News 07/2000
"On VH-1's Rock Across America they had a net request. They played the
top ten most requested rock songs and 'Smells Like Teen Spirit' was #4.
Foo Fighters' 'Everlong' got #10 and Pearl Jam's 'Jeremy' #8. #1 was
Stone Temple Pilots's 'Interstate Love Song'." Courtesy of Jeremy Bastoky.
"Last weekend, The Box (a call-in music video channel) had a back to the
90's thing. One of the videos you could call in to get played was 'Smells
like teen spirit.' "
A few more pictures were added to the "unsorted" picture gallery, bringing
up the total number of pictures to 650. A new poll was also added to the
main page, asking the question "Do you use Napster to get Nirvana MP3's ?"
If you would like to vote, please do so by using the form at the bottom
right corner of the main page.
VH-1 and Entertainment Weekly magazine recently compiled a list of the "Rock Music's
Top TV Moments". Nirvana's 1991 "Smells Like Teen Spirit" video debut at MTV made the
#18 spot. The list is topped by The Beatles' debut on the Ed Sullivan show in 1964,
followed by Elvis Presley's comeback special on NBC in 1968 at spot #2. Thanks to
'CuRmUdGeOn' and Yahoo! News for this story.
"Kurt Cobain was featured in UNCUT magazine this month, as the main article in their
'Rock's lost boys and fallen angels' segment. I'm pretty sure this is a British magazine
since, of course, I got it in Britain. The article was basically talking about the reasons
he killed himself, when it was, the reason's for his depression, and the whole heroin thing"
Courtesy of Patrick.
I finally finished my interview with the Seattle-based journalist and author Gillian
G. Gaar. In the Nirvana community, Gaar is mostly known for her comprehensive article
"Verse Chorus Verse: The Recording History of Nirvana", and for the fact that she is
helping Krist Novoselic with the forthcoming boxed set. The interview offers a lot of
interesting facts, and extensive details about some of the Nirvana shows she attended.
Special thanks to Gillian for doing this, considering her very hectic schedule.
An interview with Gillian G. Gaar.
I mentioned the other day that the Foo Fighters had done a cover of 'School' at
a recent show. This is apparently not true after all, according to a different
source who went to the show. Sorry for the misleading information.
"In an interview to Showbizz, Brazil's biggest music mag, [Dave Grohl] said that people
are wrong when they think that Nirvana were a depressive band and he said they were very
happy. He also told the mag which songs he would do in a cover album: Black Flag's 'Rise
above', Minor Threat's 'In my Eyes', Carly Simon's 'You're so vain', Hüsker Dü's 'Something
I learned Today' and Peter Frampton's 'Show me the way'. But the most important thing is:
He said he just got some Nirvana cd's with material from the box with things that were pre-
Grohl. He said its like his new favourite band and it sounds like the-craziest-crazy-punkrock-noisy-death-metal
that ever existed!" Thanks to Victor for this story.
By the way, about 50 people have e-mailed the information about the animated
Nirvana clip in a recent episode of the show "Family Guy". I know! This info
is available in the 'Nirvana in Movies and TV'
section. The info about the Nirvana posters in the 'Papa Roach' video is
also available, so please stop submitting it.
Just added is a guide with a very detailed explanation to all the symbols you
can find on the back of the In Utero CD. The guide was provided courtesy of
'boddah'. You can check it out here.
Last night, the band Metallica were once again chatting with fans online. The session got
delayed by more than an hour, and only lasted about 20 minutes but was still pretty fun.
In fact the moderators received more than 10.000 questions for the guys from where a few
were picked out. Amazingly, out of all those, they picked two of my questions! One of them
went; "Are you going to record a studio version of 'No leaf clover' for your next album?"
Lars answered; "We already did - no we didn't, it was live." Then
he said they didn't have any plans of recording it. Unfortunately I didn't get a screenshot
of this but I'm sure a full transcript of the chat will be up soon. I also asked; "How did you
decide which songs to play with the symphony?" Lars answered; "The ones we
chose were the ones Michael Kamen had written the best parts for. The ones that worked the best
with the symphony, the ones that were the most embellished." The interview was done over
the phone and was thereby a bit 'Fu##ed up' as James put it! I also asked about a forthcoming
album, about which they joked; "I think our new album is going to be called
Kill Them All Again! Killing them all again some more. But really, there is no thought that
has gone into the new album. We are going to finish this tour [first]." I'm not sure if
it was my question that got picked here, or just a similar one. A lot of the stuff the guys were
saying didn't actually end up on the chat-screen (an audio part of the interview was also available
during the session). You can check a few screenshots as well; #1,
#2, #3, #4
and #5.
Speaking of Metallica, apparently they covered Nirvana's "Come as you are" last month; "A brilliant
twist in 'King Nothing' saw a whisper of Nirvana's 'Come As You Are' paying a natural, and well-placed,
respect to one of Seattle's most important musical figures." Thanks to Jamie for this one. Read the
full story here.
"In the August 2000 issue of Total Guitar magazine, there is a section on 'The Best Cover
Versions Ever!' Nirvana is mentioned for their cover of The Man Who Sold The World, and the
issue includes tablature for Nirvana's cover of The Vaseline's 'Molly's Lips'." Courtesy of Matt.
An interesting observation about an award show in 1991; "At the 1991 American Music Awards, 'Firehouse'
found themselves standing before the nation accepting the award for Best New Hard Rock/Metal Band, chosen
over Nirvana and Alice in Chains." Story courtesy of Iliya Cirjak
Mig sent this one in; "CDnow put together 'The top 10 live albums of all time' and it includes
Nirvana's MTV Unplugged album. Here's what is says: 'MTV Unplugged frames this least unplugged
of bands in starkly acoustic mode. It's Kurt Cobain raw and exposed, singing David Bowie and
Leadbelly songs, and giving us such Nirvana numbers as All Apologies and Come As You Are in
pared, scarily intimate form. A major event.' "
Chris sent in a very interesting and detailed story about his trip to the opening day
of the Music Experience Project museum in Seattle. It includes more details on the Nirvana
items that you can see in the museum. Check Chris' story here.
A story Jason found on guitar.com last month; "Krist Novoselic says the Nirvana box set he
is preparing will be all-encompassing. 'My idea behind it is to make it an encyclopedia,
where it's the mothership of Nirvana knowledge,' says Novoselic. 'There's gonna be outtakes,
live stuff. Stuff not available on bootlegs that's been under lock and key.' " Courtesy of
Jason. Also thanks to MikeJ for the link.
Thus, the majority wanted studio sessions rather than the
50+ live recordings you could also have voted for. The result has been sent to people involved
with the creation of the album. It is unlikely they will use it for anything, but it doesn't
hurt to try. You may view the complete list of votes here. A huge
thanks to everyone who took time to vote.
As mentioned before, the result of the Boxed Set poll is now ready. The poll, running
from March 1 to July 10, received almost 4.500 unique votes. The five recordings that
received most votes are as follows:
Mike Ziegler, of a Nirvana website called "The Happening", recently obtained a copy of the
fabled "Fecal Matter Demo". This is believed to be the first demo Kurt Cobain ever recorded.
Mike put up a FAQ with some interesting information about the demo. This hereby buries all
the false information that has been floating about the tape for years. You may read the FAQ
here. Note that the demo is
not being traded.
Apparently Sub Pop Records are re-issuing Nirvana's first album "Bleach" on vinyl; "REISSUES
bless-you. We have wax for your ears in July with fancy pants vinyl reissues of NIRVANA, Bleach;
MUDHONEY Superfuzz Bigmuff; DWARVES Blood Guts and Pussy, and SOUNDGARDEN Screaming Life. We
could very well call these records a 4 pack primer for anyone who missed Seattle's music
explosion before it was immortalized in a made-for-TV movie. Sub Pop also has a MODEST MOUSE
12" EP available to you the consumer featuring four tracks that won't be found on the full
length album coming soon from Epic Records. Why don't you introduce your visa or mastercard
to the Mega Mart right away!" Courtesy of Sub Pop's website. The vinyl should be available
soon from CDNow and Sub Pop's own megamart. According to CDNow, the vinyl is released on the
18th of July and will be sold for just $9.99. Matt of Sub Pop added that; "All of them are on
black vinyl, they have not been remastered, and they will not have bonus tracks. They are just
available on vinyl again now."
I just noticed that the documentary "Kurt and Courtney" is now available on DVD. If you
for some reason want to, you can get it at amazon.com. Check the NFC FAQ or past newsletters
for more information about the movie. The DVD doesn't include anything in particular that
you don't get with the VHS.
Lars Ulrich [of Metallica] and the CEO of 'Napster, Inc.' recently spoke before the US Congress,
debating the topic of Digital music; "The digital music debate moved to Congress Tuesday [July 11]
as the head of Napster and other online music executives testified about music downloading and
its impact on the recording industry." I thought both statements were quite interesting. You can
view Lars' statement here and
Napster's statement here.
In addition, a lot of other stories about the issue of Napster being used to distribute copyrighted
music illegally, are available here.
Tomorrow evening, the british channel 'BBC Choice' will air a short Nirvana special
called 'Kurt Cobain's Rock Shrine'; "Micro TV: A rock pilgrimage to Seattle, the Mecca
of grunge. On the anniversary of Kurt's death, conspiracy theorists and fans pay homage
outside the house where he committed suicide." The show is only fifteen minutes and will
air tomorrow, July 11, at 8 PM (British time). A while ago I was approached by the lady
who produced the show, and helped out a bit finding people who would possibly appear in
the documentary. Check the March 23, 2000 update for more information. Since I don't
have the BBC here, I would greatly appreciate if someone would be willing to tape the
show for me. If you can do that, drop me a note. Thanks to Adam and a few others for
the story.
The 'Boxed Set' poll and the 6th NFC Competition have now ended. The final result of
the poll will be put here shortly. As for the competition, the winner of the 1st prize
is: Charles Runyan. The winner of the second prize is: J.A. and finally the
winner of the 3rd prize is: Eric Heinz. Congratulations to the winners. The 7th NFC
Competition will probably be put up shortly.
"Circus magazine has just put out their new months issue and theres a little Nirvana
article. Its a quiz and a little article about the band and some stuff on 'Sappy' and
'No Alternative', the AIDS benefit album." Courtesy of Marco.
KROQ also put up a story about the 'Asking for it' Hole track; "Courtney Love is offering
52 free MP3 music files on Hole's official website. Among the tracks available for downloading
is a version of 'Asking for It,' featuring vocals by her late husband and Nirvana frontman,
Kurt Cobain. Cobain reportedly laid down a backup vocal track to the song while Hole was
recording demos for 'Live Through This.' A source close to the band claims Love recently
decided to mix the track and offer it for free to fans. Other tunes now available on
www.holemusic.com include rare and live Hole songs, a version of Guns N' Roses' 'Paradise
City' recorded during the band's performance at Hollywood's Viper Room in January 1999, and
a cover of Led Zeppelin's 'Whole Lotta Love.' Since late last year, Love has promised that the
web would be the future home for Hole's music. The band is still trying to free itself from
its recording contract with Geffen Records and aim to release the next Hole album on the
Internet." Courtesy of KROQ and Nitin.
Someone sent in this; "The [Nirvana] boxed set is most likely going to be released in January of
2001 or April. I met Krist Novoselic the other day (and I was amazed that I met him) [and] he told
me! That's when it will most likely come out." I don't know how reliable this statement is, as
both Krist and Dave have previously given a September 2001 release date.
From an e-mail sent June 27; "Just to let u know that at the Glastonbury festival this weekend in
the UK, 'Kelis' performed a cover version of SLTS. It was pretty good but the solo wasn't true to
the original. Also, VH-1 re-aired 'Egos and Icons' featuring Nirvana at 27/6/00." Courtesy of Dan.
As reported earlier, the Music Experience Project [EMP] museum in Seattle recently
opened. The museum features several Nirvana items. Brian sent in a list of the ones
he found; "Last week I was fortunate enough to visit the EMP in Seattle. If you are
interested here is a list of the NIRVANA related stuff that was there:
Thanks a lot to Brian for
that. More info about the EMP will be put up shortly. If you can add something, feel free
to e-mail it. Josh added that Krist himself was at the EMP recently, talking about JAMPAC and
announcing the bands for a Northwest bands concert. VFW added that; "A few weeks ago on VH-1
they were showing the grand opening of EMP, among the stuff already mentioned on your page they
displayed NIRVANA's original contract with subpop."
This news is a little old, but I thought I'd add it as it is somewhat related to the EMP;
"One of Seattle's favourite and longest serving bands Screaming Trees have made a sudden announcement
about their breakup. Band member Mark Lanegan dropped the announcement on a surprised group of fans
during a gig in hometown Seattle on the weekend. Lanegan told the crowd 'This is the last show we're
ever playing, we've only played five shows in the last three years. We're not really a band. A couple
of the guys have families, a couple of the guys are doing other things.' Screaming Trees had a long history.
They formed in Seattle in 1983. They signed to Epic Records in 1989 making them the first of what was to
become the Seattle Grunge bands to score a major label deal. The band kept their individual creativity
alive by recording numerous solo albums over the years, many featuring friends such as Kurt Cobain. Their
Epic Records debut 'Uncle Anesthesia' was produced by Soundgarden's Chris Cornell. Screaming Trees last
album 'Dust' was released in 1996, but they continued to draw live support from their fans. The weekends
show was at the Experience Music Project. EMP is a event funded by Microsoft billionaire Paul Allen and
features the world's largest collection of Jimi Hendrix memorabilia. EMP's collection includes more than
80,000 artifacts that helped shape music history, including musical instruments (from one of the first
electric guitars to those used by artists such as Bob Dylan, Bo Diddley, Muddy Waters and Kurt Cobain),
an extensive recorded sound archive, film, photographs, fanzines from around the world, stage costumes,
handwritten song lyrics and rare song sheets." Story courtesy of Terry.
Some of you out there might have a mobile phone with WAP support. If so, check out
this site which is - according to its
author - "the world's first WAP Nirvana site". Thanks to Burc for the link.
From Adam Seldon; "I read in Kerrang! magazine these comments about Krist being
interviewed for the experience music thing in Seattle: 'Nirvana's former bassist
Krist Novoselic has compared his old band's rise to that of the Space Shuttle
Challenger, which blew up minutes after taking off, on January 28, 1986. Speaking
in a documentary to be shown at Seattle's new Experience Music Project interactive
museum, Novoselic says ''Dave (Grohl) and I came crashing back to ground. Kurt didn't
make it.'' He adds ''Nirvana ultimately failed. We had the world in the palm of our
hands and we blew it. We couldn't handle it.'' Also interviewed in the documentary are
Screaming Trees, Mark Lanegan, plus Pearl Jam guitarist Mike McCready and drummer Matt
Cameron.' " Thanks to Adam and Mic for this story.
Another story about Krist; "I was watching VH-1 US today (June 30) at around 3pm est
when their 'Daily One' show came on. They were talking about the new Experience Music
Project and showed a segment where one of the hosts went through a tour with Krist
Novoselic. He pretty much just said that it was weired that all the stuff about Nirvana
was in a museum, and that from his apartment he could see the place being built. The whole
3-3.5 minute segment had HSB and CAYA playing while they were talking."
A story from VH-1; "KURT COBAIN: LISTEN THROUGH THIS. By C. Bottomley.
A previously unreleased recording of Kurt Cobain singing backing vocals
on Hole's 'Asking For It' has turned up on the Internet. But rather than
being one of the numerous bootlegs swapped on Napster, the exclusive
track has been posted with other Hole recording ephemera on the band's
Web site, www.holemusic.com. The posting of an entire Hole archive of 50
live tracks, cover versions, demos and radio sessions makes good on Courtney
Love's threat to create an online alternative to the music industry. 'We don't
have to work with major labels anymore, because the digital economy is creating
new ways to distribute and market music,' Love recently noted. 'And the free ones
amongst us aren't going to.' The version of 'Asking For It' is a demo of the
song that eventually made it on the 1994 Hole album Live Through This. Cobain's
posthumous appearance consists of him repeating the refrain 'If you live through
this with me, I swear that I would die for you.'
The other aural treats include [a] Hole version of Nirvana's own 'Pennyroyal Tea.'
Cobain wrote 'Pennyroyal Tea' with his wife Love. The Hole Web site is also giving
their fans license to trade their bootlegs. Hole Online has provided message boards
where their fans can arrange to swap their own recordings of the band." Thanks to
a few people, including Bob Gilmartin for this story. It is worth to mention that
the song described, featuring Kurt and Courtney, has been circulating among bootleg
traders for several years. NME also put up a story about this MP3, but it is more
or less the same as VH-1's story.
Sorry for the lack of updates lately, but I just returned from a two-week trip
to Bulgaria. I will try to put up some of the news stories that have come in over
the past couple of weeks, even if some of them may be a tad irrelevant by now. So
keep watching this space for a big update. Also, keep in mind that both the current
NFC Competition as well as the "Boxed set poll" closes in two days; July 10. Thus,
if you haven't tried the competition yet, or if you haven't yet voted in the poll,
please hurry up and do so. Try the competition here
and the poll here. The NFC Discussion Board was unfortunately
disabled by the virtual host because it was apparently using too many CPU resources.
The board is currently back operating but the future of it is rather bleak. As you
may know, this site recently switched to a different host to avoid these kind of
problems. So, after returning from a wonderful vacation, this certainly is a punch
in the face. Thank you for the encouraging e-mails sent during the days where the
NFC Board was unavailable. I haven't been able to send e-mails for a couple of weeks
now so please have patience if you've e-mailed me after June 24.
By the way, if you ever happen to visit Golden Sands in Bulgaria you should make absolutely sure that you visit the snackbar/restaurant "Rai" (located close to hotel "Bonita"). Apart from their great food they also present an incredibly beautiful and talented singer - entertaining every night - as well as a great friendly staff. Milena if you are reading this: You are the BEST!