Hear Levon Helm Return to Real Rock With "Tennessee Jed"

Electric Dirt with the Dead's "Tennessee Jed," and it's a fitting opener to the legendary Band drummer's first proper rock & roll record in ages, writes Will Hermes in his four-star review. Helm returned from throat cancer with 2007's mostly acoustic Dirt Farmer, and on Electric Dirt — recorded with Larry Campbell and the rest of the band from Helm's Midnight Ramble gigs at his Woodstock, New York, home — Helm is ready to rock. The album hits stores today, and Rolling Stone has "Tennessee Jed" right here:

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Song Stories

“Smells Like Teen Spirit”

Nirvana | 1991

"Smells Like Teen Spirit," named after a brand of deodorant marketed to girls, was Kurt Cobain's attempt to "write the ultimate pop song," he said, using the soft-loud dynamic of his favorite band, the Pixies. Cobain "had that dichotomy of punk rage and alienation," the song’s producer, Butch Vig, told Rolling Stone, "but also this vulnerable pop sensibility. In 'Teen Spirit,' a lot of that vulnerability is in the tone of his voice." Sadly, by the time of Nirvana's last U.S. tour, in late '93, Cobain was tortured by the obligation to play "Teen Spirit" every night. "There are many other songs that I have written that are as good, if not better," he claimed.

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