Nirvana's Impact On American Culture

Heart-Shaped America

In America, the Rock ‘N Roll movement since the 1950’s has progressed exponentially. In the early 1990’s Nirvana made impact on the culture of America and the American Rock ‘N Roll movement. To effectively show how large this impact was, real life events that were directly affected by Cobain & his counterparts will be exemplified throughout the entirety of this document. Often times, the chosen topics in this report will cross one another, as the impact of each topic does pertain to, or make even more prevalent, the impact of another topic. Similar to “The Domino Effect” as first made popular by President Dwight D. Eisenhower. In this report, I will address the major impact Nirvana’s grunge movement had on American society

Let us take a look at the impact of Cobain’s death from a societal view first. Imagine this...Looking up to someone so saddened by their life, that they take their life into their own hands, by way of suicide, this would certainly take a toll on any common man. Think about the fans Cobain had that were already depressed. So much that, the reason for enjoying his music was the fact that they could relate to the vulgarity and hate they projected. His songs spoke of unrest and hopelessness in life, rape even. Many of Cobain's songs suggested suicide. One song even claims “I hate myself and want to die”. With that in mind you get a better picture of how Cobain’s fans might have taken his subliminal messages personally and killed themselves too. Again, when someone so influential to a group of people comes along, they start to want to be just like their hero. Now let us take a look at the facts. First and foremost, Cobain committed suicide in the spring. In the spring, a significant amount of people suffer from Seasonal Affective Disorder (2). Which means, the cold weather from winter has them feeling hopeless. Once summer comes, they aren’t affected as significantly. Spring brings the rain and even further affects their mentality. In the Winter of 1993 (5 months before Cobain’s death), spring suicide rates made the climb from the 74 a day in December, to 84 a day in April of 1994, after Cobain shot himself. Not a dramatic change but still, significant for that short of a time period (2). Secondly, suicide hotlines were rampant with incoming calls (2). People calling from all over the country to be talked down from the edge...To further explore the impact of Cobain’s grunge movement, it is crucial to include the effect on his lyrics had on crime, on other movements, and the effect his words had on He spoke of