Credit: Far Out / Alamy
Sat 19 September 2026 21:45, UK
During their time in the spotlight, one thing that you could always count on with Nirvana was their honesty.
The band are so heavily ingrained in modern pop culture now that it’s easy to misconstrue all the reasons why they became such a force of rock in the first place, but really, they established a level of authenticity few others could match back then, and even fewer today.
The band’s leader, Kurt Cobain, never really thought about whether his words were genuine or not, because he didn’t really know how to be any other way. Even growing up, he felt like an outsider on the school playground, observing the ways others would repeat derogatory language they’d heard in passing without a second thought about who they might be offending.
Even though kids will always be kids, Cobain couldn’t help but carry that same unease as he grew older when he fell in love with music and noticed all the same patterns. He’d listen to AC/DC, Led Zeppelin, and Aerosmith and enjoy the melodies and the arrangements, and the ways they seemed larger-than-life, almost for show. That only made him want to one day create something that made others feel just as inspired to get up and forget their worries for a couple of perfect minutes.
But there was always that same little niggle in the back of his mind. And really, it all came down to this: Why did they have to prove themselves with overuse of sexist, derogatory words and phrases, and not focus on what they held within, or the experiences and ideas that could actually impact those who listened?
And so, Cobain vowed never to follow in the same footsteps, ensuring that the lyrics he wrote for Nirvana would always come from the heart and soul, and not from somewhere more insidious, because it wasn’t there anyway – he didn’t have it in him to try to tear people down, at least, not in the same way as, say, those who only “wrote about their dicks and having sex”.
But that honesty bled into all aspects of the band, not just the music, but also the way they held themselves in interviews. For instance, you could probably watch any interview with Cobain and notice the immediate mannerisms that prove his inability to put on a performance, like the way he mumbles a little, or the way he almost always admits when he doesn’t like a particular song or artist.
Further reading: From The Vault
During one particular interview, the band discussed the process of recording ‘Sappy’, written for the 1993 compilation record, No Alternative. Initially released under the title ‘Verse Chorus Verse’, the song had been floating around for a while, first recorded as a demo by Cobain in the 1980s. The song was recorded four times, the fourth time recorded with Steve Albini during the sessions for In Utero.
However, the song remained off the album and was instead included in the AIDS-benefit compilation record, becoming a major vehicle for the album’s success. The band, however, remembered how much of a struggle it was to record and get it right before they were finally able to decide that it was time to include it.
“It’s one of those songs that we’ve been trying to record since we made the band,” said Cobain, “Every time we went into the studio and tried to record the song, it sucked. It sucked, and this time, it just, almost didn’t suck.”
