I think this was the statement he/she was disagreeing with. No doubt a genius, but when you phrase it like that it's more than genius.
When I hear people call Cobain a genius I feel the way I do when I'm hear someone say they've never seen The Wire. Listen to Surfer Rosa and Rid of Me!
None of this is to say Nevermind and In Utero aren't good; they're very, very good, I listen to them all the time 30 years later. But like, I still listen to Soundgarden every once in awhile too. They're not geniuses!
I think of Kurt Cobain like an accidental Elvis Presley. Perfect for the moment, and (unlike Elvis) mostly organically grown, but with very clear antecedents.
I cannot point to strong antecedents of Pixies, Sonic Youth, Throwing Muses, PJ Harvey, Cocteau Twins, Bauhaus, Einstürzende Neubauten, The Slits, Bongwater, Kate Bush, The Cure, etc. In a couple of these cases, I suspect my own ignorance. In others, I could (and might) argue all night! :)
But I cannot assemble a case for not recognizing David Bowie as a (musical|performance) genius. I don't even enjoy his recordings very much, but he was artistically sui generis and enormously influential.
Influence might not be a requirement of genius (I'm not sure), but surely a novel creativity is at the root of it?
Sonic Youth was the Velvets and The Fall; I found a list of setlists from '70s CBGB and made a playlist, and you can hear Sonic Youth all over it.
Throwing Muses (a favorite of mine) a little harder to pinpoint, feels to me like the product of a scene more than a direct evolution of clear antecedents, rather than an act like Dinosaur Jr. was a perversion of Neil Young. A good contrast to Nirvana.
PJ Harvey is the Pixies antecedents plus Patti Smith. People say Beefheart; I don't know Beefheart well enough to say and have a deep suspicion of people who bring up Beefheart.
Kate Bush is prog rock.
Einsturzende is Can (or like a violent response to Can).
The Cure is radio-friendly post-punk; their early stuff, which is the only stuff that comes close to holding up, is basically Wire.
There's no shame in that!
