Bush

Bush were one of the very first post-grunge bands, as well as one of the movement’s hardest to pin down. Their origin story is straightforward enough: when singer Gavin Rossdale and guitarist Nigel Pulsford founded Bush in 1992, they were a young London act inspired by the booming Seattle scene—Nirvana’s snarling disaffection in particular. American fans embraced them without hesitation, helping to transform Bush’s hook-laden debut, 1994’s Sixteen Stone, into one of the decade’s biggest smashes, with hit singles—“Everything Zen”, “Comedown”, “Glycerine”, “Machinehead”—arriving in rapid-fire succession. But this is where the story gets complicated. Rather than go along with their post-grunge peers, who were soaking up more and more traditional hard-rock moves, Bush unleashed 1996’s Razorblade Suitcase, a surprisingly alienated and challenging album recorded by noise-rock studio ace Steve Albini (who had previously recorded Nirvana, PJ Harvey and the Pixies). The group were intent on distinguishing themselves even further, first with the remix collection Deconstructed (remixes being an idea utterly foreign to post-grunge bands at the time) and then with 1999’s The Science of Things, a record densely layered with electronic textures. With Rossdale looking to explore outside projects, as well as starting a family with then-wife Gwen Stefani, Bush slipped into hiatus for most of the 2000s. They returned (minus Pulsford) in 2011, firing off several more full-lengths, including 2020’s The Kingdom, a chunky and brooding slab of guitar-fried alt-rock that further solidifies Bush’s standing as one of the most popular bands of their generation.