Dave Grohl Says Nirvana’s ‘Teen Spirit’ isn’t a Great Single

Dave Grohl recalled the experience of breaking into the big time with Nirvana when there 1991 track “Smells Like Teen Spirit” became a hit.

But he revealed he’d never thought of it as the standout moment on second album Nevermind, and added that, in his view, the band had written better songs.

The Foo Fighters leader said Nirvana only saw the effects of the single when they arrived at venues to play shows. Other than that, he told Mojo in a recent interview, it felt like business as usual.

“I didn’t really think much of ‘Teen Spirit’ at first,” he said. “I thought it was just another one of the jams that we were doing… But ‘Teen Spirit’ was one we kept coming back to because the simple guitar lines were so memorable.”

He continued: “We played a show in Seattle to get gas money to go down to Los Angeles to record the record. We set it up at the last minute; it was an afternoon gig and we played that song for the first time, and the audience went nuts. I don’t know if it was the rhythm or the melody, but people got caught on it pretty quick.

“I thought ‘In Bloom’ was going to be the smash hit off the record, or ‘Lithium.’ I thought ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit ‘was just another album cut… it soon became pretty clear that it would be the special song on the record. But, of course, at that point we didn’t think anything was going to happen with the record.”

Grohl said that, for the most part, Nirvana remained “in our little bubble” even while the “Teen Spirit” video gained significant airplay. “[W]e were in our van, the three of us, Krist’s wife Shelli, our monitor guy Miles, and Monty Lee Wilkes, our tour manager,” he said.

“And it didn’t seem like anything unusual was happening until we’d get to the gig and it was f––g chaos. And we started to notice there were normal people here – ‘What are they doing here? That guy looks like a jock, what the f––k is he doing here?’ And it was like, ‘Oh, maybe that video thing is attracting some riff-raff!’

Watch Nirvana’s ’Teen Spirit’ Video

Dave Grohl on What Made ‘Teen Spirit’ Such a Big Hit

“The only indication that our world was turning upside down would be when you’d get to the venue. Then it would be, ‘Holy s––t, these people are nuts!’”

He maintained the video had been a significant part of the single’s success. “People heard the song on the radio and they thought, ‘This is great,’ but when kids saw the video on MTV they thought, ‘This is cool. These guys are kinda ugly and they’re tearing up their f––g high school!’”

He added: “But do I think it’s the greatest single of all time? Of course not! I don’t even think it’s the greatest Nirvana single. And compared to ‘Revolution’ by the Beatles or ‘God Only Knows by the Beach Boys’…

“‘Smells Like Teen Spirit’ was a great moment in time. But there’s better.”