Take our ink-stained hands and join us at the OldStand, where Jon McMillan goes to remind everyone what an honest-to-goodness music magazine is supposed to look like.
Okay, I’ll admit it: I fell for the cover trick. It’s Kerrang!, right? Of course their list of “100 Coolest Rock Stars” is stupid and subjective and laughably packed with bands whose long-forgotten names elicit cringes of embarrassment among the people who admit to having spent $15.99 on a Limp Bizkit album back in the day. Don’t be so hard on yourself, man: you were thirteen.
But despite the fact that Kerrang! was engineered in a lab to resist careful scrutiny and common sense in equal measure, it’s an easy magazine to like. There’s an insider-only, cultish vibe that seems to reflect those arbitrary passions of youth; the way a band like Coal Chamber (Coal Chamber? Seriously?) can dominate the imagination to the extent that three of its members end up in the top 100. Unless the list is meant to be read as “100 Coolest Rock Stars We Can Think Of Off the Top Of Our Heads,” in which case I’ll stand down.
Warning: You will get worked up for absolutely no reason. And yes, I’m saving the good stuff for after the jump (hint: #1 is…somewhere on the cover). It’s true, however, that Kerrang!‘s independence day special sets up nicely for nostalgists (namely: Scott and me and you, if you’ve made it this far). It’s a perfect time capsule of the post-grunge, pre-nu-metal scene in 1998, which is to say: muddled and unfortunate-in-retrospect. A few goth-y, industrial types; a few electronica stars; some nods to old-school heavy metal gods, and a few ska/punk/skacore dudes to keep things well-rounded. To paraphrase Spinal Tap: “Nobody knew … who they were … or … what they were doing.”
Okay, I can’t resist. Here’s a taste:
28. Mark McGrath
Sugar RayRare indeed is the man who can admit to shitting himself onstage and setting fire to his own pubic hair, and still possess the ability to charm the knickers off a nun. Motormouth vocalist Mark McGrath is such a man. It helps that the guy is sex on a stick, has the most wicked sense of humor in rock and has solc a couple of million albums — but y’know, it’s not right, is it?
For reference, Lemmy from Motorhead is at #71. I take back what I said — Kerrang! is the best.
The rest of the magazine is filled with breathless hype, “news” of dubious provenance, and a thorough set of live reviews. Rocket From the Crypt’s RFTC gets five K’s, which I can only assume is good, and Courtney Love goes off on Billy Corgan. (Also, by popular demand: Click the pictures and, where possible, they will grow!)
How to lose instant credibility: put Kim Gordon five spots behind the chick from Whale.
Although she is kinda slobo humping.
Another good list trick: bury the real list in the mid 40s.
I know, I know: it’s ridiculous.
The top 5: 5. Shirley Manson (Garbage); 4. Jonathan Davis (Korn); 3. Liam Howlett (Prodigy); 2. Kurt Cobain (Nirvana).
I love that Courtney went after Billy in a letter to the “American magazine USA Today.”
Can somebody please translate this letter into the Queen’s English?
Does anybody else find it odd that Lars Ulrich’s pregnant wife gets a callout here?
Notice that Green Day’s Dookie is still hanging around at #26 — a full four years after it was released.
Lowest tech blog comments section ever.
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TR at #1. Still holds true today.
How did I not know that Moby was GNR’s producer on something?
“fleet-fingered fluidity”….. oh my god, please kill me now
i want to leave a comment that uses both ‘monster stylin’ and ‘bowel-loosening’ together, but it’s surprisingly difficult.
I love how Bryan Adams has not one, but two albums on the Top 40 list. I had no idea he had an Unplugged album. Damn you Nirvana for stealing all the thunder to keep this precious gem out of our sight.
Is it too late to try and add Jared Leto to the list? He’s pretty dark.
It’s sad that those are Kerrang’s glory days. Or maybe I’m just being overly nostalgic for my youth.
Oh well, Trent Reznor at number one isn’t so bad. it could have been someone much more embarrassing. Like Marilyn Manson.
heavily pregnant, ahaha
Think of the hard rockers who read that top 40 and pumped their fist to the placings of Slayer, Primus and Cradle of Filth only to screen down towards the bottom and see those two albums by “Everything I Do, I Do It For You” Bryan Adams. The readers of that mag must’ve been die hard nostalgic over “Summer of ’69″.
Easy to look back and laugh, but seriously, there are some pretty cool names on the list. Reznor is still relevant 10 years later so they must have know something.
Just because Reznor is still around doesn’t mean he’s relevant.
was john homme really built like a brick shithouse back in the day? too much pie and beer since then, methinks.
you mean josh, right idiot?
“Ace!” -that’s the best. I’m gonna have to start using that in place of “great!’, “cool!”, “excellent!”, etc…
No the fact that he’s still around doesn’t make TR still relevant, headlining Lolla and some other big festival gigs, getting 4 star reviews in RS, getting lots of songs into the top ten rock charts, working on a teevee show w/ Laurence Bender producing, these make you still relevant. Oh yeah, the breaking of the record industry mold too.
lol, getting a 4-star review in Rolling Stone makes you relevant? That’s barely above getting 5-mics from the Source. The measure of an artists relevancy should be determined by the artists they inspire. And in that case, Trent Reznor has no relevancy. Orgy? Marilyn Manson! Papa Roach?! Yeah, no. (And those were the best examples I could give.) He wouldn’t be number one today, but when this list was made Richard D. James should have been first. Just ask Trent. He made a career from ripping him off.
um… no. Trent Reznor has borrowed from a lot of artists, Aphex Twin among them. But you can’t really think that he’s made his whole career on ripping off ambient electronica. That would be a really stupid view of his work, considering how little ambient electronica TR has actually produced.
Have you actually listened to Nine Inch Nails? Or are you just attacking the music based on your snobbish principles alone?
I listened to NIN throughout my teens. And you’d be remiss if you limited Richard D. James (notice I never said Aphex Twin) to just “ambient electronica.” The guy made all kinds of electronic music in the ’90s.
Say Anything’s most recent record has a surprising amount of NIN influence. It’s a good fit.
Planet Rock? Ace!
ohmygod. why does trent reznor look like he just walked off a skit from mr. show with bob and david?!?? (guess who’s playing reznor)