yellow What a song? Really one
of the greatest songs in my lifetime period. You can
be a Coldplay hater if you want. I'm not gonna
be a Coldplay hater. I'm gonna be a Coldplay respector.
It's kind of hard to remember how big this song
was back then because Coldplay has become one of the
biggest bands on the planet. They've become so big that
(20:29):
their backlash is big. Like that's how you know somebody
is so big. Backlash only happens when you get so
popular that it's cool to not say you like someone,
and that's what happened with Coldplay. When Yellow came out
and that music video hit, my life changed. I was
living in a little rock Arkansas. I could not believe
(20:49):
it. It was the greatest song and the greatest empty video
because you kind of just saw him walking on the beach,
but you didn't really know.
Speaker 2 (20:55):
But the song doesn't try too hard.
Speaker 1 (20:57):
There's no big trick, there's no crazy production, there's no
complicated lyrics. It's just a great melody. It's a great
vocal and a feeling that almost everybody could relate to.
I mean, I think that's why it connected so much.
A lot of alternative music in the nineties was built
around angst and frustration and being on the outside. To me,
Yellow felt very different than that because it was hopeful.
(21:21):
It was also very vulnerable. It wasn't trying to be
cool at all. It was just honest. And when the
song hit, it just didn't launch a band, it kind
of launched the next era of alternative music. I mean,
suddenly there were a lot of bands that were willing
to be more emotional, more melodic, a little less concerned
with looking tough and flannel and hair like this.
Speaker 2 (21:43):
I mean.
Speaker 1 (21:43):
The other thing that stands out to me is how
many massive Coldplay songs came after this one. I mean,
most bands would love to have one song as big
as Yellow. For Coldplay, it was basically their introduction. I
love Coldplay. I did a science experiment with myself on
their second album, or Russia, Blood to the Head. I
would listen to it every night as I was going
(22:03):
to sleep to see if I heard it random times
during the day would make me sleepy.
Speaker 3 (22:07):
It didn't.
Speaker 1 (22:09):
I heard it at Kroger once in the meat aisle,
and I did not think about going to sleep. The
title kind of came by accident during recording. The band
was looking at the sky at night, and a nearby
object that happened to be yellow inspired the name, and
so they said, let's let's.
Speaker 2 (22:26):
Do the song Yellow with all the same meaning and emotion.
We're now at number one.
Speaker 1 (22:32):
I'm gonna go to my guys sitting behind the table here.
I've listed a lot of songs. What do you think
my number one song is going to be?
Speaker 3 (22:42):
How You Remind Me nickelback.
Speaker 1 (22:45):
Almost It came in at seven hundred and nineteen. Bummer,
what do you think is mine?
Speaker 2 (22:52):
Or what would you put it? One?
Speaker 3 (22:56):
Oh man, that's a tough one. That is a really
tough one.
Speaker 2 (23:01):
Mmm, he's thinking about it. He got his finger over
his lips.
Speaker 3 (23:11):
The Green Day, the Green Day one was was up
there for me.
Speaker 2 (23:18):
Like too high?
Speaker 3 (23:19):
No, I was Green Day was like number one for me.
So you hit you hit that one on the on
the head for sure.
Speaker 2 (23:26):
What about the argument that it's punk not alternative.
Speaker 3 (23:28):
No, there's It was just as mainstream as all the
other stuff at the time. So what is your number one?
Speaker 1 (23:37):
So you're not gonna guess anything else. Dylan's too young.
Dylan was born like four years ago.
Speaker 5 (23:42):
And I feel like you guys have known each other
for a decade.
Speaker 2 (23:45):
Yeah, that's true. I thought the number one song is
from nineteen ninety one my list.
Speaker 1 (23:55):
The number one song is not a repeat of any
band that I have listed so far. The number one
song focused on an instrument that isn't often focused on
in alternative music. I would say this instrument is more
focused on in bluegrass music.
Speaker 3 (24:15):
Oh wait, talking about.
Speaker 1 (24:17):
The mandolin, I'm talking about the mandolin, mandolin. My number
one song is focused on the mandolin, and it is iris.
Speaker 5 (24:26):
No.
Speaker 2 (24:27):
No, if it was Google Doll's Iris, its not like
that song.
Speaker 3 (24:29):
You should just turn this off. I was gonna say
this off and go. That's only what I can think
of right now that that had mandolin in it.
Speaker 1 (24:37):
Think about a band from Georgia. Think about a band
that other alternative bands look at as their inspiration. Kurt
Cobain even credited this band with being an inspiration to
never changing who you are and to continue experimenting. Think
about Athens, Georgia. I'm shocked, Brandon that you even when
(25:06):
I say Athens Georgia, it's not coming to you.
Speaker 2 (25:08):
Widespread. They were not widespread. Panic. No.
Speaker 1 (25:12):
This band had so many hits, but this one is
the one that launched them because it was played on
MTV so much. This band had a guy that I
really didn't know is having hair, but had hair in
the video and didn't have hair the rest of his career.
Speaker 2 (25:27):
To me, keep going, keep going. The band is rim
The song is losing my religion.
Speaker 3 (25:44):
Oh that's such a good one.
Speaker 1 (25:46):
Nineteen ninety one. If you're trying to explain alternative music
to somebody in one song. It gets no more alternative
than this because this was before alternative music really became
so easy to package is grunge and you know, guitar tones.
This should not have worked. It was built around a mandolin.
Losing My Religion helped make popular alternative music popular. And
(26:10):
again this video, Michael Stipe had hair that was crazy
to me because I really only know Michael Stipe other
than this video and maybe shiny happy people looking at
it back in time as being bald. And the song
is not actually about religion. If you're from the South,
you may have heard that before Losing my Religion. It
is very much a Southern expression meaning you're kind of
at the end of Europe, you're losing your patients that
(26:31):
type thing. So number one is the most alternative, yet
least alternative based on what we've learned. It is ram
losing my religion.
Speaker 3 (26:41):
Yes, Brandon, I can't believe I didn't connect those dots.
Speaker 2 (26:46):
I feel like I walked it to it.
Speaker 3 (26:48):
You did, And I have to admit I was very
I was so I was born in like eighty seven, Okay,
so first time I saw this video I was probably five,
and it's scared me for some reason when he was like,
that's me in the corner, that's me on the spot,
and he's like kind of like in the dark, and
like like, I don't know.
Speaker 1 (27:10):
I'm not gonna let you use your age as an
excuse because you are one of the better musicians that
I know, and you've written with pretty much. Have you
written Michael Stipe? I wish have you written with Bill Barry? No, okay,
I'll let it pass, okay.
Speaker 3 (27:26):
But what I love about Arium as I grew as
I grew up, and I didn't even realize it focused
around the mandolin. That's so funny.
Speaker 2 (27:40):
That's a mandolin.
Speaker 3 (27:41):
I don't even think about that. But as I got older,
I respected Arim so much more, you know, like, uh,
it's the end of the world as we know it.
Like they they I realize, like, oh, they're like capable
of everything.
Speaker 1 (27:56):
A very culture driven song, which you know that song
incorporates a lot of Andy Kaufman, you know, Andy Coffin dying.
Speaker 2 (28:04):
They use that in the movie that Jim Carrey did.
Speaker 1 (28:08):
About Andy Kaufman. What was that called my favorite movie ever?
Man on the Moon, Man on the Moon, Thank you
very much. The name of the song too, Thank You.
Speaker 3 (28:14):
Athens, Georgia.
Speaker 2 (28:15):
Did I say that? I think I said Adams Losing
my religion?
Speaker 1 (28:19):
Everybody hurts. Who's crawling on top of all the cars
on the highway when the day is gone?
Speaker 2 (28:25):
And then I.
Speaker 1 (28:25):
Played that song so much when I was like alone
and a loser, which is most of my life.
Speaker 2 (28:29):
Shiny happy people, man on the moon. Yeah, it's the
end of the world.
Speaker 1 (28:34):
This one goes out to the one eye Jam Drive
Orange Crush.
Speaker 2 (28:43):
Once.
Speaker 1 (28:43):
I went to an r em ACL live taping, so
it was back whenever. They had it on the campus
at the University of Texas, so there were probably eighty
people in there, and they only played their brand, brand,
brand new album at the time, and they played no hits.
I wanted to stab my eye out with a fork.
They were also playing the ACL Music Festival and I
(29:03):
went to that and they only played their new album
no hits. If I'd had eyes left after the first stabbing,
I would have stabbed my eyes out with a fork
for the second. But my number one alternative song of
all time ram Losing My Religion. Now I did have one.
It was honorable mentioned.
Speaker 3 (29:22):
Is this right here?
Speaker 2 (29:23):
Let me show you this for those that aren't watching
on Netflix. This is a It's a canvas and on
it looks like a smushy circle and it's signed at
the bottom. Can you guys see that in the frame.
Speaker 1 (29:39):
So this is the music file of County Crows mister Jones,
smushed up into a circle, and then Adam Durrett signed it.
And I have this because I bought it because I'm
such a Counting Crows fan. I never really hung it anywhere,
so it's just kind of square and weird, but I
put County Crows mister j It's a number eleven, just
(30:00):
because I love the count grow so much.
Speaker 2 (30:02):
That's right.
Speaker 1 (30:03):
And google Doll's iris since you guys thought that could
possibly be the number one alternative song because of Mandlin.
Speaker 2 (30:09):
That's the only reason that's it. Thank you everybody. Those
are my top ten alternative songs ever.
Speaker 1 (30:16):
And if you're new and you're watching this for the
first time, this is not my real hair. I suggest
you go back a couple episodes and see what my
real hair looks like, because it is a treat. I
got good hair. I just thought i'd wear this for
this show today. I could also repurpose this for ever
do like, whoa big thunder. We're about to have a storm,
So I'm gonna get out of here. That was my
name in college, by the way, Big Thunder. Yeah, all right,
(30:38):
big Thunder and little Thunder. We're out of here.
Speaker 4 (30:41):
Let's take a quick pause for a message from our sponsor,
and we're back on the Bobby Cast.
Speaker 1 (30:55):
Okay, we're off Netflix now, and so now we'll talk
about the list. How did you feel about my selection
of Rim Losing my Religion is the number one greatest
alternative song of all time?
Speaker 5 (31:06):
Yeah, I mean that's definitely your thing, Like, that's yours.
I mean, it's not the greatest of all time, but
it's yours.
Speaker 2 (31:14):
But there is no greatest of all time.
Speaker 5 (31:16):
You're kidding me, of course there is.
Speaker 2 (31:18):
But there is no greatest of all time. Meaning that's
not a trophy that you can give something based on
any sort of hard factor data. It's all right, opinion, right.
Speaker 5 (31:28):
It is.
Speaker 2 (31:28):
It is.
Speaker 5 (31:28):
And I think RAM would be in the back of
a lot of people's minds because I don't know. I
just feel like there are diehard Rim fans, but I
don't think anyone immediately goes to Ram as being the
number one all time alternative.
Speaker 2 (31:46):
I think because people don't understand the root of alternative music.
Speaker 5 (31:49):
You're right, You're right, yeah, And I don't think I
do either. Like to me, alternative music, I don't even
know where it started, Like, is grunge alternative? Yes, so
anything before grunge have been or guns n' Roses is
guns and Roses alternative?
Speaker 1 (32:04):
That was metal, Yeah, that was actual metal. Like they
only named things after they became popular, so they didn't
have a name for it, and then people fit into it.
A sound becomes popular and.
Speaker 2 (32:15):
Then for example, yacht rock, yeah, and that happened way later,
but that sound existed with all that music, and then
way later they were like, we'll just call this yacht
rock now without as big a time gap. The same
thing happened with alternative music.
Speaker 5 (32:30):
And then where does it end in your mind? Because
like I feel like it could keep going all the way.
Speaker 1 (32:35):
To it also has to be alternative from what the
mainstream is, which is why that name existed. It was
alternative from the guitar rock that was happening, the hair
band and it was absolutely alternative from any sort of
pop music for sure.
Speaker 2 (32:49):
So that's where the label came from. And I think alternative. Probably,
I think.
Speaker 5 (32:54):
It's still do you think it's still there?
Speaker 1 (32:57):
I think now though, it is just so ever present
that if you're just a little different, it can be
called alternative. There's even country music that's alternative.
Speaker 4 (33:05):
H h.
Speaker 5 (33:06):
It's just funny because my kids call it like Dad's music.
Speaker 2 (33:09):
Oh yeah, Like we talked about dad rock in another.
Speaker 1 (33:11):
Episode alternative is Dad's music. I thought some people would go,
h I am. And I like putting it at number
one because I think even Kurt Cobain credited Michael Stipe
for not like the guitar tone, but for the idea
of how different you can be and to stay committed.
Because never Mind wasn't their first album like I had
(33:34):
all so, I wasn't a Nirvana fan prior to never Mind.
Speaker 2 (33:39):
I was a child. I was eleven and then I
came out.
Speaker 5 (33:41):
And it was hard to discover music like that on
your own.
Speaker 1 (33:43):
But I became a massive Nirvana fan of the music
prior to Nevermind. After I learned Nirvana and would listen
to the Bleach all those records, I'd find them, yeah,
or we download them on Napster.
Speaker 5 (33:54):
Were you ever part of the bootleg culture.
Speaker 2 (33:58):
The culture of Napster where you could get every eating
bootleg on a download.
Speaker 5 (34:01):
See this was before I was part of the male bootleg.
Oh no, I wasn't like I will trade you my
bootleg for your bootleg of what bands? Pearl Jam and
they were all live, live shows from their very first
show in Seattle in nineteen ninety one, nineteen ninety to
all the way to you know, like two thousands.
Speaker 1 (34:17):
What would you have put as the number one alternative song?
I should say the greatest alternative song of all time.
Speaker 5 (34:26):
I would put it have to be Pearl Jam for me.
Speaker 2 (34:29):
You're not going to be wrong, I.
Speaker 5 (34:31):
Know, but there's a lot of pressure because a lot
of really good alternative songs out there. I would put
Jeremy A live Pearl.
Speaker 1 (34:38):
Jam so alive didn't make my list, but I love
that Pearl Jam major list, but Jeremy did.
Speaker 5 (34:43):
Yeah, And I loved how you described Jeremy. You were
spot on. You nailed it. Did you have to do research?
Did you know that was af from the dome?
Speaker 1 (34:51):
It was only partly from the dome. If you were
to ask me, I think I would have messed up
with some of those facts. I knew it wasn't a
school shooting.
Speaker 2 (34:57):
I think a lot of people thought it was I
think I only didn't know that because you told me
that at one point.
Speaker 1 (35:02):
But everything was research. So I go from the dome
on my list, and then I just want to make
sure I'm saying things right through research.
Speaker 5 (35:10):
So it's crazy because like when I first started listening
to Pearl Jam, I listened to all these songs and
just loved them for what they sounded like. It wasn't
ntil later and then I just kind of did research
on like, well, what does that even mean? Like Jeremy
spoke in class today, and then you started, you know,
really kind of deep diving into it, and like, dang,
that's deep stuff. Alive is deep, but well, I don't know.
Speaker 2 (35:30):
I didn't go into that.
Speaker 5 (35:31):
Live is not knowing his real his dad that he
thought was his dad is not his real dad?
Speaker 2 (35:36):
Is that true?
Speaker 5 (35:37):
Yeah? And then and then once finding that out, deciding
whether you're gonna you want to still live?
Speaker 2 (35:45):
I'm still is it still a life? I'm still alive?
Speaker 5 (35:48):
Yeah you should.
Speaker 2 (35:49):
You should go back and listen to it knowing that, Yeah,
I think it would hit different.
Speaker 5 (35:53):
It would definitely hit different. And then daughter too, I
mean daughter is no call.
Speaker 2 (35:58):
Me daughter, don't daughter. I never know words, so it's
don't call me daughter, not fair too, not fair? Oh
that's what it says. Yeah, yeah, why what's that about?
Speaker 5 (36:08):
So it's about a dad who's sexually assaulting his own
child and the child saying like, you don't deserve to
call me daughter.
Speaker 2 (36:18):
I did not know that, did you know that?
Speaker 5 (36:21):
No idea? So much of Pearl Jam. There was even
one that's like a later song. It's called I Got Id,
I Got ID and I Again And I just found
this out through a TikTok video of that song was
written in the perspective of one of his stalkers, one
of Edievedder stalkers. Dude, I mean the writing is so good.
Once you understand that, it's like, oh this is a
different Wow, this is a deep song.
Speaker 2 (36:44):
Yeah, you're a massive Pearl Jam fan.
Speaker 5 (36:45):
I love Pearl Jam. I love Eddie Vedder. I loved
just the way he writes and how he sounds when
he sings. I love the whole thing for you to.
Speaker 2 (36:52):
Put Pearl Jam alive alive at once.
Speaker 1 (36:56):
Yeah, and I talked about it, but their first single
ever from that album was.
Speaker 5 (37:02):
The very first single was alive. I feel like I
think too alive, then jorm me and then even flow.
Speaker 2 (37:13):
No even second.
Speaker 5 (37:14):
Okay, because you did say this in the video.
Speaker 2 (37:16):
Yeah I did, and that yeah yeah yeah.
Speaker 5 (37:19):
Because dude, we were so young when all that happened. Like,
as far as singles come, when they came out, I
had no idea.
Speaker 2 (37:24):
Hey, Mike, how'd you feel about putting Green Day and
uh like I have a basketcase in the top ten
as one of the greatest alternative songs ever. You're a
punk guy, though.
Speaker 6 (37:32):
Yeah, I see it more as a punk song. I
don't see them as an alternative band.
Speaker 2 (37:36):
Don't you feel that their brand of pop punk, though,
was so alternative because it went mainstream. Yeah, I guess.
Speaker 6 (37:42):
Since it went so mainstream and they adds up on
the radio, I could see where you classify it as alternative.
But to me, they're a punk rock band through and
through me too, by the way, I think they are
a pun Agreed.
Speaker 2 (37:52):
I think they're a punk band as well.
Speaker 1 (37:53):
But I guess with my whenever I was like making
my list, if you did music to guitar, you made
rock songs and they became wildly popular. It was alternative
of what was being played that to me was alternative.
It really wasn't a vocal style, a guitar tone from Seattle.
(38:15):
So but I can understand when people will go, well,
green Day not alternative. I guess for the requirements of
my stupid list. How they did it and what they
did felt like alternative, and it was played alternative radio.
Speaker 5 (38:27):
Yeah, And then you look at the name alternative, right,
it's an alternative to what was being played.
Speaker 2 (38:33):
In pop music and metal and guitar music. Sure, because
it was alternative hair metal.
Speaker 5 (38:37):
At the beginning, yes, but even like later on, because
even talking about Coldplay, it's like Coldplay was an alternative
sound to what was happening at that time. Because Green
Day was an alternative sound.
Speaker 1 (38:48):
People will look at Coldplay and go, that's alternative. That's
like hot a C that's like easy listening.
Speaker 5 (38:54):
Now.
Speaker 2 (38:54):
At the time when Coldplay came out, it was definitely
more say like symptomatic even I want to say orchestral,
but they had a lot of instruments.
Speaker 5 (39:06):
It was hard to describe it was.
Speaker 1 (39:07):
It was soft at times, so it almost was if
you had more than three soft songs, you can't be
alternative because every alternative record just I had like one ballance, right.
Speaker 2 (39:17):
You couldn't really do it more maybe two? But yeah,
Coldplay was an alternative band.
Speaker 5 (39:21):
I remember listening to the radio and I was in
like Houston at the time, and they were playing the
Strokes last Night, and then right after that was Yellow
and I remember specifically thinking, what what is this?
Speaker 2 (39:34):
Like?
Speaker 5 (39:35):
Hold on like whatever this sound is, it's different and
I like it.
Speaker 2 (39:40):
It was a whole shift.
Speaker 1 (39:42):
Yeah, it was like de verve bittersweet symphony, same deal,
complete shift. Does it sound soft now? But it was
rock but done again with orchestral instruments, and.
Speaker 5 (39:56):
And that's how I felt too. Mike with Green Day,
same kind of feeling. When I heard basket Case for
the first time, it was just like, what that's so different?
What is that? You had?
Speaker 1 (40:04):
The hidden try with their harmonies. I was not by myself,
no one was looking. I was thinking of you did.
Speaker 5 (40:11):
You discover this is my favorite on those because people
don't understand, like the kids don't understand hidden tracks on CDs,
which it's cool that they still have them on streaming.
So if you do stream that last song on the hidden.
Speaker 1 (40:22):
First seventeen minute songs, yeah, you mean on greene eighth
you mean artists aren't making them now you're saying if
you go back, correct.
Speaker 5 (40:28):
If you go back and listen to the original. It
was the end of our CD, and you sometimes you
would discover it because saying like, oh wow, that's seventeen
many we just.
Speaker 2 (40:37):
Let it play. You forget to turn at all, or
that thing would start.
Speaker 5 (40:41):
Do you remember if you discovered I was all by myself,
or did somebody.
Speaker 2 (40:44):
Tell you My cousin had my older cousin, I didn't
know that well, remember being in his house and he
had the album and he said, there's a song on
after the last song, and he would like push fast
forward down halfway, not full way, so you could fast
forward to CDC, wish it all the way, skipped the
next track, and if you sold it down a little bit,
it would hear the go fast forward and then it
(41:06):
came on same.
Speaker 5 (41:07):
I had a friend of mine tell me about it.
Speaker 2 (41:09):
Mike, would you have put a number one on the list?
Speaker 6 (41:11):
I had to put Foo fighters ever long?
Speaker 2 (41:14):
And I love food fighters. Yeah, and that wouldn't be wrong.
Speaker 5 (41:18):
That's they're so impressive because just the idea of that.
Dave Groll was part of the beginning of alternative and
is now still part of alternative, still making music to
the highest level. It's pretty impressive.
Speaker 2 (41:34):
Why would you have picked that song, Mike?
Speaker 6 (41:35):
I think that's the best alternative rock song ever made.
Like every time I hear that song, it puts me
in a good mood. And they play that like every night,
and they crush it every single night.
Speaker 2 (41:45):
Yeah, you know, it was like the sixth drummer for
I didn't know that really. I think turnover was high
in those bands. Yeah, first when you're making no money
and you're driving.
Speaker 5 (41:56):
Around Parljium had had a drummer problem. They still have
a rummer problem. They just fired their drummer, or didn't
fire him, he quit And they're now in the process
of hiring a new drummer. At age what are how
old are they they're almost sixty.
Speaker 2 (42:08):
Foo Fighters drummer Taylor Hawkins died.
Speaker 5 (42:10):
I know who is their current drummer.
Speaker 1 (42:12):
Well, they got a guy and then he ended up
quitting too, like a prolific drummer that played with a
lot of other bands.
Speaker 5 (42:16):
Josh Free.
Speaker 1 (42:17):
Oh Josh, he's not with them anymore right now, he's
out too.
Speaker 2 (42:21):
But I didn't put any smashing bunkins.
Speaker 5 (42:22):
In that's so such a big part of alternative music.
Battled it.
Speaker 1 (42:26):
I was watching an interview with Billy Corgan where he
was talking about the first time that he heard that
album never Mind and smells like teen Spirit because the
producer of that album is I want a Garbage which big?
Speaker 2 (42:41):
But no?
Speaker 3 (42:42):
The other guy?
Speaker 1 (42:43):
Yeah, it's a Butch though, right, he's won a garbage
Charlie Manson, he.
Speaker 2 (42:50):
Is Butcher big. Who's the other Buch? I'm thinking of
the Dea Punk. I'm sure you're right.
Speaker 5 (42:59):
I don't know, guys, who's it.
Speaker 2 (43:01):
Like s R seven to one? Who's that? But it
doesn't matter.
Speaker 5 (43:05):
What's our seven to one SR se one? That sounds
like a microphone?
Speaker 2 (43:08):
Hold on, let me look at garbage garbage the band
you're you're You're probably right? It probably what's your big garbage?
The band it is Shirley Manson and Butch Big. You're right,
I play right, Butcher big, but big, Butcher big.
Speaker 5 (43:22):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (43:23):
So he produced the record and he also was a
big Smashing Pumpkins guy. M Billy Corgan said, the first
time I heard it, I knew he stole my guitar
like it sound Oh no, but Billy Corgan thinks everybody
took everything from him.
Speaker 5 (43:37):
Yeah, he seems like an interesting fella.
Speaker 2 (43:38):
Yeah, but I wonder if I'm tired, I'm stupid one
of the two. Do you ever like garbage?
Speaker 5 (43:44):
Never got into garbage?
Speaker 2 (43:48):
Stupid girl?
Speaker 5 (43:49):
Yeah I know.
Speaker 2 (43:50):
Yeah, I'm only happy when it rains. Yeah, I mean yeah, No,
what else the Butcher Big produce?
Speaker 5 (43:58):
Did you get into?
Speaker 3 (43:58):
Hole?
Speaker 1 (43:59):
No?
Speaker 2 (44:00):
I felt like I knew like celebrities, celebrity skin. That's
pretty good. Not really, Courtney Corney Corney love, that was
that good?
Speaker 5 (44:11):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (44:12):
She was good in the movie Handler.
Speaker 5 (44:14):
Moon, Oh man in the Moon. No, you didn't think
she was good?
Speaker 2 (44:18):
A man in the Unleah, she's fine. But she was
in the movie but Hustler, the guy that started Whustler.
She played like prostitute.
Speaker 5 (44:23):
Oh Larry Flint, Yeah yeah, yeah yeah, the world America
versus whatever.
Speaker 2 (44:27):
I guess she was a pretty good actress. Butch Big
produced albums. Let's see what he's got here, Nirvana's never Mind,
Smashing Pumpkins, Siamese, Dream Food, Fighters, Wasting Light. It just
goes to it. It's a ton sonic youth.
Speaker 5 (44:42):
That's crazy.
Speaker 2 (44:42):
Yeah, he did it all, all right, Anyway, I just wanted.
Speaker 5 (44:46):
Your feedback on that was fun.
Speaker 2 (44:48):
What I didn't want to said, I war wig the
whole time.
Speaker 5 (44:50):
I head hitched, dude. Honestly, it was almost like I
couldn't take you serious, but it didn't look bad like
it worked like you could off as someone to where
that's just your hair.
Speaker 2 (45:02):
You haven't seen the wig, go to Netflix and you
can watch me do it on Netflix. Where for the
one we did last week where we did duets and
the one before that we did Garth Brooks, I wore
cowboy hat, which I don't wear cowboy hats. I also
don't have long hair.
Speaker 5 (45:14):
I'm not a bad luck either.
Speaker 1 (45:15):
But yeah, I felt like people that were seeing it
and not knowing it was a joke were saying, you're
not a cowboy? Why are you posing?
Speaker 5 (45:23):
Is it cut up? It's a joke. It's a joke.
Speaker 2 (45:26):
I don't wear cowboy hat.
Speaker 5 (45:27):
So are they saying that about the wig too?
Speaker 2 (45:30):
Right now? I haven't posted one.
Speaker 5 (45:31):
You don't have long hair, man, you're not a metal head.
Speaker 2 (45:35):
They haven't posted one yet.
Speaker 5 (45:36):
I don't know if you look more like Howard Stern
or like if you were in Bon Joviet. Haven't decided
it yet.
Speaker 2 (45:41):
I wanted to look alternative. It did end up kind
of looking like White Snake.
Speaker 5 (45:46):
It was wild like those dude all right.
Speaker 2 (45:48):
Thank you guys for checking out the list, Thanks for listening,
Thanks for watching on Netflix, and we got another Good
Way coming up next week.
Speaker 4 (45:55):
Thanks for listening to a Bobby Cast production.
Host
Bobby Bones
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