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Urge Overkill

Band formed in 1985 in Chicago, IL

Urge Overkill's Genre:

Alternative Pop/Rock, Alternative/Indie Rock, Hard Rock, Rock & Roll

Biography

Few bands ever lusted after rock stardom quite as blatantly as Chicago's Urge Overkill. Although they draped their quest for stardom in a cloak of ironic detachment, it's quite clear the trio members expected that if they acted like stars, they would become stars. For a while, their stylish, retro-'70s outfits, matching medallions, and heavy Cheap Trick homages earned the group a popular following in alternative rock circles. The SuperSonic Storybook and the Stull EP were both underground hits in the early '90s, before alternative rock became big business. Once alternative rock entered the big leagues, it seemed likely that Urge Overkill, with their exceptionally accessible combination of arena rock, power pop, and underground punk, would follow Nirvana to the top of the charts, but mainstream America never quite understood their ironic outlook, embracing the group only after their cover of Neil Diamond's "Girl, You'll Be a Woman Soon" was used in a key scene in Pulp Fiction. Instead of breaking down the doors to stardom, the song proved to be a breaking point. Exit the Dragon, the first album released after the hit single, was a bomb, receiving little radio or MTV support, and the bandmembers soon fell prey to their widely documented excesses.

Of course, Urge Overkill were always unlikely candidates for rock stardom. The group's core members, Nash Kato (b. Nathan Katruud; occasionally billed as National Kato) and Eddie "King" Roeser, were Midwest suburbanites who met at college in Chicago. Taking their name from a Parliament song, the duo formed Urge Overkill in 1985 with drummer Jack Watt (billed as "the Jaguar") and recorded their debut EP, Strange, I... with Kato's roommate Steve Albini the following year. Neither Strange, I... nor its full-length follow-up, the Albini-produced Jesus Urge Superstar, gained much attention, primarily because the group was attempting to replicate the noise rock aesthetic of so many other Chicago-based acts on Touch & Go Records. However, the Butch Vig-produced Americruiser (1990) featured an improved sound and sense of style, highlighted on the near-college hit "Ticket to LA."

Drummer Blackie Onassis (b. Johnny Rowan) was added to the band prior to the recording of its third album. With Onassis in the band, Urge Overkill landed on their Stonesy fusion of arena rock and punk, as well as their idea to act like stars. The new Urge Overkill were debuted on 1991's The SuperSonic Storybook, which became an underground hit thanks to strong reviews and a slot opening for Nirvana on the American Nevermind tour. Urge hired Kramer to produce the 1992 Stull EP, which featured both "Girl, You'll Be a Woman Soon" and "Goodbye to Guyville," a kiss-off to the Chicago indie rock scene the band had alienated; Liz Phair would later borrow the term for her acclaimed debut album, Exile in Guyville.

Urge Overkill signed to DGC Records in 1992, although they were still contracted to record another album for Touch & Go. Their jump to the majors angered the whole label, particularly their former producer Albini, who publicly attacked the band in several interviews. Still, the band's 1993 major-label debut, Saturation, was greeted with strong reviews upon its summer release. Produced by the Butcher Brothers (Cypress Hill), the album sounded like a sure-fire alternative crossover hit, but only "Sister Havana" earned much airplay. Furthermore, the band began to alienate certain members of the alternative rock community with its constant preening, and a few anti-Urge campaigns were launched in the American indie rock underground.

As the band was preparing to record its follow-up to Saturation, Quentin Tarantino picked the group's cover of "Girl, You'll Be a Woman Soon" for the soundtrack to his unexpected hit Pulp Fiction. On the strength of the movie's success, the song became a hit, seemingly setting the stage for a breakthrough success with 1995's Exit the Dragon. But the success never happened. Scheduled for early summer of 1995, the album didn't appear until the fall, when it was greeted with mixed reviews. The lead single from the album, "The Break," was rather uncommercial, and received little airplay. The group began a tour that fall but it quickly turned disastrous, with opening act Guided by Voices being kicked off amidst much controversy just a few weeks in. A few weeks later, the remaining concerts were canceled altogether and never rescheduled. Toward the end of the year, Blackie Onassis was picked up for heroin possession. No charges were pressed and the incident was kept quiet, but the album was already pronounced dead in the water by the media and DGC.

Urge Overkill spent 1996 in seclusion as they attempted to regroup. By the end of the year, tensions between Nash Kato and Eddie "King" Roeser had escalated, resulting in Roeser's departure from the band. Kato and Onassis continued on as a duo, leaving DGC for 550 Music in early 1997. As the band was preparing its first album for 550 Music, Roeser was replaced with guitarist Nils St. Cyr. However, unhappy with the results, the label soon dropped them, upon which point Urge Overkill disbanded. Nash Kato released his solo debut, Debutante, in early 2000.

The band, this time minus Onassis, reunited for a worldwide tour in 2004 and played the occasional festival or one-off show afterwards. In 2010 the band got serious and hit the recording studio with a renewed sense of purpose. In May of 2011, the new version of Urge, which included Kato and Roeser along with ex-Polvo drummer Bonn Quast and ex-Gaza Strippers bassist Mike "Hadji" Hodgkiss, released its first collection of new studio material in 16 years, Rock & Roll Submarine. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine

AOL Radio Stations Urge Overkill is Featured on (5)

Grunge: 20 Years Later

August and September 2011 mark 20 years since the release of Pearl Jam's Ten and Nirvana’s seminal album Nevermind, two records that forever changed the course of music history. Slacker DJ Marco Collins- who worked at legendary Seattle radio station "107.7 The End" during the Grunge explosion- is your host on this station. You'll hear the bands that influenced the Grunge movement, the artists that were right in the middle of it, and the bands that followed. You''ll also hear exclusive interview content from Marco Collins' archive with artists like Chris Cornell, Courtney Love, and Mike McCready. Grunge: 20 Years later on Slacker Radio is a conclusive look at a local movement that changed rock music forever.

'90s Alternative

90's Alternative on Slacker Radio highlights one of the most profound decades of Alternative Music. You'll hear the powerhouse artists of the Seattle grunge movement including Nirvana, Pearl Jam, Alice In Chains, Soundgarden and the Screaming Trees. You'll also get a heaping helping of non-Northwest classics like Stone Temple Pilots, The Smashing Pumpkins and Sublime as well as recalling the Punk resurgence with classics like Green Day's "Dookie" or the Offspring's "Smash" and the offbeat sounds of The Flaming Lips, Beck and Cake.

Soft Rock

Soft Rock on Slacker is a true rock station that showcases the lighter, more contemplative side of the biggest names in rock-n-roll. No sappy love ballads or lame pop songs here...just great soft rock from Coldplay, U2, Bruce Springsteen, John Mayer, Snow Patrol, Dave Matthews Band, Train, and more!

The Current

The Current brings you the best authentic new music alongside the music that inspired it, from unique to universal, indie to influential, new to nostalgic. Broadcasting from the musical hotbed that is Minnesota, listen to The Current and you’ll see why we say, “Great Music Lives Here.” Find playlist, interviews and more at thecurrent.org.

Urge Overkill

This station plays the best music from and music from related artists like Screaming Trees, Hole, The Smashing Pumpkins, Veruca Salt, Soul Asylum, Stone Temple Pilots, Jane's Addiction, Soundgarden, Nirvana, Cracker and more.

All Stations

Urge Overkill's Selected Discography (11)

All Albums

Artists Related to Urge Overkill (50)

	Screaming Trees	Where many of their Seattle-based contemporaries dealt in reconstructed Black Sabbath and Stooges riffs, Screaming Trees fused '60s psychedelia and garage rock with '70s hard rock and '80s punk.
	Hole	Throughout Hole's career, vocalist/guitarist Courtney Love's notorious public image has overshadowed her band's music.
	The Smashing Pumpkins	Of all the major alternative rock bands of the early '90s, Smashing Pumpkins were the group least influenced by traditional underground rock.
	Veruca Salt	Veruca Salt reshaped the jagged, abrasive punk-pop of the Pixies and Breeders into a more accessible, riff-driven power pop formula that also borrowed from pop/hard rockers like Cheap Trick.
	Soul Asylum	Few bands have had a more complicated relationship with commercial success than Soul Asylum. In the 1980s, they lurked in the shadows of the Minneapolis alternative rock scene, then dominated by the Replacements and Hüsker Dü, and their first tenure on a major label ended with the band being unceremoniously dropped after their expected commercial breakthrough was both a critical and a sales disappointment.
	Stone Temple Pilots	Stone Temple Pilots were able to turn alternative rock into stadium rock; naturally, they became the most critically despised band of their era.
	Jane's Addiction	Jane's Addiction were one of the most hotly pursued rock bands when they gained notice in Los Angeles in the mid-'80s, with record companies at their feet.
	Soundgarden	Soundgarden made a place for heavy metal in alternative rock. Their fellow Seattle rockers Green River may have spearheaded the grunge sound, but they relied on noise rock in the vein of the Stooges.
	Nirvana	Prior to Nirvana, alternative music was consigned to specialty sections of record stores, and major labels considered it to be, at the very most, a tax write-off.
	Cracker	During Cracker's heyday in the 1990s, the Virginia-based band molded elements of alternative pop/rock and country into several irreverent, buzzworthy anthems.
	Pearl Jam	Pearl Jam rose from the ashes of Mother Love Bone to become the most popular American rock & roll band of the '90s.
	Porno for Pyros	Perry Farrell's post-Jane's Addiction band, Porno for Pyros, followed the same path as his previous band, combining art rock, punk, heavy metal, and funk into one shrieking whole.
	Temple of the Dog	Temple of the Dog was a one-album project conceived in 1990. The purpose of Temple of the Dog was to pay tribute to the late Andrew Wood, the lead singer of Mother Love Bone, who died of a heroin overdose in 1990.
	Sponge	Sponge was one of the more underrated groups in the post-grunge boom of the mid-'90s. When they were on top of their game -- as evidenced by the hits "Plowed" and "Molly (Sixteen Candles)" -- the band's songs had a knack for jangly riffs and catchy, anthemic hard rock hooks, despite being wrapped in the fuzzy guitars and brooding seriousness that typified grunge music.
	Meat Puppets	Out of all of the bands that made SST Records a towering force in the American underground during the mid-'80s, Meat Puppets lasted the longest, surviving where other bands fell apart.
	Dinosaur Jr.	Dinosaur Jr. were largely responsible for returning lead guitar to indie rock and, along with their peers the Pixies, they injected late-'80s alternative rock with monumental levels of pure guitar noise.
	The Breeders	One of alternative rock's most promising -- and frustrating -- bands, the Breeders were conceived initially as a way for Pixies bassist Kim Deal and Throwing Muses guitarist Tanya Donelly to let out some suppressed creative energy and to take a break from being the second bananas in each of their main bands.
	Blind Melon	Whereas most up-and-coming alternative bands of the early '90s borrowed from the leaders of the pack (Nirvana, Soundgarden, Nine Inch Nails, etc.
	L7	Although often lumped in with the "Seattle Movement" of the early '90s (due to their sound, look, and attitude), the all-female punk band L7 hailed originally from Los Angeles.
	Alice In Chains	In many ways, Alice in Chains was the definitive heavy metal band of the early '90s. Drawing equally from the heavy riffing of post-Van Halen metal and the gloomy strains of post-punk, the band developed a bleak, nihilistic sound that balanced grinding hard rock with subtly textured acoustic numbers.
	Toadies	Best known as the creators of the 1995 grunge staple "Possum Kingdom," the Toadies formed in 1989 and spent their infancy playing shows in Fort Worth, TX.
	Mudhoney	Nirvana may have been the band that put an entire generation in flannel, and Pearl Jam and Soundgarden both sold a lot more records, but Mudhoney were truly the band that made the '90s grunge rock movement possible.
	Presidents of the United States of America	The Presidents of the United States of America were one of the most unlikely success stories of the post-grunge alternative rock scene in Seattle.
	The Lemonheads	The Lemonheads' evolution from post-Hüsker Dü hardcore punk rockers to teenage heartthrobs is one of the strangest sagas in alternative music.
	Mother Love Bone	Before Pearl Jam, there was Mother Love Bone. Future Pearl Jam members Stone Gossard (guitar) and Jeff Ament (bass) were founders of this Seattle-based glam/punk outfit, which was fronted by flamboyant singer Andrew Wood.
	Silverchair	Silverchair quickly rose to international stardom in 1995 by mining a mix of Nirvana and Pearl Jam on their debut album, Frogstomp.
	Tripping Daisy	Pleasantly inspired by the Beatles' psychedelic period as well as the more heavy riffers of the 1970s, alternative popsters Tripping Daisy came together in Dallas in 1991.
	Better Than Ezra	Along with such similarly styled outfits as the Goo Goo Dolls, the New Orleans-based trio Better Than Ezra helped open the floodgates for countless alt-pop acts of the late '90s (including Semisonic, Matchbox Twenty, and Third Eye Blind) by merging college rock influences with mainstream aspirations.
	Foo Fighters	When Foo Fighters released a debut album written and recorded entirely by leader Dave Grohl -- at that point known only as the powerhouse drummer for Nirvana -- in the summer of 1995, few would have guessed that the group would wind up as the one band to survive the '90s alt-rock explosion unscathed.
	Live	Live rose to success on the strength of its anthemic music and idealistic, overtly spiritual songwriting, two hallmarks that earned the group frequent comparisons to U2.
	Local H	Best known for their unorthodox two-man lineup, hard rock act Local H have made a career out of straddling the fine line between indie and classic rock, cleverly framing their sardonic lyrics with a generous helping of power chords and feedback.
	Candlebox	Candlebox rode the grunge bandwagon to multi-platinum success in the early '90s, despite howls of protest from the Seattle faithful who considered their music a watered-down version of the genuine article.
	Mad Season	Quite a few side projects containing members of renowned Seattle-based rock bands appeared through the '90s.
	Our Lady Peace	Our Lady Peace was one of the most successful Canadian bands of the post-grunge era, issuing platinum-selling album after platinum-selling album while also enjoying modest acclaim in America.
	Butthole Surfers	Arguably the most infamously named band in the annals of popular music -- for years, radio found their moniker unspeakable, and the press deemed it unprintable -- Butthole Surfers long reigned among the most twisted and depraved acts ever to bubble up from the American underground.
	Everclear	Though Everclear's Northwestern grunge-punk style was hardly revolutionary when the band rose to popularity in 1995, the trio's hook-ridden songs and Art Alexakis' "us against them" lyrics were taken to heart by bored Gen-X teens.
	Garbage	Garbage built on the sonic landscapes of My Bloody Valentine, Curve, and Sonic Youth, adding a distinct sense of accessible pop songcraft.
	Weezer	As one of the most popular groups to emerge in the post-grunge alternative rock aftermath, Weezer received equal amounts of criticism and praise for their hook-heavy guitar pop.
	Chris Cornell	Originally finding success as the frontman of Seattle's Soundgarden, rock vocalist Chris Cornell forged a successful career after the band's 1997 demise, both with the supergroup Audioslave and as a diverse solo artist.
	Cake	Best-known for their ubiquitous hit "The Distance," Cake epitomized the postmodern, irony-drenched aesthetic of '90s geek rock.
	Bush	Led by guitarist/vocalist Gavin Rossdale, Bush became the first post-Nirvana British band to hit it big in America.
	Collective Soul	When Seattle grunge went mainstream, it was only a matter of time before the ripple effect was felt in regions other than the Pacific Northwest.
	Sonic Youth	Sonic Youth were one of the most unlikely success stories of underground American rock in the '80s. Where contemporaries R.
	Beck	Initially pegged as something as a voice of a generation when “Loser” turned into a smash crossover success, Beck did wind up crystallizing much of the post-modern ruckus of the ‘90s alternative explosion, but in unexpected ways.
	The Verve Pipe	Primarily known for their post-grunge blockbuster hit "The Freshmen," the Verve Pipe formed in 1992 in Lansing, Michigan, where frontman Brian Vander Ark pieced his group together from the ashes of two local bands.
	R.E.M.	R.E.M. marked the point when post-punk turned into alternative rock. When their first single, "Radio Free Europe," was released in 1981, it sparked a back-to-the-garage movement in the American underground.
	Faith No More	With their fusion of heavy metal, funk, hip-hop, and progressive rock, Faith No More has earned a substantial cult following.
	Pixies	Combining jagged, roaring guitars and stop-start dynamics with melodic pop hooks, intertwining male-female harmonies and evocative, cryptic lyrics, the Pixies were one of the most influential American alternative rock bands of the late '80s.
	Oasis	Oasis shot from obscurity to stardom in 1994, becoming one of Britain's most popular and critically acclaimed bands of the decade in the process.
	Marcy Playground	Although the members of Marcy Playground met in New York City during the mid-'90s, both singer/guitarist John Wozniak and bassist Dylan Keefe originally hailed from Minneapolis, and drummer Dan Rieser grew up in Ohio.