WORDS BY: JAEMARK TORDECILLA
ILLUSTRATION BY: WARREN ESPEJO
April 5, 2010 | 3773 views
10. The Pixies famously shunned commercial endeavors, but Cobain kept trying to pass the spotlight on to them. He actually succeeded, because while the band actually broke up in 1993, public adulation of the Pixies by Nirvana and other bands grew the legend of Black Francis and company.
In 1999, Fight Club featured the Pixies’ “Where Is My Mind?” in its final scene. More recently, Joseph Gordon-Levitt was seen singing “Here Comes Your Man” in a karaoke bar as Summer Finn made googly eyes at him on 500 Days of Summer.
11. Nirvana helped indie-rock survive, in more ways than one. The band released originally released its music under independent label Sub Pop Records (along with stable-mates Soundgarden and Mudhoney).
Nirvana moved to Geffen Records as Sub Pop encountered financial difficulty, but a royalty deal between the labels provided much needed cash for the latter.
Sub Pop has since released music from popular indie artists such as The Postal Service, Iron and Wine, and The Shins, allowing Natalie Portman to share with Zach Braff music that will change his life.
12. Even pretentious hipster douchebags acknowledge the brilliance of Nevermind. Pitchfork Media named it the sixth best album of the 1990s, writing: “Anyone who hates this record today is just trying to be cool, and needs to be trying harder.”
Of course, being a bunch of hipster douchebags, they placed the record below albums by My Bloody Valentine, The Flaming Lips, Pavement, and Neutral Milk Hotel. (Spin Magazine had the album at number 1 in its 1990s list.)
13. Long before the band’s famous cover of David Bowie’s “The Man Who Sold the World,” Kurt actually indulged in something else that Ziggy Stardust was known for: wearing dresses.
“Wearing a dress shows I can be as feminine as I want,” he told the Atlanta Journal Constitution in 1993. “I’m a heterosexual . . . big deal. But if I was a homosexual, it wouldn't matter either.”
14. Cobain enjoyed a deep connection with Nirvana bass player Krist Novoselic. “Krist [Novoselic] and Kurt had a legendary lifetime connection. Those guys were soulmates,” drummer Dave Grohl told Rolling Stone in 2005.
15. Grohl’s relationship with Cobain was more complicated. The drummer was constantly seeking validation from the frontman, who wasn’t so forthcoming. “I don't think I've ever told anyone this, but there were times when Kurt was really unhappy with the way I played drums,” Grohl said in the same interview.
“I thought I was a decent drummer, but I didn't know if I was good enough to be doing this thing, this big deal. I didn't imagine myself a world-class drummer.”
16. The title of Nick Hornby’s second novel About a Boy is a play on Nirvana’s “About a Girl.” Nirvana’s music plays a central role in the story, which was set during the period of the band’s worldwide popularity.
An early chapter deals with a discussion of the intensity of Nirvana’s music, and a turning point late in the book deals with its characters’ reactions to news of Cobain’s suicide.
