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Casting call for the video of Nirvana's Smells Like Teen Spirit

Cory Doctorow at 7:50 am Sat, Feb 11, 2012

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Here's the casting-call poster for Samuel Bayer's video for Nirvana's iconic 1991 anthem, Smells Like Teen Spirit. It asks (unpaid?) extras to be prepared to "adopt a high-school personna (sic), i.e. preppy, punk, nerd, jock..."

Here's a link to the finished product, though it's not working for me at the moment.

Nirvana Video Casting (via How to Be a Retronaut)

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I write books. My latest is a YA science fiction novel called Homeland (it's the sequel to Little Brother). More books: Rapture of the Nerds (a novel, with Charlie Stross); With a Little Help (short stories); and The Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow (novella and nonfic). I speak all over the place and I tweet and tumble, too.

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  • http://mordicai.livejournal.com Mordicai

    Adapt that persona!

    • spacemunky

      That was the working title for Come As You Are (before some heavy revision in the studio)

  • http://twitter.com/markjohnh Mark John Hiemstra

    How does this keep resurfacing every couple of months? 

  • Maverick

    Yes, unpaid! Believe it or not, in 1992 people sometimes would actually work for no pay. Unlike today, of course, when… wait a minute, people still do that.

    • Bernard Dubuisson

      Correct me if I am mistaken but it must have been august 1991. The song hit the charts somewhere between sept. and dec. 91.

  • http://9bytz.com/ 9bytz

    Come on guys, its for Nirvana! Besides supporting this great band that changed rock history, you’ll be immortalized in one of the greatest music video clips ever! I would do that for free on a lazy saturday!

  • nixiebunny

    The company that makes money from the dead rock star Kurt Cobain really doesn’t want us to see his work. 

    Wait, here it is.
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kPQR-OsH0RQ

  • twency

    Smells Like Nirvana

    • V

      The best detail of that video is that Weird Al used the same set and extras (except Dick Van Patten, of course)…

  • jeligula

    It never worked for me in the first place.  Ama mondo, ama blondo, ama shmeel, a big deal, yeah!

    Yeah, I know what the actual lyrics are, but it makes more sense as it sounds.

    • twency

      It’s unintelligible
      I just can’t get it through my skull
      It’s hard to bargle nawdle zouss 
      with all these marbles in my mouth…

  • travtastic

    Too old for a Nirvana video?!?! You can’t measure my angst in years. :(

  • Gorgonaut

    “No clothing with name brand or logos, please!” I’ve often wondered why this is important. I see it all the time on TV, logos taped over, or blurred out. Even if it’s just a cap with a monkey on it. Why is this happening? It’s annoying and it looks weird. Now, if you’ll excuse me,I’ll go make a t-shirt with duct tape printed where a logo would normally be.

    • Ryan_T_H

       It’s a question of copyright and sponsorship. For example, a small production doesn’t want to give the impression that they are being sponsored or supported by someone like Nike or Coke or Disney when it is not the case.

      Also a question of best practices for costumes/set design. Every image that goes on screen should be intentional. No director wants images that have large emotional impacts or associations on screen unless it will support the story. And in our modern society brand names have some of the strongest associations around. A production would never dream of dressing a character up in a brand name without a deliberate reason, and they see no reason to bend that rule just because the extras brought their own clothes.

  • wilberfan

    The Weird Al version is almost identical–but MUCH better!

  • Editz

    Why?  Seriously?  Permission and money.  Company that created/owns the logo on the cap didn’t give you permission to use it in your video (that you intend to make money from) and even if they did, they’d probably want a fee as well.

    There was a court case where Nike animated the arm tattoo of some basketball player it had under contract, but failed to pay the tattoo artist or give him any credit.  Is that fair?

  • jiminnc

    another link that works
    http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x1wcq4_nirvana-smells-like-teen-spirit-1_music

  • anderalert

    That works for me every damn time. I always brag about how I got a letter from a friend that told me about this new band, even sent me a newspaper clipping (yes) describing a live show. So I went out and bought their album, Bleach, on cassette tape. Incredible.

  • http://twitter.com/trempls tré

     I fit the age range, but sadly the dates don’t work too well for me. Which sucks; I love this band.