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Nirvana: The Biography
As the assistant editor of Melody Maker, Everett True was the first journalist to cover the Seattle music scene in early 1989 and interview Nirvana. He is responsible for bringing Hole, Pavement, Soundgarden, and a host of other bands to international attention. He introduced Kurt Cobain to Courtney Love, performed on stage with Nirvana on numerous occasions, and famously pushed Kurt onto the stage of the Reading Festival in 1992 in a wheelchair. The Biography is an honest, moving, incisive, and heartfelt re-evaluation of a band that has been misrepresented time and time again since its tragic demise in April 1994 following Kurt Cobain's suicide. True captures what the band was really like. He also discusses the music scene of the time -- the fellow bands, the scenes, the seminars, the countless live dates, the friends and allies and drug dealers. Drawn from hundreds of original interviews, The Biography is the final word on Nirvana, Cobain, and Seattle grunge.
688 pages, Kindle Edition
First published January 1, 2006
90 people are currently reading
1875 people want to read
About the author
Everett True
21 books47 followersMy name is Everett True. I am a music critic. This is what I do. I criticise music.
The clue is in my job description – music critic. I do not consider myself a journalist, as I do not research or report hard news. I do not consider myself a commentator as I believe that everyone should be a participant. I criticise people and in return I am not surprised if other people criticise me. It is part of the whole deal of being in the public arena.
I write about music, and my life. I do not separate one from the other, nor am I ashamed of voicing opinion. Indeed, I believe opinion to be central to my craft. I do not need others to tell me what to enjoy and I do not trust critics who claim to be impartial because – at the very least – they have not fully thought through what they are doing.
I am Everett True. Believe in me and I have power like a God. Quit believing in me and I no longer exist.
The clue is in my job description – music critic. I do not consider myself a journalist, as I do not research or report hard news. I do not consider myself a commentator as I believe that everyone should be a participant. I criticise people and in return I am not surprised if other people criticise me. It is part of the whole deal of being in the public arena.
I write about music, and my life. I do not separate one from the other, nor am I ashamed of voicing opinion. Indeed, I believe opinion to be central to my craft. I do not need others to tell me what to enjoy and I do not trust critics who claim to be impartial because – at the very least – they have not fully thought through what they are doing.
I am Everett True. Believe in me and I have power like a God. Quit believing in me and I no longer exist.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 84 reviews
September 30, 2024
detailed and informative history of the band from early days in Aberdeen to Kurts death and the aftermath
November 30, 2017
Just from the title (Nirvana: The True Story - geddit?) I should have known - this is another self-promotional exercise a la Nick Kent, in which the writer attempts to convince us that he's as important as his ostensible subjects. His justification? He knew Courtney Love, drove around in the van a few times with Nirvana, even got up and sang with them on occasion. All well and good, and the fact that he was a Beat Happening fan from way back is great too, because he's able to put the whole Olympia influence in context. There's a wealth of information here and maybe if I hadn't already read half of it in the Charles R. Cross biography I would have made it to the end. But whether or not this dude is 'The Legend' of Creation Records fame and was pivotal in introducing grunge to the UK music press and then the world, I basically can't stand to read another sentence for fear it will spiral into megalomania. The guy lives in Brisbane now - a small scene, in which I can only presume he's making a hell of a noise. The only recent music bio as irritating as this is Kris Needs's The Scream: The Music, Myths & Misbehaviour of Primal Scream (another English writer far too enamoured with the first person POV). No, being a friend of the band does not qualify you to write their biography - it qualifies you to be interviewed by a real biographer. Cut the shit and tell us what you know!
November 5, 2008
fucking everett true. don't waste your time on this shit. everett is way more entranced by his own imagined celebrity than anything else. this book was outrageously long--over 500 pages, & it was published on that irritatingly thick paper that weighs like three timesmore than normal paper, so the books weighed like ten pounds. ten fucking pounds of everett true bragging about being friends with kurt cobain. no one gives a fuck, dude. read this is you are an obsessive nirvana fan, maybe, or if you are writing your thesis on smug english music critics, but skip it otherwise.
January 12, 2021
Finally finished with this book. Took me quite a while. It's an extremely long book! Felt like it was a 1,000 pages lol It actually gets really good halfway through it got very interesting.
But the majority of this drags on & on. Some pet peeves I had about this book is. #1 The author! I mean I don’t know this guy personally. But this author doesn’t come across like a nice person. He comes across as arrogant, & a bit cold at times. There were moments I felt he was putting Nirvana down. Like backhanded compliments. Or maybe that’s his sense of humor. And then writes stories in such a way like “look at me! Here’s what I did! Aren’t I impressive!” It was just annoying. There were times I felt like he was trying to milk his 15 minutes of fame being associated or in close quarters with Nirvana.
#2 The book is called “Nirvana”. Therefore to me focus on the title of the book! That should be a given to me. It should’ve been titled “My experiences in the 90s grudge era”. That’s basically what it felt like most consistently. It kept hopping around to different bands. Some I never even heard of. Like any band he mentioned as a side bar he would go off & ramble on & on about his opinion on this or that particular band. Usually it wasn't positive. It got to the point I was skimming through if I didn't see the word Nirvana on the page! lol like get back on topic dude! I picked up this book to read about Nirvana. Not all these others bands or the author himself.
It ended kind of abruptly and weird. I do like it felt a bit objective. Even though I feel like this guy is more pro courtney than Kurt. I like he still pointed out her lies or things about her. He didn't sugar coat it. Unlike Charles Cross’s book that’s so far up courtney’s @ss. I liked the parts with Cali & Jessica Hopper too. Particularly Cali. Gave me a newer point of view towards him.
All in all it was an okay book. Not the best. I’ve read several Nirvana books & this doesn’t even make my top 3. So won’t be rereading it again. Not staying on topic for Nirvana just got bothersome too often.
But the majority of this drags on & on. Some pet peeves I had about this book is. #1 The author! I mean I don’t know this guy personally. But this author doesn’t come across like a nice person. He comes across as arrogant, & a bit cold at times. There were moments I felt he was putting Nirvana down. Like backhanded compliments. Or maybe that’s his sense of humor. And then writes stories in such a way like “look at me! Here’s what I did! Aren’t I impressive!” It was just annoying. There were times I felt like he was trying to milk his 15 minutes of fame being associated or in close quarters with Nirvana.
#2 The book is called “Nirvana”. Therefore to me focus on the title of the book! That should be a given to me. It should’ve been titled “My experiences in the 90s grudge era”. That’s basically what it felt like most consistently. It kept hopping around to different bands. Some I never even heard of. Like any band he mentioned as a side bar he would go off & ramble on & on about his opinion on this or that particular band. Usually it wasn't positive. It got to the point I was skimming through if I didn't see the word Nirvana on the page! lol like get back on topic dude! I picked up this book to read about Nirvana. Not all these others bands or the author himself.
It ended kind of abruptly and weird. I do like it felt a bit objective. Even though I feel like this guy is more pro courtney than Kurt. I like he still pointed out her lies or things about her. He didn't sugar coat it. Unlike Charles Cross’s book that’s so far up courtney’s @ss. I liked the parts with Cali & Jessica Hopper too. Particularly Cali. Gave me a newer point of view towards him.
All in all it was an okay book. Not the best. I’ve read several Nirvana books & this doesn’t even make my top 3. So won’t be rereading it again. Not staying on topic for Nirvana just got bothersome too often.
June 25, 2017
My own interest in grunge music has been... delayed. I was probably a little too young for Nirvana to truly appreciate them "back in the day". I was 9 years old when "Nevermind" was released. I remember seeing a "big kid" wearing a t-shirt with the "Nevermind" album cover, and thinking that it was just mean. And then there's the fact that I come from the "opposite side of the train tracks" from Kurt Cobain. My parents were extremely stable, educated people. Democrats, for sure, and surely concerned for the plight of the poor and vulnerable in society. But I never had to deal with the desperation that was part of the lifestyle that Nirvana's music screamed bloody murder against. I was never spoiled (which I define as getting whatever you want whenever you want.... I've never understand how children can just point at a toy in a store and their parents will automatically buy it for them. If I ever did that, it would have entirely tanked my chances ever getting it. Instead I had to wait for Christmas or my birthday for a single $5 action figure....), but I was never in want for food or clean clothing or shelter. It's like what Jack Black says in "School of Rock": rock music is about whatever pisses you off. And at the age of 9, 10, 11, 12, there really wasn't anything that did piss me off because I was damned lucky to have the kind of responsible parents that every kid deserves. About the only thing that pissed me off were my asshole peers I had in middle school. What did they listen to? Nirvana. Everybody listened to Nirvana. I remember being asked several times who my favorite musicians were when I was in the sixth grade. My answer was always "Rogers and Hammerstein". Stupid response, I know (and I've long outgrown it), but it was my own hair-brained way of separating myself, or saying "Fuck you", to all the jerks I had to share class with. I don't know whose side Kurt Cobain would take if he had known what was going on. I doubt he had any patience for Rogers and Hammerstein's work, but he himself was an outsider as a teenager.
Then, years later as a college student in Tacoma, I began to listen to 107.7 The End, and I discovered that I actually loved Nirvana's music. Because of that, and my general interest in the Pacific Northwest, I decided to read this book, but it took me a while to get around to it. It's not exactly a "Cascadian" book, but Nirvana and the grunge scene of the late 80s and 90s are extremely important to the Pacific Northwest, so I decided to review it as a "Cascadian" book anyway.
The Northwest has always been a bit of an island away from the rest of North America. We have a sizeable population and plenty of development out here, yet we're a thousand-mile drive from San Francisco, Denver, or Minneapolis. The nearest big city outside our region is probably Calgary, itself an isolated locale. And the difference between the Northwest and California, in terms of settlement from colonial powers, is that while emigrants to California were more likely to be seeking huge fortune (the '49 gold rush, the entertainment industry in Hollywood, etc.), emigrants to the Northwest were more likely to be seeking a good life away from the rat races of the East Coast. Sooner or later, something interesting was going to happen artistically in this forgotten corner of the continent.
Enter the "grunge" music scene of Washington state in the eighties. Everett True was among the British punk music journalists who paid attention to what was happening out here, and came to know Kurt Cobain personally before Nirvana was ever known to the rest of the United States. Then, in 1991, Nirvana "hit the big time". The rest of the world unexpectedly descended on the Northwest, "discovering" a few of the other local punk and metal bands (Pearl Jam), singling out their regional idiosyncrasies (flannel shirts!), and converting them into commercially-viable products. Their very own success bewildered Nirvana, deeply confusing and disturbing Kurt Cobain, who committed suicide after completing only two major albums ("Bleach" is awesome, but it was still just a local release).
Everett True doesn't go into this much detail describing the Northwest, but what he does describe he mostly gets right (aside from the fact that he confuses the Kingdome with the Tacoma Dome). In all honesty, I couldn't imagine a better person to write a biography about Nirvana. He knew the members personally, covered them for several years while they were just a small-time band playing gigs with only ten people in the audience. While he counted Kurt Cobain and Courtney Love as friends, he still had his professional duties as a journalist, and could be critical when necessary. I imagine that much of the reason for the vitriol and low-ratings for this book is because it breaks with the conventional wisdom that music fans have regarding Nirvana. It would be a lie to suggest that Courtney Love wasn't a problem. But the mythology that has risen up around the band paints Love as a complete villain and Kurt Cobain as a complete martyr. Everett True does a more-than-competent job describing the intricacies and gray areas of the situation with reason and thoughtfulness, which for some who are seeking outright condemnation of Love and hero-worship of Cobain won't appreciate. People and relationships can be complicated, folks. Bitch that she may be, Love is also a legitimate artist. Brilliant as he could be, Cobain was still a junkie. There are probably lots of people out there who don't want to accept that, but it's true.
As others have noted, it's a huge book. 500+ pages with small font printing. It took me two months to slog through it, but I enjoyed it the whole way. Part of the reason why it took me so long was because I would often stop to listen to music and watch the old music videos on YouTube. Everett True's book is well-written, rational, emotional, compelling, informative. It stoked my interest in several other grunge bands that I hadn't heard of before, namely Mudhoney and Tad, and I'd love to take on another book in the future that covers the Seattle and Olympia scenes outside of Nirvana in more depth.
Five stars. Initially wanted to give it four because of the Kingdome/Tacoma Dome fuckup, but I had to admit that the volume was too enjoyable to do to that.
Then, years later as a college student in Tacoma, I began to listen to 107.7 The End, and I discovered that I actually loved Nirvana's music. Because of that, and my general interest in the Pacific Northwest, I decided to read this book, but it took me a while to get around to it. It's not exactly a "Cascadian" book, but Nirvana and the grunge scene of the late 80s and 90s are extremely important to the Pacific Northwest, so I decided to review it as a "Cascadian" book anyway.
The Northwest has always been a bit of an island away from the rest of North America. We have a sizeable population and plenty of development out here, yet we're a thousand-mile drive from San Francisco, Denver, or Minneapolis. The nearest big city outside our region is probably Calgary, itself an isolated locale. And the difference between the Northwest and California, in terms of settlement from colonial powers, is that while emigrants to California were more likely to be seeking huge fortune (the '49 gold rush, the entertainment industry in Hollywood, etc.), emigrants to the Northwest were more likely to be seeking a good life away from the rat races of the East Coast. Sooner or later, something interesting was going to happen artistically in this forgotten corner of the continent.
Enter the "grunge" music scene of Washington state in the eighties. Everett True was among the British punk music journalists who paid attention to what was happening out here, and came to know Kurt Cobain personally before Nirvana was ever known to the rest of the United States. Then, in 1991, Nirvana "hit the big time". The rest of the world unexpectedly descended on the Northwest, "discovering" a few of the other local punk and metal bands (Pearl Jam), singling out their regional idiosyncrasies (flannel shirts!), and converting them into commercially-viable products. Their very own success bewildered Nirvana, deeply confusing and disturbing Kurt Cobain, who committed suicide after completing only two major albums ("Bleach" is awesome, but it was still just a local release).
Everett True doesn't go into this much detail describing the Northwest, but what he does describe he mostly gets right (aside from the fact that he confuses the Kingdome with the Tacoma Dome). In all honesty, I couldn't imagine a better person to write a biography about Nirvana. He knew the members personally, covered them for several years while they were just a small-time band playing gigs with only ten people in the audience. While he counted Kurt Cobain and Courtney Love as friends, he still had his professional duties as a journalist, and could be critical when necessary. I imagine that much of the reason for the vitriol and low-ratings for this book is because it breaks with the conventional wisdom that music fans have regarding Nirvana. It would be a lie to suggest that Courtney Love wasn't a problem. But the mythology that has risen up around the band paints Love as a complete villain and Kurt Cobain as a complete martyr. Everett True does a more-than-competent job describing the intricacies and gray areas of the situation with reason and thoughtfulness, which for some who are seeking outright condemnation of Love and hero-worship of Cobain won't appreciate. People and relationships can be complicated, folks. Bitch that she may be, Love is also a legitimate artist. Brilliant as he could be, Cobain was still a junkie. There are probably lots of people out there who don't want to accept that, but it's true.
As others have noted, it's a huge book. 500+ pages with small font printing. It took me two months to slog through it, but I enjoyed it the whole way. Part of the reason why it took me so long was because I would often stop to listen to music and watch the old music videos on YouTube. Everett True's book is well-written, rational, emotional, compelling, informative. It stoked my interest in several other grunge bands that I hadn't heard of before, namely Mudhoney and Tad, and I'd love to take on another book in the future that covers the Seattle and Olympia scenes outside of Nirvana in more depth.
Five stars. Initially wanted to give it four because of the Kingdome/Tacoma Dome fuckup, but I had to admit that the volume was too enjoyable to do to that.
June 10, 2012
All right, i'm a huge fan of Nirvana, and I do enjoy picking up books that have to do with music. The downside is they usually fail me, unless they are written properly.
This book is MASSIVE, in my opinion, a Nirvana book does not have to be 500+ pages. They had a short-lived career; Dave Grohl and Krist Novoselic went on to prusue other careers in music, and Kurt Cobain died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head. I mean, we don't need another biography on Nirvana. 1989-1994, FIVE YEARS. Huge band, died at their peak. Oh well. Just don't waste your time with this book. Seriously.
This book is MASSIVE, in my opinion, a Nirvana book does not have to be 500+ pages. They had a short-lived career; Dave Grohl and Krist Novoselic went on to prusue other careers in music, and Kurt Cobain died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head. I mean, we don't need another biography on Nirvana. 1989-1994, FIVE YEARS. Huge band, died at their peak. Oh well. Just don't waste your time with this book. Seriously.
December 19, 2022
UWIELBIAM. Książka jest cudowna. Historia mojego ulubionego zespołu w jednej książce ❤️
July 13, 2012
was this book about Nirvana, Kurt Cobain or Courtney Love? I found myself questioning that through the whole book, while the author seemed very knowledgeable about Nirvana he barley mentioned the members Krist and Dave he seemed completely obsessed with Courtney and even mentions that he had a crush on her , I really was.annoyed by this the only thing ms Love had too do with Nirvana was the fact she was married to Kurt yet she was talked about at length through the book, I did however enjoy the authors writing style which is the only reason I gave this book more then a two star rating
March 11, 2022
Full disclosure…I picked up this book for $5.99 at a local good will. For the first time ever I feel like a charity took advantage of me. I should have known better when the cashier chuckled to herself as she rang up my purchase…muttering a sucker is born every minute. She clearly knew something I didn’t.
Skip the addenda. All of them!! They offer nothing.
Skip the notes. It’s a failed attempt to be fun and cheeky.
Some people write to tell a story. Other people write to set history straight. Everett writes because he wishes he was in Nirvana but here’s the thing…he lacks talent in writing. Case in point my favorite line in the book…page 388…”you could have heard a used tampon drop.” Can’t make that up and wow what a douche.
For being a journalist a lot of his questions are very closed and not open ended. Leading almost to the point of what fits his story and not so much what the person has to say. I suppose it’s hard to take an interest in other people when you are so into yourself. Also lacks any skill in connecting events. Case in point:
Olympia had a reputation of being a dark place where people died of drug use…without missing a beat Andrew Wood died of heroin overdose. Andrew died in Seattle and was from Mississippi. Two completely different trains of thought and not linked in any way to the problem in Olympia. If you have a person and a place maybe try to connect them? Or better yet…have a point!! Just ONE of the many stories where you have to wonder what the hell??
Melody Maker was apparently the only rock publication at the time? Clearly not the case and holy shit they would let anything into their fly by night publication.
According to Everett Billy Corgan - self centered and pompous. He is also constantly trashing Pearl Jam. Maybe keep your self serving opinions to yourself? It’s great if you think they suck but your opinion on these musicians does nothing for your story. It just makes you look like a petty little man.
Lazy writing…Courtney Loves dad rumored to have hired the hells angels at Altamont. Call up Steve Parish (famous Grateful Dead roadie) and ask him! Clearly you have connections (or maybe not).
I could go on but, unlike this book, I know when to stop.
I will be putting this book in the free library on the corner of our street. Some poor soul will see this and think WOW…a rare free library gem. Little will they know they will lose hours of time and gain nothing from the experience. As I skim the last page of this book I’m just thankful I never have to read anything by Everett True again.
Skip the addenda. All of them!! They offer nothing.
Skip the notes. It’s a failed attempt to be fun and cheeky.
Some people write to tell a story. Other people write to set history straight. Everett writes because he wishes he was in Nirvana but here’s the thing…he lacks talent in writing. Case in point my favorite line in the book…page 388…”you could have heard a used tampon drop.” Can’t make that up and wow what a douche.
For being a journalist a lot of his questions are very closed and not open ended. Leading almost to the point of what fits his story and not so much what the person has to say. I suppose it’s hard to take an interest in other people when you are so into yourself. Also lacks any skill in connecting events. Case in point:
Olympia had a reputation of being a dark place where people died of drug use…without missing a beat Andrew Wood died of heroin overdose. Andrew died in Seattle and was from Mississippi. Two completely different trains of thought and not linked in any way to the problem in Olympia. If you have a person and a place maybe try to connect them? Or better yet…have a point!! Just ONE of the many stories where you have to wonder what the hell??
Melody Maker was apparently the only rock publication at the time? Clearly not the case and holy shit they would let anything into their fly by night publication.
According to Everett Billy Corgan - self centered and pompous. He is also constantly trashing Pearl Jam. Maybe keep your self serving opinions to yourself? It’s great if you think they suck but your opinion on these musicians does nothing for your story. It just makes you look like a petty little man.
Lazy writing…Courtney Loves dad rumored to have hired the hells angels at Altamont. Call up Steve Parish (famous Grateful Dead roadie) and ask him! Clearly you have connections (or maybe not).
I could go on but, unlike this book, I know when to stop.
I will be putting this book in the free library on the corner of our street. Some poor soul will see this and think WOW…a rare free library gem. Little will they know they will lose hours of time and gain nothing from the experience. As I skim the last page of this book I’m just thankful I never have to read anything by Everett True again.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
May 31, 2022
Okay, I think I'm done with Nirvana now for a while. This was such a thorough biography of a band that I have no idea where to go from here.
Even a super fan like me learned some new stuff! And yes; took bunch of it with a grain of salt because I'm pretty sure about the errors in here, having read these same exact stories from all possible angles. But who knows, who cares.
Possibly the best thing about this was that it wasn't really about Nirvana but all the other bands and people surrounding it. I found so many new cool bands through this, like Half Japanese and Breeders.
As a book this was a giant, close to 800 pages of stories that revolve kinda around the same subject.
This band was so great. Also lucky, right time and right place. Pure energy and the absolute deep vulnerability of Kurt Cobain in sense of creating. Such a beautiful, tortured soul. And a total asshole, too. They all were! They were kids. And it's also very sad to read this in retrospect because you can pinpoint where they went wrong. I would've quit the In Utero tour, taken a big break with Cobain going to rehab and Grohl starting Foo Fighters and then they could've made the fourth album, serene and beautiful, a perfect epilogue. And then Cobain could've become a monk, painting and smoking, maybe releasing some obscure solo albums or doing poetry. And everything else would've been as it was; Foo Fighters, Novoselic and his politics and so on. Would've loved to hear Cobain's views on a few subjects. And toying around the idea of a reunion and never actually doing it, hahahaha.
They've actually done the perfect reunions with John McCauley and St. Vincent and Joan Jett and Lorde. Just perfect, all of it.
One more thing: I loved how Everett True put himself in this book. Feels very real. Very TRUE.
Even a super fan like me learned some new stuff! And yes; took bunch of it with a grain of salt because I'm pretty sure about the errors in here, having read these same exact stories from all possible angles. But who knows, who cares.
Possibly the best thing about this was that it wasn't really about Nirvana but all the other bands and people surrounding it. I found so many new cool bands through this, like Half Japanese and Breeders.
As a book this was a giant, close to 800 pages of stories that revolve kinda around the same subject.
This band was so great. Also lucky, right time and right place. Pure energy and the absolute deep vulnerability of Kurt Cobain in sense of creating. Such a beautiful, tortured soul. And a total asshole, too. They all were! They were kids. And it's also very sad to read this in retrospect because you can pinpoint where they went wrong. I would've quit the In Utero tour, taken a big break with Cobain going to rehab and Grohl starting Foo Fighters and then they could've made the fourth album, serene and beautiful, a perfect epilogue. And then Cobain could've become a monk, painting and smoking, maybe releasing some obscure solo albums or doing poetry. And everything else would've been as it was; Foo Fighters, Novoselic and his politics and so on. Would've loved to hear Cobain's views on a few subjects. And toying around the idea of a reunion and never actually doing it, hahahaha.
They've actually done the perfect reunions with John McCauley and St. Vincent and Joan Jett and Lorde. Just perfect, all of it.
One more thing: I loved how Everett True put himself in this book. Feels very real. Very TRUE.
August 16, 2007
At one point it had really felt we could've changed things, but with his suicide it was finally proved to me, irrevocably, this is what happens when you try to fuck with the system.
Everett True was - pretty much - there from the start. Working for Melody Maker at the time, he was the first journalist in the UK to delve into the music scene of Seattle and the surrounding area. He travelled around the world with Nirvana, performed on stage with them multiple times, spent hour after hour with them, becoming the rarest of things: a trusted journalist. Who introduced (albeit indirectly) Courtney Love to Kurt Cobain? Everett True. When Cobain was brought on to the headlining stage of Reading festival in a wheelchair in 1992, who was doing the pushing? Everett True. When Cobain died, who was the only journalist welcomed into the household? Everett True.
After so many books, biographies, bootlegs and blogs about Nirvana, it's difficult for anyone to get a clear sense of what it was like at the time, what the band was about, what they meant...all that sort of stuff. It's hard not to have memories distorted by so many differing accounts. And so, it's about time that a book like this came out - a genuinely definitive book on the subject of Nirvana. This is the only one you need. Others have proved interesting reads, but have always been suspiciously angled. Charles R. Cross' Heavier Than Heaven, for example, has some wonderful anecdotes...but if you dig a bit deeper, at times it's worryingly biased in favour of Courtney Love, no doubt a result of her 'endorsement'.
True offers us a hands-up-in-the-air, as-honest-as-can-be account of the few years in which Nirvana changed nothing by changing everything. At times he goes into an obsessive amount of detail, with interviews from pretty much anyone and everyone that played a part in the band's rise to stardom, with the main exception of Courtney Love. It's difficult to gauge whether the two are still on good terms, but judging by the lack of fresh input from Love, you'd assume not. Fortunately, True has a veritable library of interviews that he conducted with her over the years to draw from.
The main reason this is the definitive Nirvana book is that it doesn't pretend to be definitive. So many stories surround the band, with conflicting reports from all quarters on every 'important' event. True always points out the different sides of the stories, noting quite rightly that half the time, you just can't be sure what the truth is. 'Kurtney', as he puts it, made up so many things in an attempt to throw people off the scent of their real selves; truths were refuted, myths became reality.
It's Everett True's position as an insider that makes this book what it is. Without it, he'd be just another writer trying to capture what made this band and their music so special, and he'd be ten years too late in doing it, too. Instead, we're taken into the eye of the storm; a maelstrom of smashed guitars, world domination, passionate love affairs, and, ultimately, self-destruction.
N.B. I never knew Nirvana was in Berlin the night the wall came down.
Everett True was - pretty much - there from the start. Working for Melody Maker at the time, he was the first journalist in the UK to delve into the music scene of Seattle and the surrounding area. He travelled around the world with Nirvana, performed on stage with them multiple times, spent hour after hour with them, becoming the rarest of things: a trusted journalist. Who introduced (albeit indirectly) Courtney Love to Kurt Cobain? Everett True. When Cobain was brought on to the headlining stage of Reading festival in a wheelchair in 1992, who was doing the pushing? Everett True. When Cobain died, who was the only journalist welcomed into the household? Everett True.
After so many books, biographies, bootlegs and blogs about Nirvana, it's difficult for anyone to get a clear sense of what it was like at the time, what the band was about, what they meant...all that sort of stuff. It's hard not to have memories distorted by so many differing accounts. And so, it's about time that a book like this came out - a genuinely definitive book on the subject of Nirvana. This is the only one you need. Others have proved interesting reads, but have always been suspiciously angled. Charles R. Cross' Heavier Than Heaven, for example, has some wonderful anecdotes...but if you dig a bit deeper, at times it's worryingly biased in favour of Courtney Love, no doubt a result of her 'endorsement'.
True offers us a hands-up-in-the-air, as-honest-as-can-be account of the few years in which Nirvana changed nothing by changing everything. At times he goes into an obsessive amount of detail, with interviews from pretty much anyone and everyone that played a part in the band's rise to stardom, with the main exception of Courtney Love. It's difficult to gauge whether the two are still on good terms, but judging by the lack of fresh input from Love, you'd assume not. Fortunately, True has a veritable library of interviews that he conducted with her over the years to draw from.
The main reason this is the definitive Nirvana book is that it doesn't pretend to be definitive. So many stories surround the band, with conflicting reports from all quarters on every 'important' event. True always points out the different sides of the stories, noting quite rightly that half the time, you just can't be sure what the truth is. 'Kurtney', as he puts it, made up so many things in an attempt to throw people off the scent of their real selves; truths were refuted, myths became reality.
It's Everett True's position as an insider that makes this book what it is. Without it, he'd be just another writer trying to capture what made this band and their music so special, and he'd be ten years too late in doing it, too. Instead, we're taken into the eye of the storm; a maelstrom of smashed guitars, world domination, passionate love affairs, and, ultimately, self-destruction.
N.B. I never knew Nirvana was in Berlin the night the wall came down.
March 28, 2008
Easily the best Nirvana biography I have read. I was initially interested in reading this book because it was written by Everett True, who dedicated music fans might remember as the guy who "broke" Sub-Pop into the national consciousness with his early Melody Maker profiles. Of course, if you were old enough and cool enough you probably knew about that whole world much earlier, but I was young enough and uncool enough for it to be news to me. I remember one time in high school these older kids came over to my neighbor's house and announced they were going to a Mudhoney concert. They asked us if we had ever heard of Mudhoney. No, we replied. Good, they laughed! That was an early indication for me of a secret world I knew nothing about. Anyways, Everett True later endeared himself to me even more by championing all things Riot Grrrl, a scene that I was a big fan of. Plus, he had and still has an enthusiastic fan type perspective to his writing. He really writes himself into the story here, which could be annoying but isn't since I know from other sources that he really was fairly central to the Nirvana story. He was probably the closest writerly person to the band there was. He may not have been granted all of the interviews from the main characters that the offical Nirvana biographer was, but he was able to secure access to many people who have never spoken about Nirvana before because he was their friend. Overall, definitely better than Heavier than Heaven. A good companion to Come As You Are but also better. Own this and the journals, if you must own anything.
November 10, 2011
I didn't believe it was still possible to discover any uncharted waters as it pertains to Cobain and Nirvana, but this book did that. I have volumes upon volumes of books and DVD's of this material, and somehow this bio revealed new dimensions to the tragic saga. This writer brought a personal,much greater in depth touch, to counter most of the self-created mythology around this subject matter.The author is just about super annoying, but he delved way deeper into the very environments that created and shaped Cobain and Nirvana. What I found really valuable and enlightening was the information he gleaned from relatively non-descript sources from the Olympia scene,casual acquaintances,fellow Seattle scene bands that I had assumed were rivals, and even Frances Bean's formerly drug-addled live-in nanny with his sordid account of the Dark Period aka the Kurtney years.
I'm glad I took the time to give one more Nirvana bio a look, though the book is a door stopper, I tore through it. It seems highly unlikely that there is anything else left in the Nirvana ouevre for me to consume, but I'll probably find something at some point.
I'm glad I took the time to give one more Nirvana bio a look, though the book is a door stopper, I tore through it. It seems highly unlikely that there is anything else left in the Nirvana ouevre for me to consume, but I'll probably find something at some point.
September 25, 2015
“Sister [Sonic Youth’s 1987 album] is more bad acid trips I never took,” stated Courtney Love to me in 1992, “plus physics or psychics, Philip K. Dick, astronomy, best bending of English and football, no boyfriends at all, no girlfriends either, lots of cigarettes and bad drugs, a frozen spring in a room all alone for six months not talking to anyone except the regulars at the strip bar. Bad wine and the same old stinky old nightie and trench coat, big holes in my shoes all over NYC, until I got bag lady blisters and I had this record, anti-depressants don’t work now. Times Square is sick, I gotta go back to LA, maybe I’ll stop listening to this damn velvet shiny light Josephine Wiggs’ [Breeders bassist] sticky New York dark. I can’t get the rats out of my hair, angels are dreaming of you”.
Shit, Courtney should've become a rock critic.
Shit, Courtney should've become a rock critic.
June 6, 2008
Horrible narcissistic self-serving piece of shit book. I couldn't have hated it more. True is a tireless self-promoter and all his "insights" revolve about his own fucked-up life as Courtney Love's sycophant. Barf.
I do highly recommend Charles Cross's Heavier Than Heaven.
I do highly recommend Charles Cross's Heavier Than Heaven.
February 18, 2015
Plenty of interesting Nirvana history here, but discerning fact from fiction amid Everett True's "I was a big part of this story" delivery is problematic. Could just as easily have been titled Me and Nirvana by Everett True.
August 23, 2012
Like the name implies: this is a story of a band. To get inside the man, read Heavier Than Heaven : A Biography of Kurt Cobain.
I recently read both of these books back-to-back because these are the two books out of three that are most commonly described as "accurate" (the third one being Come As You Are). Since Azerrad's book was not available in my local libraries at the moment, and having already seen the documentary "Kurt Cobain: About a Son" which featured Azerrad's audio interviews that were used as a material for the book, I figured I'm not missing out on much one way or the other.
I pretty much just wanted to know for once and for all why this funny, lovable guy ended up blowing his brain out for no good reason, and if we could not possible learn some lesson here.
I'm just going to write about Cross' book too, since they are both intertwined in my mind as one book anyways (with the exception that Cross' book was actually well written).
Since I was pretty much alive when Nirvana was only the biggest thing around in the popular culture, I already had the basics covered concerning the band. Even when my memories had grown vague about what Kurt had actually scribbled in his journals, I remembered that this guy was no accident. He was smart in his own way and anything but a guy who didn't know what he was trying to accomplish. Kurt wanted to become a rock star and he figured he had the drive and the talents to do so.
Frankly, I don't understand why people want to hear so desperately about the bands rather than about the people behind those bands who make the actual music happen. I believe there has never been a successful band where its members' creative input (=significance) has been equal. In arts specifically democratic participation has never amounted to much if anything at all. All great bands are great because there's someone who says: "No, I need you to play it like this, that is just shit." Kurt was Nirvana's despot and without him it would not have existed at all. I'm happy that Dave Grohl still manages to get his kick out of touring with his AOR-band, but I'm even happier to see Krist Novoselic do something actually respectable.
Writing Nirvana off as merely a fluke and a trend and Cobain as nothing but a druggie, is the easiest thing for people to say and to feel like a better wo/man.
But let's get one thing straight first: Americans have been enchanted by drugs ever since they were introduced to the masses in the 60's and 70's. Not surprisingly in the 80's and early 90's every cool kid did dope as well.
There's always certain amount of debauchery and egotistical behavior going on when we look into the lives of any rock band. Documenting who f*cked who and who did what crazy stuff while intoxicated is besides the point, and frankly, boring. I'm no rock star but I've done my share of boozing - maybe more than the next guy, maybe less. Point is, today it's pretty hard to "impress" anyone. You don't have to be an illiterate, arrogant rock star to do drugs, to sport a million tattoos and body piercings, to flunk out of school, and to generally piss away your life. Any wanker can do that. And these hazy crazy reminiscences always sound crazier than they really were.
No one is denying that Kurt didn't do heroin. That is a fact. Yes, Kurt might even have used more drugs already in his youth than his peers, but it's all relative. First off, people react to drugs individually. Secondly, the more you use, the higher tolerance you will develop. And thirdly, before "Nevermind" was starting to churn money, Kurt had always been more or less broke. It would not have been even financially possible to maintain a habit before the success. And fourth, Kurt lied about having had used heroin in the 80's. And fifth, a former junkie (and Kurt's drug buddy) who's seen many succumb to heroin says in effect that Kurt was an early stage heroin addict who was still in denial and who would most likely have come out it just fine in due course, had people only left him be.
Some insist that Kurt really preferred getting f*cked up rather than staying sober. A lot of folks not only share this sentiment but actually live by it, too. Instead of heroin, they just stick with alcohol and subscription pills. It feels much, much less evil and much less dirty, dangerous or even harmful than shooting up. They might be right, but they are still treating the disease (whatever it may be) the same way - in principal.
Would it be surprising to hear that Kurt too was shocked when he learned for the first time that his friend had tried heroin? Like any decent friend, Kurt scolded him. He thought it was stupid and dangerous thing to be doing. But I bet before Kurt had taken his first puff of marijuana, he had deemed also pot stupid and dangerous. This is how the logic goes.
No, heroin isn't pot, and pot isn't a cigarette. Heroin is a pain killer that works much faster and more reliably than, say, drinking alcohol. Kurt himself explained that he started to use heroin because it was the only thing that was making his chronic stomach pains go away. One can always say that this is how addicts tend to legitimize their use. I can imagine that to be true in many - even in most - cases.
Then again, I have never had to endure the sort of pain in my stomach that Kurt described he had to endure pretty much every time he wanted to eat something. Maybe you have? And Kurt was pretty infamous for not eating much. But I'm sure he was just making this all up. I am not at all suggesting that modern medical science wouldn't have ultimately figured out what was causing his pains. It's just that Kurt had already found a cure he figured he could manage to live with. Without a doubt it came as a godsent bonus that heroin pretty much also made him forget all the other things he found troubling his worried mind.
And Kurt was a worried guy alright.
He was always worried about (losing) money because he had never had any (pre-Nevermind). He had also somehow convinced himself that Courtney was cheating on him, yet he couldn't even handle the very notion of a divorce nor being the one to subjugate his own daughter to those feelings of abandonment that he was very familiar with in his own childhood and youth. In a way Kurt had always been somewhat lost, somewhat love sick puppy everyone except his anonymous junkie friends seemed to want a piece of.
Like most successful artists, he too was suffering from those oh-so-existential questions that deal with arbitrary notions of "authenticity", "staying true", "being loyal", "being real", and so on. He knew his fans would ultimately buy anything he chose to present them with. He would publicly rant about evil labels, corporations and whatnot, while outside the public eye he wanted his music to be promoted at every possible chance.
You see, at some point all artists start hating their previous work, sabotaging their own shows. They start isolating from the public, start running away from fans, friends and family and from other band members as well. They want to take a break, break up the band, branch out and become a painter/writer/director/whatnot and generally wanting more credit (=money) and exposure (though not too much and preferably not anything neg). They might say stuff like how they welcome the remaining members to participate more - yet in actuality work hard at making that damn near impossible. They are always left wanting. For something that even they themselves can't put a finger on.
We'll all seen this pattern a thousand times.
"Nevermind" is still one of the greatest rock albums around, but critics like to pan it because it's "too polished and lacking depth and dynamics" when they really want to say it's "too commercial". They like to remind us that "In Utero" is "much more mature work - more experimental, openly candid, and raw". This is just another way of saying it's full of self-pity, nonsense and half-assed songs that were probably recorded like crap on purpose.
I wouldn't say it's a bad record. I'm just pissed of when I know what the man was capable of and particularly because that album ended up being his last one. I'm pleased to hear that Grohl pretty much copied Chad Channing's original drum playing on "Nevermind". He was the new guy, and was simply told to do so. I don't personally pay much attention to drums because I can't drum worth shit, but when those more experienced assert that Grohl is a hard hitting machine, I kinda see what they mean.
When I overheard Foo Fighters playing live in almost our backyard about a year ago, I didn't really feel much, if anything. And this is coming from someone who - after hearing Grohl sing Marigold while Nirvana was still around - though that, my god, he's doing it better than Kurt. Now all these years ago, I tend to think that Grohl's 1995 debut is likely the best r'n'r he can muster, and that as a performer and a songwriter, he managed to become the man whom Kurt never wanted to end up as: indifferent and bland.
By now it's part of the official Nirvana canon that Chad Channing was fired because he couldn't play well enough. That's pretty funny coming from a guy who - let's face it - was a sloppy and at best intermediate guitarist himself. I think that sacking had much more obvious reasons: Channing was too pleasant, too nice of a guy who didn't share Kurt's positively negative look on life either. He probably didn't even take (making) music that seriously. Krist and Kurt on the other hand were like an old couple who really needed to make it happen: they had absolutely nothing they could fall back on.
***
You will no doubt hate the way True tells the story. He desperately wants to be viewed in the annals of rock history as the fifth Beatle - or rather the fourth member of Nirvana. "I introduced Courtney to Kurt.", "Who was I to tell Kurt what to do?", and so on. True is still under the impression that he played a bigger part in the story of Nirvana, let alone in the life of Kurt Cobain, than most people realize (and give him credit for).
Yes, you befriended the band, its frontman, Courtney Love, and many other folks who happened to hang around the band and Cobain, particularly. A paid dog who kinda hopes to not be seen as a paid dog but as a True (sic), fellow and suffering, artist. If you want to be a rock journalist who gets to write more than just about how the gigs went, sorta kinda has to make the effort to try and befriend with the band. Particularly when it comes to up-and-coming and famous people it always works wonders if and when you suck up to these people and party with them (at command or willingly). Or be their nanny, the father figure, the funny foreigner, the useful idiot. Or whatever the hell it is that these people want you to be for them, if only for a little while.
Kurt might have been a pretty selfish s.o.b., but he was a self-made man also. Everett True a.k.a. Jerry Thackray was a music journo who was hoping a little bit of rock stardust might eventually latch onto his clothing too. If it's true that The Laughing Apple's (not that anyone's heard of this particular band either) lead singer Alan McGee (not that anyone would know who he is and why it would even matter) said of Thackray that he "was the most un-enigmatic, boring, kindest, shyest person you could ever meet - and it just appealed to my sense of humour to make him compère", I can't help but wonder if another frontman saw and did exactly the same...
I recently read both of these books back-to-back because these are the two books out of three that are most commonly described as "accurate" (the third one being Come As You Are). Since Azerrad's book was not available in my local libraries at the moment, and having already seen the documentary "Kurt Cobain: About a Son" which featured Azerrad's audio interviews that were used as a material for the book, I figured I'm not missing out on much one way or the other.
I pretty much just wanted to know for once and for all why this funny, lovable guy ended up blowing his brain out for no good reason, and if we could not possible learn some lesson here.
I'm just going to write about Cross' book too, since they are both intertwined in my mind as one book anyways (with the exception that Cross' book was actually well written).
Since I was pretty much alive when Nirvana was only the biggest thing around in the popular culture, I already had the basics covered concerning the band. Even when my memories had grown vague about what Kurt had actually scribbled in his journals, I remembered that this guy was no accident. He was smart in his own way and anything but a guy who didn't know what he was trying to accomplish. Kurt wanted to become a rock star and he figured he had the drive and the talents to do so.
Frankly, I don't understand why people want to hear so desperately about the bands rather than about the people behind those bands who make the actual music happen. I believe there has never been a successful band where its members' creative input (=significance) has been equal. In arts specifically democratic participation has never amounted to much if anything at all. All great bands are great because there's someone who says: "No, I need you to play it like this, that is just shit." Kurt was Nirvana's despot and without him it would not have existed at all. I'm happy that Dave Grohl still manages to get his kick out of touring with his AOR-band, but I'm even happier to see Krist Novoselic do something actually respectable.
Writing Nirvana off as merely a fluke and a trend and Cobain as nothing but a druggie, is the easiest thing for people to say and to feel like a better wo/man.
But let's get one thing straight first: Americans have been enchanted by drugs ever since they were introduced to the masses in the 60's and 70's. Not surprisingly in the 80's and early 90's every cool kid did dope as well.
There's always certain amount of debauchery and egotistical behavior going on when we look into the lives of any rock band. Documenting who f*cked who and who did what crazy stuff while intoxicated is besides the point, and frankly, boring. I'm no rock star but I've done my share of boozing - maybe more than the next guy, maybe less. Point is, today it's pretty hard to "impress" anyone. You don't have to be an illiterate, arrogant rock star to do drugs, to sport a million tattoos and body piercings, to flunk out of school, and to generally piss away your life. Any wanker can do that. And these hazy crazy reminiscences always sound crazier than they really were.
No one is denying that Kurt didn't do heroin. That is a fact. Yes, Kurt might even have used more drugs already in his youth than his peers, but it's all relative. First off, people react to drugs individually. Secondly, the more you use, the higher tolerance you will develop. And thirdly, before "Nevermind" was starting to churn money, Kurt had always been more or less broke. It would not have been even financially possible to maintain a habit before the success. And fourth, Kurt lied about having had used heroin in the 80's. And fifth, a former junkie (and Kurt's drug buddy) who's seen many succumb to heroin says in effect that Kurt was an early stage heroin addict who was still in denial and who would most likely have come out it just fine in due course, had people only left him be.
Some insist that Kurt really preferred getting f*cked up rather than staying sober. A lot of folks not only share this sentiment but actually live by it, too. Instead of heroin, they just stick with alcohol and subscription pills. It feels much, much less evil and much less dirty, dangerous or even harmful than shooting up. They might be right, but they are still treating the disease (whatever it may be) the same way - in principal.
Would it be surprising to hear that Kurt too was shocked when he learned for the first time that his friend had tried heroin? Like any decent friend, Kurt scolded him. He thought it was stupid and dangerous thing to be doing. But I bet before Kurt had taken his first puff of marijuana, he had deemed also pot stupid and dangerous. This is how the logic goes.
No, heroin isn't pot, and pot isn't a cigarette. Heroin is a pain killer that works much faster and more reliably than, say, drinking alcohol. Kurt himself explained that he started to use heroin because it was the only thing that was making his chronic stomach pains go away. One can always say that this is how addicts tend to legitimize their use. I can imagine that to be true in many - even in most - cases.
Then again, I have never had to endure the sort of pain in my stomach that Kurt described he had to endure pretty much every time he wanted to eat something. Maybe you have? And Kurt was pretty infamous for not eating much. But I'm sure he was just making this all up. I am not at all suggesting that modern medical science wouldn't have ultimately figured out what was causing his pains. It's just that Kurt had already found a cure he figured he could manage to live with. Without a doubt it came as a godsent bonus that heroin pretty much also made him forget all the other things he found troubling his worried mind.
And Kurt was a worried guy alright.
He was always worried about (losing) money because he had never had any (pre-Nevermind). He had also somehow convinced himself that Courtney was cheating on him, yet he couldn't even handle the very notion of a divorce nor being the one to subjugate his own daughter to those feelings of abandonment that he was very familiar with in his own childhood and youth. In a way Kurt had always been somewhat lost, somewhat love sick puppy everyone except his anonymous junkie friends seemed to want a piece of.
Like most successful artists, he too was suffering from those oh-so-existential questions that deal with arbitrary notions of "authenticity", "staying true", "being loyal", "being real", and so on. He knew his fans would ultimately buy anything he chose to present them with. He would publicly rant about evil labels, corporations and whatnot, while outside the public eye he wanted his music to be promoted at every possible chance.
You see, at some point all artists start hating their previous work, sabotaging their own shows. They start isolating from the public, start running away from fans, friends and family and from other band members as well. They want to take a break, break up the band, branch out and become a painter/writer/director/whatnot and generally wanting more credit (=money) and exposure (though not too much and preferably not anything neg). They might say stuff like how they welcome the remaining members to participate more - yet in actuality work hard at making that damn near impossible. They are always left wanting. For something that even they themselves can't put a finger on.
We'll all seen this pattern a thousand times.
"Nevermind" is still one of the greatest rock albums around, but critics like to pan it because it's "too polished and lacking depth and dynamics" when they really want to say it's "too commercial". They like to remind us that "In Utero" is "much more mature work - more experimental, openly candid, and raw". This is just another way of saying it's full of self-pity, nonsense and half-assed songs that were probably recorded like crap on purpose.
I wouldn't say it's a bad record. I'm just pissed of when I know what the man was capable of and particularly because that album ended up being his last one. I'm pleased to hear that Grohl pretty much copied Chad Channing's original drum playing on "Nevermind". He was the new guy, and was simply told to do so. I don't personally pay much attention to drums because I can't drum worth shit, but when those more experienced assert that Grohl is a hard hitting machine, I kinda see what they mean.
When I overheard Foo Fighters playing live in almost our backyard about a year ago, I didn't really feel much, if anything. And this is coming from someone who - after hearing Grohl sing Marigold while Nirvana was still around - though that, my god, he's doing it better than Kurt. Now all these years ago, I tend to think that Grohl's 1995 debut is likely the best r'n'r he can muster, and that as a performer and a songwriter, he managed to become the man whom Kurt never wanted to end up as: indifferent and bland.
By now it's part of the official Nirvana canon that Chad Channing was fired because he couldn't play well enough. That's pretty funny coming from a guy who - let's face it - was a sloppy and at best intermediate guitarist himself. I think that sacking had much more obvious reasons: Channing was too pleasant, too nice of a guy who didn't share Kurt's positively negative look on life either. He probably didn't even take (making) music that seriously. Krist and Kurt on the other hand were like an old couple who really needed to make it happen: they had absolutely nothing they could fall back on.
***
You will no doubt hate the way True tells the story. He desperately wants to be viewed in the annals of rock history as the fifth Beatle - or rather the fourth member of Nirvana. "I introduced Courtney to Kurt.", "Who was I to tell Kurt what to do?", and so on. True is still under the impression that he played a bigger part in the story of Nirvana, let alone in the life of Kurt Cobain, than most people realize (and give him credit for).
Yes, you befriended the band, its frontman, Courtney Love, and many other folks who happened to hang around the band and Cobain, particularly. A paid dog who kinda hopes to not be seen as a paid dog but as a True (sic), fellow and suffering, artist. If you want to be a rock journalist who gets to write more than just about how the gigs went, sorta kinda has to make the effort to try and befriend with the band. Particularly when it comes to up-and-coming and famous people it always works wonders if and when you suck up to these people and party with them (at command or willingly). Or be their nanny, the father figure, the funny foreigner, the useful idiot. Or whatever the hell it is that these people want you to be for them, if only for a little while.
Kurt might have been a pretty selfish s.o.b., but he was a self-made man also. Everett True a.k.a. Jerry Thackray was a music journo who was hoping a little bit of rock stardust might eventually latch onto his clothing too. If it's true that The Laughing Apple's (not that anyone's heard of this particular band either) lead singer Alan McGee (not that anyone would know who he is and why it would even matter) said of Thackray that he "was the most un-enigmatic, boring, kindest, shyest person you could ever meet - and it just appealed to my sense of humour to make him compère", I can't help but wonder if another frontman saw and did exactly the same...
April 15, 2021
Massive story with details of a legendary band
I am a long time Nirvana fan and picked his book up on sale. I didnt think it would be as in depth as it was and I am happy that it went into details. I feel it gets to a truer accurate portrayal of what happened and cuts through legend and mystery to get to a more valid truth. I think it painted a very good picture of who Kurt really was. The only negative is that as it was supposed to be a Nirvana book, it was mainly a Kurt and band book. However it is obvious that the main story is and will be Kurt. I highly recommend this book to any Nirvana and Kurt fan, or for anyone worried about the pitfalls of becoming famous.
I am a long time Nirvana fan and picked his book up on sale. I didnt think it would be as in depth as it was and I am happy that it went into details. I feel it gets to a truer accurate portrayal of what happened and cuts through legend and mystery to get to a more valid truth. I think it painted a very good picture of who Kurt really was. The only negative is that as it was supposed to be a Nirvana book, it was mainly a Kurt and band book. However it is obvious that the main story is and will be Kurt. I highly recommend this book to any Nirvana and Kurt fan, or for anyone worried about the pitfalls of becoming famous.
April 21, 2022
Everett True can be kind of a douche.
This is such a tragic story, though. It gets more sad the older I get. Mark Arm nails it in a section about the In Utero tour: Kurt Cobain was a dude who just didn’t have the skill set to be the boss of Nirvana, Inc. He was just a dude who liked Cap n Crunch and playing in a band. He was a numbnuts.
Music industry plankton picked his bones, yes. The fact that his suicide note is available to purchase as a T shirt tells you everything you need to know about that part of the story.
But imagine this happening to your favorite local band. How do you think it would go?
This is such a tragic story, though. It gets more sad the older I get. Mark Arm nails it in a section about the In Utero tour: Kurt Cobain was a dude who just didn’t have the skill set to be the boss of Nirvana, Inc. He was just a dude who liked Cap n Crunch and playing in a band. He was a numbnuts.
Music industry plankton picked his bones, yes. The fact that his suicide note is available to purchase as a T shirt tells you everything you need to know about that part of the story.
But imagine this happening to your favorite local band. How do you think it would go?
October 16, 2020
I spent the first couple of hundred pages putting up with Everett's style (which I've never been a fan of) and considering whether I'd bother with the rest of this.
I'm glad I did; the back half changes its approach considerably, becoming less about True's part in the proceedings and more of a grimly compelling pacey warts-and-all document of the accounts of people around the Cobains who saw the last year play out.
I'd never read this up-close a version of that history before. While it's obviously terribly sad, I enjoyed the book very much. Despite the author :)
I'm glad I did; the back half changes its approach considerably, becoming less about True's part in the proceedings and more of a grimly compelling pacey warts-and-all document of the accounts of people around the Cobains who saw the last year play out.
I'd never read this up-close a version of that history before. While it's obviously terribly sad, I enjoyed the book very much. Despite the author :)
March 27, 2023
Great if you want some truly inside dirt on the band, the Seattle scene, and 90s alt rock landscape as a whole. The author knew and partied with everyone from Kurt Cobain to Kim Deal to Kim Gordon so he’s got some wild anecdotes from living and actually knowing all these musicians. Too bad he tries to go Lester Bangs self aggrandizing gonzo journalist mode sometimes bragging about jumping onstage and shouting nonsense with some band or another. A price to pay for a real ground level view of the whole ‘90s alternative boom and bust, though.
May 26, 2021
Definitely not the book for you if you want to read the short and sweet version. An in-depth telling of the whole Nirvana story from beginning to Kurt Cobain's tragic end from an insider. If you want all of the dirty details of Kurtney, the Pearl Jam rivalry, the MTV squeeze and the story of Sub-Pop Records then this book is for you but at 500+ pages you're not reading it over the weekend.
October 18, 2022
My favorite Nirvana-related book, written by somebody who knew them, but had enough distance from them to not be terribly biased. Highly recommended. (I say as I rub the scar above my right eye that I got from being kicked in the head by a crowd surfer at a late-93 Nirvana show outside of Buffalo.)
January 31, 2026
Fascinating, heart wrenching, somber, informational text that I truly felt like I connected with. This book is an intimate and capturing read that allows the reader a new perspective on Kurt, the band Nirvana, and the 90s music scene. I enjoyed reading this book slowly digesting each chapter and recommend this book for all readers interested in knowing all the nooks and crannies of music history.
January 8, 2020
Just finished reading it. I am not sure what to think about Nirvana or Kurt Cobain or the whole rock world. I am starting to feel like I shouldn't get deep into these celebrities life and just simply enjoy the work of art they gave us.
October 20, 2022
It’s a must-read for any true Nirvana fan. It’s a DEEP dive by someone who witnessed the rise and fall of the band first-hand. My only negative point is how the author felt the need to shit on several other bands from that era. Other than that, I thoroughly enjoyed this one.
May 2, 2019
This book made me like Kurt Cobain even more and I was already a huge fan of Nirvana. Kurt was a lot funnier than people gave him credit for and this book shows that side of him.
January 17, 2022
Incredible, behind the scenes account of Nirvana's rise and fall. Tapped into great sources with intimate knowledge of the "Kurtney," including their nanny. Highly recommend.
January 25, 2022
Lots of interesting tidbits to fill in the gaps from an insider
July 14, 2022
Nirvana was my fav thing growing up. I had much solace with the words and tunes from Kurt and the band.
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