Courtney Love, to me in 2002, about Kurt’s legacy: “In our society, art and celebrity has everything to do with being untapped. Do you think Nirvana would still be vital today? I say abso-fucking-lutely. Janis Joplin was done. Jim Morrison was done. Jimi Hendrix was done. But Kurt, he wasn’t done. You are talking about somebody, at twenty-seven, who had barely scratched the surface.”
Courtney Love, to me, 2003, on Frances Bean Cobain: “She’s got great karma. And she’s just such a great human. And it’s really important that she came here [and was born]. And it’s really important that she not get the load dumped on her that Sean [Lennon] did. You never know if you are going to like your kids, but I’m honored she’s my daughter, our daughter.”
No analysis of Kurt Cobain could ever be complete enough to encompass every aspect of his legacy. The question of any performer’s impact is ultimately a personal one. If you were touched or moved in any way by Kurt Cobain, whatever drew you in is the key to what that legacy means to you now. There are as many answers to Larry King’s query—“Why did Kurt Cobain matter?”—as there are Nirvana fans.
There is, however, one physical embodiment of Kurt’s legacy beyond just his albums, and that, of course, is Frances Bean Cobain. She is a twenty-one-year-old as I write this book. She now controls aspects of Kurt’s estate and will have a say in the future how his tangible assets are marketed. She has Kurt’s striking blue eyes, and she’s gorgeous, a mix of the best features of her two parents. She’s lived with a troubled family history and has had to deal with remarkable intrusions to her privacy as well. I’ve heard a few stories over the years of disrespectful strangers who have literally grabbed Frances and announced they wanted to “touch” Kurt. The first time this ever happened, Courtney told me, was backstage at Saturday Night Live, and the person grabbing then-baby Frances was a B-list movie star who you would have thought would have known better. But it has happened in all sorts of places, including once at the ballet when Frances was seven and an elderly, matronly woman grabbed Frances away from Courtney and said, “I want to look into the eyes of Kurt Cobain.” In a People magazine piece, Frances called these encounters “creepy” and said she is quick to note to anyone, “I’m not my parents.” She does, however, have a sense of humor and understands irony and serendipity, two of the main ingredients to her father’s success.
Last year, Frances was walking through a large comic-book convention wearing a cardigan sweater. A stranger approached her. This happens all the time to beautiful and famous young women, but in this instance the man who approached her clearly had no idea who he was talking to. He probably was trying to hit on her. He looked at her outfit and remarked, “Pretty good Kurt Cobain imitation.”
I didn’t see this incident firsthand, so I can only imagine the expression on Frances’s face, how her eyes would have skirted around as she tried to comprehend exactly what was being said, whether the guy was a stalker, another creep, or just a random dude trying to get her number. Somehow in my mind I imagine Frances’s look at the moment the rich irony of this came to her, and I imagine it would have looked remarkably similar to what I saw on her father’s face back in September 1991, pre-fame, pre-Frances, when he and the other members of Nirvana were getting kicked out of their own Seattle record-release party for Nevermind for starting a food fight.
This book touches on only a handful of the ways Kurt affected music and culture—the ways I saw as most significant or easiest to track. Kurt appealed to people for many reasons, and continues to do so, and most parts of that are not as quantifiable as Nirvana’s album sales, the amount of radio airplay he earned, or the number of sneakers that have his name on them. To most people his impact is personal, and it will be different for everyone.
Over the years many fans, seeking more information on ways they felt they intersected with Kurt, have contacted me. Those have included some who wanted to know more about his left-handedness, and how that variance affected his creativity, but many seem to share some kind of medical issue with Kurt. Often they ask if I know if he was ever diagnosed with some kind of malady they have, for example manic depression (he was never officially diagnosed, as far I know). Sometimes they share one of the issues he most certainly had: scoliosis, irritable bowel syndrome, ADHD, drug addiction. Kurt had so many health problems that his story connects with a panoply of people with similar ailments.
I can’t help these people in their quest for further information because Kurt’s myriad medical issues were never well documented. I examined some of his medical records that still exist and spoke with a few of his physicians, but given the chaos of his life, it wasn’t exactly like he was carting around a file folder of his patient records. Still, I found it fascinating when I discovered that Kurt’s stomach problems were so unique, and so pathological, that his case is still discussed in medical schools—minus his name on the records, of course. If Kurt were alive, this fact might give him more satisfaction than his ranking on any rock critic’s best-of list: that medical students at this very moment might be pouring over X-rays of his stomach and trying to figure out his ailments. Kurt wrote in his journal once that he wanted his own disease named after him. In a way, that’s come true.
But sometimes even thinking about Kurt’s medical problems makes me feel melancholy, simply because there’s a sadness in armchair quarterbacking a life that has already been lost. I’m nearly certain that if Kurt had been treated with a medical “whole body” approach—with all his issues tackled by a talented team—his drug addiction may have been easier to beat once his other problems were in check. Kurt’s lifelong stomach ailments caused him the greatest physical pain in his life, and when he discovered that opiates helped block that hurt, his addiction never receded for long. There are so many what-ifs in the story of a man who dies young and tragically. There are no answers, no matter how many hours you spend pondering, no matter how long you dream. Events of history don’t change just because you wonder about them, or Larry King asks a thousand what-ifs.
When you wake up from your dream, that haunting red Line One button is still flashing, still waiting for you.
And he’s still gone.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Special thanks go to Carrie Thornton (who like me has Bunnymen albums next to punk-rock ones), and Sarah Lazin (pretty fine classic-album collection as well) for the steerage on this project. Other support came from Cal Morgan, Brittany Hamblin, Doug Manelski, Manuela Jessel, Heidi Metcalfe Lewis, Lorie Pagnozzi, and the rest of the staff at It Books and HarperCollins. For help with research or interviews within the world of Nirvana—on this project and past ones—I’d like to acknowledge the assistance of Ryan Aigner, Cortney Alexander, Mark Arm, Joris Baas, Skip Berger, Jim Berkenstadt, Lauren Brown, Aaron Burckhard, Jeff Burlingame, David Byrnes, Nicole Jon Carroll, Chad Channing, Marco Collins, Stephanie Coontz, Kurt Danielson, Marie Walsh Dixon, Mike Doughty, Mari Earl, Jasen Emmons, Jack Endino, Steve Fisk, Gillian Gaar, Cam Garret, Dave Grohl, Rasmus Holmen, Mitch Holmquist, John Hughes, Robert Hunter, David Jobes, Chaz Kangas, Stephanie Kuehnert, Erica Krusen, Andrea Linett, Courtney Love, Tracy Marander, Jacob McMurray, Michael Meisel, Krist Novoselic, Harold Owens, Bruce Pavitt, Jonathan Poneman, Charles Peterson, Hilary Richrod, Pepper Schwartz, Ava Stander, Susie Tennant, Kim Thayil, Vicki Wagner, Alice Wheeler, and Mike Ziegler.
I’d also like to thank my family, including Ashland Cross, Bettie Cross, Catherine Cross, Herb Cross, Joe Guppy, John Keister, Brenda Lane, Geoff MacPherson, Carl Miller, Matt Smith, and Sarah Westbook. Thanks also go to Ken Anderson, Will Balla, Erik Bell, Julie Cascioppo, Peter Callaghan, Amber Caska, Aaron Coberly, Caspian Coberly, Mary Crandall, Paul DeBarros, Don Desantis, Melissa Duane, David Dubois, Sue Ennis, Cathy Erickson, Erik Flannigan, Wayne Foster, David French, Ray Rae Goldman, Nancy Guppy, Robert Hilburn, Josh Jacobson, Larry Jacobson, Dwight Jacobson, Eric Johnson, Bill King, Mary Kohl, John Kohl, Chris Kornelis, Gretchen Lauber, Joe Lee, Arthur Levin, Ben London, Cindy May, Summer Mayne, Norman McGlashan,
Lance Mercer, Curtis Minato, Barbara Mitchell, Marshall Nelson, Mark Nuckols, Michael O’Mahony, Harley O’Neil Jr., Don O’Neill, Shannon Payne, Peter Philbin, Chris Phillips, Ed Pierson, Rebecca Polinsky, Jonathan Pont, the staff of The Rocket (1979–2000, R.I.P.), Bob Rivers, Craig Rosenberg, Mary Schuh (R.I.P.), Shinkle Family, Megan Snyder-Camp, Denise Sullivan, Sam Sutherland, Charley Sweet, Brad Tolinski, Mary Truscott, Ron Upshaw, Mary Anne Vance, Michael Wansley, Cynthia West, Ann Wilson, Nancy Wilson, Amely Wurmbrand, and, of course, Larry King, without whom this book wouldn’t have had a beginning.
This book addressed the impact of the life and work of someone who died way too young, because of many complications. If you or someone you know needs assistance with mental health or addiction issues, there are resources are available. There are free addiction and recovery support groups in virtually every city in the United States, and the only requirement for attendance is a desire to break the habit. The MusiCares MAP Fund is one group that provides specific assistance for musicians or those in the music industry in need of addiction-recovery services (Musicares.org, 1-800-687-4227). In the field of suicide prevention, there are many resources available, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention lists many on their website (cdc.gov/violence prevention/suicide/). The American Foundation for Suicide Prevention (AFSP) maintains a twenty-four-hour hotline (1-800-273-TALK). Every year the AFSP holds walkathons in hundreds of cities around the United States to raise funds and increase awareness about this national health crisis. There is help.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Photo by Doug Manelski
CHARLES R. CROSS has written nine books, including Heavier Than Heaven: The Biography of Kurt Cobain, which was a New York Times bestseller, won the 2002 ASCAP Award for Outstanding Biography, and was called “one of the most moving and revealing books ever written about a rock star” by the Los Angeles Times. He is also the author of the New York Times bestseller Room Full of Mirrors: The Biography of Jimi Hendrix and was the coauthor of the New York Times bestseller Kicking & Dreaming: A Story of Heart, Soul, and Rock & Roll, with Ann and Nancy Wilson. He lives in Seattle, Washington.
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ALSO BY CHARLES R. CROSS
Backstreets: Springsteen, the Man and His Music
Led Zeppelin: Heaven and Hell
Nevermind: Nirvana
Heavier Than Heaven: A Biography of Kurt Cobain
Room Full of Mirrors: A Biography of Jimi Hendrix
Cobain Unseen
Led Zeppelin: Shadows Taller Than Our Souls
Kicking & Dreaming: A Story of Heart, Soul, and Rock & Roll (coauthored with Ann and Nancy Wilson)
CREDITS
Cover design by Gregg Kulick
Front cover photograph © by Michel Linssen/Redferns/Getty Images
Back cover photograph © by AJ Barrett/Retna UK/Retna Ltd.
COPYRIGHT
HERE WE ARE NOW. Copyright © 2014 by Charles R. Cross. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
FIRST EDITION
ISBN 978-0-06-230821-4
EPub Edition February 2014 ISBN 9780062308245
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