I Found My Friends (40 page)

CHRIS BROKAW:
The vibe was just sort of … high drama. I think everyone was sort of afraid of Kurt and afraid of what he might do. But a lot of that drama surrounded his wife … When she left the tour, in Atlanta, the whole mood of the tour became instantly more relaxed.

PAUL LEARY:
His wife was always doing her best to make sure he didn't hang out with us. She had been a concert promoter in Minneapolis, Minnesota, a few years earlier, and had booked us to play a show in Minneapolis. We drove for two days to get there, played our show, and then she stiffed us … We didn't get along after that. She was extremely unpleasant during our shows with Nirvana. I remember once talking with Kurt, and his wife literally grabbed him by the ear and pulled him away. I have to admit, in my thirty-plus years of being in music, I have gotten along well with every musician I have ever met, except for Kurt's wife. So I don't really consider her a musician.

CRIS KIRKWOOD:
He was so famous by then and dealing with so much stuff, it was at the point they'd have to put signs up backstage telling people not to molest the guy—where even seasoned show hands are stopping you to try to get their photo taken with you, certainly you could tell that was something. He was just withdrawn, sheltered in a way—but we still had fun, things like that MTV practice session was trippy … We'd take them to parties at an old friend's house and it'd feel like we'd brought this little Northwest guy with us but he's really fucking famous and everyone was aware and that changed things. And he was such a newly minted star—but then it's not like he was a plumber who suddenly became famous.

Cobain was notably withdrawn and lonely. He was barely visible when he wasn't onstage.

CHRIS BROKAW:
I was walking down the hallway and Kurt came up and was saying how we should come to their backstage room more often. He was saying, “You guys should come and hang out with us before shows … it gets
so
lonely back there.” When he said that, he was looking into my eyes. He looked so sad, and suddenly a group of people came rushing down the hall at us and mobbed him screaming for autographs and trying to touch him. There was this circle of people swarming around him and he was still just looking into my eyes. He looked so alone, so small and lost. He was a sweet person but his fame seemed overwhelming. I just backed up slowly. It was a scary moment. He was surrounded.

THALIA ZEDEK:
My impression of him was pretty fleeting. He didn't hang out much with us or with the rest of his band and he was pretty quiet. I think he enjoyed our performance, but he was pretty reserved. He seemed pretty overwhelmed and not comfortable, either physically or mentally. I didn't get the impression that he was enjoying the tour or their success very much. He was traveling in a separate bus with Frances, if I remember correctly, and he seemed really devoted to her.

JAD FAIR:
I saw a lot more of Dave and Krist than I did of Kurt. Krist and Dave seemed to spend time together. Kurt didn't … We didn't see much of Kurt at the shows.

YAMANTAKA EYE,
Boredoms:
Kurt seemed like he already had angel wings—his steps across the stage were uncertain and it looked so pitiful you could almost see his heart bleeding with a deep self-pity that I thought was very dangerous indeed.

KEVIN WHITWORTH:
The next time I saw him was walking off the huge stage at some enormo-dome … I was stage left. We'd just played the punk-rock club down the street and were let in the back door. And he looked so tired, walking out of a room full of thousands of adoring fans, like he'd just left a coal mine after a twelve-hour shift.

No one felt more than a vague unease. This was Kurt Cobain, after all, a man everyone knew had a few problems. There wasn't anything to suggest that his moodiness was anything more than “Kurt being Kurt.”

CHRIS BROKAW:
They seemed like any other band to me. All bands fight and get over it. They are together because for some reason when they make music together it sounds good, and they know that is worth something to them even if they argue in the van. Every band goes through it. I think they were like everyone else in that respect.

THALIA ZEDEK:
I remember that Kurt always had this huge fan blowing air directed right at his head while he was playing. I guess that's the image in my mind of that tour. I don't know, I definitely got the feeling that something was wrong, everyone was just kind of uptight. But they played really good every night and treated us very well and with respect

PAUL LEARY:
Those shows were a blast. I remember on New Year's Eve sitting in the audience watching Nirvana put on a really great show. Nine shows didn't seem like enough, I wanted more … I never saw his mood drop. He seemed to be in a good mood backstage after the last show.

In contrast to late 1991, when he had been writing on tour and the band sound-checked new material, it seems Cobain had written only one song since January 1993. Fans place hope in the supposed “lost song” jammed onstage on November 12 and December 29, but it barely registered at the time.

TROY VON BALTHAZAR:
I think they might have been writing a bit and jamming at sound check, but everyone does that on tour. It's usually the only chance to work on anything new. I don't recall the particular piece you are talking about though.

THALIA ZEDEK:
I don't remember hearing any jamming or new material at sound checks. But they
did
always sound check. But they didn't spend hours noodling around or anything. The sets were slightly different every night if I recall correctly, but there wasn't a huge variation.

Fans claim the piece may have been demoed in 1994, but producer Adam Kasper can only say, having listened to the live track, “Sounds familiar but I would have to hear it re: the demo again to know for sure.” That didn't mean there was nothing there, but it certainly hadn't gone so far as to become a true song.

JAD FAIR:
Kurt was always friendly to me. He told me that he would be starting a label and wanted to release albums by Half Japanese and my solo albums. Yes, he made it clear that he liked my music.

TROY VON BALTHAZAR:
I know Kurt was considering starting his own record label. I do wish that would have happened. There would have been some good music on it. He was a huge music fan.

The cessation of creativity had become a deep malaise stretching back two years. At first everyone could shrug it off, but there'd been less than a dozen songs written since Nevermind. The band made it into the studio in January but Cobain only showed up for one day.

ADAM KASPER,
producer
: Not sure how long we spent, but Cobain was present all day and after dinner break. Cobain was the creative genius behind Nirvana and we all knew things were not right, as far as the well-documented problems Kurt was having … So we just got to work. The studio and band is sometimes the last refuge for someone thrust into that kind of whirlwind and incredible fame … Everyone seemed to be getting along good. Kurt was like a brother to Novoselic and Grohl. So there was love, there was concern—there was the hope that the music would be the healer … The thing that stood out for me was the fun we had—all those guys are incredibly funny and smart … He had a song ready to go, minus some final lyrics, which became “You Know You're Right,” and we got to it. I had the studio all set up in terms of amps, guitars, and drums … Cobain arrived and we began his song in earnest. Cobain gave no direction or input on sounds. He had the song and the arrangement complete and Dave and Krist jumped right in. When it came to vocals we did some takes, listened back, and punched in some spots and did a few more parts. I made some rough mixes that only the band and myself had for all those years … I was blown away by Cobain's raw talent. He was completely self-contained and what you hear in terms of songwriting and performance is just so real. I've worked with many talented people, but few can get up to the mike and in one performance be so transcendent … It was a complete song that Cobain brought in. We attempted to get the best version of it we could. There was no discussion of future releases or any business-related conversations that I was aware of … Can't recall future bookings. But there was definite talk of doing more when they got back from tour in Europe.

There was no talk of a Lollapalooza EP, or of further Nirvana releases; the future of the band, and any aim for that last recording, remained veiled.

 

20.0

One More Solo? The Curtain Falls

February to April 1994

The January session
was to be the last time Nirvana worked together in studio. While there was only the scantest evidence of artistic activity from Cobain—he was too busy switching homes again—Grohl and Novoselic still presented compositions for Cobain's perusal as potential material for Nirvana. Even now—as late as January 30, 1994—no one could see that the end to Nirvana was within touching distance. The future was vague, but not preordained. There was no forewarning of the spiraling events that led to Cobain's death.

ADAM KASPER:
I was struck by Grohl's songs and the demos we made that week. At the time I offhandedly made the remark that he should do a solo album someday … There was talk of the guys wanting a chance to include some of their songs on the new album work. Cobain listened to a few tracks and it seemed he was open to considering other material, but not much time or energy was spent on this.

STEVE DIGGLE:
I sat with Dave at the end of the tour and said, “We're gonna miss you guys, y'know?” because we got on really well on the road—all in [it] together. We were sat at the table and he said he had some songs he wanted to do when he got back. I have to be honest, I thought, I bet they're pretty good but … the drummer? You're not sure what he's got but …

Having spent part of 1993 on a reunion tour with Scream, Grohl joined other musicians in early 1994 for the soundtrack to the film
Backbeat.

DON FLEMING:
Thurston [Moore] put the lineup together and told Don Was we would do it but only if we could do it without any rehearsal and if we could do it in two days. That helped everyone with their busy schedules; we literally flew out there, learned the songs on the spot one-by-one … There are certain drummers, especially from producing, I've worked out are such a key element of the band. They can take a band that are great and make them a step above—that's what [Dave] did with Nirvana. There were great songs, great front man; the drums took it a step up, and that's why they were so successful … He brought so much energy to the songs and never fucked up. I don't remember about where they were at as a band at that point. They'd become very popular but I don't remember him talking about it at all. I think he was just there to have a good time.

While Cobain was increasingly absent as a creative artist, Nirvana as a performing entity rolled on and arrived in Cascais, Portugal, in February to play their first European shows since 1992. Cobain, Novoselic, Grohl, and Pat Smear had performed these songs so many times that whatever was occurring behind the scenes, their well-drilled onstage chemistry was still there.

STEVE DIGGLE:
I remember those shows, standing at the side of the stage, hearing Dave Grohl's drums and just thinking, Jesus! It's like John Bonham! This guy can play! Krist was an amazing bass player and Kurt was sometimes quiet but suddenly this roar of a vocal and this intensity. Pat Smear—great guy and great guitarist, he blended in well. It was amazing to see, I'd heard the records but I was blown away by the live thing … I'd heard
Bleach
and I'd heard the
Nevermind
album, but the first time I saw their show I thought, Wow, I've got it now. Watching Dave Grohl just a few yards away banging the fuck out the drums, Krist to one side, Kurt in the middle belting it out, the intensity rocketing up and down … I saw what it was all about. Kurt was a great guitarist in his idiosyncratic way—using your limitations. A lot of people in punk are like that; it's not like you're some virtuoso muso guy, you never got that sense off him, but it was just the right thing—right on the button. It's the noise, the inflections. I was a big fan of Neil Young and the way he works the noise as well as the notes—that's passion, feeling, a lot of artistry.

Cobain's band mates had long since developed immunity to the roller coaster of his moods. For years he swung between spells of shyness, sullenness, or whatever.

STEVE DIGGLE:
He was up and down on the tour—one day he'd be quiet, other times he'd be animated. Everyone gets like that on tours—you didn't detect anything heavy. There's a bit of video somewhere: I'm walking to the stage, he walks out [of] his dressing room and walks with me all the way to the stage—together. He was such a lovely guy, like they all were. All of them had learned something from punk rock and he'd taken it into this era—and he was true to it. There's a lot of inspiring things about the heaviness of what he was saying. They weren't there to be fucking bought. I thought he was sticking to his beliefs—heavy-duty, real things. Maybe dark and intense but real—we couldn't see where it was ending. As well as Kurt, Dave, Krist—incredible musicians and very thoughtful. Krist is very thoughtful! A big part of that band … There's the serious side, the intensity—I did get that from the way the band played. It was like thunder coming—but just in the dressing rooms, we knew about this, that we all deal with our own stuff when out on the road. But we did connect in a lot of ways with those guys. I could sympathize with that awkwardness.