News 05/2000
The transfer of this website to a new host has now been completed. Your Internet
provider might still point at the old location, though. If so that should change
shortly. All interactive sections of the website, including the Discussion Board,
are also back again after being down for a couple of days. Hopefully the new host
will grant the bandwidth and space needed for the site without too much hassle.
The new host is a bit faster than the old one and grants more disk space so there
should be a good foundation of expanding the site without too many problems. The
sound gallery will also be back very soon. Thanks.
Jason sent in this story; "Krist Novoselic Makes His Peace With Life After Nirvana.
He's happy not having a band, thank you. Next stop: the Internet. By STEVE HOCHMAN
from Calendar Live! Next year's 10th anniversary of Nirvana's explosive major-label
debut, 'Nevermind,' will certainly be surrounded by a lot of hoopla, including the
release of a boxed set of the band's material that Nirvana bassist Krist Novoselic is
assembling with drummer Dave Grohl. Don't look for Novoselic--who says the collection
will be 'encyclopedic'--to try to use the attention to launch a new musical project of
his own, though. While Grohl has had great success fronting the Foo Fighters, Novoselic
has had only one major-label release (in 1997 with his now-defunct band Sweet 75) since
the April 1994 suicide of Nirvana leader Kurt Cobain. And he says he doesn't miss it at all.
'Every place I've been with Nirvana and all that, I don't feel I need to deal with the
pressures of the commercial side of the business,' he says. 'I don't feel like putting a
band together and doing that whole thing. It doesn't yank my crank anymore. Nirvana was
reluctant to do that anyway.' In fact, Novoselic has recently moved out of Seattle and back
to the Washington coast, not far from Aberdeen, the town where he and Cobain grew up together.
But he's hardly taking it easy. Musically he's represented with 'No WTO,' an album featuring
him along with Dead Kennedys founder Jello Biafra, former Soundgarden guitarist Kim Thayil
and drummer Gina Mainwal. The album, just released on Biafra's Alternative Tentacles label,
was recorded at the group's only performance, last fall in Seattle during the World Trade
Organization protests. And on June 4, Novoselic makes his debut as an Internet content provider.
He's teamed with Roderick Romero, a longtime friend and former frontman of the Seattle band
Sky Cries Mary, to create 'Intervision,' a series described as 'neo-beat political cultural
music reportage.' The first episode features footage Novoselic shot and edited of the WTO
protests and at the concert, with future episodes planned of material Romero shot at a music
festival in Taiwan and from a trip to Cuba. The series will be found at the FastBand Web site
[http://www.fastband.com]. Novoselic has also continued to be active in Washington state circles,
performing occasionally with Romero in a band called Sunshine Cake, and serving as executive
director of the Joint Artist and Music Promotions Action Committee [JAMPAC], seeking to soften
the state's tough restrictions on live music. However, with the Nirvana anniversary coming up
and the task of combing through a vast archive of unreleased material, outtakes, live recordings
and videos for the anthology project, Novoselic says he's starting to gain enough distance from
the intense life and demise of the band to appreciate it all. 'It took me, I don't know, what is
it now--six years? It took me that long to settle down and have perspective and the whole survivor
thing--anger, grief,' he says. 'I miss Kurt a lot.' " Very interesting article indeed. Courtesy
of Steve Hochman and Jason Gerber.
"A british music magazine did an article on Oasis recently and it showed an old interview with Noel
Gallagher and they were talking about Oasis's history. Noel said that 'Definitely maybe had to be the
most important rock record since Nevermind by Nirvana, otherwise there would have been no f**king point
doing it. We might never make a second record.' Another music magazine 'rock sound' had an article about
an interview with Pearl Jam talking about their new album and just basic Pearl jam stuff. Q: 'Was there
ever a time when you thought Pearl Jam might disintergrate?' Mike M: 'Yeah, there were two distinct points
of utter vulnerability in our career: one was around our breakthrough success and the second was after
Kurt Cobain died. Eddie was having a difficult time and wasn't really set on continuing.' Q: 'Have you ever
had any doubt about not grabbing the opportunity to take over the Nirvana-vacated place at the top of the
rock heap?' MM: 'No, never, for the simple reason that that wouldn't have been us. We needed to remain true
to ourselves, to maintain our own credibility and honesty; not chase after something that was no interest to
us. Eddies not that kind of person anyway.' " Courtesy of Dave Black.
"As the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame's new fashion exhibit opens, check out some of rocks most famous
looks at RollingStone.com. Included in this trip down memory lane is the same picture of Nirvana,
featured at the bottom of your home page. Other bands in this archive include No Doubt and Aerosmith."
More ...
Tom submitted this; "I bought the new issue of Entertainment Weekly. It has Kurt on the cover, well
kind of, anyway, its an issue about the last ten years. It has lots of references to Kurt and Nirvana
in there. Its not bad."
Apparently the Courtney Love chat yesterday was cancelled. At least a couple of days after announcing
it, Yahoo! stopped mentioning it again and it wasn't mentioned at all at the GURL.com website where
the chat was supposed to take place. Oh well.
IMPORTANT! Due to switching hosts, the NFC Discussion board will be closed for a couple of
days. All other interactive sections of the website (including polls and competitions) will
also be down for a little bit. In addition, certain sections of the website might also be
unavailable. Everything should be back to normal by the first couple of days of June, 2000.
Thanks for understanding.
"I have recently launched a website entitled 'toptenalbums' - each month we feature ten LPs
and ask people to vote for their favourite - for May we are doing live LPs and are including
'Nirvana unplugged'. People can come and vote at: www.toptenalbums.co.uk" Courtesy of Matt.
"Somewhere in the last weeks, I don't know the exact date, Anton Corbijn had an exhibit about
himself in the 'Groninger Museum' [in Holland]. Of course the videoclip Heart-Shaped box was
being displayed also, as Anton directed it". Courtesy of Paul Holleman. The exhibit has been
mentioned before, as it is being displayed around Europe.
"i just bought the leadbelly cd 'Midnight Special'. This cd was released in 1998 and includes
'Where did you sleep last night'. When I opened the cd cover there was a litle story about
Leadbelly and in the end of the story there was this thing about Kurt: 'In 1994 when Kurt
Cobain and Nirvana released a live version of Leadbelly's Where did you sleep last night?
the song enjoyed fame all over the world.' " Courtesy of Marcus.
The NFC chat last night was very entertaining and was attended by a number of 'regulars'
as well as new users. Once again a huge thanks to Mr. Tyler Oaks and Mr. Brendan Marten
for arranging this chat. Also thanks to everyone who turned up to chat. Check a partial
transcript of it here. The log may contain offensive
language and explicit references. Thanks to pLuTo for the 2nd part of the log [edited].
"VH1's 'The List' had a topic of 'The best album of the '90s'. Well at the end of the
list Nirvana's NEVERMIND was voted the number one album of the 90's and at the end, this
group [Stir] did a cover of IN BLOOM." Courtesy 'fanofrock'. Heather added a bit more; "I
was just watching The List on VH-1. It was an episode entitled 'Best album of the 90's', with
host K.D. Lang. Nirvana's Nevermind won! Pearl Jam came in 2nd with Ten, and there was a tie
for 3rd between Radiohead's OK Computer and some Garth Brooks album."
Later this month there will be an online chat session with none other than Courtney
Love! This is a unique opportunity for the fans to chat with Courtney, the widow of
Kurt Cobain and mother of his child. The chat is taking place on May 30 at 7 PM (ET),
4 PM (PT). It would be in particular interesting if she would answer a few questions
related to Nirvana and Kurt. So be sure to join the chat for your chance to ask Miss
Love a question. It it taking place at www.gurl.com.
Another very interesting event coming up is an online chat session with the wonderful
and talented actress Alicia Silverstone, who will be chatting with her fans on June 7
at 8 PM ET, 5 PM (PT). "Best known for her starring roles as an obsessed adolescent in
The Crush and as a Beverly Hills teen in Clueless, Alicia Silverstone is once again back
in the limelight starring opposite Kenneth Branagh and Nathan Lane as the Princess In
love with The King in the latest adaptation of a William Shakespeare work, Love's Labour's
Lost. Ask her about her multi-million dollar Producing deal with Columbia Pictures, working
with Kenneth Branagh, and her plans for the future." This chat session is arranged by
bigstar.com. Speaking of chat
sessions -- don't forget the official "NFC Chat" tomorrow, May 25, starting around 5 PM.
To join the chat you can either use the web-based chatroom
or connect to irc.afternet.org and join the #NirvanaClub channel. Note: The chat was
moved from May 24 to May 25.
I recently finished an interview with Tom Grant. Tom, a private investigator, was hired
by Courtney Love in April of 1994 to locate Kurt Cobain. That triggered an investigation
which would ultimately lead Tom to conclude that Kurt was murdered. While I don't believe
most of Tom's theories, they are still quite interesting. Most of his answers to my questions
are quite detailed so he decided to include them with the latest update of his investigation
website. You can read the interview here. Thanks a lot to Mr.
Grant for taking time to do this interview. Please do not e-mail me anything that is even
remotely related to the murder theories. For the time being you are, however, allowed to
discuss the theories at the NFC Discussion Board.
Thus the rule about not discussing this will be waived but only for a limited period. Please
keep it at a mature level, and try to stick with topics pertaining to the interview.
The "Nirvana & Marketing" documentary that aired on German TV the other day was
not actually about Nirvana. It was in fact about a guy, Christopher Wilcha, who
used to work for the US record club 'Columbia House'. Basically it was about his
work at Columbia House, as he brought the camera to work almost daily to document
the company and how everything works there. As Nirvana is Chris' favorite band
there were a few references to them and clips of their 01/10/92 show for MTV. It
was a pretty funny documentary, proving how screwed up a large corporate American
ensemble as this one works in reality - and it provided a good impression of what
goes on "behind the scenes". You can read another little review of the special,
made by Franzi, here. Courtesy of Reidar.
Some info on the 'Behind the Music: 1992' special that aired on VH-1 the other
night; "The show basically mentioned the popularity of SLTS as an anthem for youth
culture and then for about 10-15 minutes, discussed the emerging popularity of the
Seattle bands on the national music scene. The bands that they mentioned were Nirvana
(of course), Pearl Jam, Soundgarden, and Alice in Chains. Then, the show focused
on how Kurt was deemed the spokesperson for Generation X. They talked about
his life and showed a few pics from Come As You Are. One of the points that
I thought was misleading was that one journalist said that Kurt was evicted
from his apartment right before Nevermind was released and the day the album
came out, all his personal belongings were on 'a street corner in Olympia.'
They showed the pic from Come As You Are where Kurt is sleeping during the
underwater sessions with a blanket and his guitar to make him seem homeless.
That pic was really out of context in the show. Also, they had clips of a
what I assume is a recent interview with Krist. He said that Nirvana didn't
come to the mainstream, that it was the opposite. I was suprised that they
didn't interview Dave." Thanks a bunch to Harris for that information.
The most wanted list was updated again. Please take a
look at it, to see if you can help locate some of the stuff on it. Thanks.
"Wall of Sound has this Top 10 videos stuff, along with a 'hip clip' and a 'flashback'.
This week's (month's?) flashback is none other than Nirvana's 'In Bloom' music video"
Go here. Thanks to
"angel's ass" for that info.
"Request (this magazine that the music store stuck in with my Hendrix CD)
recently featured an article on Cobain cult followings, which disbanded
rumors about a "Church of Cobain". It wasn't much of an article, but gives a
bit of a reason why Courtney Love has yet to leave an official memorial place
for Kurt's remains. Basically, the cemetaries she visited were charging
$100,000 for the displaying of Kurt's tombstone plus $50,000 for security.
Love refused to pay the price and eventually stopped grave searching. As for
the cult, it was supposed to consider Love the devil, live in warehouses, and
imitate Kurt exactly in every way." Thanks to "ChinoStefAbe" for that story.
Tonight on German TV a documentary called "Nirvana & Marketing" will be aired. I'm
not sure exactly what the docu is about but I assume it is about Nirvana! The docu
will air on the German channel 3 SAT at 11 PM (Central European Time) today, Friday.
If you have access to the Astra satellite, the channel is found at frequency 11.347V.
Hopefully the docu will be in English and not overdubbed with German as everything
else on German TV sadly is. Thanks to Dimitri Pischin for the news.
On May 25, there will be an 'official' chat session for users of this
website and in particular users of the NFC Discussion Board. Previous
chat sessions have went quite well and been pretty funny. Once again
thanks to Tyler and pLuTo for arranging it. If you would like to show,
just connect with the chatroom on May 25,
beginning 4 PM Eastern Time. The chats usually go on for several hours.
If you'd rather use an IRC client just connect to irc.afternet.org and
join the #NirvanaClub channel. Of course you are always welcome
to chat here but hopefully it will be more crowded on May 25. Thanks.
Also airing tonight (as mentioned in a previous update) is a documentary on VH-1
which will mention Nirvana; "Behind the Music looks at the year when the capital of
the rock and roll world was hijacked to Seattle, when hard core hip hop artists
prophesized a riot in Los Angeles, when the president of the United States took
rap music to task - while the man who would be president picked up a saxophone
and rocked the voters on late night television. Also explored is the farewell to
big hair bands and spandex and the their replacements of grunge and flannel."
This is on the US VH-1 and the show will air tonight at 9pm/8c. More air dates:
SAT 5/20 at 9:30am/8:30c, SAT 5/20 at 6pm/5c, SUN 5/21 at 10pm/9c, TUE 5/23 at
11:30pm/10:30c, THU 5/25 at 9pm/8c. Thanks to Maria for this information.
"I was watching MTV Uncensored and they were talking about past New Year Eve
Shows that they have televised. Anyway they showed Nirvana and how Pearl
Jam was supposed to play with them but stepped out earlier in the day that
it was supposed to be filmed. Then they show a 5 second snippet of 'Come
As You Are' from MTV's Live and Loud the Nirvana's New Years Eve Show. This
has never been seen or heard before, and most certainly shows that MTV does
have the complete show taped. If someone out there has a tv in card they
could record it if and when it comes on again." Thanks to 'abrewer'.
Sonicnet put up a story about the No-WTO album; " '[The protest] was profound,'
said Novoselic, who serves as president of Seattle's Joint Artists and Musicians
Political Action Committee. 'People started asking questions about how these
international trade agreements supercede local laws. It pulled the WTO out from
under its rock. Now it's in the people's consciousness.' The protests were a
response by environmental and other activist groups who have accused the Geneva-based
WTO of catering to the needs of giant multinational corporations at the expense
of protecting the environment and workers' rights. The protests resulted in $3
million worth of property damage and 500 arrests." - "Originally scheduled to
perform on Nov. 30, the No WTO Combo rescheduled their show when violence broke
out during the day in downtown Seattle. Novoselic and Thayil observed escalating
tensions between activists and police. That day it was 'almost a carnival atmosphere,
a cop-free zone,' Novoselic said. 'Then [the police] formed a perimeter and, as things
started to deteriorate, they started to go on the offensive. I just took off, and left.
I wasn't gonna fight those cops.' " - "After releasing one album with his post-Nirvana
project Sweet 75, Novoselic said he is not concentrating on music projects at the moment.
'I moved out to the country and I'm taking it easy,' he said. 'I'm doing some writing
and dabbling in film. I don't know when I'm going to do more music.' " An interesting
story courtesy of SonicNet Music News of the World, the daily music news service. Full
story.
Thanks Bob Gilmartin for the link.
Sonicnet also put up a story about Hole leader Courtney Love wanting to release music online.
Read it here.
Preston sent this info in; "The May 2000 issue of Hit Parader has an article on Kurt
Cobain. Its the '6th anniversary Kurt Cobain tribute' and it has a few pictures to go
with the article which is called 'Kurt Cobain: Man or Myth'. It basically says that it
has been six years and his fans still love him and that the new generation just doesn't
understand or appreciate what he did. Great 2 page pull out of Kurt." Thanks to Preston.
I think I mentioned this earlier, but oh well!
"This evening (May 15), while flipping through the channels, I came across Courtney
Love on C-Span2. She was speaking at the Million Mom March in Washington D.C. on
Sunday, May 14 (Mother's day) along with many other speakers including Rosie O 'Donnell.
This was obviously pre-recorded. I only saw the end of her speech but it was something
about Kurt. She said that Kurt's friend went and bought him a gun at a pawn shop, gave
Kurt the gun on the 6th of April and Kurt was found dead on the 7th." Thanks to Jeremy
for that story. There are a couple of errors. Kurt was found on the 8th and the gun was
not purchased at a pawn shop. You can read a complete transcript of Courtney's speech
here. You can also check out NME's story about it
here. Courtesy of NME.
Dave Black submitted this; "UK music magzine 'Select' is giving away a free Nirvana
'In Utero' Cd sized information booklet. Its all about like the worries Geffen had
about how it sounded. There are some really cool quotes in there like; 'The bands label,
Geffen, not having seen the 'Nevermind' phenomenon coming, were understandibly jumpy
about what would happen next. -They're going to eat my shit- Kurt warned. Of course
they want another 'Nevermind', but I'd rather die than do that. If they reject the
album they know we'll break up. Fuck we made them 50 million dollars last year.'
And apparently 'In Utero' producer Steve Albini tagged Courtney Love as psycho
hosebeast. There is also stuff about how they came up with the title of 'In utero'.
With it being titled as 'I hate myself and I want to die' Krist thought it would
prompt mass suicide. And apparently the working title for 'Nevermind' was 'sheep' "
Today the former Nirvana bassist Krist Novoselic turns 35. Since 1994 Krist has been
very active in politics, working with his JAMPAC organization and the Spitfire tours.
In the music world he formed a band called Sweet 75 who got to release one album before
the end. Most recently, Krist has been involved with a band called 'The NO WTO Combo'
who released a CD earlier this month - as mentioned in earlier updates. Krist has also
been appearing with Dave Grohl a couple of times, most noteably in the 'Stinky Puffs'
and on stage with the Foo Fighters in 1997 and 1999. As for Nirvana, Krist is currently
compiling a box set, scheduled to be the next Nirvana album. Or he should be at
least :) Happy birthday Krist!
Speaking of Krist he recently commented on Metallica's lawsuit against the MP3
sharing software Napster; "Krist Novoselic was a bit more supportive of the
metallurgists: 'Those guys worked hard for years, they wrote those songs, they've
been through tragedy with their band, they tour,' The former Nirvana bassist said
to Launch. 'Why shouldn't they enjoy the fruit of their harvest?' While Novoselic
admitted that home taping was never going to kill music, Napster was a little more
insidious in its ability to quickly distribute large volumes of MP3s. 'Nobody's gonna
make 100,000 copies of a cassette and then give it away,' he said. '[Napster is] piracy
for idiots, right? With the Internet and the new technology, it's just a few clicks
of the mouse and you have this wealth of information. You know, if you want to trade
music for free, write your own music.' " Story was courtesy of VH1 and "Curmdgyn".
I just got a copy of "Live From The Battle in Seattle" by the WTO Band, mentioned
several times earlier in this news section. The CD is quite good, offering several
interesting speeches and songs recorded at the show on December 1st, 1999. Just to
recap: the WTO Band was a band formed to protest against the World Trade Organization,
in connection with the WHO summit in Seattle last year. The WTO Band featured Jello
Biafra [Dead Kennedys] on vocals, Krist Novoselic [Nirvana] on bass/vocals, Kim Thayil
[Soundgarden] on guitar and Gina Mainwal [Sweet 75] on drums. The disc was mixed by
none other than Jack Endino. The CD also comes with some interesting liner notes by
Jello Biafra and Krist. Krist's notes is a chronological account of the days leading
up to the show, and his personal opinions on the whole WTO issue. The liner notes also
features some general info about the WTO, as well as disturbing pictures from the WTO
protests in December 1999. Generally I'd recommend picking up a copy of the CD direct
from the record label, Alternative Tentacles, who are selling it for a reasonable price.
They also use a very fast and effective shipping method, as opposed to Amazon and
CDnow's bull$hit where you have to wait 2 months for your order to arrive, and
pay a crapload in shipping expenses! If you live overseas at least ;) Anyway, you
can order the WTO Band CD here.
The webbased chatroom was changed a bit as the old one was a bit too instabile
and not very flexible. The new chatroom offers a java client that is very similar
to a regular IRC client. It also uses the AfterNET IRC network which is much more
stabile than the one we previously used (DALnet). In order to use the chatroom
you must have a browser supporting Java. Most recent browsers do. Thanks a lot to
Anthony Sanchez and AfterNET for providing the chat client. Also thanks to Scott
Byczek for all his help. Remember if the chat is empty, just stick around for a
few minutes and someone will probably turn up. Alternatively you can join several
'channels' and pick some of the more crowded ones. For a list of channels, just
type /list in the main chat window and double click one of them to join. Join the
chat here.
Something nobody in the Nirvana community semes to talk about, is the band Stinky Puffs.
The band - featuring Dave Grohl and Krist Novoselic - was actually the very first project
in the music world that both Dave and Krist was involved with after Kurt's death. On July
12, 1994 - just three months after Kurt died - the band performed briefly at the 'Yo Yo
A Go Go' festival in Olympia, WA. Some more info courtesy of an old article from Goldmine;
"On July 12, Novoselic and Grohl made their first live performance after Cobain's death as
part of the Stinky Puffs, a band led by Simon Timony, then 10 years old. Timony had previously
released a four-song EP, which he'd sent to Cobain, who acknowledged the gift in the liner
notes of Incesticide. Timony later met the band members when his then-stepfather's band, Half
Japanese, opened for Nirvana during the band's fall '93 tour. Timony himself joined the band
onstage during their November 15 performance at [the] Roseland [Ballroom in New York, NY]. The
July 12 performance was the opening night of the Yo Yo A Go Go Festival, held in Olympia (Yoyo
being another Olympia label). Sheenah Fair, Timony's mother and the Stinky Puffs' drummer, asked
Novoselic to sit in with the band. "Krist wrote the most beautiful letter back to us," she says.
"And it was 'I can't believe you asked me to do this. Should I do this? I think I should do this.
I'm gonna do this. Should I do this? This would be a good thing."' On the night of the show, Grohl
was also on hand with DGC's Mark Kates. "I saw Dave checking out Krist just about to go on," Fair
says. "And I said, 'Dude, get a drum set. Come on, come on with us. This'll be good, it'll be good
for you.' He’s like, 'I'm gonna fuck it up—I don't even know your music!"' Eventually, Grohl did
agree to go on, and though their appearance was unannounced, the media on hand for opening night
of the festival insured instant coverage of the event. "One journalist said that Simon had performed
a mass healing," says Fair. "And that's really how it felt." The set, which included a song for
Cobain, 'I Love You Anyway,' was recorded and released the following year."
As mentioned in the
article, a double-CD was released by YoYo recordings - offering the Stinky Puffs track "I Love
You Anyway". I don't know which other songs the band did, though "I am Gross" is rumoured to be
one of them. Pat from YoYo Recordings confirms that it was Krist and Dave in the band and that
it was their first appearance after Kurt's death. Another '97 edition of the Yo Yo A Go Go CD
has also been released but it contains no songs by the Stinky Puffs. Sound clip is no longer up.
Congratulations to my country's very own Brødrene Olsen for winning the Eurovision Song
Contest with more than 40 points over the runner up, Russia. Putting up an mp3 of the song
on a Nirvana site would probably not be a wise career move, though :-)
"I just heard that on VH1 on Friday I believe they are going to do a premiere episode
of Behind the Music on Nirvana. It is going to be part of the time warp week." Thanks
to Steve Caldwell for that story. A little correction from Jonathan; "Apparently the
person who told you that [the US] VH1 was doing a Nirvana 'Behind The Music' was a bit
confused, actually it's 'Behind The Music 1992' that airs on Friday, May 19. Although
it's not centered around Nirvana; on the commercial they did show footage of Smells Like
Teen Spirit."
And now some statistics ... our sponsor, ValueClick, recently upgraded this site to
'premium host' which essentially means that the payment goes up. This would obviously
not have been possible if it hadn't been for all of you out there clicking the sponsor
banners. Thank you for that! Looking over the statistics, May 11 was a particular good
day with the banners being clicked 217 times! That it quite a bit compared to, ie. May
7 which only had 37 banner clicks. The number of "impressions" (basically how many times
a day the banners are displayed) is pretty steady though. According to the stats there
are about 8.000 daily impressions with a total of about 2.2 million impressions since
December 1998. So again thanks for making us a 'premium site', a status only given to
those with 100.000+ impressions per month and "High quality content and design" (quote:
valueclick.com).
VH-1 also put up a story about the Nirvana boxed set allegedly being slated for a September
2001 release, as mentioned in the May 9 update. Here's the beef; "Six years after the death of
Kurt Cobain, Nirvana still exerts a powerful allure over its fans. Therefore, the surviving
members of Nirvana have chosen September 2001 - the 10-year anniversary of the release of
Nevermind, the band's breakthrough and the key release of the alternative-rock deluge - to
unveil a career-spanning box set featuring rarities, outtakes, and live tracks. Nirvana
bassist Krist Novoselic spoke to Launch.com about the compilation of the set, which he has
been undertaking with his former drummer and current Foo Fighters general Dave Grohl. 'Sometimes
I feel like I'm going into the past,' Novoselic said, 'but I know that people really want it
and they really miss it, so if I can put time and heart and soul into it, then that's the least
I can do.' " Full story. As
I said before, I don't know how reliable that September 2001 date is. But its an interesting bet.
This story was courtesy of VH-1 and MTV Networks. Thanks to Bob of MTV for the link.
Krist Novoselic recently commented on the "No WTO" EP released the other day, as described
in yesterday's news update; "... the Combo's show nearly didn't happen. Biafra and Novoselic
got the ball rolling last October, when both appeared at a Spitfire show (a touring panel
discussion featuring speakers of varying political beliefs) and decided to put together a
band for the upcoming WTO conference, bringing in Thayil and Mainwal, whom Novoselic had been
regularly jamming with. Originally scheduled for Nov. 30, the show was one of two benefits held
that week for the Institute for Consumer Responsibility. As tensions between protestors and police
escalated throughout the day, Novoselic witnessed the activity first-hand. 'There's cops amassing
on the corner,' he remembers. 'There's tear gas all over the streets, our eyes are burning, people
are coughing, some girl had a concussion, she got a rubber bullet to the head. It just didn't look
good. I wanted to postpone the show for a night, because things were just getting worse and worse,
and I didn't know where they were going to go.' The show was ultimately canceled, and Biafra,
Novoselic, and Spearhead put on a make-shift show at the Central, a Seattle club just outside the
so-called 'curfew zone,' the core of downtown Seattle sealed off to all people except those with
'legitimate business.' Though the show did occur without mishap, Biafra says 'I don't think we
knew we were going to play until we walked onstage. We finally decided, 'Let's play anyway and
see who shows up.' Among those who did was a man who taped the show on a 16-track ADAT recorder
and presented the tape to Novoselic afterwards. A little tweaking by grunge-meister producer Jack
Endino, and liner notes by Biafra and Novoselic, and Live From the Battle of Seattle is ready to go.
'I'm excited to have a record coming out,' says Novoselic. 'It's a document about a moment in time.
It's a document about people power and motivation. And it's a document about bringing positive change.' "
Full story.
This story was courtesy of allStar news and Gillian G. Gaar. Make sure to check yesterday's update
for more info on the EP, and some of December's news updates for the full story on the WTO show.
An interesting story, courtesy of Wall of Sound; "In the midst of the WTO riots in Seattle
last December, Jello Biafra (formerly of the Dead Kennedys), Krist Novoselic (Sweet 75,
formerly of Nirvana), Kim Thayil (formerly of Soundgarden), and Gina Mainwal (Sweet 75)
convened as the No WTO Combo for a one-off show protesting the World Trade Organization.
That gig was recorded live on a multi-track and mixed by Novoselic and Jack Endino, and now
it surfaces as a five-song EP on Jello Biafra's label, Alternative Tentacles. The set includes
29 minutes of music and 15 minutes of spoken word. Track List - No WTO Combo: Live From the
Battle in Seattle (Alternative Tentacles)"
Thanks to "angel's ass" for the link. The EP was released yesterday, May 8. You can purchase this album for a very reasonable price at the Alternative Tentacles official website. I hope to have some soundclips from the EP up soon.
"(5/8/00, 5 p.m. ET) - The surviving members of Nirvana (Punk) are eyeing the 10th anniversary of
the release of their landmark album Nevermind to issue the band's still-in-the-works boxed set. That
would mean September 2001 for the project, giving Foo Fighters frontman Dave Grohl and Kris Novoselic
ample time to work through all the available material. Novoselic tells LAUNCH that there's plenty to
choose from. 'There's a lot of stuff. I can't believe how many live shows there are, how many outtakes
there are, alternate versions, jams, [and] video[tapes],' he says. 'Not everything's gonna make on
there, so we're just kinda gauging it and see what would best represent Nirvana; because, you know,
I feel like a boxed set should be encyclopedic, and it should be for the serious fan and for, you know,
the not-so-serious fan. So, it's gonna be something there for everybody.' Novoselic adds, 'Sometimes I
feel like I'm going into the past, but I know that people really want it and they really miss it, so if
I can put time and heart and soul into it, then that's the least I can do. -- Neal Weiss, Los Angeles"
An interesting story indeed, courtesy of Launch Media. While a September 2001 release date is possible,
I don't know how likely it is. Though, it might be a good idea to use the Nevermind anniversary as the
release date. Time will tell what they do.
"Mudhoney have a exclusive new song on Musicblitz.com. They've pretty much been inactive
since their bassist (Matt Lukin) quit almost a year ago. I thought that this might be worth
mentioning, since Kurt was a big fan of theirs and they seemed to be friends, and the fact
that Dan Peters played on Sliver." Thanks to Scott for that one. You can get more info about
the new song here.
From Daniella: "There was this article in a Brazilian magazine called ISTOE about a new book.
Sorry for the translation, I did the best I could; 'It was released on April 24th in Rio de
Janeiro - the 'Guia do Rock em CD, uma discoteca basica' (Guide of Rock, a basic cd collection).
The authors are the journalists Arthur Dapieve and Luiz Henrique Romanholli, who selected 300
albuns from 170 rock singers or bands. Among these albuns there are all the albums from NIRVANA,
two albuns from the Pixies and some pioneers, such as Elvis Presley and Buddy Holly. The guide
covers 44 years of rock history. Brazil is represented by 20 bands."
Here is small, but important, warning about a guy who claims to have videos such as 10/31/91
and 7/23/93 but does not; "This message is to warn you all of a poor trader / evil dishonest
human that has been making his rounds and ripping people off in the NIRVANA bootleg trading
community. Marc Paradis from Quebec, Canada, has earned the reputation over the last several
months of being the worst trader of all time. He claims to have lots of unsurfaced stuff
that doesn't exist and asks hundreds of dollars for it from smaller traders. One major warning
sign is that the guy can barely speak english. BASIC INFO TO REMEMBER - NAME: Marc (Mark) Paradis,
E-MAIL: nodoubtman@hotmail.com. LOCATION: Canada. If you are contacted by this guy please email
the maintainer of the LiveNirvana.com Bad Traders List at morris@LiveNirvana.com"
The design of the main page was changed a bit. It's not that much different from the old
design, but still a significant change. I've wanted to change the design for a while, so
here is the result. The new design should be a little faster to load, compared with the
old one. It basically contains the same information, though one little new feature has been
added; The main page now displays the names of the five latest topics discussed in the
forums "Nirvana" and "Born in a junkyard" (general discussion) of the NFC Discussion Board.
So if there is a subject that catches your eye, just click the link to read the entire thread.
Remember you still need to register if you'd like to reply to a thread. You can view the new
design here if you haven't already.
"www.teenpeople.com put Nirvana's 'Smells Like Teen Spirit' as one of the top prom songs of the
90's. I knew the song was nice, just don't see it playing at the prom though." Thanks to 'TallSlim'
for that one.
Not that Nirvana related but somewhat interesting; "We've got the Foo Fighters' new video
'Breakout' and behind-the-scenes goodies all on mtv.com! *The Foos on being ugly, dumb, &
funny. *Dave Grohl on the concept of the video. *Dave's thoughts on the final outcome of
'Breakout'. Go here
for behind the scenes video/audio clips & more info." Thanks to Maro of MTV for sending this in.
"I was just reading the May issue of Newsweek and there is an interview with Neil Young. In
it there's this bit where he says: 'The [entertainment] business is so crude and brutish and
forceful with the gentlest of objects', says Young. 'Nirvana's just one illustration of where
a real artist can end up in real trouble being honest and pure. I try to stay as far away from
that as I can. Never look the devil in the eye.' " Thanks to "Angel's ass" for sending that story.
Mitch from Digitalnirvana is looking for a copy of the February 1993 issue of Select Magazine,
with Nirvana featured in the 'images' section. If you can help him locate this issue, please
drop him a note here. Thanks in advance.
"In the latest issue of KERRANG magazine (Issue 800), they did a poll on the 100 most influental
rock bands ever. Nirvana finished 3rd, behind Black Sabbath and Metallica." Thanks to Andrew.
The 'Experience Music Project' museum opening in Seattle soon will, as mentioned before, feature
some unique Nirvana things up for display. In its opening weekend, a number of bands will perform
there - including Metallica, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Filter, Eurythmics and more. For more info about
that, check this story. Thanks to
"Angel's Ass" for the link. Also check the official experience site.
"In Greece, there's a movie called 'Freedom Deep'. I don't if you've heard of it, but the whole movie
is a tribute to Kurt Cobain. It's about a little boy who has family problems and the other usual stuff
(rejection etc.). You can see a great painting in his bedroom wall, with Kurt nailed on a cross! So it's
a GREAT MOVIE, very complex in a way you should notice that the boy never speaks or anyone else having a
dialogue, it's very strange." Thanks to George for that info. Brendon found a site with info on
the movie here.
At approximately 3:30 PM (Eastern Time) today, this website hit visitor number 2
million. In other words, since April of 1997 the main page of this site has been
visited more than 2.000.000 times! Of course this doesn't mean that exactly two
million people have visited it. What it means is that the main page itself has
been 'hit' at least 2 million times over the past three years. Someone
might increment the counter several times during one session, some people visit
the site regularly, and some go to specific sections of the site (ie. the NFC
Discussion Board) without actually going to the main page first. In any case,
I am glad to see the counter at 2 million, exactly three years after the site
was opened on nirvanaclub.com. Ironically, the Internet has been the biggest
news story (on Danish TV at least) today, because of the infamous 'I love you'
virus. Anyway, a big thanks to all of you out there for visiting this site and
for all the support. Now let's see if we can hit 4 million before 2002 ... :-)
Here is some more info on the Todd McCormick benefit event, described in the
April 20 update; "This Sunday, May 7th, 8pm pacific-time - Spitfire invites you
to join us on the web for a special audio-broadcast of the Todd McCormick benefit,
taking place at LA's House Of Blues. Todd is currently in Federal prison for growing
medical marijuana, which is legal under California state law. Performers include:
* Comedian Bill Maher, * Nirvana's Krist Novoselic, * Janes Addiction's Perry
Farrell (DJ Peretz), * Spearhead's Michael Franti (band will perform post-Spitfire),
* X's Exene Cervenka, * Todd's Attorney David Michael. You can listen to the live show
with Firetalk technology.
[After downloading], go to The Spitfire site on Sunday at 8pm & click the banner ad
promoting the live event. Spitfire's site is at: http://www.colleges.com/spitfire."
A very nice scan was added to the Unsorted Pictures section. This is a beautiful painting
of Kurt Cobain, made by Solly Mohamed. Special thanks to Solly for sending it to me. View
it here.
Tomorrow evening there will be an online chat session with the legendary band
Metallica; "It's a fan forum with Metallica. The band will be taking questions
and comments straight from the fans on the Napster controversy. It's your chance
to chat with the band directly and get your questions answered. Hold nothing back:
This is Metallica, after all. They can take it! Be sure to check out Metallica.com
and ARTISTdirect and join the chat on Tuesday, May 2nd at 8pET/5pPT." This info was
courtesy of Yahoo! The even more legendary Deep Purple will also be chatting online,
already tonight at 8 PM ET; "Chat with the group, (regarding their new world tour,
complete with the 80 piece orchestra, including a run of summer dates in the States
beginning in June), Monday, May 1st at 8pET/5pPT." This chat is @ rockonline.com
Adding to the April 26 info about "Ain't it a shame" here is some info about the
song "Grey Goose" submitted by Jamie Ahearn; "I just got the Leadbelly cd 'Where
Did You Sleep Last Night' and on it there is a song called Grey Goose. There's also
two versions of a song called 'Duncan and Brady' which features the lyric 'Ain't it
a shame'. Of course, there's also the song 'Ain't It A Shame To Go Fishin' On A Sunday'
(which I don't have). I think it's possible that the song Kurt and Lanegan recorded
might be 'Duncan and Brady', since according to the liner notes on my cd many releases
of Leadbelly's material were mislabeled. Kurt or Mark Lanegan might have owned one of
these records. Anyway, I wanted you to know 'Grey Goose' does indeed exist and is a
traditional southern folk song whose original writer is unknown (like In The Pines/Where
Did You Sleep Last Night)." Thanks to Jamie and Benoit for info about Grey Goose.
The NFC Discussion Board has been getting a lot of hits lately, but unfortunately a lot
of spam too. The 'Junkyard' forum alone - which is essentially for discussing everything
not related to Nirvana - received approx. 10.000 unique posts in the month of April alone!
In fact during this one month about 9.200 messages were posted, spreading over 500+ threads.
That is even excluding several threads that had been deleted for various reasons. So, it is
safe to say that the current 1150 registered users have been quite active lately. The Nirvana
forum is also getting a lot of posts, with it currently holding 7500 posts where the oldest is
only from March 27. Thanks to all those who have participated and created meaningful discussions.
In an effort to continue the flow of these, more security will be added to the board to avoid
spam and other junk. Also thanks to the current moderators for all their work with the board.
Note: To free server space and bandwidth, most of the old posts in the 'Junkyard' were deleted,
or moved to the archive.