NEVERMIND 10 ANNI DOPO NEVERMIND
10 YEARS LATER SPECIALE
NIRVANA
SONO
PASSATI 10 ANNI DALL'USCITA DI "NEVERMIND". SEMBRA
DAVERO VICINISSIMO IL PERIODO DEI NIRVANA, L'ALTRO IERI PER CHI E' CRESCIUTO
CON I MENTE LE NOTE E LE IMMAGINI DI QUESTA GRANDE BAND PIENA DI IDEE, TALENTO
E TANTO PATHOS. POCHI
SONO RIUSCITI A COMUNICARE COSI' DIRETTAMENTE E COSI' APPASSIONATAMENTE TUTTO
IL DISAGIO, LA MALINCONIA ED IL MALE DI ESISTERE COME HANNO FATTO LA VOCE
DI KURT COBAIN, IL BASSO DI KRIST NOVOSELIC E LA BATTERIA DI DAVE GROHL. POCHI
RIESCONO A COINVOLGERE ED AD INVISCHIARE NELLE MAGLIE DELLA LORO MUSICA, IN
UN MODO COSI' UNIVERSALE, TANTE PERSONE. IN ITALIA
IL VIDEO CHE HA LANCIATO LA BAND DI SEATTLE, "SMELL LIKE TEEN SPIRIT", E'
USCITO NEL 1993 E PER MOLTI DI NOI LA STORIA DEI NIRVANA INIZIA DA LI', PRATICAMENTE
SUL FINIRE.... ECCO UN
PO' DI MATERIALE RELATIVO AI 10 ANNI DI NEVERMIND, CHE HO RACCOLTO SFOGLIANDO
VARIE RIVISTE ITALIANE ED INGLESI.
10 YEARS AGO NEVERMIND
WAS RELEASED. IT SEEMS
SO CLOSE THE NIRVANA'S TIME, ABOUT YESTERDAY FOR PEOPLE, LIKE ME, WHO HAVE
GROWN UP WITH THIS GREAT BAND, RICH OF IDEAS, TALENT AND PATHOS, TUNES AND
IMAGES IN THEYR MIND. FEW BANDS
GOT TO STRAIGHTLY AND ARDENTLY EXPRESS ALL THE DISCOMFORT, THE SADNESS AND
THE LIFE SICKNESS AS THE KURT COBAIN'S VOICE, THE KRIST NOVOSELIC'S
BASS AND THE DAVE GROHL'S DRUMSTICKS. FEW GET
TO INVOLVE AND TOUCH WITH THEIR MUSIC IN SUCH AN UNIVERSAL WAY. "SMELL
LIKE TEEN SPIRIT"'S VIDEO CAME UP IN ITALY IN 1993, AND FOR MANY OF
US THE NIRVANA HYSTORY BEGINS AT THE END..... HERE SOME
STUFF THAT I COLLECTED ON SEVERAL MAGAZINES, ITALIAN AND ENGLISH, ABOUT THE
NEVERMIND ANNIVERSARY AND ABOUT NIRVANA.
INTERVISTA
CON KRIST NOVOSELIC SUL DECENNALE DI NEVERMIND ABOUT NEVERMIND: INTERVIEW WITH KRIST NOVOSELIC
INTERVISTA CON DAVE GROHLSUL DECENNALE DI NEVERMIND
ABOUT NEVERMIND: INTERVIEW WITH DAVE GROHL
DA "THE
ROLLING STONE" 13 AGOSTO 2001, EXCERPT FROM THE ROLLING STONES August 23,
2001 ANTHONY
DECURTIS As is
so often the case, the music itself says it all. Nevermind,the Nirvana album
that altered the landscape of popular music in the early Nineties, kicks
off with the full-on assault of "Smells Like Teen Spirit" and (not counting
the buried track at the end, "Endless Nameless") closes with the unsettling,
free-floating dread of "Something in the Way." That emotional
arc traces the journey the band itself traveled between Nevermind's release
on September 13, 1991 and Kurt Cobain's soul-ravaging suicide in April 1994.
As Dave Grohl put it in a recent interview with Rolling Stone's David Fricke,
"From the time Nevermind came out to the time that Kurt died, that's not
even three years. That's not enough time to get used to something that life-altering." Somehow
the ten years that have passed since Nevermind's release isn't enough time
either. The album has certainly lost none of its force -- it is simply extraordinary
to listen to it from start to finish. In a way that seems true of so few
albums these days, each song on Nevermind feels essential. The album famously
knocked Michael Jackson off the top of the charts, ended the reign
of the metal hair bands and, for one brief, shining moment, made the world
safe again for rock & roll. But it
takes nothing away from Nevermind's achievement to admit that it is impossible
to listen to it -- or to any of Nirvanas music, really, at this point --
without thinking of Kurt Cobain's suicide. Maybe at some time in the future
that won't be true, at least for people who weren't alive when it happened
and didn't experience that sickening feeling in their stomachs when they
heard the news. But it is true now. That
is not the case with the other artists -- Jim Morrison, John Lennon, Jimi
Hendrix, Janis Joplin, 2pac, the Notorious B.I.G.,among them -- who died violent
or untimely deaths. And the reason for the difference has to do with the
nature of suicide. The truly
frightening degree of intent in Cobain's death -- its ferocious "fuck you"
quality -- makes his dying different, more fearsome and disturbing. Of course,
as with so many literary figures, his suicide has also made Cobain a romantic
figure. His death can be naively read as a rejection of fame or popularity,
or even of the world itself, with all its unbearable affronts, slights and
insults, all its inevitable, wearying compromises. No doubt, there are young
kids now who hear Nirvana's music only in this way. But,
finally, it was a personal decision. Cobain simply couldn't live inside his
own skin any longer; the suicide genes that he half-seriously believed were
part of his family's legacy exerted too powerful a hold on him. And is it
necessary to mention all the drugs? He took the only exit he believed was
available to him. He wanted to erase himself, and to an unfortunate extent
he succeeded in that goal. Nevermind
has sold more than 10 million copies. It's an acknowledged masterpiece, and
it appears on all the official and unofficial lists of the most important
albums in the history of popular music. But through his death, Cobain achieved
what may possibly have been one of his goals: making Nirvana a cult band once
again. Among Nirvana's contemporaries, Cobain's death made ambition unseemly,
and to that degree abandoned the charts to the pop and hip-hop kids who don't
share his reluctance about fame and success. Even
among current rock bands, where is Nirvana's influence? Those bands would
certainly say respectful things about Nirvana, if asked, but they're far more
likely to have been genuinely influenced by Dr. Dre, Jane's Addiction or
even Guns N' Roses (a band, ironically, that Cobain despised) than Nirvana.
A band setting out to emulate Nirvana must feel as if it's heading for a
dead-end. Or worse. That will
change over time. As the shadow of Cobain's dark final act recedes, Nirvana's
music will once again come to the fore. Even now, it is quietly finding the
listeners who need to hear it, the fans who can find release and succor in
the bands brutal roar and soothing melodies, in the cryptic beauty of Cobain's
lyrics and the howling intimacy of his singing. Eventually the feuds -- so
Beatle-like that one only hopes Cobain is getting a perverse kick out
of them, wherever he is -- that have prevented Courtney Love and the surviving
members of Nirvana, Dave Grohl and Krist Novoselic, from agreeing to release
the long-awaited Nirvana box set will be settled, and the band's music will
have another important opportunity to assert itself in the world. For
now, though, anything having to do with Nirvana must stir up complicated,
contradictory feelings in anyone who cared at all about the band -- and who
is honest enough not to turn away from the darkness. Every anniversary, good
or bad, will be, at least in part, a memorial service, and every celebration
of a triumph will also be haunted by an event that everyone knows occurred
and that, in its anger and absolute conviction, just can't be put to rest.
