Nirvana: In Utero

In Utero

Best song: Pennyroyal Tea

Worst song: Dumb

Overall grade: 5

On 1993’s ‘In Utero’, Nirvana live up to the potential that I thought they maybe, kind of, might possibly have after listening to ‘Nevermind’. They do this by releasing a set of songs that (with one or two notable exceptions) are more enduring and more meaningful.

That’s not to say I think this record is amazing. My biggest problem with it, which I also feel with its predecessor, is that it’s so crafted – ie. It doesn’t show who Nirvana really are as a band, it just shows how Kurt Cobain wanted people to think of the band at that point in time. Because of that, it doesn’t feel quite real. In addition, there are a few places where he just takes things too far. His complaints about his post-Nevermind fame, the status he’d been awarded because of it and the expectations piled upon him regarding the followup are all mostly justified, but he can be a bit heavy-handed as he writes about it.

So, I’ll get the negative stuff out of the way first: I really don’t like ‘Dumb’ or ‘Tourette’s’ at all. The second of these is clearly meant to be some kind of hardcore song, but at a minute and a half, the only point it manages to make is ‘Hey, Kurt Cobain can scream!’ And the first of the two really lives up to its name. It was written in 1990, before Kurt’s songwriting skills had properly developed, which is fair enough – but why put it on the album? It should have been consigned to the vaults.

Those are the only two real missteps though. The closing ‘All Apologies’ is the closest Nirvana would ever get to beautiful. Coincidentally, or perhaps not, it’s the song where he sheds the anti-fame stance to take a look at his marriage, and it comes across as the most sincere and heartfelt song here. The only thing better than it is ‘Pennyroyal Tea’, one of the tracks that shows Kurt just couldn’t help adding melodies and hooks into his songs… even as they’re as disturbing as this one, foreshadowing his suicide next year with lyrics that make me just a little uncomfortable.

The most famous song here is ‘Rape Me’ and its fame is more deserving than the singles from Nevermind. You can’t really sing along to the chorus like you can the others, but the lyrics aren’t just there to shock, they have a strong meaning.

But this isn’t just a lyrics-based record. There’s also harder rocking tracks like ‘Scentless Apprentice’ and ‘Radio Friendly Unit Shifter’ as well as the opener ‘Serve The Servants’, another great song that plays to the band’s strength of fusing noise and accessibility.

I always wonder, how do bands pick which song from an album will be a bonus track? This album is confused and doesn’t flow at all, so it should follow that any track could be the bonus (in this case, bonus = unlisted and appearing only after a 20 minute silence) except that they couldn’t. ‘Gallons of Rubbing Alcohol Flow Through the Strip’ really seems like the only logical choice. It is different, it’s more improvised than the others – you can even hear Kurt saying “Shall we have one more solo?” at one point. It’s a good bonus too. If you can fast-forward through the silence, it’s definitely worth listening to, at least for the cool effect where the band sound really far away during the vocal portions and right up close during the solos.

It’s a great final statement that makes me wish it hadn’t been their final statement. I’d like to hear the kinds of songs Kurt might have written next.

Nirvana: Nevermind

Nevermind

Best song: Something In The Way

Worst song: On A Plain

Overall grade: 4

If there’s one type of person I really can’t stand, it is the Nirvana superfan. You know, the one who’s all ‘Nirvana is the greatest thing that ever happened to music! Kurt Cobain is a genius and no other songwriter before or since could come anywhere close!’ The kind who worships the band with an undying devotion and considers them impossible of doing any wrong. Now, many bands have a subset of fans like this one, but Nirvana’s are some of the most extreme I’ve come across. And I’ve never told any of them this because I’m a coward who doesn’t like having eggs thrown at her, but…

‘Nevermind’ is so overrated.

I mean, I like it and all. I can even see why people love it. But this whole ‘greatest album of the 90s, singlehandedly saved rock’ rubbish is just that. If you asked me the greatest album of the 90s, that’d be… well, that review’s coming up next week and I won’t spoil it. And I don’t think there’s one album that singlehandedly saved rock. Even as far as grunge goes, when that’s what I’m in the mood for I’m more likely to put on Pearl Jam.

But I do still like this album (cannot stress that enough) and I have tried very hard to understand what it is about Kurt Cobain that makes people worship him like others worship John Lennon or Bob Dylan. I’ve come to the conclusion that it’s because he seems like a real person. He doesn’t seem like someone famous, from another world who has a lot of money and spends his time writing songs/making records; he seems like the slightly weird guy who sits at the back of your maths class or a random, hunched-over dude with big headphones who you notice on the bus, and he just happens to write songs in his spare time. Which accidentally get released and become huge hits, of course.

I don’t know how much this is true and how much it’s an act, so it’s not why I like him; I like him because he took simple pop tunes and put them through punk and metal filters so that they came out as a schizophrenic blend of both. It’s a very effective way of appealing to a wide variety of people, but of course, it was so effective that he just repeated it every time for every song, with one or two exceptions. I’ll quickly mention these: ‘Something In The Way’ reminds me of the Beatles and is a surprising, but excellent, finish, and it even has a cello, which is cool. I love ‘Polly’ too, it’s a song that really sucks me into the story. But I won’t talk about the huge hit songs – what is there to say? Apart from the fact that Dave Grohl’s drumming sets them apart slightly from other big radio hits of the time.

This record, well, it’s a contradiction in terms. It’s meant to be alternative and anti-mainstream but it’s actually incredibly accessible and fun; it’s supposed to be revolutionary but much of the bass and guitar work is pretty generic. I think its reputation has spoiled it a bit. I’m supposed to like it so much that I find myself drifting in the opposite direction until I actually listen to it. That’s the moment when I realise, these songs are mostly good and yeah, these guys had talent. Just maybe not for quite the same things as a lot of people think.