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Fans gather in Seattle to pay their respects

It has become a tradition that fans flock to Kurt Cobain's former residence, or the nearby Viretta Park, on April 5 and/or April 8 to pay their respects. This year was no different. The Seattle Post-Intelligencer reports from a April 5 vigil:

"Wednesday night, the presumed date that Cobain committed suicide, a small and steady stream of fans young and old, from as far as Switzerland and England, gathered outside the house at 171 E. Lake Washington Blvd. where Kurt's body was found three days after the fact on April 8, 1994. Ejae Dillury from Kent, England, planned a vacation to Seattle just to be there at the park bench where a half-dozen candles burned with incense amid bouquets of roses, tulips, guitar picks and other memorabilia. She had come out to the house a day before with her aunt, who now lives in Seattle.

Longtime Seattle pop-culture critic and photo-journalist Gillian Gaar wrote for the now-defunct alternative weekly The Rocket back in 1994, and had actually phoned Cobain's wife, Courtney Love, the night before his fateful suicide, but wasn't able to connect. Her next phone call related to Kurt was about news of his death. Gaar said she recently was called by a Dutch [sic] Web site wanting to know what Seattle was doing to remember Cobain this week. Gaar couldn't think of anything planned at all, and recalled the days after his death, when Seattle came together in mourning.

'You had a sense that you were part of a community. I just remember everyone feeling dazed a bit,' Gaar said. 'Now, you can see the legacy of the music and the legacy for Seattle, and in a way, the biggest legacy was beyond music, almost cultural.' "
Read the full story here. A couple of corrections: Gillian G. Gaar actually tried to call Courtney on April 5 and not April 4 (the news of his death, of course, didn't surface until April 8). The "Dutch" website mentioned was actually this one which is run by a Danish guy :)

Posted in NFC news section at www.nirvanafanclub.com on 04-08-2006 @ 8:48 PM (GMT).

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