Blind Melon

Rip It Up, Issue 203, 1 July 1994, Page 16

Blind Melon

Neil Diamond and Blind Melon guitarist Christopher Thorn don’t have a lot in common. According to Neil “LA’s fine, the sun shines most of the time and the feeling is laidback.” Thorn’s view is a little different, “It’s a pit and it’s disgusting, the air is gross and so are a lot of the people." This didn’t stop Thom from moving permanently to the city of Angels in a bid to escape the monotony of small town life. He shifted from Dover, Pennsylvania, a town not famous for churning out long haired rock stars. “It was a horrible place, very conservative and it was hard to surround yourself with creative people. I felt extremely out of place and like a freak. That’s why I moved to Los Angeles cause there were lots of freaks there and I could fit in a little better." In fact Thorn had a lot of luck running into “freaks.” He hooked up with his-soon-to-be fellow members after a chance meeting at a “ghastly sounding” folk-rock gig. Almost immediately the newly named Blind Melon began to stir up a ruckus — mostly because of lead singer Shannon Hoon’s friendship with Axl Rose and his subsequent appearance in the Guns ‘N’ Roses video ‘Don’t Cry.’ The new band started rehearsing intensely while managing to avoid the Sunset Strip glam scene, and eventually recorded a four-track demo tape that got people jumping. A bidding war broke out between several major US record companies desperate to sign the band, and this allowed Blind Melon to call the

shots on their own terms. “I think all our pot smoking made us very paranoid people, so.we wanted a deal that would treat us right. In the end Capitol Records gave us we what we wanted.” When the timing was right and a deal had been struck Blind Melon holed up in an LA studio to record their debut album. Despite ignoring the label and acquired business commitments the band got nothing done, even a threeweek tour opening for Soundgarden failed to provide inspiration. Eventually they retreated to Durham, North Carolina — exactly the type of small town they chose to flee from in the first place. “The hype around the band was too much, there was so much business stuff in LA that we couldn’t concentrate.” The result of this three month hiatus is Blind Melon, a 70s sytle rock album that has drawn comparisons as diverse as Jane’s Addiction and the Allman Brothers. After the album’s release Blind Melon won many fans the old fashioned way, by playing live and touring constantly, but commercial success only came as a result of the hugely influential music show MTV. The video of the first single ‘No Rain’ featured a chubby young girl tap dancing and dressed in a bumble bee outfit. Exactly the type of quirky image that MTV adore and love to thrash to death. Surely this is the real reason for Blind Melon’s success? “That’s very unfair. We knew ‘No Rain’ was a good song, it felt like a really

good song when we recorded it and we knew people would see that for themselves. It can be pretty silly and stupid as many people equate us with her. We put that image on the album cover and in the video so we’re responsible for it, but we didn’t know that it was going to blow up into this huge, out of hand publicity thing.” So if MTV’s criteria for playing a song is based on an image rather than good music, do you disagree with the whole MTV syndrome? “I don’t know what to say to that ‘cause I’m a part of it. I do think it’s pretty intense and really scary the power that they have. Beavis and Butthead in particular, people are looking at them to see what’s hip and what’s happening. It’s amazing that people can watch two cartoon characters and respect what they say. It’s pretty sick that they’re speaking to such a large audience of our generation.” At the time of our conversation the MTV youth Thorn speaks of had just been rocked by the suicide of Kurt Cobain. Since Thorn calls Seattle home it seems fair to ask him for comment. “It’s still a very heavy thing, and it comes up in conversation all the time. Even if you didn’t know him I think people felt close to him because of the songs he wrote. He’s the first person in our generation who was in a position as important as he was that has died. But I hope people are healing, and realising that that’s not the way to go out. . . but he’ll be a legend won’t he?”

And that folks will be the difference between Nirvana and Blind Melon.

JOHN RUSSELL