Bands That Successfully Navigated the Hair Metal to Grunge Transition
The 1990s brought such an interesting decade of music. What’s wild is that as the 1980s wrapped up, hair metal was all the rage, and the music that topped the…
The 1990s brought such an interesting decade of music. What's wild is that as the 1980s wrapped up, hair metal was all the rage, and the music that topped the charts came from bands such as Motley Crue, Warrant and Poison. It really seemed like nothing in the world could dethrone hair metal during its 1980s heyday.
But, something did dethrone hair metal, and it happened really fast. Heading into the 1990s, music tastes started to change. As with any major musical movement, listeners started to yearn for something different after a while. Enter grunge music. This was literally the antithesis of hair metal. Grunge was raw, introspective, deep, lo-fi and its band members didn't wear eyeliner or have wild hairdos. Instead, the face of grunge was Kurt Cobain, a guy who wore his hair long and stringy and sported ripped up jeans and flannel.
Following the release of Nirvana's sophomore album Nevermind in 1991, hair metal pretty much went away. It came back, of course, and is nostalgic and popular today, but for a while, it was nearly extinct while grunge ruled the planet. But, here are some bands that successfully navigated the hair metal to grunge transition.
Bands That Were Able to Be Both Grunge and Hair Metal
Mother Love Bone
Sadly, Andrew Wood from Mother Love Bone passed away before Nevermind came out. Wood passed away on March 19, 1990, and Nevermind came out the following year. But, Mother Love Bone perfectly meshed the hair metal sound with grunge. The band was the precursor to Pearl Jam, featuring Pearl Jam's instrumentalists with Wood's vocals. Wood was a total rock star and fit right into the hair metal aesthetic, while the band's instrumentation was very grunge, so this band would have appealed to Motley Crue and Nirvana fans alike.
Jane's Addiction
Jane's Addiction formed in Los Angeles in 1985, and they had a very Hollywood and even hair metal tint with their presentation, but their music also appealed to grunge fans. The band's debut album, Nothing's Shocking, dropped in 1988, and the singles "Jane Says" and "Mountain Song" were an early look into alternative rock. Jane's Addiction is another band that attracted both metal and grunge fans.
Alice in Chains
If there's one grunge band that even hair metal listeners like, it's likely Alice in Chains. Frontman Layne Staley actually started out as the singer of a Seattle-based glam metal band called Sleze. He brought a hair metal style to Alice in Chains' music, but the rest of the band was totally grunge with their lo-fi and raw sounds.
