Monday 19 March 2012

Cobain Today

I'm not sure where it came from but for the last few days i have had the opening bass line from Nirvana's 'Come As You Are' running through my head. As with most ear worms, i find actually digging out the song and listening to it is the best way to remedy the constant repeats inside your mind so that's what i did and as Krist Novoselic did his thing, i found myself looking through the inside of the album cover and at the picture of the three young men but especially the blonde haired figure in the middle flipping the finger to the camera.
Only 27 when he died, i began to wonder just what Kobain would be doing today if he hadn't taken that self-imposed exit that April morning in 1994.
Looking at what he left behind, Nevermind was Nirvana's highspot, what followed never lived up to that first album so they may have just faded away as the 90s rolled on and we would be suffering today through a lacklustre Nirvana reunion tour like Guns n Roses or they may have continued making album after album of sub standard pap like U2 or The Rolling Stones.
They could easily have sold out and be on our television screens hawking beer like Lemmy from motorhead or flogging car insurance like Iggy Pop.
In my mind, Cobain will always be the shaggy haired blonde dude in the out of shape cardigan, belting out those fast-slow-loud-quiet songs that epitomised the Grunge sound.
I can’t imagine him being 45 and can't believe Nevermind was over 20 years ago and its probably very selfish that there is a side of me that is content that he will be forever that brash, angry, handsome 27 year old sticking up a finger to the camera and not a balding, overweight, washed up has been living on former glories.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

really, after all these years you still admire someone that spat in the face of the society that enabled him with freedom...

i'm not shocked, but i don't understand...

q

Lucy said...

An analogy q.

Imagine a room full of beige tablemats on a long table and halfway down there is a red one. It is always going to stand out and draw your eye. Now drag that analogy to music in the late very early 90s. Pretty poor, very beige, so when a red tablemat happens along it is going to stand out and draw your eye. Kurt was a red tablemat and that's why he sticks long in the memory.

Anonymous said...

Oh, you mean kinda like Tiny Tim or Boy George?

q

Lucy said...

Don't know Tiny Tim but if you considered Culture Club an alternative to what was around at the time then why not. For me the biggest game changers were Rock n Roll in the 50s, punk in the 70s and Grunge in the 90s but i imagine everyone has a different perspective according to musical taste and Charles Dickens characters.