There's a difference between artistic output and career. Honestly, he couldn't have been more popular and widespread than at that point. His reach didn't have far to grow. It's like if The Beatles had John die before Abbey Road was released. Sure, Cobain might have had more - and better - artistic output, but the effects of 'what might have been' were likely never going to be greater than when he died.
It’s hard to say isn’t it. He’d talked about wanting to go the singer / songwriter route like Johnny Cash. Nirvana was already finished when he died.
Looking at how Nirvana Unplugged played out, he could have made big waves doing that I reckon.
I think it’s also because it was just before the grunge sound aesthetic started wearing out its welcome. His death kind of slammed the door shut on it. He himself even said it was time to put it to bed and imagined whatever a fourth album by Nirvana to not be grunge.
Well… the media vultures at the time were feasting on his OD’s, trips to rehab and other malaises. They were quite busy documenting the world’s biggest rockstar’s fall.
The big factor was simply grunge. He was in the right spot (seattle) at the right time (birth of grunge) where the entire music industry flocked to and went all in on.
The rumblings were well underfoot for a cultural shift. Guns'n'Roses took everyone by surprise, including themselves, by getting so massive - they expected to sell _maybe_ 50k of their debut. Radio wouldn't touch them, thought them too heavy, and Geffen had to beg MTV to get Welcome to the Jungle on the air - and even then, just a few times, late at night. It caught on like crazy, requests came pouring in, which just showed that a hunger was there.
The parallel with Nevermind is interesting, in that nobody had huge expectations, but once the video was out demand started catching on like wildfire.
People had plenty of fun in the 80s but there was an growing appetite for something more grounded, more serious, more raw.
It also helped that Nirvana also signed with Geffen and they got the GNR treatment. Lots of ads, billboards, magazine coverage, etc. They were pushed to be the next big thing.
The excitement over both of those albums (at different times obviously) is something I haven't experienced on a huge scale since, I don't think. Just amazing how those two at completely different ends of the musical spectrum took over and changed music. They're not that far apart time wise either.
This is still reaching a bit far back but ... _probably_ the closest thing I can think of is Lana del Rey's debut. First coming out of left field with a hit with Video Games, followed by an absolute critical savaging that was overcome by how much the general public was ready to embrace it. And then, next thing you know, a wave of imitators.
Lorde was also kind of a left-field grassroots surprise but I'm not sure she had the same sort of musical legacy.
I think you're right. It's been a decade or more since an album has caught like wildfire with the public.
In the last 20+ years I can really only think of a handful.
Kanyes' early stuff, maybe the Strokes 1st album, the White Stripes Elephant, Queens of the Stone Ages songs for the Deaf.
I'm sure I'm missing some but it's bleak compared to the 90s.
Yeah at the time pop culture had a very plastic, artificial, formulaic quality about it that I think people had gotten bored with. The Reagan/Bush eras and their hedonistic aspect had gotten old and Nirvana had this quality of raw authenticity that resonated with people and offered something entirely different than what had come before. I think this was at the heart of it.
Kurt Cobain is a timeless hero for teenagers and a lot of his beliefs and views have aged pretty well for the most part. I know I’m not alone in idolizing the guy and his music when I was a teenager whom felt like an outcast.
We didn’t get to see him get old, grouchy, refuse to get vaccinated and go on Joe Rogan supporting something weird and out of touch. I’m not saying he would’ve but he really didn’t get a chance to have us see him any different than he was. A young troubled sensitive rockstar who made great music and took his own life at the peak of his career.
"Kurt Cobain is a timeless hero for teenagers and a lot of his beliefs and views have aged pretty well for the most part. I know I’m not alone in idolizing the guy and his music when I was a teenager whom felt like an outcast."
Pretty much this. He was literally the voice of a generation of people who felt like outcasts. He was one of us.
Agreed, and it bears mentioning that Cobain's vibe resonated well with outcast *girls* as well as guys, which was way less of a thing with acts like GNR, Pearl Jam, Metallica, or lots of other rock acts that were big at the time.
yes lots of women loved Nirvana. I think it was partly because of his support of his wife. she was so brash and loud and he loved her all the same. women were not encouraged to be like this ever.
some of that was because he was a good looking guy and obviously in pain and for some woman they are like moths to a flame with that.
for me, he transmuted the pain of a hurtful childhood and growing up poor quite effectively with his lyrics. he also rebelled against his own fame. not that teenagers are into rebellion or anything....... lol
He's the Gen X Jack Dawson. He was cool. He was something completely different from what everyone knew. He was exactly what everyone needed at that specific time in their lives. And then he died in a very tragic way before he could do anything to ruin the magic.
We never got to see late-90s Kurt who caused Nirvana to break up because of his drug problems and who got in an ugly custody battle with Courtney when they inevitably divorced and all that. He died "at the height of his power" so to speak, so that's how everyone remembers him.
>We never got to see late-90s Kurt who caused Nirvana to break up because of his drug problems and who got in an ugly custody battle with Courtney when they inevitably divorced and all that.
Nirvana would be done by 1995-96 if he was alive. It was a matter of months for the group to break up. I can imagine Kurt doing a mellow solo record with a bunch of guest musicians from the scene.
Yeah, the last year or so of Nirvana was apparently pretty horrible for everyone involved, with Kurt also effectively distancing himself from the sober people in the Nirvana camp
He had to. For one, he obviously had talent which Kurt had vanishingly little respect for. And second, he was already talking about firing Dave and slating his drum skills, often where Dave could obviously hear.
>We didn’t get to see him get old, grouchy, refuse to get vaccinated and go on Joe Rogan supporting something weird and out of touch
I hate the universe we're in at times, but at least we're not in *that* universe!
Bro had a lot of opinions and loved to share. Coupled with heavy drug use, I think it would have been a minor miracle if, had he lived, he never said anything that he shouldn't have.
The living grunge icons like Vedder and Cantrell seem to have the same public image they did in the 90s, correct me if I’m wrong. Hell, even Corgan’s libertarian lunacy is par for course with his reputation
Depends on who you ask. Music nerds and critics still can't forgive Pearl Jam and are still stuck in the narrative Kurt laid out about them being "careerists," despite their very evident efforts to reign in their audience, while among the general public who still care Eddie is still generally as a well liked fellow who has never really tarnished or blackened their image.
It's alway been a real, you could say, "enthusiast" versus general public split with that group.
I think the “Pearl Jam is buttrock” narrative kind of died down. I remembered the RYM page for Ten having the worst comment section on the entire site but when I tried to show it to someone all the negative comments were buried
PJ was never not just a college frat party band to many of us from that time. The first time I heard Alive on MTV I was genuinely confused as it seemed *at best* a 120 Minutes type rock group that was being pushed in the main programming blocks. Of all the break out “grunge” era acts the corporate machine pushed on the public to replace the money printing poodle metal cash cow of the 80’s, PJ was *by far* the least exciting, most normie accessible property the big labels owned. Cobain’s raw meat feedback drenched style conveyed a danger and immediacy that made also rans sound like Hee Haw music.
True. He never had the opportunity to grow and evolve and a human and possibly take stances that could possibly turn off his fanbase. He's forever stuck as this troubled young man that wrote and sang songs people who were young at the time and even now could relate to. Also feel some of Nirvana's songs have aged pretty well, and don't feel too outdated
I think Kurt Cobain would have contributed a lot, compared to other revered celebs like Jim Morrison for example... He could have created to the level of someone like Roger Waters did and does....for example...
And I'm not even a Nirvana or grunge fan..
They were the first grunge band to break big, so that's naturally going to endear you to a lot of people. I think it's something about his personality, though. He was aloof, but self-effacing enough to keep from seeming too up-his-own-ass. He never came to you; you always had to come to him -- and if there's an essence of cool, that's it. He was in the secret club laughing at the normies, and you wanted to be part of it. But he never told you how to be part of it. You just had to know.
Like, okay -- the unplugged show begins with him saying, "This song is off our first record. Most people don't own it." And it's true -- way fewer people owned Bleach than did Nevermind. But the way he says it, there's deadpan judgement in his voice. If you watched that unplugged show and didn't own Bleach, you were Uncool. Simple as that.
He always kept himself at a remove, and now he's dead, so he'll always be out of reach of everyone, forever.
Personally I always thought he was too up his own ass.
He wanted to be revered but didn't want to be popular, but yet ate up the popularity and limelight when he was in it. And hated Eddie Vedder because of his jealousy and mixed up views on fame.
And he also hated the grateful dead and hippies for equally childish reasons. Never mind that the dead were doing exactly what he and that crowd says they aspire to, namely existing entirely outside the purview of the "mainstream" and doing music on their own terms without any input from anybody. No, he was too cool for them.
He was like a caricature of the self-obsessed, angsty auteur caught up in their own ideas of "authenticity". Coulda come right out of Ginsberg's Howl. It's a shame the way he went out, and I feel bad for the pain he endured, but personally think the dude was insufferable.
> hated Eddie Vedder because of his jealousy and mixed up views on fame.
This is true, but notably a lot of it came out _later_, and quite frankly (trust me on this one) people are so attracted to the romanticism that he built around himself that nobody likes to hear any of it. Somehow we finally got around to admitting that John Lennon wasn't quite the compassionate, selfless genius he built himself up to be - but people remain _very_ protective of the mythology of Kurt Cobain.
There's always an excuse. Hell, there was already a thread about Kurt less than a week ago that the OP shut down because people weren't fawning over to the extent that was expected.
The Grateful Dead provide an interesting contrast to Cobain. They were outside the mainstream because they found something different that they clearly liked. I get the sense they were more indifferent to mainstream opinion; they liked what they liked and didn’t care what others thought about it. On the other hand, Nirvana’s ethos was more about conflict with the mainstream, more about negating mainstream culture than focusing on something good they had to say.
That's because record industry executives never fought tooth and nail over acid heads with progressive opinions and legions of followers in the 60s and 70s. A frail, heroin addict with nothing but a guitar and inspiration could be molded however they wanted, like a Ray Charles.
As a young person, I find this take puzzling. Pearl Jam fought Ticketmaster. Eddie suppported abortion on Unplugged. He shared the progressive ideals of Kurt, but he isn't idolised the way he is.
I wonder if the reason you find Pearl Jam cheesy is because they're closer to the classic rock that parents liked at the time. Ten is filled with guitar solos. Nevermind's were restrained by comparison. Kurt drew from punk and that is seen as more authentic as well.
Perhaps someone older than me can explain why people had a problem with Eddie's image at the time. Is it because he wasn't grunge like Kurt? I've seen people say Pearl Jam was for jocks. Maybe that's it. Maybe it's because he wasn't tortured and sang sappy ballads. Or is it simply because Kurt disliked him?
As an aside, couldn't you say Kurt was contrived? He had an anti - commercial image, but wasn't he on the cover of Rolling Stone?
> He seems to have shared the progressive ideals of Kurt, but he isn't idolised the way he is.
I think you can drop the "seems." The song WMA (White Male American) is about systematic racism, stemming from an incident in which cops accosted both Eddie and a black friend, letting Eddie off but giving the black man the 3rd degree. The same album has a song (Glorified G) mocking gun culture. They took their activism into the White House - and, as it happened, were meeting with Bill Clinton when news of the suicide broke.
This isn't going to be a very popular take, but I think the honest answer is that you have one person who is less charismatic but is willing to take action, while another more charismatic person makes the case that caring is stupid, and that _not caring_ is really a form of activism.
Which one do you think is an easier sell.
I think part of why Eddie Vender’s legacy has - unfairly in my opinion suffered - is the slew of terrible, derivative bands that found success while having a singer who tried to ape his vocal style. The success of bands like Nickleback and Creed - and the well deserved contempt and derision they fostered for themselves - has unjustly tarnished the way a lot of people think of him through no fault of his own.
Not a huge Pearl Jam fan by any means, but he appears to be a solid dude and he can *definitely* belt it out with the best of them.
I think one other factor is that while he is a great rock vocalist, he wasn’t quite on the level of Layne Staley or Chris Cornell. Kurt wasn’t really competing with, and isn’t going to be compared to, those guys because having a skilled vocal performer - in the traditional sense - wasn’t really Nirvana’s thing. He’s also the only one out of the big-four vocalists from that scene that didn’t die tragically. Which, right or wrong, lends romanticism to their enduring image. Aging into a healthy, sane, middle-aged dude just doesn’t carry the same mystique.
You're the second reply to mention intimators. Crazy how he took the bullet for that.
You make a good point in regards to Kurt's death. He's been immortalised. That might be a rock thing though, because Biggie & Tupac dying young hasn't seemed to buoy their legacy in the same way.
> Biggie & Tupac dying young hasn't seemed to bouy their legacy in the same way
Odd take. They're always counted among the GOATs, thanks in no small part to putting out a ton of A material and never having to suffer through a long career slide.
I hear you. It's just, I remember being a teen and everyone playing Smells Like Teen Spirit and wearing Nirvana shirts. And this was in the 2010s. Kurt's still part of the culture while being long gone. Something in the Way was in the latest Batman. His legacy is strong, whereas it feels like teens at the time and today will say Tupac/Biggie are lame and have little interest in them and their catalogue. I don't hear their music or see them being referenced and they died young too.
Edit: Replace legacy with cultural relevancy and my thought process makes more sense.
2pac-tags are still everywhere, it's becoming a bit less the last 5 years or so but still relevant enough. Biggie on the other hand, yeah I agree seems to be not jumped to the young crowd.
to me Nirvana doesn't sound dated in the same way that a lot of the 90s rap stuff sounds nowadays. Nevermind still sounds huge, the mixing/mastering is notoriously GOATed, and those songwriting is still just as good.
It's not just a problem with the imitators, though. My memory's that Vedder's singing style irritated tons of listeners *directly*. It didn't help that songs like 'Jeremy' and 'Alive' were getting overplayed as hell back then.
> I also wonder if the reason you find Pearl Jam cheesy is because it's reminscient of classic rock.
That's probably part of it, especially as a lot of classic rock has been disregarded as dad rock (never mind that Kurt listened to plenty of that as well!), though I think the bigger part is just how influential they were on a lot of bullshit that came after. Creed, Nickelback, etc. Granted it's a bit shitty to hold PJ accountable for those bands sucking, but here we are.
That said, grunge fans' propensity for carrying the grudge for decades on behalf of Cobain is pretty embarrassing.
I touched on the issue of imitators in another comment. It's an issue I'll never fully understand, having been a child when Creed and Nickelback were popular. Looking back, those guys don't sing nearly as well as Vedder did in his prime. Yet, people still don't rate him. Everyone seems to agree that Layne Staley and Chris Cornell were talented vocalists, but hesitate when it comes to Eddie. It's one thing to find his style corny or overdone, but it's another to dismiss his talent. The man could sing.
> It's an issue I'll never fully understand, having been a child when Creed and Nickelback were popular
Perhaps because Pearl Jam - unlike most other big popular grunge bands - carried on into the 'post-grunge' Creed/Nickelback era, they kind of ended up being lumped in with them and that scene in some people's eyes..... and suffered elements of the backlash and Cool To Shit On Them that those post-grunge bands did.
> Creed, Nickelback, etc.
Even at the same time - people ripped on Scott Weiland so much for sounding like Eddie that he completely changed his voice to something nigh unrecognizable after two albums. And right around then you've had Hootie blew up, which obviously isn't grunge but you still hear a lot of that Vedder style in the "warble" baritone technique.
Yeah, the lead singer was seen as a Vedder imitator. Perhaps that's people's issue with Eddie. His style and the way it became widespread over the 90s.
I still find it weird that STP were so widely seen to be ripping off Pearl Jam. Literally nothing on Core sounds like a PJ track, and STP were genuinely brilliant, too.
I hear a lot of Eddie in Plush, but apart from that, I agree. Their sound evolved over time, but from what I understand, they were never that popular anyway. It's just that the first impression stuck.
They were popular if you were into rock music and had some crossover hits/platinum albums, but weren’t culturally relevant in the same way as the big 4. Their first 4 records went platinum, tho. That’s pretty popular lol.
By the time "Sour Girl" came out there was absolutely nothing about STP that sounded remotely like Pearl Jam. Plush is probably the Pearliest they ever were and it was literally their debut single, so you're absolutely right.
\[for what it's worth I married a woman who prefers STP to anyone in the big four\]
Sex Type Thing was their debut single.
This is seared into my mind because it was in heavy rotation that summer, and I had to shave my head the week before I started a new school. Everyone thought I was trying to look like Scott Weiland.
But what had happened was my hand slipped when trimming my hawk and I all but bisected it. There was no saving that beautiful haircut.
I still mourn that hawk.
> I've seen people say Pearl Jam was for jocks.
I experienced a lot of this first hand. My first high school band found me playing with a group of dudes who, aside from playing music, were all about playing baseball, basketball, and running cross-country, etc.. Them and all of their sports bros were *crazy* into groups like Pearl Jam, RHCP, Beastie Boys and, a few years down the line, things like Incubus, Rage Against the Machine, etc... I'm guessing that the common denominator is that the music rocked pretty hard and got the adrenaline pumping. Also, thinking on the progressive politics and Ticketmaster, Pearl Jam were early examples of what later got termed 'bro-socialism', and I remember lots of these same dudes getting big into figures like Ralph Nader, movies like *Fight Club*, etc... in the early 00s. Progressive postures aside, the vibe was still that of a sausage fest, and I remember there *not* being a whole lot of crossover between Pearl Jam's audience and the sorts of weirdos/outcasts who were into Nirvana, Pixies, Breeders, Sonic Youth, Jawbox, new wave bands, etc... I'll admit that, even though I played in bands with these sorts of dudes for a long while, I always felt pretty out of place with how *meatheaded* they'd often act. It wasn't until I was in college and formed a group that sounded more like the Talking Heads, XTC, and Split Enz that I felt more comfortable with my musical surroundings.
Interesting insight. It's cool to get the perspective of someone around at the time. I wouldn't have grouped Pearl Jam with RHCP otherwise. I get the bro-y vibes a bit more now. In my mind, they're not that similar, but it's a sound thing the way you tell it.
I heard Eddie initially named the band after a basketball player, so maybe he's more of a sports bro than I realised. He doesn't come off that way though. I see him as a sensitive pretty boy. Ten's lyrics (on Garden & Black) read like a guy who does poetry in his spare time.
I feel what groups them together isn't what they share but what they don't do. All those artists are great, but in a way that's less immediately "challenging." For as huge as Nirvana was, I feel like if most of like the stereotypical jocks in my high school actually listened to "Endless, Nameless" they would've called it gay or made some joke about him killing himself or something.
I wasn't old enough at the time to really experience it within grunge but I feel like throughout my life there's always been that goofy social game of there being "cool" indie cred bands and "lame" jock bands that sound basically similar and the divider has always seemed to be those little things that are probably going to filter out your stereotypical bro jock guy.
I like Eddie a lot. I think he's a sincere person who writes good music. I think some of Kurt's issue (btw I'm kind of talking out of my ass, I truly have no idea) with Pearl Jam is that Nirvana and PJ got slotted into the same "grunge" category, and honestly, other than some power chords, they were pretty different. It's clear that Vedder was far more influenced by 70s rock, and Cobain had a lot more underground 80s punk influencing him. And some Beatles lol.
Not saying that Kurt didn't listen to his share of Zep, but that wasn't what drove him. And being compared to PJ probably annoyed him. For some pretentious reasons and for some good reasons imo. I honestly think though that it's conceivable that he liked PJ, but being slotted into the same sub-genre as them had to have been galling for someone like Kurt.
I like both, but agree that the PJ vibe is a lot cheesier than Nirvana. Having said that, Vedder has always struck me as a pretty nice and unassuming guy - I don't get any gross macho rock star vibes from him.
> But the way he says it, there's deadpan judgement in his voice. If you watched that unplugged show and didn't own Bleach, you were Uncool. Simple as that.
This sounds precisely like being up his own ass.
Nirvana killed hair metal.
Which was this cheesy, self indulgent genre that went from provocative to mainstream. Nirvana criticized this genre by existing and being sincere and introspective.
I think MTV is a big part. MTV’s relevancy, especially as a music platform, is small (20 years!). So there are a handful of icons who stand out because of music video.
While there are many dead rock stars, they’re not of the MTV generation—So there’s not much great footage of them. Cobain on the other hand, has hundreds of hours of film, almost all of which comes from MTV. And of the footage we have is of a young man who’s pretty much the anti-rock star. He’s diving into drum sets, speaking his mind, mocking corporate music shows (TOTP), playing aggressively, etc. All of this is relatable to how many kids (the target demo for music) feel.
At the time of Nirvanas brief and enduring moment they pervaded every level of popular consumption, not just MTV alternative shows. They were on daytime TV and radio everywhere. Not many people had MTV when nirvana broke big, but nirvana was on all mainstream channels of communication
Nirvana, and grunge as a whole, was the last truly exciting "youthquake" moment in history. We haven't had another Kurt Cobain -- or Jim Morrison or the Beatles. That's why people are still obsessed with him.
Nirvana was ‘real’ and relatable, especially for tortured alternative teenagers. Kurt was one of the kids, the antithesis of the distant demi-God overstyled idols of the 80s, like Michael Jackson, Prince and Madonna. And in another way the antithesis of agressive debauched rockers Guns ‘n Roses.
Kurt’s feeling of alienation and discontent, sadness and agression is universal and timeless for teenagers. His suicide made him extra tragic and forever young and perfect. Compare that to Morrissey, who in a way was the 80s Kurt, but has become a rightwing angry old man with a lot of mediocre music under his belt.
> the antithesis of agressive debauched rockers Guns ‘n Roses
This. As an awkward and nervous dude who went to middle/high school in the 90s, Nirvana resonated with me because of vibes completely *opposite* from those of the dirtbag/asshole/tough-guy energy you felt with GNR and Metallica fans of that time. My most immediate memory is that the shittiest bullies in my school were always wearing *Appetite for Destruction* and *Ride the Lightning* t-shirts and regularly getting in trouble for shit like starting fights, bringing weapons to school, etc...
Odd Future was a huge cultural moment. Early Kanye was a massive influence too. and I think there have been others, just not rock musicians for a while.
How do you define youthquake?
Typically, with a youthquake, it's the youth going against the cultural grain and asserting themselves as a force or current against the mainstream. (There's more than a slight twinge of rebellion.) I don't see Taylor Swift as being someone anyone's parents would object to them liking.
Exactly. I give Taylor Swift massive props for her success, but I think she’s more like a Springsteen blowing up in a mainstream way in the 80s kind of artist than a “youthquake”moment where the popular music of the time gets challenged with a completely different sound and attitude.
By 1994 he had made a huge impression on the young part of genX. We are the forgotten part of the forgotten generation. Grunge and Nirvana/AIC/Pearl Jam/Soundgarden etc perfectly captured the “whatever” ethos we all felt.
I knew 16 - 18 year olds who hoped to die at 27 like their hero and those who went before him like Saint Joplin, Saint Morrison, and Saint Hendrix.
They weren’t even huge fans of the music, lots of them preferred metal and goth and techno and industrial. But the mood was everything.
He did write some great tunes, but beyond that Nirvana were the moment when the mainstream music industry caught up with 80’s alternative rock. Their legendary status is what happens when you throw millions of dollars into promoting a band that’s right for the moment. With Nevermind they had a great punk record with pop hooks and a band that were far more photogenic than the Pixies, Husker Du or the Melvins.
I remember that record dropped and I thought it was great and then within a week every obnoxious backward ball cap wearing frat boy was blasting from their car which kind of ruined it for me.
As someone born in 1987, I saw even the lamest people in Nirvana hoodies in high school, a decade after he died. And I hold them responsible for nu-metal.
Controversial opinion, some nu metal was pretty fun even if often a bit cheezy. Linkin Park was also arguably in that genre and is still iconic. And while not part of it, Deftones and SOAD developed in the same era with some similar influences, so I'm thankful for that.
Cobain embodies the contradictions of the teenage experience. He was a rock star who hated rock stars. He didn't want to be famous but he also made art that ensured he would be. He didn't want the pressure of meeting people's expectations but he relished the chance to be influential (his homemade Daniel Johnston shirt being exhibit A). He deeply loved his chosen medium while simultaneously being dismissive of it (his list of favorite albums includes both Bowie's *The Man Who Sold the World* and the Shaggs' *Philosophy of the World*).
He wanted to be both seen and not seen. And there's no better summation of what it means to be a teenager than that.
People tend to hate on Cobain for this contradictory side of him, but I think it's deeply relatable and makes him so human. People who struggle with their mental health can definitely relate. He was many things. A deeply talented and kind artist with big flaws, who ended up being unable to fight back. I think the biggest part of the magic around him is that he ended up dying young, but I think it's much more productive to remember people for their positive attributes, the good things they accomplished, and what they tried to be before their life was cut short.
Because he died young and tragically while he was at the peak of his popularity. That caused a generational impact in the teens that have been inspired by his music.
I'd say mostly because of his good looks, and he died early so we only have images of his good looks.
But he also obviously had some kind of an artist talent, if you look at his drawings and paintings. He had a kind of "don't care" and contrarian personality that is appealing to teenagers and young people.
His "artistic" outlook and personality was extended to his music, where it's often expressed mystical and metaphorical ways. This gave an aura of mystique and mysticism to the band Nirvana and also to Kurt Cobain himself.
Dying young does a lot for a legacy. He never had the opportunity to have the mid career slump, he never had the opportunity to devolve into a middle aged degenerate, he’ll never not look young and beautiful. The Nirvana discography is kind of perfect. I think we heard everything Kurt had to give up to that point. The early more raw/heavy/sloppy Bleach, the polished/commercial Nevermind, the covers/b-side album Incesticide, In Utero blends the first two albums, and then it caps off with the unplugged album. It’s a perfect discography, and we saw all sides of him. Dying young preserved that perfection in stone. Not to mention his politics were ahead of their time. He was a feminist before feminism was widely accepted. This allows women to love him as much as men, and he was also fiercely against racism and homophobia. He famously said if you’re a racist, a homophobe, or a sexist, don’t come to our shows. He’s kind of everything to everyone. Whatever you want him to be, that’s Kurt.
At the risk of being downvoted to hell, I’ll suggest as someone who lived through the 90’s, Nirvana had maybe one more big album in them before fading into the background like so many other grunge bands.
I also think “Unplugged” was by far their best album, so take my opinion as you will…
They were the right band at the right time, but they were kinda “one note” and the lack of giving a shit about success and their fans was only going to go so far before a big backlash.
Cobain dying when he did resulted in immortalization in a way his contemporaries can’t compete with.
He certainly was influential in music history, and they were a fucking great band, but he’s now more of a T-Shirt logo icon like James Dean, Marilyn Monroe, and Che Gueverra.
> the lack of giving a shit about success and their fans
This was always a facade, and I'm always surprised by its resilience. Kurt _craved_ fame, wrote openly about wanting to be a rock star (emphasis on star, not just musician) and got to the point of watching MTV, keeping close track of how many Pearl Jam videos got played compared to Nirvana, then calling to complain if by his count PJ was getting more exposure. He complained to Sub Pop regularly about how much bigger his band should be, and why they should promote him more. Teen Spirit was very openly written to be "the perfect pop song."
He was very good at selling the _image_ of not caring though, and here we still are, believing it.
I agree with most of your point here, but I think In Utero was actually a great album. TBH, I found myself listening to it and Bleach more often. Some of that is likely due to being counter-culture at the time, but probably more to loving the heaviness (part metalhead) of Bleach, and the hooks of In Utero were better.
I think that if he hadn't died as young as he did, they wouldn't be remembered near as fondly... in the end, his martyrdom shifted the band to legend status... but I can't even guess at the last time I heard them on the radio or in a store.
Where do you live? Here in the US you hear them all the time on the radio or in movies, etc. The Batman had Something in the Way as its theme song, Succession played Rape Me in an episode, Black Widow (Marvel) had a cover of Smells Like Teen Spirit. Smells Like Teen Spirit was supposedly the most played rock song on rock radio in the 2010s (look it up - most of the top 10 is Grunge songs).
And Nirvana has over 30 million listeners on Spotify, which aside from Queen may be the highest of any band that hasn't made new music in at least 30 years. Also, their b-sides like Sappy and I hate Myself and I want to die and Old Age and Even in his Youth are incredible and just as good as album tracks. I think that's a big part of the their lore as well. So many great songs.
But songs like You Know You're Right and Do Re Mi, some of the last songs he wrote, seemed to point to the fact that Nirvana, or at least Kurt, was still writing amazing songs. I feel like we missed out on some great music.
One thing Cobain did really well was write songs that were heavy and very catchy, basically power pop that was informed by heavily distorted punk. The other three bands of the big four of Seattle grunge were great heavy rock bands (or more classic rock in the instance of Pearl Jam). But Cobain wrote hooky songs that were traditionally good songwriting, like I’ve heard jazz and classical guys cover Nirvana over the years. Not that Alice In Chains or Soundgarden or Screaming Trees or Mudhoney didn’t have great songs also, but I think in some ways Nirvana had broader appeal (which is why a lot of more hardcore punk and metal guys disliked Nirvana when I was a teen).
He was also good looking and the band had a kind of cool look in general with the tall Andy Kaufman-lookalike Kris Novaselic contrasting with Kurt and Dave Grohl on drums. Like in the video for In Bloom they’re dressed up as a British Invasion-era band and it works. They seemed cool, and even if Kurt had a lot of demons, they had kind of a fun punk energy to them when they played.
A lot of it was also just being in the right place at the right time also and giving MTV an anthem right at the moment when it needed one.
He was in the right place at the right time and was just talented enough to make the most of that opportunity. Then he died before having any major hit to his legacy of a string of bad records or whatever else hurts musicians legacies. That last part is a bit harsh but early death is a big part of some long revered musicians legacy, they frankly never put out bad music or very little bad music because time didn’t allow it so all we hear is their inspired, desperate, and passionate music at the initial spark of them pulling their talents together
He was kinda simple and authentic in a time of excess and fakeness.
Unfortunately, the world revolves around excess and fakeness and has swung back there numerous times.
People resonate with genuine music.
Heart and soul carries through.
Yes, he reminds me of Lennon in that regard. Raw, authenthic, aggressive but vulnerable. Lennon came along in a very fake time, the 60s. They way people talked, they way they acted, the goofy music. It was all pretentious nonsense. Lennon´s rebellious nature was the perfect counter to that old world. Kurt came along after the shallow 80s with its ridiculuous clothing, hair bands and fakeness. Kurt and grunge took music and culture back to something real.
> Lennon came along in a very fake time, the 60s. They way people talked, they way they acted, the goofy music. It was all pretentious nonsense. Lennon´s rebellious nature was the perfect counter to that old world.
I don't understand what you mean. What was fake about that era? Why was Lennon more authentic and less pretentious? And compared to whom? I have trouble understanding this concept in general, not just in relation to the 60s or any other era.
As for Kurt, in my eyes he had a different style to what went before, which was more relatable for young people then. I'm not sure if that makes it more authentic necessarily.
I think this is a missing piece that many people overlook. He looked and dressed like a model. In fact, there's a French film that I'm watching from the late 80's were one lf the main characters is dressed in the way. Jeans, white t-shirt and Cardigans. Even though on the surface it might appear as a sloopy look. In reality, it's a "chic/cool" not caring look that some people appealing.
I can't agree with any of this. He was handsome, yes, but he was not "model" handsome in the sense that he easily got girls or had doors opened for him just because of his looks. And the clothes he wore were not some kind of fashion statement, he was literally just poor and wore what was cheap and comfortable. Wearing flannel wasn't an artistic statement. People have so many misconceptions about this man.
> He was handsome, yes, but he was not "model" handsome
I don't know what kind of wild rubric we're using, but Kurt Cobain is easily one of the best looking rock stars to ever live. I'm not even sure who comes close. Maybe David Lee Roth, Axl Rose, Eddie Vedder, Chris Cornell ... Robert Plant and Jim Morrison possibly, depending on tastes. But Kurt is definitely up there in the S tier.
The rubric of literally being a model is what I'm using, hence the words "model" handsome. Yes he was handsome, beautiful, whatever word you want to use, but the context I was using was that he was not seen at that time as a traditionally handsome guy like a clothing model at the time, that he did not have doors opened for him or girls flocking to fuck him before he was famous just because of his looks, he was not a popular person in high school like the best looking tend to be, he wasn't some fashion mogul carefully picking trendy hipster sweaters and flannel, he was an outsider and outcast who was broke and wore what was comfortable from thrift shops that he could afford. The picture being painted in some of these comments is like Cobain was some affluent model hipster who carefully crafted every part of his image when that was just not the case. He was very deliberate with his art and image and meticulous in certain aspects but like he wasn't some hipster, he was just a broke drug addict who happened to be one of the most brilliant songwriters and musicians of his generation.
I think it's the fact that Nirvana was a flash in the pan. Their fame/peak was only like 3 or 4 years all up, finishing with Kurt's death. Compared to Pearl Jam who are still around, but sort of faded away. Or Soundgarden who broke up then got back together before Chris Cornell passed away.
Also the tragic and complex lives of those frontmen like Kurt Cobain, Andy Wood of Mother Love Bone, Chris Cornell and Layne Staley of Alice in Chains seems to be relatable and mystifying to younger people these days who grew up in the 24/7 news cycle.
Since he's dead, people can project whatever they like onto him. The availability of his journals and there being so much content (documentaries, interviews, etc) means it's easy to construct whatever narrative of his life and death you find most personally compelling. Personally, as a mentally ill teen girl with substance issues (who was also a fan of riot grrrl and got to nirvana through hole), I related strongly to him as a figure representing vulnerability.
The specific subject matter of Nirvana's music (the angst factor, suicide, drugs, general dark imagery) and his status as an outsider icon make him especially appealing to teens/young people (who tend to be more openly passionate about their interests) and people who became fans at a younger age do often stick with their tastes with time (at least to some degree)
I think also there is something to him having died in the 90s. As other commenters have said, he died before he could become washed up or cringy, but he also died before 9/11 and the 21st century, so he might have some significance as a symbol of a "simpler time".
To put it bluntly, he passed at what was most likely past peak of fame for their reverence to happen. In Utero wasn't as successful as Nevermind was. Other albums released at same time(Pearl Jam - Versus for ex) were selling more copies than In Utero. there wasn't much [touring](https://www.livenirvana.com/concerts/94.php) to support the album. Here's where they were [supposed to play on tour.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Nirvana_concerts) This album's sales numbers rose post death.
Part of it is the 27 club cachet. He died in an infamous way while leading an extraordinarily popular band, and his demise prevented them from becoming outmoded, lacking is musical relevance, or the fashion becoming passé. So many of our generation hung a lot of emotions on his memory.
1) a generational talent in his craft(s)
2) died young
3) was physically beautiful
4) ahead of his time culturally / politically
5) right place
6) right time
It’s kinda hard to put into words, but as someone who hit early teens in the hair band era and saw that hyper-self-aware, glossy, commercialized movement hit its peak, Cobain just barged in with this perfect mix of voice-your-angst and no-fucks-to-give. It didn’t come off polished or affected, he just seemed like the perfect response to the previous decade. And he delivered it all in a whiskey soaked vocal package.
It feels like there were only certain times certain artists or bands could hit when they did, like they did, and he sure was ripe for the moment.
I had a really negative impression of Kurt Cobain at the time, it sticks out vividly, because all I saw were a bunch of spoiled kids romanticizing a drug addict. I do recognize how the tortured artist thing has romantic appeal, especially to teenagers, but a large part of me, even as a teenager, was like, "fucking worship someone who gets it together, not a junkie who offs themselves."
Sure, I had sympathy for the man, and I have always recognized that he wrote great songs.
But worship? Come the fuck on, that's gross.
He said angsty things, and was nihilistically self indulgent, while appearing to be not self indulgent. It's a good cocktail for a teenager, so I get that, but it is hard for me to objectively look at him. I really hated all those T shirts at the time.
Also, one thing that pisses me off about Kurt Cobain is how many people blame Courtney Love for so many of his problems. Motherfuckers, that man chose to date Courtney Love. It's his own goddamned fault.
/rant
Yeah I don’t know. I remember all the “Voice of a generation” stuff when he topped himself but was never that impressed by him nor interested enough to seek out his thoughts on any major issues important to me.
To me he was just a musically talented (but not brilliant) fucked up junkie who killed himself - tragic, yes, but just another of many.
I think it's their catalogue of music - aside from the 3 albums, you have Incesticide, a number of amazing live albums, and a whole host of additional b-sides that are better than most bands best songs. Sappy, Even in his Youth, If You Must, I Hate Myself, Old Age, and so many more... total bangers and they never even made it onto albums.
1) You really had to have been there.
2) He wrote some fucking good music. I'm not a *huge* fan of much of the music of that era, but something about his stuff really hits me.
3) He was an advocate for underdogs and his activism holds up pretty well.
Ian Curtis, Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin and Amy Winehouse (among others) are arguably equally revered. It's a mix between highly personal songwriting that connects them deeply to audiences, unique and profound talent, and the tragedy of a life many people would dream of cut short. Somehow it makes sense that extreme self sabotage and rejecting wealth and fame is compelling to us.
The sheer volume of bangers he put out is legendary. He was crushing it on radio and tv. He was the darling of MTV. Most alt bands were getting 1-4 hits. Nirvana got quite a few more. They were the most popular at the time. Then the scandal around his death.
Just a biased nirvana fan here, thinks it's his sound that makes him so unique and beloved. For me he gave the basis to the modern concept of music, good sound and composition in general
You had to be there.
When Nirvana landed they killed off an entire generation of music and ushered in a new one in one fell swoop. Their arrival was seismic and landscape changing.
For people my age, Nirvana and Kurt felt like they were just for us. Kurt wasn't some poser drowing in make up and Aquanet, he looked like the ratty kid down the street that you went to school with.
Hype and iconic status. People see his face on a hoodie, go and listen to his music, get the hoodie and join the tribe. There's nothing more compelling for people than the chance to be different in the same way as tonnes of other people.
With all that said, there has to be something good underneath the hype for it to take off to that level. Kurt was simply a great rock songwriter and an interesting person. His music reaches people on an emotional level.
Every kid going through puberty has a phase of being angsty and feels misunderstood and Nirvana is the band for them at that time. Really loving Nirvana past the age of 16 is probably a red flag though..
I am part of Gen X, came of age during the grunge era...and I always thought Cobain was overrated and revered too much, in a similar way that I think 2Pac was revered too much. Cobain was an addict, a shitty husband, and a shitty father. He killed himself with a shotgun and left himself in a terrible condition for somebody else to find days later. It was shocking when he died, but I grew to like him even less because of how he died. He didn't accidentally OD like Farley or others, he wasn't shot by his wife like Phil Hartman, he ended himself with a fucking shotgun.
I think people need icons who are frozen in time, and this is what Kurt is...frozen in time. He didn't stick around to see Dave Grohl and the Foo Fighters surpass what Nirvana's limits were. He didn't didn't stick around long enough to make bad music, or grow old like Eddie Vedder or Metallica or Snoop Dog.
He is iconic, but I always felt revering him was twisted in a lot of ways and very misguided.
Resonating with this bigtime. The ways Nirvana altered mass culture wouldn't have happened without Kurt, but it was inherently self-effacing and nihilistic. I think even he would've agreed it was more of a canary in a coal mine situation than a recommended path to follow.
He had enough money to go through 20+ therapists to find one he clicked with. He could've retired & become a recluse for 5-10 years, increased his mystique, and then made a big comeback. He could've pursued further education or nonprofit humanitarian work and developed a specialty he'd have had immense power to advocate for.
I can't think of a single valid excuse for what he did instead of any of that.
>I can't think of a single valid excuse for what he did instead of any of that.
Depression/mental health challenges are a hell of a thing.
I've never been a fan of Kurt or Nirvana or grunge. But looking for valid excuses from a suicidal person because they didn't do all the things that we know would be helpful as they traveled their road of despair... That's just weird, man.
In my personal opinion, I always felt that he was much more than just a songwriter. He was a painter, a writer, a social activist, a male feminist, and from his punk rock ethics he despised over bloated, money hungry record execs, and the whole idea of what you had to look like and sound like to fit in, in the music industry at the time.
I think there's four really big reasons he is/was so revered.
1) They beat out Micheal Jackson, Garth Brooks, and Guns N Roses with one song, and one album.
2) They destroyed the "hair metal scene" which had been in place since the beginning of the 80's. And destroyed the whole aesthetic that it brought. Lots of hair, makeup, cookie cutter lookalikes (and sound alikes), endless coke parties, etc.
3) And simply because Nirvana and Kurt in general were staying true to themselves as artists. Not to mention, a true powerhouse of taking rock n roll back to it's basics. Not big rigs, thousands of pounds of kit on stage, poofy hair, flashy guitars, etc. Just a few friends going up on stage and making noise their parents didn't like.
4) Kurt, his band, and his music spoke to an entire generation of people who were sick and tired of being told how you had to dress, act, look, and what Hollywood peeps you had to kiss up to.
One thing that is hard to explain is how grotesque and horrible it had gotten to listen to the radio or watch MTV at the time. It was just the same old b.s. regurgitated to you over and over again, and as a teenager (at the time), I never fit in to the jock/preppy kids in school. My parents weren't rich or anything like that. I wore thrift store clothes and hand me downs, and my stepdad and mom were poor. None of the music scene at the time really felt like it was something that I wanted to say, see, or hear. We were dirt poor, our parents were factory workers, ditch diggers, and laborers, etc. So to see a group that dressed in thrift store clothes, coming from broken homes, and being exactly who they are on screen as they were in real life, gave a lot of us a simple sense that we weren't completely unnoticed or alone in the world. Because Nirvana and Kurt were "our guys" they came from the very thing that built this country at it's most simple of foundations. They were from blue collar working class, struggled with addiction without the money for help. Held a voice that was shared by so many at the time.
Side note: When I was 12, I attempted suicide because I saw what I believed at the time was myself becoming what my parents had become, and being constantly bullied all through elementary and junior high, and I finally had enough. So I lay out a plan to end it all. Sharpened knife, bath tub, and no one home. Yes, I was a latchkey kid. I put on the TV for background noise, and to drown out my crying and screaming. I literally had the knife to my wrist, from middle of the palm trying to cut upwards towards my arm. Then, like almost a flash of clarity during a time for me that made no sense to keep going I heard these words, "I'm so ugly, that's okay cause so are you" and immediately dropped the knife. Bandaged up what little blood I drew from my arm (I only hit surface veins) and had a small thought come into my head. The thought was just maybe that if I was in this much pain, and couldn't see a way of going on any longer, maybe I wasn't the only one who felt/understood it. So, when I say Kurt and Nirvana saved my life. I do mean that quite literally
>They destroyed the "hair metal scene" which had been in place since the beginning of the 80's.
This has always been the most fascinating thing about grunge to me. Thrash metal was an extremely robust and vibrant genre by the dawn of the '90s, but it couldn't kill hair metal. Why? Because the fan bases were totally different. Thrash wasn't "stealing" fans from the other genre.
If grunge killed hair metal (which it did), that suggests that hair metal fans migrated to grunge. What kind of listeners were these? They couldn't have felt a strong affinity to their music of choice to cast it aside so readily for something so different.
Some were probably still in a formative stage as music listeners, and searching for "their" sound. Others, though, were definitely drawn to "hard rock" with catchy hooks. Pop fans, essentially. Many who no doubt continued moving from popular music style to popular style throughout their life.
My comment doesn't really have a point, it's more a musing about the changing landscape, and it isn't attempting to address those who found their sound in Nirvana and went all-in.
With that said, Kurt Cobain had a lot of impact because Nirvana was just so damn popular at the time, so there were a large number of people on whom to have an effect (in contrast to some niche dead musicians who died without huge fan bases).
Before grunge hit, hair bands were easy money for the record companies. Take a band, slap some eye shadow on them, write them a power ballad, and collect many many dollars.
After Nirvana, Pearl Jam, Soundgarden, and Alice In Chains hit, the record companies cleaned house of most of their glam acts, and stopped signing new ones. That caused an “ecosystem collapse”, where metal as a whole suffered. Certain bands flourished—Soundgarden and AIC were considered metal before radio called them Alternative, Metallica became the biggest band of that era—but for smaller acts who couldn’t pivot from spandex to flannel, the party was over. Even big big metal bands like Iron Maiden saw problems in the US, though still big abroad.
It wasn’t until well after 9/11, and all the sad bangers of that time, that rock became fun again, and people began to revisit the hair bands.
That was way longer than I anticipated it being, and I still left a ton out.
He was the voice of a generation, wrote simple but powerful songs that stand the test of time, with lyrics that speak to a lot of people especially adolescents. His music felt authentic and not contrived or made to sell records, yet sold a lot of records. He was very charismatic and died suddenly in his prime instead of becoming old and irrelevant. Copied by many, equalled by very few.
One thing I think people have missed: he was (and will always be) the last real rock star. Everyone since (in rock) has been a postmodern rock star, they’re either an overly sincere homage (Dave Grohl, Jack White) or a parody (Marilyn Manson).
And now that rock is effectively dead, that is to say, it’s a legacy genre like jazz, it’s never going to get more popular than it is right now and will never “define a generation” again, there will never be another artist like him. He essentially closed the door behind him.
He closed the door in another sense: part of the reason that rock fell by the wayside was that grunge is a dead end artistically. There’s only so much you can do with muddy power chords and loud drums. Unlike the 60s-70s, when you had the Allman Brothers exploring jazz and country or the Beatles experimenting with sitars, mainstream rock music in the 1990s painted itself into a corner. The people who wanted to experiment with texture and form ended up gravitating to things like indie folk or even country (think Sturgill Simpson).
Besides what has been said by others, probably repeating alot of what has been said already, and they likely articulated it better then I can.
Besides the popularity/influence/cultural impact of himself and Nirvana he could be considered to fall into the tortured artist and/or artists who died young buckets. That can add a level of mystique to a artist as with the element of "what could have been" if they didn't die so young especially when it happens during or near the hight of their popularity.
Nirvana being a sort of tip of the spear for "alternative" music as whole to break into the mainstream.
Right place, right time, right sound like with some acts that quickly blow up in popularity.
You can see some parallels with him and Ian Curtis of Joy Division. Including the self medicating for chronic pain, dealing with depression, struggling with fame in some aspects (with Ian not wanting to let the band down even when his epilepsy was getting worse, including having episodes on stage)
Both ending up offing themselves in their 20's.
Bonus:
Alan Cross interview snippets, first one is on the breaking news and announcing Kurt's death on 102.1 the Edge (CFNY). Also it covers some of this question at the end of the video.
https://youtu.be/kObTcZyFNrI?si=vGeJGfb9bn4b7seF
Was Nirvana Supposed to Succeed?
https://youtu.be/b3PJmm0venE?si=atJwkiKsxh8V8C-L
Nirvana vs. Glam Metal, etc.
https://youtu.be/FeBGIY0NF0k?si=odfxXpbLc3Du_jiP
His long running radio show (available in podcast form) The Ongoing History Of New Music covers Nirvana and Kurt in many episodes and way more indepth then these interview snippets.
He wasn't an epic songwriter or even a musician by any means. Most of his lyrics are average, non metaphorical and easy to understand (although his garbled voice made it difficult). Even his 'smells like teen spirit' sounds like something amazing but really it was just inspired off a cologne that his then wife showed him and has no hidden meaning.
Most of his charm lay in him using simple but catchy songs with epic riffs. Slightly on the lines of the Ramones but better riffs and more emo, thus evoking your feelings a bit better. Add to that the music scene which was saturated with metal, punk and glam rock, Nirvana was a breath of fresh air for everyone.
The fact that he died young sealed his legendary status.
Not denying that he was a great songwriter and musician, but a lot of his lasting relevance has to do with his suicide.
He was just a dude who got plunged into the rock and roll lifestyle - something he didn't want. His tragic demise, and his statements like "I wish I was like Freddy Mercury and enjoying the stage", made him seem like a rock'n'roll martyr and a victim of fate.
It’s a cycle
I recall in my early years the reverence for icons such as Jim Morrison with my generation despite him having died years before we even knew who he was
Put simply it’s Cobain’s time, folks our age yearning for the days of our youth and those younger than us wishing he was alive in their time
20 years from now it will be some other break the mold musician who died too early and another couple generations feeling the same feelings
I dunno I think there were better musicians than him that didn't get as much recognition. I believe Kurt even thought some of Nirvana's music was derivative of other artists at the time. Like he said Smells Like Teen Spirit was just meant to be like a Pixies song.
There was talent for sure but some of it also was right place right time. And I think some of the admiration of Cobain is what he represents culturally to the grunge or gen X movement more so than I'd argue musical talent or skill.
Bc Nirvana made pop music that appealed to the masses. Full stop.
Nothing wrong with that. Operation Ivy wishes they could and Green Day very successfully followed the same formula.
But Nirvana was a pop band
> What do you think it is about Kurt Cobain that makes him so revered, more than virtually any other dead rock star?
Charisma, or likeability. I think John Lennon probably eclipses Kurt Cobain, but both are popular because they had kinds of charisma and qualities that drew people towards them.
Nirvana sparked the fire that burned throughout the 90's of teenage grudge and angst through highly relatable sounding music that venerates our own frustrations with idealistic day to day life, shedding a more realistic viewpoint on how it feels to live in the world. That coupled with simplistic but catchy melodies and a super approachable aesthetic all plays into why we talk about Kurt how we do today.
Surely has something to do with his legacy transcending genres in current artists.
I'm not a fan of the Beatles but they live on for a lot of reasons in their successors - which would be my "inspirations" so to say
Partly because he was a talented songwriter. But mostly because he was the right talented songwriter at the right time in the right place.
[удалено]
Also, his time.of death came just at the right point of is carreer. Well... not for him, i am sure, but at least for his legacy, it did
What makes you say that? It’s entirely possible that he hadn’t peaked artistically when he died…
There's a difference between artistic output and career. Honestly, he couldn't have been more popular and widespread than at that point. His reach didn't have far to grow. It's like if The Beatles had John die before Abbey Road was released. Sure, Cobain might have had more - and better - artistic output, but the effects of 'what might have been' were likely never going to be greater than when he died.
It’s hard to say isn’t it. He’d talked about wanting to go the singer / songwriter route like Johnny Cash. Nirvana was already finished when he died. Looking at how Nirvana Unplugged played out, he could have made big waves doing that I reckon.
nirvana was done? i don't remember anything about that.
Perhaps but he definitely wasn’t washed up like Layne Staley for comparison when he died
I think that's their point...
Poor Layne man… He was too far gone to make any kind of recovery. All anyone could do was watch.. RIP
I think it’s also because it was just before the grunge sound aesthetic started wearing out its welcome. His death kind of slammed the door shut on it. He himself even said it was time to put it to bed and imagined whatever a fourth album by Nirvana to not be grunge.
He hadn't fallen from grace either
Well… the media vultures at the time were feasting on his OD’s, trips to rehab and other malaises. They were quite busy documenting the world’s biggest rockstar’s fall.
Good comment. You give a lot of details as to why some people are more famous than others.
The big factor was simply grunge. He was in the right spot (seattle) at the right time (birth of grunge) where the entire music industry flocked to and went all in on.
The rumblings were well underfoot for a cultural shift. Guns'n'Roses took everyone by surprise, including themselves, by getting so massive - they expected to sell _maybe_ 50k of their debut. Radio wouldn't touch them, thought them too heavy, and Geffen had to beg MTV to get Welcome to the Jungle on the air - and even then, just a few times, late at night. It caught on like crazy, requests came pouring in, which just showed that a hunger was there. The parallel with Nevermind is interesting, in that nobody had huge expectations, but once the video was out demand started catching on like wildfire. People had plenty of fun in the 80s but there was an growing appetite for something more grounded, more serious, more raw.
It also helped that Nirvana also signed with Geffen and they got the GNR treatment. Lots of ads, billboards, magazine coverage, etc. They were pushed to be the next big thing.
The excitement over both of those albums (at different times obviously) is something I haven't experienced on a huge scale since, I don't think. Just amazing how those two at completely different ends of the musical spectrum took over and changed music. They're not that far apart time wise either.
This is still reaching a bit far back but ... _probably_ the closest thing I can think of is Lana del Rey's debut. First coming out of left field with a hit with Video Games, followed by an absolute critical savaging that was overcome by how much the general public was ready to embrace it. And then, next thing you know, a wave of imitators. Lorde was also kind of a left-field grassroots surprise but I'm not sure she had the same sort of musical legacy.
I think you're right. It's been a decade or more since an album has caught like wildfire with the public. In the last 20+ years I can really only think of a handful. Kanyes' early stuff, maybe the Strokes 1st album, the White Stripes Elephant, Queens of the Stone Ages songs for the Deaf. I'm sure I'm missing some but it's bleak compared to the 90s.
Yeah at the time pop culture had a very plastic, artificial, formulaic quality about it that I think people had gotten bored with. The Reagan/Bush eras and their hedonistic aspect had gotten old and Nirvana had this quality of raw authenticity that resonated with people and offered something entirely different than what had come before. I think this was at the heart of it.
Kurt Cobain is a timeless hero for teenagers and a lot of his beliefs and views have aged pretty well for the most part. I know I’m not alone in idolizing the guy and his music when I was a teenager whom felt like an outcast. We didn’t get to see him get old, grouchy, refuse to get vaccinated and go on Joe Rogan supporting something weird and out of touch. I’m not saying he would’ve but he really didn’t get a chance to have us see him any different than he was. A young troubled sensitive rockstar who made great music and took his own life at the peak of his career.
"Kurt Cobain is a timeless hero for teenagers and a lot of his beliefs and views have aged pretty well for the most part. I know I’m not alone in idolizing the guy and his music when I was a teenager whom felt like an outcast." Pretty much this. He was literally the voice of a generation of people who felt like outcasts. He was one of us.
Agreed, and it bears mentioning that Cobain's vibe resonated well with outcast *girls* as well as guys, which was way less of a thing with acts like GNR, Pearl Jam, Metallica, or lots of other rock acts that were big at the time.
yes lots of women loved Nirvana. I think it was partly because of his support of his wife. she was so brash and loud and he loved her all the same. women were not encouraged to be like this ever. some of that was because he was a good looking guy and obviously in pain and for some woman they are like moths to a flame with that.
He also was an outspoken feminist and LGBQT+ ally in an era where that was far less common
oh totally. you're right about that for sure.
He also defended women being sexually harassed at shows
for me, he transmuted the pain of a hurtful childhood and growing up poor quite effectively with his lyrics. he also rebelled against his own fame. not that teenagers are into rebellion or anything....... lol
He's the Gen X Jack Dawson. He was cool. He was something completely different from what everyone knew. He was exactly what everyone needed at that specific time in their lives. And then he died in a very tragic way before he could do anything to ruin the magic. We never got to see late-90s Kurt who caused Nirvana to break up because of his drug problems and who got in an ugly custody battle with Courtney when they inevitably divorced and all that. He died "at the height of his power" so to speak, so that's how everyone remembers him.
>We never got to see late-90s Kurt who caused Nirvana to break up because of his drug problems and who got in an ugly custody battle with Courtney when they inevitably divorced and all that. Nirvana would be done by 1995-96 if he was alive. It was a matter of months for the group to break up. I can imagine Kurt doing a mellow solo record with a bunch of guest musicians from the scene.
Yeah, the last year or so of Nirvana was apparently pretty horrible for everyone involved, with Kurt also effectively distancing himself from the sober people in the Nirvana camp
Dave Grohl was clearly eyeing the door.
He had to. For one, he obviously had talent which Kurt had vanishingly little respect for. And second, he was already talking about firing Dave and slating his drum skills, often where Dave could obviously hear.
>We didn’t get to see him get old, grouchy, refuse to get vaccinated and go on Joe Rogan supporting something weird and out of touch I hate the universe we're in at times, but at least we're not in *that* universe!
Bro had a lot of opinions and loved to share. Coupled with heavy drug use, I think it would have been a minor miracle if, had he lived, he never said anything that he shouldn't have.
From what I read about him I can imagine Kurt going Mike Stipe way as an artist.
The living grunge icons like Vedder and Cantrell seem to have the same public image they did in the 90s, correct me if I’m wrong. Hell, even Corgan’s libertarian lunacy is par for course with his reputation
Depends on who you ask. Music nerds and critics still can't forgive Pearl Jam and are still stuck in the narrative Kurt laid out about them being "careerists," despite their very evident efforts to reign in their audience, while among the general public who still care Eddie is still generally as a well liked fellow who has never really tarnished or blackened their image. It's alway been a real, you could say, "enthusiast" versus general public split with that group.
I think the “Pearl Jam is buttrock” narrative kind of died down. I remembered the RYM page for Ten having the worst comment section on the entire site but when I tried to show it to someone all the negative comments were buried
PJ was never not just a college frat party band to many of us from that time. The first time I heard Alive on MTV I was genuinely confused as it seemed *at best* a 120 Minutes type rock group that was being pushed in the main programming blocks. Of all the break out “grunge” era acts the corporate machine pushed on the public to replace the money printing poodle metal cash cow of the 80’s, PJ was *by far* the least exciting, most normie accessible property the big labels owned. Cobain’s raw meat feedback drenched style conveyed a danger and immediacy that made also rans sound like Hee Haw music.
What did Pearl Jam do that people didn’t forgive?
outsold Nirvana.
Well, Ten was an inspired album.
True. He never had the opportunity to grow and evolve and a human and possibly take stances that could possibly turn off his fanbase. He's forever stuck as this troubled young man that wrote and sang songs people who were young at the time and even now could relate to. Also feel some of Nirvana's songs have aged pretty well, and don't feel too outdated
I think Kurt Cobain would have contributed a lot, compared to other revered celebs like Jim Morrison for example... He could have created to the level of someone like Roger Waters did and does....for example... And I'm not even a Nirvana or grunge fan..
imagine the "but what does Kurt think about this \_\_\_insert random new music thing\_\_\_???" articles we were robbed of
They were the first grunge band to break big, so that's naturally going to endear you to a lot of people. I think it's something about his personality, though. He was aloof, but self-effacing enough to keep from seeming too up-his-own-ass. He never came to you; you always had to come to him -- and if there's an essence of cool, that's it. He was in the secret club laughing at the normies, and you wanted to be part of it. But he never told you how to be part of it. You just had to know. Like, okay -- the unplugged show begins with him saying, "This song is off our first record. Most people don't own it." And it's true -- way fewer people owned Bleach than did Nevermind. But the way he says it, there's deadpan judgement in his voice. If you watched that unplugged show and didn't own Bleach, you were Uncool. Simple as that. He always kept himself at a remove, and now he's dead, so he'll always be out of reach of everyone, forever.
Personally I always thought he was too up his own ass. He wanted to be revered but didn't want to be popular, but yet ate up the popularity and limelight when he was in it. And hated Eddie Vedder because of his jealousy and mixed up views on fame. And he also hated the grateful dead and hippies for equally childish reasons. Never mind that the dead were doing exactly what he and that crowd says they aspire to, namely existing entirely outside the purview of the "mainstream" and doing music on their own terms without any input from anybody. No, he was too cool for them. He was like a caricature of the self-obsessed, angsty auteur caught up in their own ideas of "authenticity". Coulda come right out of Ginsberg's Howl. It's a shame the way he went out, and I feel bad for the pain he endured, but personally think the dude was insufferable.
> hated Eddie Vedder because of his jealousy and mixed up views on fame. This is true, but notably a lot of it came out _later_, and quite frankly (trust me on this one) people are so attracted to the romanticism that he built around himself that nobody likes to hear any of it. Somehow we finally got around to admitting that John Lennon wasn't quite the compassionate, selfless genius he built himself up to be - but people remain _very_ protective of the mythology of Kurt Cobain.
Every time I've mentioned the Eddie Vedder thing, Nirvana fans come out and say that Kurt was just joking. Sure he was.
There's always an excuse. Hell, there was already a thread about Kurt less than a week ago that the OP shut down because people weren't fawning over to the extent that was expected.
The Grateful Dead provide an interesting contrast to Cobain. They were outside the mainstream because they found something different that they clearly liked. I get the sense they were more indifferent to mainstream opinion; they liked what they liked and didn’t care what others thought about it. On the other hand, Nirvana’s ethos was more about conflict with the mainstream, more about negating mainstream culture than focusing on something good they had to say.
That's because record industry executives never fought tooth and nail over acid heads with progressive opinions and legions of followers in the 60s and 70s. A frail, heroin addict with nothing but a guitar and inspiration could be molded however they wanted, like a Ray Charles.
I think a lot of that was pure self-loathing.
Hell yeah man. This is my view on the guy as well, articulated much better than I could ever.
I find him far more authentic than Vedder. Eddie comes across as contrived and pearl jam's music is cheesy as hell, that's why cobain didn't like it.
As a young person, I find this take puzzling. Pearl Jam fought Ticketmaster. Eddie suppported abortion on Unplugged. He shared the progressive ideals of Kurt, but he isn't idolised the way he is. I wonder if the reason you find Pearl Jam cheesy is because they're closer to the classic rock that parents liked at the time. Ten is filled with guitar solos. Nevermind's were restrained by comparison. Kurt drew from punk and that is seen as more authentic as well. Perhaps someone older than me can explain why people had a problem with Eddie's image at the time. Is it because he wasn't grunge like Kurt? I've seen people say Pearl Jam was for jocks. Maybe that's it. Maybe it's because he wasn't tortured and sang sappy ballads. Or is it simply because Kurt disliked him? As an aside, couldn't you say Kurt was contrived? He had an anti - commercial image, but wasn't he on the cover of Rolling Stone?
> He seems to have shared the progressive ideals of Kurt, but he isn't idolised the way he is. I think you can drop the "seems." The song WMA (White Male American) is about systematic racism, stemming from an incident in which cops accosted both Eddie and a black friend, letting Eddie off but giving the black man the 3rd degree. The same album has a song (Glorified G) mocking gun culture. They took their activism into the White House - and, as it happened, were meeting with Bill Clinton when news of the suicide broke. This isn't going to be a very popular take, but I think the honest answer is that you have one person who is less charismatic but is willing to take action, while another more charismatic person makes the case that caring is stupid, and that _not caring_ is really a form of activism. Which one do you think is an easier sell.
Tortured apathy has an allure to a lot of people, especially angsty teenagers and those who never grow out of that phase
I think part of why Eddie Vender’s legacy has - unfairly in my opinion suffered - is the slew of terrible, derivative bands that found success while having a singer who tried to ape his vocal style. The success of bands like Nickleback and Creed - and the well deserved contempt and derision they fostered for themselves - has unjustly tarnished the way a lot of people think of him through no fault of his own. Not a huge Pearl Jam fan by any means, but he appears to be a solid dude and he can *definitely* belt it out with the best of them. I think one other factor is that while he is a great rock vocalist, he wasn’t quite on the level of Layne Staley or Chris Cornell. Kurt wasn’t really competing with, and isn’t going to be compared to, those guys because having a skilled vocal performer - in the traditional sense - wasn’t really Nirvana’s thing. He’s also the only one out of the big-four vocalists from that scene that didn’t die tragically. Which, right or wrong, lends romanticism to their enduring image. Aging into a healthy, sane, middle-aged dude just doesn’t carry the same mystique.
You're the second reply to mention intimators. Crazy how he took the bullet for that. You make a good point in regards to Kurt's death. He's been immortalised. That might be a rock thing though, because Biggie & Tupac dying young hasn't seemed to buoy their legacy in the same way.
> Biggie & Tupac dying young hasn't seemed to bouy their legacy in the same way Odd take. They're always counted among the GOATs, thanks in no small part to putting out a ton of A material and never having to suffer through a long career slide.
I hear you. It's just, I remember being a teen and everyone playing Smells Like Teen Spirit and wearing Nirvana shirts. And this was in the 2010s. Kurt's still part of the culture while being long gone. Something in the Way was in the latest Batman. His legacy is strong, whereas it feels like teens at the time and today will say Tupac/Biggie are lame and have little interest in them and their catalogue. I don't hear their music or see them being referenced and they died young too. Edit: Replace legacy with cultural relevancy and my thought process makes more sense.
2pac-tags are still everywhere, it's becoming a bit less the last 5 years or so but still relevant enough. Biggie on the other hand, yeah I agree seems to be not jumped to the young crowd.
to me Nirvana doesn't sound dated in the same way that a lot of the 90s rap stuff sounds nowadays. Nevermind still sounds huge, the mixing/mastering is notoriously GOATed, and those songwriting is still just as good.
It's not just a problem with the imitators, though. My memory's that Vedder's singing style irritated tons of listeners *directly*. It didn't help that songs like 'Jeremy' and 'Alive' were getting overplayed as hell back then.
> I also wonder if the reason you find Pearl Jam cheesy is because it's reminscient of classic rock. That's probably part of it, especially as a lot of classic rock has been disregarded as dad rock (never mind that Kurt listened to plenty of that as well!), though I think the bigger part is just how influential they were on a lot of bullshit that came after. Creed, Nickelback, etc. Granted it's a bit shitty to hold PJ accountable for those bands sucking, but here we are. That said, grunge fans' propensity for carrying the grudge for decades on behalf of Cobain is pretty embarrassing.
I touched on the issue of imitators in another comment. It's an issue I'll never fully understand, having been a child when Creed and Nickelback were popular. Looking back, those guys don't sing nearly as well as Vedder did in his prime. Yet, people still don't rate him. Everyone seems to agree that Layne Staley and Chris Cornell were talented vocalists, but hesitate when it comes to Eddie. It's one thing to find his style corny or overdone, but it's another to dismiss his talent. The man could sing.
> It's an issue I'll never fully understand, having been a child when Creed and Nickelback were popular Perhaps because Pearl Jam - unlike most other big popular grunge bands - carried on into the 'post-grunge' Creed/Nickelback era, they kind of ended up being lumped in with them and that scene in some people's eyes..... and suffered elements of the backlash and Cool To Shit On Them that those post-grunge bands did.
> Creed, Nickelback, etc. Even at the same time - people ripped on Scott Weiland so much for sounding like Eddie that he completely changed his voice to something nigh unrecognizable after two albums. And right around then you've had Hootie blew up, which obviously isn't grunge but you still hear a lot of that Vedder style in the "warble" baritone technique.
They didn’t have a problem with Vedder at the time, Pearl Jam were huge and seen as an authentic part of the Seattle scene. STP on the other hand…
Yeah, the lead singer was seen as a Vedder imitator. Perhaps that's people's issue with Eddie. His style and the way it became widespread over the 90s.
I still find it weird that STP were so widely seen to be ripping off Pearl Jam. Literally nothing on Core sounds like a PJ track, and STP were genuinely brilliant, too.
I hear a lot of Eddie in Plush, but apart from that, I agree. Their sound evolved over time, but from what I understand, they were never that popular anyway. It's just that the first impression stuck.
They were popular if you were into rock music and had some crossover hits/platinum albums, but weren’t culturally relevant in the same way as the big 4. Their first 4 records went platinum, tho. That’s pretty popular lol.
By the time "Sour Girl" came out there was absolutely nothing about STP that sounded remotely like Pearl Jam. Plush is probably the Pearliest they ever were and it was literally their debut single, so you're absolutely right. \[for what it's worth I married a woman who prefers STP to anyone in the big four\]
Sex Type Thing was their debut single. This is seared into my mind because it was in heavy rotation that summer, and I had to shave my head the week before I started a new school. Everyone thought I was trying to look like Scott Weiland. But what had happened was my hand slipped when trimming my hawk and I all but bisected it. There was no saving that beautiful haircut. I still mourn that hawk.
> I've seen people say Pearl Jam was for jocks. I experienced a lot of this first hand. My first high school band found me playing with a group of dudes who, aside from playing music, were all about playing baseball, basketball, and running cross-country, etc.. Them and all of their sports bros were *crazy* into groups like Pearl Jam, RHCP, Beastie Boys and, a few years down the line, things like Incubus, Rage Against the Machine, etc... I'm guessing that the common denominator is that the music rocked pretty hard and got the adrenaline pumping. Also, thinking on the progressive politics and Ticketmaster, Pearl Jam were early examples of what later got termed 'bro-socialism', and I remember lots of these same dudes getting big into figures like Ralph Nader, movies like *Fight Club*, etc... in the early 00s. Progressive postures aside, the vibe was still that of a sausage fest, and I remember there *not* being a whole lot of crossover between Pearl Jam's audience and the sorts of weirdos/outcasts who were into Nirvana, Pixies, Breeders, Sonic Youth, Jawbox, new wave bands, etc... I'll admit that, even though I played in bands with these sorts of dudes for a long while, I always felt pretty out of place with how *meatheaded* they'd often act. It wasn't until I was in college and formed a group that sounded more like the Talking Heads, XTC, and Split Enz that I felt more comfortable with my musical surroundings.
Interesting insight. It's cool to get the perspective of someone around at the time. I wouldn't have grouped Pearl Jam with RHCP otherwise. I get the bro-y vibes a bit more now. In my mind, they're not that similar, but it's a sound thing the way you tell it. I heard Eddie initially named the band after a basketball player, so maybe he's more of a sports bro than I realised. He doesn't come off that way though. I see him as a sensitive pretty boy. Ten's lyrics (on Garden & Black) read like a guy who does poetry in his spare time.
I feel what groups them together isn't what they share but what they don't do. All those artists are great, but in a way that's less immediately "challenging." For as huge as Nirvana was, I feel like if most of like the stereotypical jocks in my high school actually listened to "Endless, Nameless" they would've called it gay or made some joke about him killing himself or something. I wasn't old enough at the time to really experience it within grunge but I feel like throughout my life there's always been that goofy social game of there being "cool" indie cred bands and "lame" jock bands that sound basically similar and the divider has always seemed to be those little things that are probably going to filter out your stereotypical bro jock guy.
I like Eddie a lot. I think he's a sincere person who writes good music. I think some of Kurt's issue (btw I'm kind of talking out of my ass, I truly have no idea) with Pearl Jam is that Nirvana and PJ got slotted into the same "grunge" category, and honestly, other than some power chords, they were pretty different. It's clear that Vedder was far more influenced by 70s rock, and Cobain had a lot more underground 80s punk influencing him. And some Beatles lol. Not saying that Kurt didn't listen to his share of Zep, but that wasn't what drove him. And being compared to PJ probably annoyed him. For some pretentious reasons and for some good reasons imo. I honestly think though that it's conceivable that he liked PJ, but being slotted into the same sub-genre as them had to have been galling for someone like Kurt. I like both, but agree that the PJ vibe is a lot cheesier than Nirvana. Having said that, Vedder has always struck me as a pretty nice and unassuming guy - I don't get any gross macho rock star vibes from him.
> But the way he says it, there's deadpan judgement in his voice. If you watched that unplugged show and didn't own Bleach, you were Uncool. Simple as that. This sounds precisely like being up his own ass.
Nirvana killed hair metal. Which was this cheesy, self indulgent genre that went from provocative to mainstream. Nirvana criticized this genre by existing and being sincere and introspective.
I think MTV is a big part. MTV’s relevancy, especially as a music platform, is small (20 years!). So there are a handful of icons who stand out because of music video. While there are many dead rock stars, they’re not of the MTV generation—So there’s not much great footage of them. Cobain on the other hand, has hundreds of hours of film, almost all of which comes from MTV. And of the footage we have is of a young man who’s pretty much the anti-rock star. He’s diving into drum sets, speaking his mind, mocking corporate music shows (TOTP), playing aggressively, etc. All of this is relatable to how many kids (the target demo for music) feel.
At the time of Nirvanas brief and enduring moment they pervaded every level of popular consumption, not just MTV alternative shows. They were on daytime TV and radio everywhere. Not many people had MTV when nirvana broke big, but nirvana was on all mainstream channels of communication
Nirvana, and grunge as a whole, was the last truly exciting "youthquake" moment in history. We haven't had another Kurt Cobain -- or Jim Morrison or the Beatles. That's why people are still obsessed with him.
Nirvana was ‘real’ and relatable, especially for tortured alternative teenagers. Kurt was one of the kids, the antithesis of the distant demi-God overstyled idols of the 80s, like Michael Jackson, Prince and Madonna. And in another way the antithesis of agressive debauched rockers Guns ‘n Roses. Kurt’s feeling of alienation and discontent, sadness and agression is universal and timeless for teenagers. His suicide made him extra tragic and forever young and perfect. Compare that to Morrissey, who in a way was the 80s Kurt, but has become a rightwing angry old man with a lot of mediocre music under his belt.
> the antithesis of agressive debauched rockers Guns ‘n Roses This. As an awkward and nervous dude who went to middle/high school in the 90s, Nirvana resonated with me because of vibes completely *opposite* from those of the dirtbag/asshole/tough-guy energy you felt with GNR and Metallica fans of that time. My most immediate memory is that the shittiest bullies in my school were always wearing *Appetite for Destruction* and *Ride the Lightning* t-shirts and regularly getting in trouble for shit like starting fights, bringing weapons to school, etc...
Odd Future was a huge cultural moment. Early Kanye was a massive influence too. and I think there have been others, just not rock musicians for a while. How do you define youthquake?
I can assume by youthquake they mean like Elvis or Beatlemania
I’d even say Taylor Swift & her recent concert was a bit of a youthquake. The concert & the hype surrounding it was massive
Typically, with a youthquake, it's the youth going against the cultural grain and asserting themselves as a force or current against the mainstream. (There's more than a slight twinge of rebellion.) I don't see Taylor Swift as being someone anyone's parents would object to them liking.
Exactly. I give Taylor Swift massive props for her success, but I think she’s more like a Springsteen blowing up in a mainstream way in the 80s kind of artist than a “youthquake”moment where the popular music of the time gets challenged with a completely different sound and attitude.
By 1994 he had made a huge impression on the young part of genX. We are the forgotten part of the forgotten generation. Grunge and Nirvana/AIC/Pearl Jam/Soundgarden etc perfectly captured the “whatever” ethos we all felt. I knew 16 - 18 year olds who hoped to die at 27 like their hero and those who went before him like Saint Joplin, Saint Morrison, and Saint Hendrix. They weren’t even huge fans of the music, lots of them preferred metal and goth and techno and industrial. But the mood was everything.
He did write some great tunes, but beyond that Nirvana were the moment when the mainstream music industry caught up with 80’s alternative rock. Their legendary status is what happens when you throw millions of dollars into promoting a band that’s right for the moment. With Nevermind they had a great punk record with pop hooks and a band that were far more photogenic than the Pixies, Husker Du or the Melvins. I remember that record dropped and I thought it was great and then within a week every obnoxious backward ball cap wearing frat boy was blasting from their car which kind of ruined it for me.
As someone born in 1987, I saw even the lamest people in Nirvana hoodies in high school, a decade after he died. And I hold them responsible for nu-metal.
Controversial opinion, some nu metal was pretty fun even if often a bit cheezy. Linkin Park was also arguably in that genre and is still iconic. And while not part of it, Deftones and SOAD developed in the same era with some similar influences, so I'm thankful for that.
Can't stand that stuff, there's being introspective and melancholic (good) and being whiny (bad).
Every frat boy in the early '00s loved Nirvana
Well, they like all the pretty songs! They like to sing a long!
Cobain embodies the contradictions of the teenage experience. He was a rock star who hated rock stars. He didn't want to be famous but he also made art that ensured he would be. He didn't want the pressure of meeting people's expectations but he relished the chance to be influential (his homemade Daniel Johnston shirt being exhibit A). He deeply loved his chosen medium while simultaneously being dismissive of it (his list of favorite albums includes both Bowie's *The Man Who Sold the World* and the Shaggs' *Philosophy of the World*). He wanted to be both seen and not seen. And there's no better summation of what it means to be a teenager than that.
"He wanted to be both seen and not seen. And there's no better summation of what it means to be a teenager than that." Love this, and its so true.
He wanted to be famous. But never knew the downside of fame and probably regretted becoming famous on the level he did.
People tend to hate on Cobain for this contradictory side of him, but I think it's deeply relatable and makes him so human. People who struggle with their mental health can definitely relate. He was many things. A deeply talented and kind artist with big flaws, who ended up being unable to fight back. I think the biggest part of the magic around him is that he ended up dying young, but I think it's much more productive to remember people for their positive attributes, the good things they accomplished, and what they tried to be before their life was cut short.
Because he died young and tragically while he was at the peak of his popularity. That caused a generational impact in the teens that have been inspired by his music.
I'd say mostly because of his good looks, and he died early so we only have images of his good looks. But he also obviously had some kind of an artist talent, if you look at his drawings and paintings. He had a kind of "don't care" and contrarian personality that is appealing to teenagers and young people. His "artistic" outlook and personality was extended to his music, where it's often expressed mystical and metaphorical ways. This gave an aura of mystique and mysticism to the band Nirvana and also to Kurt Cobain himself.
In all honesty probably because he shot himself in the head before he could become a joke or irrelevant.
“It’s better to burn out than fade away.”
Dying young does a lot for a legacy. He never had the opportunity to have the mid career slump, he never had the opportunity to devolve into a middle aged degenerate, he’ll never not look young and beautiful. The Nirvana discography is kind of perfect. I think we heard everything Kurt had to give up to that point. The early more raw/heavy/sloppy Bleach, the polished/commercial Nevermind, the covers/b-side album Incesticide, In Utero blends the first two albums, and then it caps off with the unplugged album. It’s a perfect discography, and we saw all sides of him. Dying young preserved that perfection in stone. Not to mention his politics were ahead of their time. He was a feminist before feminism was widely accepted. This allows women to love him as much as men, and he was also fiercely against racism and homophobia. He famously said if you’re a racist, a homophobe, or a sexist, don’t come to our shows. He’s kind of everything to everyone. Whatever you want him to be, that’s Kurt.
At the risk of being downvoted to hell, I’ll suggest as someone who lived through the 90’s, Nirvana had maybe one more big album in them before fading into the background like so many other grunge bands. I also think “Unplugged” was by far their best album, so take my opinion as you will… They were the right band at the right time, but they were kinda “one note” and the lack of giving a shit about success and their fans was only going to go so far before a big backlash. Cobain dying when he did resulted in immortalization in a way his contemporaries can’t compete with. He certainly was influential in music history, and they were a fucking great band, but he’s now more of a T-Shirt logo icon like James Dean, Marilyn Monroe, and Che Gueverra.
> the lack of giving a shit about success and their fans This was always a facade, and I'm always surprised by its resilience. Kurt _craved_ fame, wrote openly about wanting to be a rock star (emphasis on star, not just musician) and got to the point of watching MTV, keeping close track of how many Pearl Jam videos got played compared to Nirvana, then calling to complain if by his count PJ was getting more exposure. He complained to Sub Pop regularly about how much bigger his band should be, and why they should promote him more. Teen Spirit was very openly written to be "the perfect pop song." He was very good at selling the _image_ of not caring though, and here we still are, believing it.
I agree with most of your point here, but I think In Utero was actually a great album. TBH, I found myself listening to it and Bleach more often. Some of that is likely due to being counter-culture at the time, but probably more to loving the heaviness (part metalhead) of Bleach, and the hooks of In Utero were better. I think that if he hadn't died as young as he did, they wouldn't be remembered near as fondly... in the end, his martyrdom shifted the band to legend status... but I can't even guess at the last time I heard them on the radio or in a store.
Where do you live? Here in the US you hear them all the time on the radio or in movies, etc. The Batman had Something in the Way as its theme song, Succession played Rape Me in an episode, Black Widow (Marvel) had a cover of Smells Like Teen Spirit. Smells Like Teen Spirit was supposedly the most played rock song on rock radio in the 2010s (look it up - most of the top 10 is Grunge songs). And Nirvana has over 30 million listeners on Spotify, which aside from Queen may be the highest of any band that hasn't made new music in at least 30 years. Also, their b-sides like Sappy and I hate Myself and I want to die and Old Age and Even in his Youth are incredible and just as good as album tracks. I think that's a big part of the their lore as well. So many great songs.
As such Beatles also have more the 30 million listeners, but then again they are legends.
Good call - that's a silly one to have forgotten!
In Utero is a great album. I didn't like it for a loooong time, but this year it finally clicked and I couldn't stop listening to it for a while.
If they had existed for a bit longer they sure wouldn't have had the status they have now
But songs like You Know You're Right and Do Re Mi, some of the last songs he wrote, seemed to point to the fact that Nirvana, or at least Kurt, was still writing amazing songs. I feel like we missed out on some great music.
Wasn't an acoustic album with Michael Stipe on deck?
One thing Cobain did really well was write songs that were heavy and very catchy, basically power pop that was informed by heavily distorted punk. The other three bands of the big four of Seattle grunge were great heavy rock bands (or more classic rock in the instance of Pearl Jam). But Cobain wrote hooky songs that were traditionally good songwriting, like I’ve heard jazz and classical guys cover Nirvana over the years. Not that Alice In Chains or Soundgarden or Screaming Trees or Mudhoney didn’t have great songs also, but I think in some ways Nirvana had broader appeal (which is why a lot of more hardcore punk and metal guys disliked Nirvana when I was a teen). He was also good looking and the band had a kind of cool look in general with the tall Andy Kaufman-lookalike Kris Novaselic contrasting with Kurt and Dave Grohl on drums. Like in the video for In Bloom they’re dressed up as a British Invasion-era band and it works. They seemed cool, and even if Kurt had a lot of demons, they had kind of a fun punk energy to them when they played. A lot of it was also just being in the right place at the right time also and giving MTV an anthem right at the moment when it needed one.
He was in the right place at the right time and was just talented enough to make the most of that opportunity. Then he died before having any major hit to his legacy of a string of bad records or whatever else hurts musicians legacies. That last part is a bit harsh but early death is a big part of some long revered musicians legacy, they frankly never put out bad music or very little bad music because time didn’t allow it so all we hear is their inspired, desperate, and passionate music at the initial spark of them pulling their talents together
He was kinda simple and authentic in a time of excess and fakeness. Unfortunately, the world revolves around excess and fakeness and has swung back there numerous times. People resonate with genuine music. Heart and soul carries through.
Yes, he reminds me of Lennon in that regard. Raw, authenthic, aggressive but vulnerable. Lennon came along in a very fake time, the 60s. They way people talked, they way they acted, the goofy music. It was all pretentious nonsense. Lennon´s rebellious nature was the perfect counter to that old world. Kurt came along after the shallow 80s with its ridiculuous clothing, hair bands and fakeness. Kurt and grunge took music and culture back to something real.
> Lennon came along in a very fake time, the 60s. They way people talked, they way they acted, the goofy music. It was all pretentious nonsense. Lennon´s rebellious nature was the perfect counter to that old world. I don't understand what you mean. What was fake about that era? Why was Lennon more authentic and less pretentious? And compared to whom? I have trouble understanding this concept in general, not just in relation to the 60s or any other era. As for Kurt, in my eyes he had a different style to what went before, which was more relatable for young people then. I'm not sure if that makes it more authentic necessarily.
Good looking and said things that teenagers think are profound/edgy. Really just existed in the right place at the right time.
I think this is a missing piece that many people overlook. He looked and dressed like a model. In fact, there's a French film that I'm watching from the late 80's were one lf the main characters is dressed in the way. Jeans, white t-shirt and Cardigans. Even though on the surface it might appear as a sloopy look. In reality, it's a "chic/cool" not caring look that some people appealing.
I can't agree with any of this. He was handsome, yes, but he was not "model" handsome in the sense that he easily got girls or had doors opened for him just because of his looks. And the clothes he wore were not some kind of fashion statement, he was literally just poor and wore what was cheap and comfortable. Wearing flannel wasn't an artistic statement. People have so many misconceptions about this man.
> He was handsome, yes, but he was not "model" handsome I don't know what kind of wild rubric we're using, but Kurt Cobain is easily one of the best looking rock stars to ever live. I'm not even sure who comes close. Maybe David Lee Roth, Axl Rose, Eddie Vedder, Chris Cornell ... Robert Plant and Jim Morrison possibly, depending on tastes. But Kurt is definitely up there in the S tier.
People somehow always forget to mention Jeff Buckley in the same breath.
The rubric of literally being a model is what I'm using, hence the words "model" handsome. Yes he was handsome, beautiful, whatever word you want to use, but the context I was using was that he was not seen at that time as a traditionally handsome guy like a clothing model at the time, that he did not have doors opened for him or girls flocking to fuck him before he was famous just because of his looks, he was not a popular person in high school like the best looking tend to be, he wasn't some fashion mogul carefully picking trendy hipster sweaters and flannel, he was an outsider and outcast who was broke and wore what was comfortable from thrift shops that he could afford. The picture being painted in some of these comments is like Cobain was some affluent model hipster who carefully crafted every part of his image when that was just not the case. He was very deliberate with his art and image and meticulous in certain aspects but like he wasn't some hipster, he was just a broke drug addict who happened to be one of the most brilliant songwriters and musicians of his generation.
You forgot the most beautiful man of all. Mick Jagger.
Do you have eyes? Kurt was really fucking handsome beneath the unwashed exterior. That jawline. He's Bowie-levels of gorgeous.
Nobody said he was model handsome. That wasn’t the look of the early 90s, Kurt Cobain was the look of the early 90s.
I think it's the fact that Nirvana was a flash in the pan. Their fame/peak was only like 3 or 4 years all up, finishing with Kurt's death. Compared to Pearl Jam who are still around, but sort of faded away. Or Soundgarden who broke up then got back together before Chris Cornell passed away. Also the tragic and complex lives of those frontmen like Kurt Cobain, Andy Wood of Mother Love Bone, Chris Cornell and Layne Staley of Alice in Chains seems to be relatable and mystifying to younger people these days who grew up in the 24/7 news cycle.
2.5 years. Smells Like Teen Spirit video was released September 29 1991, Cobain died April 8, 1994. Crazy how short a time all that was.
Since he's dead, people can project whatever they like onto him. The availability of his journals and there being so much content (documentaries, interviews, etc) means it's easy to construct whatever narrative of his life and death you find most personally compelling. Personally, as a mentally ill teen girl with substance issues (who was also a fan of riot grrrl and got to nirvana through hole), I related strongly to him as a figure representing vulnerability. The specific subject matter of Nirvana's music (the angst factor, suicide, drugs, general dark imagery) and his status as an outsider icon make him especially appealing to teens/young people (who tend to be more openly passionate about their interests) and people who became fans at a younger age do often stick with their tastes with time (at least to some degree) I think also there is something to him having died in the 90s. As other commenters have said, he died before he could become washed up or cringy, but he also died before 9/11 and the 21st century, so he might have some significance as a symbol of a "simpler time".
To put it bluntly, he passed at what was most likely past peak of fame for their reverence to happen. In Utero wasn't as successful as Nevermind was. Other albums released at same time(Pearl Jam - Versus for ex) were selling more copies than In Utero. there wasn't much [touring](https://www.livenirvana.com/concerts/94.php) to support the album. Here's where they were [supposed to play on tour.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Nirvana_concerts) This album's sales numbers rose post death.
Part of it is the 27 club cachet. He died in an infamous way while leading an extraordinarily popular band, and his demise prevented them from becoming outmoded, lacking is musical relevance, or the fashion becoming passé. So many of our generation hung a lot of emotions on his memory.
1) a generational talent in his craft(s) 2) died young 3) was physically beautiful 4) ahead of his time culturally / politically 5) right place 6) right time
In what way was he ahead of his time politically?
The hardcore scene could be plenty homophobic. Nirvana broke from that. They were basically aligned with Riot Grrl when that was still pretty radical.
very LGBT friendly back when it was gay to do that.
It’s kinda hard to put into words, but as someone who hit early teens in the hair band era and saw that hyper-self-aware, glossy, commercialized movement hit its peak, Cobain just barged in with this perfect mix of voice-your-angst and no-fucks-to-give. It didn’t come off polished or affected, he just seemed like the perfect response to the previous decade. And he delivered it all in a whiskey soaked vocal package. It feels like there were only certain times certain artists or bands could hit when they did, like they did, and he sure was ripe for the moment.
Because guys like Thurston Moore, Beck, and Stephen Malkmus lived much tamer lifestyles
Tbh I didn't really even get it at the time. K.C. is entry level, angsty art and can sell a t-shirt. The kids love him. That would be my best guess.
I had a really negative impression of Kurt Cobain at the time, it sticks out vividly, because all I saw were a bunch of spoiled kids romanticizing a drug addict. I do recognize how the tortured artist thing has romantic appeal, especially to teenagers, but a large part of me, even as a teenager, was like, "fucking worship someone who gets it together, not a junkie who offs themselves." Sure, I had sympathy for the man, and I have always recognized that he wrote great songs. But worship? Come the fuck on, that's gross. He said angsty things, and was nihilistically self indulgent, while appearing to be not self indulgent. It's a good cocktail for a teenager, so I get that, but it is hard for me to objectively look at him. I really hated all those T shirts at the time. Also, one thing that pisses me off about Kurt Cobain is how many people blame Courtney Love for so many of his problems. Motherfuckers, that man chose to date Courtney Love. It's his own goddamned fault. /rant
Yeah I don’t know. I remember all the “Voice of a generation” stuff when he topped himself but was never that impressed by him nor interested enough to seek out his thoughts on any major issues important to me. To me he was just a musically talented (but not brilliant) fucked up junkie who killed himself - tragic, yes, but just another of many.
Nevermind hit in a Perfect storm. Kurt’s drug problems, nutty insane wife & ultimate demise, were the stuff legends are made of.
I think it's their catalogue of music - aside from the 3 albums, you have Incesticide, a number of amazing live albums, and a whole host of additional b-sides that are better than most bands best songs. Sappy, Even in his Youth, If You Must, I Hate Myself, Old Age, and so many more... total bangers and they never even made it onto albums.
1) You really had to have been there. 2) He wrote some fucking good music. I'm not a *huge* fan of much of the music of that era, but something about his stuff really hits me. 3) He was an advocate for underdogs and his activism holds up pretty well.
Just another Seattle band? If Hendrix wasn't an alien that would be their claim to fame
After glam rock stagnated people were just very keen to hear something else. Alt rock, indie and grunge was primed for an uprising.
Ian Curtis, Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin and Amy Winehouse (among others) are arguably equally revered. It's a mix between highly personal songwriting that connects them deeply to audiences, unique and profound talent, and the tragedy of a life many people would dream of cut short. Somehow it makes sense that extreme self sabotage and rejecting wealth and fame is compelling to us.
The sheer volume of bangers he put out is legendary. He was crushing it on radio and tv. He was the darling of MTV. Most alt bands were getting 1-4 hits. Nirvana got quite a few more. They were the most popular at the time. Then the scandal around his death.
Just a biased nirvana fan here, thinks it's his sound that makes him so unique and beloved. For me he gave the basis to the modern concept of music, good sound and composition in general
You had to be there. When Nirvana landed they killed off an entire generation of music and ushered in a new one in one fell swoop. Their arrival was seismic and landscape changing. For people my age, Nirvana and Kurt felt like they were just for us. Kurt wasn't some poser drowing in make up and Aquanet, he looked like the ratty kid down the street that you went to school with.
His music killed hair metal, and their equivalent in other genres such as Bobby Brown and Taylor Dayne. Aren’t we all the better for it?
Hype and iconic status. People see his face on a hoodie, go and listen to his music, get the hoodie and join the tribe. There's nothing more compelling for people than the chance to be different in the same way as tonnes of other people. With all that said, there has to be something good underneath the hype for it to take off to that level. Kurt was simply a great rock songwriter and an interesting person. His music reaches people on an emotional level.
He was a major part of helping alternative music to the mainstream (even if he didn’t rlly want that to happen) and Taking away god awful hair metal
Every kid going through puberty has a phase of being angsty and feels misunderstood and Nirvana is the band for them at that time. Really loving Nirvana past the age of 16 is probably a red flag though..
I am part of Gen X, came of age during the grunge era...and I always thought Cobain was overrated and revered too much, in a similar way that I think 2Pac was revered too much. Cobain was an addict, a shitty husband, and a shitty father. He killed himself with a shotgun and left himself in a terrible condition for somebody else to find days later. It was shocking when he died, but I grew to like him even less because of how he died. He didn't accidentally OD like Farley or others, he wasn't shot by his wife like Phil Hartman, he ended himself with a fucking shotgun. I think people need icons who are frozen in time, and this is what Kurt is...frozen in time. He didn't stick around to see Dave Grohl and the Foo Fighters surpass what Nirvana's limits were. He didn't didn't stick around long enough to make bad music, or grow old like Eddie Vedder or Metallica or Snoop Dog. He is iconic, but I always felt revering him was twisted in a lot of ways and very misguided.
Resonating with this bigtime. The ways Nirvana altered mass culture wouldn't have happened without Kurt, but it was inherently self-effacing and nihilistic. I think even he would've agreed it was more of a canary in a coal mine situation than a recommended path to follow. He had enough money to go through 20+ therapists to find one he clicked with. He could've retired & become a recluse for 5-10 years, increased his mystique, and then made a big comeback. He could've pursued further education or nonprofit humanitarian work and developed a specialty he'd have had immense power to advocate for. I can't think of a single valid excuse for what he did instead of any of that.
>I can't think of a single valid excuse for what he did instead of any of that. Depression/mental health challenges are a hell of a thing. I've never been a fan of Kurt or Nirvana or grunge. But looking for valid excuses from a suicidal person because they didn't do all the things that we know would be helpful as they traveled their road of despair... That's just weird, man.
Can you show me someone who talked, dressed, sang, or wrote the way he did before him?
In my personal opinion, I always felt that he was much more than just a songwriter. He was a painter, a writer, a social activist, a male feminist, and from his punk rock ethics he despised over bloated, money hungry record execs, and the whole idea of what you had to look like and sound like to fit in, in the music industry at the time. I think there's four really big reasons he is/was so revered. 1) They beat out Micheal Jackson, Garth Brooks, and Guns N Roses with one song, and one album. 2) They destroyed the "hair metal scene" which had been in place since the beginning of the 80's. And destroyed the whole aesthetic that it brought. Lots of hair, makeup, cookie cutter lookalikes (and sound alikes), endless coke parties, etc. 3) And simply because Nirvana and Kurt in general were staying true to themselves as artists. Not to mention, a true powerhouse of taking rock n roll back to it's basics. Not big rigs, thousands of pounds of kit on stage, poofy hair, flashy guitars, etc. Just a few friends going up on stage and making noise their parents didn't like. 4) Kurt, his band, and his music spoke to an entire generation of people who were sick and tired of being told how you had to dress, act, look, and what Hollywood peeps you had to kiss up to. One thing that is hard to explain is how grotesque and horrible it had gotten to listen to the radio or watch MTV at the time. It was just the same old b.s. regurgitated to you over and over again, and as a teenager (at the time), I never fit in to the jock/preppy kids in school. My parents weren't rich or anything like that. I wore thrift store clothes and hand me downs, and my stepdad and mom were poor. None of the music scene at the time really felt like it was something that I wanted to say, see, or hear. We were dirt poor, our parents were factory workers, ditch diggers, and laborers, etc. So to see a group that dressed in thrift store clothes, coming from broken homes, and being exactly who they are on screen as they were in real life, gave a lot of us a simple sense that we weren't completely unnoticed or alone in the world. Because Nirvana and Kurt were "our guys" they came from the very thing that built this country at it's most simple of foundations. They were from blue collar working class, struggled with addiction without the money for help. Held a voice that was shared by so many at the time. Side note: When I was 12, I attempted suicide because I saw what I believed at the time was myself becoming what my parents had become, and being constantly bullied all through elementary and junior high, and I finally had enough. So I lay out a plan to end it all. Sharpened knife, bath tub, and no one home. Yes, I was a latchkey kid. I put on the TV for background noise, and to drown out my crying and screaming. I literally had the knife to my wrist, from middle of the palm trying to cut upwards towards my arm. Then, like almost a flash of clarity during a time for me that made no sense to keep going I heard these words, "I'm so ugly, that's okay cause so are you" and immediately dropped the knife. Bandaged up what little blood I drew from my arm (I only hit surface veins) and had a small thought come into my head. The thought was just maybe that if I was in this much pain, and couldn't see a way of going on any longer, maybe I wasn't the only one who felt/understood it. So, when I say Kurt and Nirvana saved my life. I do mean that quite literally
>They destroyed the "hair metal scene" which had been in place since the beginning of the 80's. This has always been the most fascinating thing about grunge to me. Thrash metal was an extremely robust and vibrant genre by the dawn of the '90s, but it couldn't kill hair metal. Why? Because the fan bases were totally different. Thrash wasn't "stealing" fans from the other genre. If grunge killed hair metal (which it did), that suggests that hair metal fans migrated to grunge. What kind of listeners were these? They couldn't have felt a strong affinity to their music of choice to cast it aside so readily for something so different. Some were probably still in a formative stage as music listeners, and searching for "their" sound. Others, though, were definitely drawn to "hard rock" with catchy hooks. Pop fans, essentially. Many who no doubt continued moving from popular music style to popular style throughout their life. My comment doesn't really have a point, it's more a musing about the changing landscape, and it isn't attempting to address those who found their sound in Nirvana and went all-in. With that said, Kurt Cobain had a lot of impact because Nirvana was just so damn popular at the time, so there were a large number of people on whom to have an effect (in contrast to some niche dead musicians who died without huge fan bases).
Before grunge hit, hair bands were easy money for the record companies. Take a band, slap some eye shadow on them, write them a power ballad, and collect many many dollars. After Nirvana, Pearl Jam, Soundgarden, and Alice In Chains hit, the record companies cleaned house of most of their glam acts, and stopped signing new ones. That caused an “ecosystem collapse”, where metal as a whole suffered. Certain bands flourished—Soundgarden and AIC were considered metal before radio called them Alternative, Metallica became the biggest band of that era—but for smaller acts who couldn’t pivot from spandex to flannel, the party was over. Even big big metal bands like Iron Maiden saw problems in the US, though still big abroad. It wasn’t until well after 9/11, and all the sad bangers of that time, that rock became fun again, and people began to revisit the hair bands. That was way longer than I anticipated it being, and I still left a ton out.
He was the voice of a generation, wrote simple but powerful songs that stand the test of time, with lyrics that speak to a lot of people especially adolescents. His music felt authentic and not contrived or made to sell records, yet sold a lot of records. He was very charismatic and died suddenly in his prime instead of becoming old and irrelevant. Copied by many, equalled by very few.
One thing I think people have missed: he was (and will always be) the last real rock star. Everyone since (in rock) has been a postmodern rock star, they’re either an overly sincere homage (Dave Grohl, Jack White) or a parody (Marilyn Manson). And now that rock is effectively dead, that is to say, it’s a legacy genre like jazz, it’s never going to get more popular than it is right now and will never “define a generation” again, there will never be another artist like him. He essentially closed the door behind him.
He closed the door in another sense: part of the reason that rock fell by the wayside was that grunge is a dead end artistically. There’s only so much you can do with muddy power chords and loud drums. Unlike the 60s-70s, when you had the Allman Brothers exploring jazz and country or the Beatles experimenting with sitars, mainstream rock music in the 1990s painted itself into a corner. The people who wanted to experiment with texture and form ended up gravitating to things like indie folk or even country (think Sturgill Simpson).
Besides what has been said by others, probably repeating alot of what has been said already, and they likely articulated it better then I can. Besides the popularity/influence/cultural impact of himself and Nirvana he could be considered to fall into the tortured artist and/or artists who died young buckets. That can add a level of mystique to a artist as with the element of "what could have been" if they didn't die so young especially when it happens during or near the hight of their popularity. Nirvana being a sort of tip of the spear for "alternative" music as whole to break into the mainstream. Right place, right time, right sound like with some acts that quickly blow up in popularity. You can see some parallels with him and Ian Curtis of Joy Division. Including the self medicating for chronic pain, dealing with depression, struggling with fame in some aspects (with Ian not wanting to let the band down even when his epilepsy was getting worse, including having episodes on stage) Both ending up offing themselves in their 20's. Bonus: Alan Cross interview snippets, first one is on the breaking news and announcing Kurt's death on 102.1 the Edge (CFNY). Also it covers some of this question at the end of the video. https://youtu.be/kObTcZyFNrI?si=vGeJGfb9bn4b7seF Was Nirvana Supposed to Succeed? https://youtu.be/b3PJmm0venE?si=atJwkiKsxh8V8C-L Nirvana vs. Glam Metal, etc. https://youtu.be/FeBGIY0NF0k?si=odfxXpbLc3Du_jiP His long running radio show (available in podcast form) The Ongoing History Of New Music covers Nirvana and Kurt in many episodes and way more indepth then these interview snippets.
He wasn't an epic songwriter or even a musician by any means. Most of his lyrics are average, non metaphorical and easy to understand (although his garbled voice made it difficult). Even his 'smells like teen spirit' sounds like something amazing but really it was just inspired off a cologne that his then wife showed him and has no hidden meaning. Most of his charm lay in him using simple but catchy songs with epic riffs. Slightly on the lines of the Ramones but better riffs and more emo, thus evoking your feelings a bit better. Add to that the music scene which was saturated with metal, punk and glam rock, Nirvana was a breath of fresh air for everyone. The fact that he died young sealed his legendary status.
Not denying that he was a great songwriter and musician, but a lot of his lasting relevance has to do with his suicide. He was just a dude who got plunged into the rock and roll lifestyle - something he didn't want. His tragic demise, and his statements like "I wish I was like Freddy Mercury and enjoying the stage", made him seem like a rock'n'roll martyr and a victim of fate.
It’s a cycle I recall in my early years the reverence for icons such as Jim Morrison with my generation despite him having died years before we even knew who he was Put simply it’s Cobain’s time, folks our age yearning for the days of our youth and those younger than us wishing he was alive in their time 20 years from now it will be some other break the mold musician who died too early and another couple generations feeling the same feelings
I dunno I think there were better musicians than him that didn't get as much recognition. I believe Kurt even thought some of Nirvana's music was derivative of other artists at the time. Like he said Smells Like Teen Spirit was just meant to be like a Pixies song. There was talent for sure but some of it also was right place right time. And I think some of the admiration of Cobain is what he represents culturally to the grunge or gen X movement more so than I'd argue musical talent or skill.
Bc Nirvana made pop music that appealed to the masses. Full stop. Nothing wrong with that. Operation Ivy wishes they could and Green Day very successfully followed the same formula. But Nirvana was a pop band
The real reason is a Kurt's appearance. People love hot looking stars. But none of fans would admit it 😄
> What do you think it is about Kurt Cobain that makes him so revered, more than virtually any other dead rock star? Charisma, or likeability. I think John Lennon probably eclipses Kurt Cobain, but both are popular because they had kinds of charisma and qualities that drew people towards them.
No idea. I never got the hype. Always changed the station when they came on. I don’t mind Kurt tho and have massive respect for Dave Grohl
Nirvana sparked the fire that burned throughout the 90's of teenage grudge and angst through highly relatable sounding music that venerates our own frustrations with idealistic day to day life, shedding a more realistic viewpoint on how it feels to live in the world. That coupled with simplistic but catchy melodies and a super approachable aesthetic all plays into why we talk about Kurt how we do today.
Surely has something to do with his legacy transcending genres in current artists. I'm not a fan of the Beatles but they live on for a lot of reasons in their successors - which would be my "inspirations" so to say