Because I’m too lazy to actually count the number of times I’ve done this.
- Happy Discovery of Kurt Cobain’s Body Day! It should be noted that I was a huge Nirvana fan at one point–“Smells Like Teen Spirit” was the first song I ever learned start-to-finish on bass, in fact–and at one point I honestly thought they could have been as big as The Beatles had Cobain not offed himself. Oh well. What might have been…
- Today I took the first tentative steps toward finding my own place to live. It’s a little scary, and I almost wonder if I’m doing it too quickly. I’ve gone over my essential “game plan” of “pay off school debt, then worry about place to live”. And I’ll have paid off the debt earlier this month, so I wonder if I’m subconsciously realizing that I’m out of excuses, as it were, to get the heck out of here.
- In keeping with another webcomic page construction theory–“Make sure the comic is the star of the page”, I’m considering adding something like a “Latest song” link above the blog entries. It wouldn’t be an automatic play thing or anything like that, but it would put the latest song uploaded in a prominent place. I only wish I had thought of it before I had uploaded all but one track from The Six Day Exile. Oh well, hindsight and all that.
- I guess, in keeping with the first item I posted, I’ll leave you with this link to the first live performance of “Smells Like Teen Spirit”. Note how it’s a good 30 seconds longer and structured somewhat differently. Also note the completely different lyrics (Insert “You can understand him?” joke here). I actually like this early version of the song better than the final Nevermind version.
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Oddly, I remember Kurt Cobain’s announcement– I was playing tennis with my friend Carl Brault in Southington in the mid-afternoon. It was shocking for sure and like many other 18 year olds, I think i was more angry than sad–why would someone who had the world in his hand and talent to spare just end it all? Of course, I’ve never been married to Courtney Love either…
I think “what would have Nirvana done next” is one of those facinating questions. The Foo Fighters proved they had a very good songwriter with Dave Grohl, though I can’t picture Nirvana playing any of the FF songs. In Utero was a good CD and different enough from Nevermind to really hint at a new direction. Cobain obviously had the gift of melodic rock and there’s no reason to think he would have waned in that ability. That being said, no one knows how much suffering and life experience can actually feed an artist. Either way–it would have been cool to see what Nirvana in the 2000s would have done.
As for living on your own–well, in about 2 weeks I’ll be completely out of debt- and 32 years old. Maybe not the most conventional path, but I think my risks were all worth it. I certainly don’t think it’s too quickly–only you can decide for yourself–but I think it’s a great change. Heck, I moved to Colorado when I was 22– crazy, huh?
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Yeah, I remember hearing about it, although being all of 10 years old at the time, didn’t really appreciate how respected he was at the time (Of course, his death probably only served to increase said stature and respect). From an artistic perspective, clearly he didn’t want to be pigeonholed into doing just one type of music–heck, listen to Nevermind and contrast “Territorial Pissings” wth “Something in the Way”.
Perhaps the most amazing thing in hindsight is that “Smells Like Teen Spirit” was never supposed to get as big as it did–it was just supposed to be the sort of introduction to alternative fans, with “Come As You Are” hopefully being the big crossover hit (“Big” in this case meaning “Results in a gold album”, not “Sells megamillions and turns Nirvana into the unwilling voice of a generation”).
It’s an interesting argument though–KC seems to reluctantly be thrown into the spotlight but why even record a CD (or sign with a major label) if you’re not willing to play the role? I’m sure its more complicated then that in the end–and this complication only boosts his stature. All I know is that in highschool, black converse and flannel was everywhere (though not on me, for the most part).
I think there is a LITTLE bit of exaggeration to the idea “Smells Like Teen Spirit” was not expected to perform well– it was the lead song on Nevermind. That reminds me, I’m going to watch the Weird Al video of it on youtube :)