Smells Like Teen Spirit
"Smells Like Teen Spirit" is a song by the American rock band Nirvana. It is the opening track and lead single from the band's second album, Nevermind, released on DGC Records. Having sold over 13 million units worldwide, it is one of the best-selling songs of all time. The success propelled Nevermind to the top of several albums charts and is often marked as the point when grunge entered the mainstream. It was Nirvana's biggest hit, charting high on music industry charts around the world in 1991 and 1992, and was number one on the charts in Belgium, France, New Zealand and Spain.
The guitarist and singer, Kurt Cobain, described "Smells Like Teen Spirit" as an attempt to write "the ultimate pop song", inspired by the soft-and-loud dynamics of the Pixies. The title derives from a phrase written by his friend Kathleen Hanna, the singer of the riot grrrl band Bikini Kill: "Kurt smells like Teen Spirit." Hanna was referencing the deodorant Teen Spirit, but Cobain misinterpreted it as a revolutionary slogan.
The music video depicts a high school pep rally which ends in chaos, inspired by Jonathan Kaplan's 1979 film Over the Edge and the Ramones' film Rock 'n' Roll High School. It won two MTV Video Music Awards, and was in heavy rotation on MTV during the 1990s. Amy Finnerty, formerly of MTV's programming department, said the video "changed the entire look of MTV" by giving the channel "a whole new generation to sell to". In 2000, the Guinness World Records named "Smells Like Teen Spirit" the most played video on MTV Europe.
"Smells Like Teen Spirit" was met with acclaim and described as an "anthem for apathetic kids" of Generation X. It was included in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's list of "The Songs That Shaped Rock and Roll". In 2001, the Recording Industry Association of America ranked it number 80 on their Songs of the Century list. In 2002, NME named it the second-greatest single, and in 2013 Kerrang! ranked it the greatest. In 2021, Rolling Stone ranked "Smells Like Teen Spirit" fifth on its list of the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time. In 2017, it was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame.
Writing and recording
"Smells Like Teen Spirit" was one of several songs written following Nirvana's first recording sessions with producer Butch Vig in 1990. Lead singer and guitarist Kurt Cobain began writing it a few weeks before recording their second album, Nevermind, in 1991. He said it was an attempt to write a song in the style of the Pixies, a band he admired:When Cobain presented the song to his bandmates, it comprised just the main guitar riff and the chorus vocal melody. Cobain said the riff was "clichéd", similar to a riff by Boston or the Richard Berry song "Louie Louie". Bassist Krist Novoselic dismissed it as "ridiculous"; in response, Cobain made the band play it for an hour and a half. Eventually, Novoselic began playing it more slowly, inspiring drummer Dave Grohl to create the drum beat, which drew from disco artists such as the Gap Band. As a result, it is the only song on Nevermind to credit all three band members as writers.
The title derives from a phrase coined by Cobain's friend Kathleen Hanna, singer of the riot grrrl band Bikini Kill: "Kurt smells like Teen Spirit." Hanna and Tobi Vail, Cobain's then-girlfriend, had been at a grocery store earlier in the day, discovered Teen Spirit deodorant, thought the name was funny and joked that various things "smelled like Teen Spirit". Later on, Hanna wrote the phrase in sharpie on Cobain's wall. Cobain said that he was unaware of the deodorant until months after the single was released, and had interpreted it as a revolutionary slogan, as they had been discussing anarchism and punk rock.
Prior to the album recording, the band sent Vig demos for songs including "Teen Spirit". While the sound was distorted due to the band playing at a high volume, Vig felt it had promise. Vig and the band recorded "Smells Like Teen Spirit" at Sound City Studios in the Los Angeles, California neighborhood of Van Nuys in May1991. Vig suggested changes to the arrangement, including moving a guitar ad lib to the chorus and shortening the chorus. The band recorded the basic track in three takes, and used the second take. Vig corrected some timing errors created by Cobain switching between his guitar effects pedals. Cobain recorded only three vocal takes; according to Vig, "I was lucky to ever get Kurt to do four takes."
Music
"Smells Like Teen Spirit" is a grunge and alternative rock song. It was recorded in the original key of F minor and follows a F5-B5-A5-D5 chord progression, with the main guitar riff constructed from four power chords played in a syncopated sixteenth note strum by Cobain. The guitar chords were double tracked to create a "more powerful" sound. The chords occasionally lapse into suspended chord voicings as a result of Cobain playing the bottom four strings of the guitar for the thickness of sound. The riff resembles that of Boston's 1976 hit "More Than a Feeling", although it is not identical; the band would sometimes play a fragment of that song as an introduction. During the verses, Cobain used a Small Clone effect pedal to add a chorus effect."Smells Like Teen Spirit" uses a "somewhat conventional formal structure" consisting of four-, eight-, and twelve-bar sections, including an eight-bar verse, an eight-bar pre-chorus, a twelve-bar chorus and a post-chorus. Musicologist Graeme Downes, who led the band the Verlaines, says that "Smells Like Teen Spirit" illustrates developing variation. Elements of the structure are marked with shifts in volume and dynamics, moving from quiet to loud several times. This structure of "quiet verses with wobbly, chorused guitar, followed by big, loud hardcore-inspired choruses" became an alternative rock template.
During the verses, the band maintains the same chord progression as the chorus. Cobain plays a two-note guitar line over Novoselic's root-note eighth note bassline, which outlines the chord progression. In the pre-chorus, Cobain begins to play the same two notes on every beat of the measure and repeats the word "Hello". In the post-chorus, Cobain simultaneously sings the word "Yay" and performs a unison bend on his guitar. After the second chorus, Cobain plays a 16-bar guitar solo restating his vocal melody from the verse and pre-chorus. During the outro, Cobain sings "A denial" repeatedly; his voice becomes strained from the force of yelling.
Lyrics and interpretation
The lyrics to "Smells Like Teen Spirit" were often difficult for listeners to decipher, both due to their nonsensicality and because of Cobain's slurred, guttural singing voice. This problem was compounded by the fact that the Nevermind album liner notes did not include any lyrics for the songs aside from selected lyrical fragments. This incomprehensibility contributed to the early resistance from radio stations towards adding the song to their playlists; one Geffen promoter recalled that people from rock radio told her, "We can't play this. I can't understand what the guy is saying." MTV went as far as to prepare a version of the video that included the lyrics running across the bottom of the screen, which they aired when the video was added to their heavy rotation schedule. The lyrics for the album—and some from earlier or alternate versions of the songs—were later released with the liner notes of the "Lithium" single in 1992. American rock critic Dave Marsh noted comments by disc jockeys of the time that the song was "the 'Louie Louie' of the nineties" and wrote, "Like 'Louie', only more so, 'Teen Spirit' reveals its secrets reluctantly and then often incoherently." Marsh, trying to decipher the lyrics, felt after reading the correct lyrics from the song's sheet music that "what I imagined was quite a bit better than what Nirvana actually sang", and added, "Worst of all, I'm not sure that I know more about 'Smells Like Teen Spirit' now than before I plunked down for the official version of the facts."The book Teen Spirit: The Stories Behind Every Nirvana Song describes "Teen Spirit" as "a typically murky Cobain exploration of meaning and meaninglessness". Azerrad plays upon the juxtaposition of Cobain's contradictory lyrics and states "the point that emerges isn't just the conflict of two opposing ideas, but the confusion and anger that the conflict produces in the narrator—he's angry that he's confused". Azerrad's conclusion is that the song is "alternately a sarcastic reaction to the idea of actually having a revolution, yet it also embraces the idea". Additionally, the "famously obscure couplet" in the chorus—"A mulatto, an albino / A mosquito, my libido"—is, according to Azerrad, "nothing more than two pairs of opposites, a funny way of saying the narrator is very horny". In Heavier Than Heaven, Charles R. Cross' biography of Cobain, Cross argues that the song is a reference to Cobain's relationship with ex-girlfriend Tobi Vail. Cross cites the line "She's over-bored and self-assured" and states the song "could not have been about anyone else". Cross backs up his argument with lyrics which were present in earlier drafts, such as "Who will be the King & Queen of the outcasted teens".
"Teen Spirit" is widely interpreted as a teen revolution anthem, an interpretation reinforced by the music video. In an interview conducted the day Nevermind was released, Cobain stated the song was about his friends, explaining, "We still feel as if we're teenagers because we don't follow the guidelines of what's expected of us to be adults... It also has kind of a teen revolutionary theme." In Michael Azerrad's biography Come as You Are: The Story of Nirvana, Cobain said he felt a duty "to describe what I felt about my surroundings and my generation and people my age". He also said, "The entire song is made up of contradictory ideas... It's just making fun of the thought of having a revolution. But it's a nice thought." As Cobain did more interviews, he changed his explanation of the song and rarely gave specifics about the meaning. Grohl stated he does not believe the song has any message, and said, "Just seeing Kurt write the lyrics to a song five minutes before he first sings them, you just kind of find it a little bit hard to believe that the song has a lot to say about something. You need syllables to fill up this space or you need something that rhymes."