Kurt Cobain RIP

It’s hard to believe that thirty years have passed since Kurt Cobain was found dead in Seattle. I recall that I heard the news via a tabloid headline stating, with the questionable taste characteristic of the time, something like “Rock Star blows his brains out”, which I initially assumed was a figurative reference to Cobain’s well-known drug use, before reading the story and finding out that it was horribly literal.

I like to think that I was one of the earlier fans of Nirvana, in the UK at least, having picked up an imported copy of Bleach, mainly on the strength of it being on Sub Pop. I was moderately impressed, enough anyway that I bought Nevermind in October 1991, before the hype really took off. I had recently acquired my first car, and for the next few months I had a tape of Smells Like Teen Spirit and the rest on more or less constantly as I drove around town, imagining myself a fine arbiter of alternative taste.

I saw Nirvana play live once, at the Reading Festival in 1992. Kurt came onstage in a wheelchair, wearing a hospital gown, a reference to rumours of a recent near-fatal overdose. I remember it as a great show, though at that point I had been continuously awake and high for around 72 hours, which may have influenced my critical judgment a little.

That appearance, their last in the UK, was probably the peak of my fandom; I liked In Utero well enough, but it wasn’t the ubiquitous soundtrack that Nevermind had been a couple of years earlier. Still, I was shaken up by Kurt’s untimely demise, which seemed like a dark reflection of Gen-X apathy. The following week the NME featured a sombre portrait of Cobain on the cover; I carefully cut it out and framed it, keeping it on my wall in numerous apartments, before it got lost during a move.

Looking back now, it all seems part of some previous life, though one that somehow feels simultaneously recent and distant. I guess it’s because I have no frame of reference for those events other than the experience of my younger self, and I haven’t remained 27 in the way that Kurt always will be. It’s bittersweet to be reminded of the relentless passage of time, but it’s good to have some things to look back on fondly.

Oh well, whatever. Nevermind.