Blind Melon

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BLIND MELON

Formed: 1989, Los Angeles, California

Members: Shannon Hoon, vocals (born Lafayette, Indiana, 26 September 1967; died New Orleans, Louisiana, 21 October 1995); Roger Stevens, guitar (born West Point, Mississippi, 31 October 1970); Christopher Thorn, guitar (born Dover, Pennsylvania, 16 December 1968); Brad Smith, bass (born West Point, Mississippi, 29 September 1968); Glen Graham, drums (born Columbus, Mississippi, 5 December 1968).

Genre: Rock

Best-selling album since 1990: Blind Melon (1992)

Hit songs since 1990: "No Rain"

By the early 1990s, music videos were a well-established means of creating excitement over and awareness of a group's music. Few bands from that era were as defined by their music videos as Blind Melon of Los Angeles. Though the group's career was cut short by the drug overdose death of vocalist Shannon Hoon in 1995, their time in the spotlight was defined by the hippieish, classic-rock-inspired sound of their signature song and video "No Rain."

Formed in Los Angeles in 1989, Blind Melon looked backward for inspiration for their music. Whereas popular grunge-rock bands such as Nirvana and Soundgarden drew inspiration from the aggressive, harsh punk and post-punk movements of the decade before, and the heavy metal bands of the era focused on trashy, pop-inspired sounds, flashy clothes, and make-up, Blind Melon looked to the earthy southern rock and folk of the 1970s for their motivation.

Built around the whiny falsetto of the Indiana-born singer Shannon Hoon and the Allman Brothers–inspired guitar playing of Roger Stevens and Christopher Thorn, the group caught the attention of Capitol Records thanks to a four-track demo recording dubbed The Goodfoot Workshop, recorded in 1989, just one week after the band had formed. Lacking sufficient material to record a full-length album, Blind Melon set to work on a mini-album with veteran producer David Briggs (Neil Young), but the results were scrapped when the band feared the songs were too polished.

It was through music videos that Blind Melon reached a mass audience. While the group pondered their next move, Hoon rekindled a relationship with fellow Indiana native and Guns N' Roses singer Axl Rose, who invited the long-haired Blind Melon singer to lend backing vocals to a number of tracks on the Guns N' Roses 1991 double album, Use Your Illusion. Hoon sang on and appeared in the video for the hit song "Don't Cry."

With buzz from the Guns N' Roses cameo, but still without an album, the group appeared on the 1992 MTV 120 Minutes Tour in the spring alongside several more established acts, helping to build anticipation for their self-titled debut, which was released in September of that year.

A Landmark Video

Produced by Rick Parashar (Pearl Jam), songs such as "Soak the Sin" explore hard-charging Led Zeppelin–style rock, while the tracks "Change" and "Tones of Home" mix elements of wistful acoustic folk with Hoon's mostly upbeat, nature-inspired lyrics about growing up and searching for meaning in life. With the excitement from the Guns N' Roses cameo and the MTV tour diminished, and their songs not garnering attention on radio or on MTV, the group took to the road. In addition to opening for Guns N' Roses, Blind Melon shot a video for the simple acoustic ballad "No Rain" with director Samuel Bayer, best known for his pioneering direction of videos by Nirvana.

Bayer brought to life the cover image from the group's album: a photo of drummer Graham's sister in a bumblebee costume. The imagery of the video came to define the band. Floated on a sprightly acoustic guitar figure and Hoon's high, cracked vocals, "No Rain" is a simple song about trying to find sanity in an insane world. "All I can say is that my life is pretty plain / I like watching the puddles gather rain / All I can do is just pour some tea for two / And speak my point of view, but it's not sane, it's not sane," Hoon sings. The video, in which the group performed in a vast green field while a chubby, bespectacled girl danced around them in a bee costume, became a smash hit, helping the album sell more than 3 million copies. Despite critical indifference, the group found itself opening for such superstar acts as the Rolling Stones, Pearl Jam, Lenny Kravitz, and Neil Young.

A pair of Grammy nominations for Best New Artist and Best Rock Performance followed, but the group was unable to celebrate its success because of Hoon's increasing drug use, which forced the cancellation of their 1994 headlining tour. They performed a strong set at Woodstock '94 and opened several dates for the Rolling Stones before entering the studio with producer Andy Wallace (Nirvana) in the fall to begin work on their second album. Hoon was arrested for a drunken brawl with an off-duty police officer during the sessions and later entered into a rehab facility upon the album's completion. Hoon's girlfriend gave birth to a daughter one month before the September release of Soup (1995).

The album is much darker than the group's debut, with a harsher, more aggressive sound and lyrics about drug dependency, thoughts of suicide, and soul weariness. The exception is "New Life," in which Hoon practically pleads for the answer to the question, "When I look into the eyes of our own baby / Will it bring new life into me?"

Though Soup was an artistic success, helping to dispel Blind Melon's reputation as a lightweight one-hit wonder, audiences and critics did not respond to the sound and sales foundered. Against the advice of his rehabilitation doctors, Hoon joined the band for a promotional tour, dismissing a drug counselor less than two months into the outing. Several days later, the twenty-eight-year-old Hoon was found dead of a cocaine overdose on the band's tour bus in New Orleans.

An album of unfinished tracks, demos, rarities, and unreleased material, Nico (named after Hoon's daughter), was released in November 1996, accompanied by a home video, Letters from a Porcupine. The remaining members attempted to recruit a new lead singer, but eventually called it quits and split to pursue several side projects.

Though Blind Melon brought a playful, bright edge to the mostly dim, pessimistic rock scene of the early 1990s with "No Rain," the group was torn apart by those same dark forces that felled many of their grunge peers.