If there’s one song that captures the spirit of the ‘90s more than any other, then it’s definitely Nirvana’s “Smells Like Teen Spirit.” Many artists have covered the alt rock anthem, but few have done it with the panache that Walk off the Earth managed with their quirky version. The Canadian indie pop band covered the classic tune on kazoos and a comically huge guitar, which was so big it basically became an oversized bass guitar.
The band had more than the big guitar novelty going for them, though, as the four-piece also delivered a brilliant arrangement for “Smells Like Teen Spirit.” They realized that everyone has heard this song so much by this point that if you’re gonna cover it, you gotta shake it up, and they delivered on that 110%. The band played the main riff on kazoos and used every part of the big guitar, with one member playing percussion on it, while three others played the strings in different registers.
Walk off the Earth performed their “Smells Like Teen Spirit” cover live in Toronto recently, and uploaded the performance on YouTube on July 11, 2024. The video quickly caught netizens’ attention, and so far has been viewed 442,000 times. Fans gushed about the performance below the video, adding comments such as “Wow, the energy and musicianship is off the chains. You and Nirvana should be proud” and “This may be one of the best covers of ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit’ ever made. I got the chills!”
There’ve been countless covers of “Smells Like Teen Spirit” over the years, but surely the most famous is “Weird Al” Yankovic’s cover. The comedian’s cover poked fun at Kurt Cobain’s unintelligible lyrics, but unbothered by this, Cobain himself famously green-lit the cover after a phone call with Yankovic. The Music Man readers will definitely want to tune into the guitar solo, which Yankovic performs by gargling a glass of water in one of his greatest moments ever.
Nirvana released “Smells Like Teen Spirit” on September 10, 1991, as the lead single from their second studio album Nevermind. The song went Platinum in the US, and the success of the single helped propel the album to a Diamond certification. The success of “Smells Like Teen Spirit” is noted as the point where grunge entered the mainstream and became a cultural phenomenon, and the song has also been called an “anthem for apathetic kids” of Generation X.
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