20 Years Since The Death Of Kurt Cobain

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namkcuR

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I don't start new threads very often in B&C anymore, but I felt like creating this one. It's been 20 years since Kurt Cobain's death. Think what you will of Nirvana's music - you might like it, you might think it's overrated, whatever - but there's no denying how huge they were in their brief time in the limelight, their influence on many bands that came after, and that Cobain's death was a major event in music in the 90s. Honestly, outside of Michael Jackson and Whitney Houston, I can't off the top of my head think of another musician's death since then that has generated the kind of media coverage that Cobain's death did. That kind of coverage of course probably has as much to do with the circumstances surrounding those deaths as it does the people who died, but still, it was there.

Anyway, it's hard to believe its been 20 years. I was only nine years old, but I remember the evening news talking about it on the day his body was found(April 8, he actually died on April 5). I don't remember exactly what was said, just that they talked about it.

I also remember MTV covering it...a lot. For a while. I remember Courtney Love going a little nuts over the phone during a wake for Cobain as part of that coverage.

And I remember a shift in rock music occurring after Cobain's death. "Grunge" faded and other alternative subgenres became popular.

So, yeah, I just felt like creating this thread for anyone who has any interest in discussing it. If you don't have any interest, cool, move right along.

Here is some coverage from the day he was found:

http://www.youtube.com/video/8qibk2XNemY 30 minutes of MTV coverage

http://www.youtube.com/video/Xof8CV_tITs ABC World News Tonight

http://www.youtube.com/video/rlDOlUsldoA Headline News

http://www.youtube.com/video/1vnT255QEaw Some local newscast showing peoples' reactions



And here are some current articles about this dark anniversary:

Kurt Cobain Remembered 20 Years After His Death

Cobain 20 Years Later: Smells Like Another Retrospective|Dave Tomar

‘Here We Are Now’: 20 years after Kurt Cobain’s death | Books | The Seattle Times

Recalling Kurt Cobain and Nirvana at Springfield Civic Center 20 years after his death | masslive.com

https://music.yahoo.com/blogs/music...na-10-best-songs-20-years-kurt-195632892.html

Kurt Cobain: Seattle PD release first photos of rocker's body just ahead of 20th anniversary of suicide - CBS News

Britpop and Kurt Cobain 20 years on - don't look back in anger | Music | The Guardian

Kurt Cobain Getting His Own Comic Book as Part of Tribute Series | Music News | Rolling Stone



Finally, this gives me a feeling of dread:

Kurt Cobain Musical Theater Production 'Very Likely,' Courtney Love Says | Music News | Rolling Stone



That's all.
 
I know this is supposed to be one of those events that you remember exactly where you were when you heard the news. But you know what? I don't.

I was very busy with my last semester of college and I didn't have a TV at the time. Internet of course barely existed. I'm sure someone told me but I really have no memory of it.
 
I remember hearing the news on the radio in the car. Went home and watched the coverage mostly on MTV.

Had seen Nirvana 6 months earlier in Fitchburg MA.
 
I was far too young to be swept up in the grunge era. I like a handful of Nirvana songs a good deal but because I'm not a big fan of the genre and because so many people eulogise and mythologise Cobain to ridiculous levels I've found myself pretty cynical about the man. I've got mates who are fans who treat him as a martyr, a god, as the saviour of music after the 80s, and it's always bugged me.

Just my two cents. One day I'll delve deeper into their catalogue and have a more informed point of view.
 
I was at work. A co-worker and friend told me the news, and I spent the last couple hours of the day before going home listening to the radio on headphones at my desk.
 
I was at college, in The Pit - the student union hangout/restaurant, with a friend. The TV was tuned to MTV, and Kurt Loder came on with breaking news.

I said "HOLY SHIT," and my friend said "Who's Kurt Cobain?"

So very few of us music majors at that school were into the rock and/or roll.
 
Honestly, outside of Michael Jackson and Whitney Houston, I can't off the top of my head think of another musician's death since then that has generated the kind of media coverage that Cobain's death did.

Harrison's death was big, and had a lot of coverage on TV, and the difference was people actually liked him as a person.
 
Harrison's death was big, and had a lot of coverage on TV, and the difference was people actually liked him as a person.

I thought of him...it's just my recollection was that he got coverage, but not quite as much as the others...but yeah you can include him.
 
Still one of my favourite eras in music. My whole musical obsession started with bands like U2, Pixies, Depeche Mode, Sonic Youth, but the emphasis was especially on those big Seattle bands. Oddly enough, Nirvana is probably my least favourite one, although that doesn't say much, because they were still pretty fucking amazing.

Some of my favourite tracks like Negative Creep and School are as visceral now as they have always been. I have always preferred the more violent, abrasive side of Nirvana to the more melodic one (Territorial Pissings is my favourite song from Nevermind). There was an energy to their music that I still find to be unique. Smells Like Teen Spirit - as overplayed as it is now - did open way for some great bands to get more attention.

The mythology around the man does get annoying. But he really was that talented.
 
Harrison's death: not a big deal media-wise. Yes, he died of cancer but it's not like he was young or in his prime.

And Houston and Jackson's deaths, while sudden, were directly or indirectly the result of unhealthy living, and people already thought they were in bad shape. Also not the same.

Cobain was someone who was young, in his prime, and near the peak of his popularity when he died. He had a young child at home. And he seemed to be on the cusp of a major change in direction musically.

So you have a situation like Hendrix where a talented individual dies with just a few albums under their belts, and the suicide angle made it sensational news. Plus, he was considered (deservedly or not) the spokesperson for an era in pop culture.

Really trumps the other examples.
 
Can I ask this - because I genuinely don't know. Did he have serious mental health issues? I want to tread carefully here because the last thing I want to do is come off sounding like INDY and call him selfish and an asshole for killing himself and leaving behind a family. It's just... in some of the conversations I've had with Nirvana and Cobain sycophants over the years, they paint his suicide as almost heroic... in a sense like he killed himself because he didn't want to sell out over his music, that he was taking some sort of anti-corporate stand by killing himself. I've honestly seen people who treat him as this Jesus-like figure, that his suicide was a way of "dying for our sins", dying for the sins of a music environment where there were label pressures and the like. And I guess I've probably fallen for that mythologising at times.
 
Yes, he did have serious mental health issues. People who kill themselves tend to have those. He also had physical health problems even before he became a serious addict.

The anti-corporate stand excuse is beyond ridiculous. Nirvana was hardly this "underground band", a label that is often attributed to them, especially when silly and unnecessary comparisons with Pearl Jam come into discussion.
 
Harrison's death: not a big deal media-wise. Yes, he died of cancer but it's not like he was young or in his prime.

And Houston and Jackson's deaths, while sudden, were directly or indirectly the result of unhealthy living, and people already thought they were in bad shape. Also not the same.

Cobain was someone who was young, in his prime, and near the peak of his popularity when he died. He had a young child at home. And he seemed to be on the cusp of a major change in direction musically.

So you have a situation like Hendrix where a talented individual dies with just a few albums under their belts, and the suicide angle made it sensational news. Plus, he was considered (deservedly or not) the spokesperson for an era in pop culture.

Really trumps the other examples.
Plus the manner of death was probably the most shocking outside of John Lennon or Dimebag Darrell.
 
I was 21 and a moderate fan of Nirvana when Cobain died. I wasn't surprised he had taken his life. He had tried before. It was sad because he was immensely talented to say the least. When he died, to me, grunge died. Probably for another year or so, you had the grunge ripple effect, but by 1996, that genre faded away. They were white hot during my college years and I'll never forget that time or the music.
 
Can I ask this - because I genuinely don't know. Did he have serious mental health issues? I want to tread carefully here because the last thing I want to do is come off sounding like INDY and call him selfish and an asshole for killing himself and leaving behind a family. It's just... in some of the conversations I've had with Nirvana and Cobain sycophants over the years, they paint his suicide as almost heroic... in a sense like he killed himself because he didn't want to sell out over his music, that he was taking some sort of anti-corporate stand by killing himself. I've honestly seen people who treat him as this Jesus-like figure, that his suicide was a way of "dying for our sins", dying for the sins of a music environment where there were label pressures and the like. And I guess I've probably fallen for that mythologising at times.


Cobain had a stomach problem that, I believe, no one could ever diagnose but that would cause him considerable physical discomfort/pain. Supposedly he first started using heroin because he claimed it was the only thing that made his stomach feel better. Of course that led to hard-core heroin addiction.

It is also generally accepted that he suffered from lifelong undiagnosed depression, which is probably at least partially stemmed from his pretty-much-unhappy childhood(broken home, didn't much care for either parent, spent a lot of time living with aunts/uncles, friends, etc, instead of them) and subsequent lack of love for himself.

He was a disturbed guy from what I read. Apparently he had been preoccupied with death since he was a child, often writing about it and painting(or otherwise creating works of art) about it.

As for the corporate/sell-out thing...I used to buy that when I was younger, as recent as my early 20s, but I'm almost 30 now and I recently read a book about him that pretty much spelled out that that was bullshit, that nobody in Nirvana was more aggressive about sending demo tapes out, 'making it' and getting a record deal than Cobain.

So, yeah, mix undiagnosed depression with undiagnosed physical ailments with heroin addiction, and it's not a good recipe.
 
Cobain had a stomach problem that, I believe, no one could ever diagnose but that would cause him considerable physical discomfort/pain. Supposedly he first started using heroin because he claimed it was the only thing that made his stomach feel better. Of course that led to hard-core heroin addiction.



It is also generally accepted that he suffered from lifelong undiagnosed depression, which is probably at least partially stemmed from his pretty-much-unhappy childhood(broken home, didn't much care for either parent, spent a lot of time living with aunts/uncles, friends, etc, instead of them) and subsequent lack of love for himself.



He was a disturbed guy from what I read. Apparently he had been preoccupied with death since he was a child, often writing about it and painting(or otherwise creating works of art) about it.



As for the corporate/sell-out thing...I used to buy that when I was younger, as recent as my early 20s, but I'm almost 30 now and I recently read a book about him that pretty much spelled out that that was bullshit, that nobody in Nirvana was more aggressive about sending demo tapes out, 'making it' and getting a record deal than Cobain.



So, yeah, mix undiagnosed depression with undiagnosed physical ailments with heroin addiction, and it's not a good recipe.


This is what I remember from the outset. Never even heard that "sell out" theory. Revisionist bullshit.
 
Cobain had a stomach problem that, I believe, no one could ever diagnose but that would cause him considerable physical discomfort/pain. Supposedly he first started using heroin because he claimed it was the only thing that made his stomach feel better. Of course that led to hard-core heroin addiction.

This. It's even mentioned in the suicide note. And I think his published journals cover this in detail. His mother also confirmed it after his death.

It seems crazy that at the end of the 20th century someone could have chronic pain that no drug would alleviate, but there you have it.
 
Cobain had a stomach problem that, I believe, no one could ever diagnose but that would cause him considerable physical discomfort/pain. Supposedly he first started using heroin because he claimed it was the only thing that made his stomach feel better. Of course that led to hard-core heroin addiction.



It is also generally accepted that he suffered from lifelong undiagnosed depression, which is probably at least partially stemmed from his pretty-much-unhappy childhood(broken home, didn't much care for either parent, spent a lot of time living with aunts/uncles, friends, etc, instead of them) and subsequent lack of love for himself.



He was a disturbed guy from what I read. Apparently he had been preoccupied with death since he was a child, often writing about it and painting(or otherwise creating works of art) about it.



As for the corporate/sell-out thing...I used to buy that when I was younger, as recent as my early 20s, but I'm almost 30 now and I recently read a book about him that pretty much spelled out that that was bullshit, that nobody in Nirvana was more aggressive about sending demo tapes out, 'making it' and getting a record deal than Cobain.



So, yeah, mix undiagnosed depression with undiagnosed physical ailments with heroin addiction, and it's not a good recipe.


huh. I knew about his depression issues, but didn't know as much about the stomach ailment. I'd be willing to bet he had crohn's disease or another form of ibd...it usually takes years to diagnose and even then, you need to have a great doctor to spot it. and then, it can be near impossible to manage if you've got severe disease that refuses to respond to treatments. I have it and have a vicodin script for joint pain that I take very occasionally. my symptoms are always their best the day after taking one, so I could see how heroin would help slow his stomach down, etc.

it's terrible how modern medicine failed him in multiple ways though...
 
wow yeah, not sure how I missed that when I was younger and listened to nirvana more regularly. it's extremely obvious looking at the lyrics now..."anemic royalty," "warm milk and laxatives," "cherry-flavored antacids."
 
Cobain had a stomach problem that, I believe, no one could ever diagnose but that would cause him considerable physical discomfort/pain. Supposedly he first started using heroin because he claimed it was the only thing that made his stomach feel better. Of course that led to hard-core heroin addiction.

It is also generally accepted that he suffered from lifelong undiagnosed depression, which is probably at least partially stemmed from his pretty-much-unhappy childhood(broken home, didn't much care for either parent, spent a lot of time living with aunts/uncles, friends, etc, instead of them) and subsequent lack of love for himself.

He was a disturbed guy from what I read. Apparently he had been preoccupied with death since he was a child, often writing about it and painting(or otherwise creating works of art) about it.

As for the corporate/sell-out thing...I used to buy that when I was younger, as recent as my early 20s, but I'm almost 30 now and I recently read a book about him that pretty much spelled out that that was bullshit, that nobody in Nirvana was more aggressive about sending demo tapes out, 'making it' and getting a record deal than Cobain.

So, yeah, mix undiagnosed depression with undiagnosed physical ailments with heroin addiction, and it's not a good recipe.

I didn't really know any of this, not even the heroin addiction, makes a lot more sense now, thanks.
 
I didn't really know any of this, not even the heroin addiction, makes a lot more sense now, thanks.

When he died he had enough heroin in his system to render a person essentially incapacitated, hence theories that he was murdered.
Courtney Love had him killed
 
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