Nirvana Biography

Drummer Chad Channing soon quit and was replaced, briefly, by Mudhoney's Dan Peters for the single Sliver. By the end of the summer, Dave Grohl, formerly of Washington hardcore rockers Scream, had become Nirvana's drummer. After recording a six-song demo with producer Butch Vig, the band singed to major label Geffen and set about recording their second album, Nevermind. Released in September 1991, the record almost immediately became a hit, quickly selling out its initial shipment of 50,000 copies in the US. The album was propelled by the brilliant, power punk pop of single, Smells Like A Teen Spirit. Featuring all of Cobain's trademark sardonic fury, the song was an anthem for the blank generation. Cobain had managed to condense the collective frustrations and despair of teenage youth not seen since the Sex Pistols. Come As You Are was a slice of semi-acoustic, bruised beauty while Territorial Pissings was a rapid blast of hardcore punk. The album was full of choruses that exploded out of the chainsaw-riffing din.

By 1992 Nevermind had become a phenomenon commercially and artistically, selling 10m copies worldwide and single-handedly changing the face of rock music. Cobain was hailed as a spokesman for a generation. But it soon became clear that the band, Cobain especially, really didn't know how to handle their success. Cobain would turn up for TV appearances dressed in drag, the group mocked their own performance on TOTP by half-heartedly pretending to mime and would destroy their instruments after live TV performances. Cobain's health began to suffer. (He had suffered from chronic stomach complaints since childhood). Cobain was also concerned that the irony in his lyrics was missed on his growing army of fans (which now included the macho jocks whom Cobain had despised growing up).

Amid the mayhem, Cobain married Hole singer Courtney Love in February 1992 and announced that the couple were expecting a baby later that year. But the couple almost lost custody of their newborn baby, Frances, later that summer following revelations of the couples heroin abuse. Cobain would overdose twice during the year. With Cobain's highly publcised personal problems, Nirvana were unable to record a follow up to Nevermind until 1993. in the interim, Geffen released a compilation of rare material, Incesticide in 1992.

The band's next album, In Utero, released in 1993, reflected the turmoil that Cobain was experiencing. Upon hearing the album Geffen accused the band of making a deliberately uncommercial album. The band denied the allegations. Produced initially by Steve Albini, the band later hired REM producer Scott Litt to remaster it. If Kurt Cobain had been allowed to indulge himself the album probably would have been an unlistenable howl. Instead, with Litt's guidance, the unlistenable fuzz was replaced with cathartic rock that blended the raw edges of Bleach with the pop of Nevermind. The melodies were still there on tracks like All Apologies and Pennyroyal Tea. You just had to dig deeper to find them!

Despite the label's misgivings the record became a transatlantic chart topper, although it never matched the success of Nevermind. The group agreed to play an MTV Unplugged show at the end of the year and embarked on a European tour. Following a concert in Munich in February 1994, Cobain stayed in Rome with Love for a holiday. On March 4, Love woke up to find that Cobain had attempted suicide by overdosing on Rohypnol. It was reported as an accidental overdose but within the Nirvana camp it became known that Cobain had left a suicide note. The European tour was cancelled and the couple returned home to Seattle.

But Cobain's mental illness began to grow. On March 18 1994 police were called to the couple's home to talk the singer out of suicide after he had locked hmself in a room threatening to kill himself. Love signed Kurt into the Exodus Recover Centre in Los Angeles on March 30 but he escaped a few days later and returned to Seattle. His mother filed a missing persons report on April 4. The following day Cobain shot himself in the head at his Seattle home. His body wasn't discovered until April 8 when an electrician arrived to install an alarm system.

Cobain's death became the most widely mourned rock death since John Lennon. Almost immediately Cobain became a symbol for the tortured angst of Generation X-ers. Cobain concluded his suicide note with a line from Neil Young's My My Hey Hey (Out Of The Blue) advising: "It's better to burn out than fade away." And 11 years on, the cult of Nirvana is as strong as ever...