September 22, 1992: L.A.-based rock band Blind Melon releases their debut album. Was it lost in the shuffle of ’92?
The self-titled debut from Blind Melon is an interesting study. It contains the band’s breakthrough hit “No Rain,” a song that is still omnipresent on American radio and numerous streaming platforms. But it was also released in a year–1992–where it was overshadowed not only by albums released in that same year, but albums from the previous year that were still monsters.
Case in point: September 24, 1991 saw the release of three seminal albums in the alternative rock canon. Albums that were still very much top-of-mind a year later when Blind Melon dropped. And no sooner did that debut drop that Stone Temple Pilots debuted with Core and Alice In Chains released their breakthrough sophomore album Dirt. No, seriously. It was a week later. Toss Rage Against The Machine‘s debut album into the mix in November and, well, you can see the problem.
It didn’t help either that “No Rain” didn’t really start to hit until 1993. Thirty years on, we find ourselves talking about all the bands and the albums I’ve listed so far pretty regularly. But no so much with Blind Melon’s Blind Melon. Which is a shame, as it’s a hell of a debut album. Five guys from three states with decidedly differing musical backgrounds, all coming together in Los Angeles to write a record an album that both encapsulates and defines the alt-rock sound of the early ’90s.
Blind Melon Debut Turns 30 (+1)
Maybe “No Rain” is the problem. Maybe the big hit single takes away from the greater body of work. There were three other singles on the album. Let’s revisit them below, and let’s give a good album its due. And think about what might have been if the band had stuck around a little longer.
