29th_Candidate's Full Review: Nirvana by Nirvana (US)
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"HOPE I DIE BEFORE I TURN INTO PETE TOWNSHEND..."
...Reads an entry jotted in one of the notebook journals left behind by Nirvana's astrally onward-traveling frontman, Kurt Cobain. Eight years after a point-blank blast from the business end of a Remington 22 gauge shotgun transformed that sentiment into prophecy, Cobain's other commerce-reincarnating, corporeal counterparts, Nirvana bandmates Dave Grohl, Krist Novoselic and Geffen/Universal Records, along with Courtney Love, have seen fit to reconcile their long-term differences and grace us with a "fiscally forward-looking" greatest-hits collection. Who says, “money is the root of all evil?”
"C'mon 29th-- Why the cynical sarcasm? This is a Nirvana collection; what's not to like?"
Well theoretical consumer, since you asked... (theoretical consumers are so much more perceptive and discerning than their "real-world" counterparts; don't you think?) A deconstruction of this album's parts makes me wonder if Pete Townshend doesn't actually get the "last laugh" after all. I refer specifically to the following aspects of "Nirvana," (i.e., the album; not the band:)
• Its conservative track selection and order (i.e., all but one song are "A-side" hit singles arranged in the chronological order of their original release,)
• Its yawn-inducingly generic album jacket; a plain, black background with "Nirvana" written in the center,
• Its eponymous album title (is it possible to offend anyone with a collection of Nirvana songs titled "Nirvana?,") and,
• its liberally-hyped, concurrent release with a compilation of Cobain's private journals, coincidingly called: "Journals."
29_C's 29 "C's" Of Consumerly-Critical "C"-Consonance:
The consumer-conniving confluence of "commercial" components that comprise this conspicuously commerce-conscious Cobain coda, characterize a cash-cow conspiracy's cockeyed conception of competently counterfeited creativity; a cost-cutting, culture-contaminating, consumer-compromising contrivance I call :::"corporate formula reconstruction.":::
"CORPORATE FORMULA RECONSTRUCTION: The Art Of Making The Consumer-Product Match Burn Twice
If you've ever suffered through the slapdash sequel of a successful movie; one wherein the various characters find frighteningly hokey ways of repeating the classic lines and actions that made them seem so appealing in the original, one in which the rehashed plot is so shamelessly similar to that of its predecessor that the thematic elements of the two seem interchangeable, then you understand what it’s like to be fleeced by a formula reconstruction. You've also discovered why there will always be a need, if not employment, for artists. Formula reconstruction is simply the reverse-engineering of a successful media product to isolate its component parts, synthesizing them into a "formula," then reconstructing a similar product from the formula, varying one or two of the components just enough to be able to dump it off on consumers as "New & Improved." So, how does this apply to Nirvana's "Nirvana?"
REHEATING NIRVANA LEFTOVERS
If you're the sort of person whose craving for a meal cooked by the chef who used to work for one of your favorite restaurants is so compelling that you don't mind paying top dollar to chow on that chef's frozen leftovers as reheated by the restaurant's Epicurean instincts-challenged dishwasher, this album should slake your appetite for Nirvana sustenance. The previous frame of reference-unfettered Nirvana newby demographic should be very satisfied by the entry-level appeal of the broad smorgasbord of "safe" selections. Long-term devotees might feel like THEY'RE the ones being played; not the album. Though I realize my craving for fresh Nirvana tracks is unlikely to dramatically increase the odds of Cobain rising up and producing a post-mortem encore album, I'm disturbed by the shamelessly impersonal manner (as underscored by the album components I've noted above,) in which this album’s collaborators have seen fit to package and market Cobain's legacy of grunge greatness. This album neither honors his musical trend-setting originality and creative excellence, nor pays tribute to his singlehanded restoration of rock to its former, pre-MTV glory; it merely reheats Nirvana's musical leftovers.
DISTINGUISHING THE CREATIVE PROCESS FROM THE CREATION PROCESS
Aside from the music, (admittedly, the most important aspect,) nothing about this album conveys the uncompromising, artistic edginess that made Nirvana so appealing. There's no evocative album cover image, no message-conveying, underlying concept, no thought-provoking album title, each of which (for me) provided Nirvana's previous albums with an abstract, spiritual and creative dimension that noticeably influenced and enhanced my appreciation of the latter's music and lyrics. I believe these flaws reflect the media executive minimization of, or outright refusal to acknowledge the existence of an intangible, creative-process alchemy; one that fuses the sum total of a media product's component parts into a greater "whole."
Though progress-rationalized, thick-skinned, abject insensitivity may be an asset when it comes to attaining corporate success, it is anathema to grasping the importance of the child-like inner-vision and imaginative whimsy that gives rise to the creative process's evanescent alchemizing agent, "inspiration;" a spiritual commodity that cannot be synthesized in a lab, or manufactured on a factory assembly line, but can only be generated spontaneously, in the crucible of the artist's imagination. Nirvana's "Nirvana" provides mass-produced material proof that profit-motivated media-product packaging and mass-marketing of previously published musical masterpieces should not be attempted without the direct and constant supervision of a certified creative person. Its mediocre presentation demonstrates Artistic creativity and inspiration cannot be synthesized into a reusable formula and stored for future use.
Media marketability had turned Cobain into an artistic sanctuary-seeking spiritual stow-away trapped in the hold, vainly trying to hide in the growing shadow cast by the grotesquely metamorphasizing image of his own media-manipulated persona. The cherished days of coffee shop dining, sleeping in the tour van and no-name dancehall performances delivered in the same party-ravaged clothes in which he had passed out the night before, had all been stripped away from him in a moment of reluctantly-surrendered anonymity. No amount of money, social recognition or heroin could rescue him from the corporate exploitation, profit considerations and material interests that had permanently estranged him from the bohemian, worn-shoe comfort of his simple lifestyle.
For this reason in particular, the opportunistic release of Nirvana's "Nirvana" by the people he most trusted would have only served to further embitter Cobain; further alienate him from the art-corrupting corporate greed and the soulless, wanton consumerism he so loathed and feared. Cobain's song lyrics and journals indicate he felt he had "sold out" his artistic integrity to some degree. He believed selling out to materialism and commercial success stripped Pete Townshend of his artistic soul and turned him into a public spectacle; a fate Cobain feared more than death. Perhaps Cobain saw in death the possibility of discovering another plane of existence from which he might regain the elusive artistic Nirvana he unwittingly, irreversibly and permanently sacrificed to commercial success. How tragically ironic that Cobain's death "before he turned into Pete Townshend," is the event perhaps most responsible for transforming Cobain's surviving image and legacy into the time-outlasting corporate cash-cow Pete Townshend's persona represented to him.
ALBUM RELATED INFO:
NIRVANA:
Kurt Cobain (vocals, guitar);
Dave Grohl (vocals, drums);
Krist Novoselic (bass).
Nirvana includes liner notes by David Fricke.
All of its previously-released tracks have been digitally remastered.
(The enhanced sound enabled by the remastering, provides the only reason a fan possessing Nirvana's 5 previous releases might buy this album, besides obtaining the band's previously-unreleased, "You Know You're Right.")
NIRVANA'S TRACKS FOLLOWED BY THEIR SOURCE ALBUMS:
1) YOU KNOW YOU'RE RIGHT: Unreleased
2) ABOUT A GIRL: Bleach
3) BEEN A SON: Incesticide
4) SLIVER: Incesticide
5) SMELLS LIKE TEENSPIRIT: Nevermind
6) COME AS YOU ARE: Nevermind
7) LITHIUM: Nevermind
8) IN BLOOM: Nevermind
9) HEART-SHAPED BOX: In Utero
10) PENNYROYAL TEA: In Utero
11) RAPE ME: In Utero
12) DUMB: In Utero
13) ALL APOLOGIES: MTV Unplugged In New York
14) THE MAN WHO SOLD THE WORLD: MTV Unplugged In New York
15) WHERE DID YOU SLEEP LAST NIGHT:MTV Unplugged In New York
NIRVANA ALBUM BACKGROUND:
Geffen/Universal decided to put all of its marketing eggs into the aural basket of this collection's sole, previously-unreleased single, "YOU KNOW YOU'RE RIGHT," shrewdly gambling that the legions of Nirvana-starved music fans would be hungry enough to buy a snack-sized "single" at the 15-course meal-sized price of an album. For between one and two years prior to the release of "Nirvana," the rights to “You Know Your Right” were the subject of a heated legal battle between Nirvana members, Dave Grohl and Krist Novoselic, and Courtney "The Cash-Register" Love. By parlaying the acrimony and controversy surrounding the simultaneous release of "Journals," (a published collection of private notes taken from, what else, Cobain's personal journals,) into media visibility and marketing hype, Geffen would all but guarantee the kind of consumer feeding-frenzy that would make the 14-track garnish surrounding the 1-track of meal combine into a delectable-seeming disk. It would have been more responsible of Geffen to allow long-term fans to buy "Nirvana" at an "upgrade price" (like software companies do,) upon proof of previous purchase of the five prior albums whose tracks make up the content of this album
THE MUSIC:
I've already provided the album's tracks, their source albums and the chronological arrangement of same, so forgive me if I abstain from following Geffen’s gratuitously repetitious lead by rehashing technical discussions of the album's previously-released individual tracks, all of which can be readily accessed in the multitude of reviews related to their original albums. I will, however detail Nirvana's "You Know You're Right" track, since essentially, it IS the album.
"YOU KNOW YOU'RE RIGHT" BACKGROUND:
Recording Sessions:
January 28 - 30, 1994 - Bob Lang's Studio, Seattle, recorded by Adam Kasper.
In between its live Chicago debut in 1993 and the October release of "Nirvana," the song has had at least three distinct variations and perhaps there are more. The October 1993 incarnation Nirvana played in Chicago was referred to as "You've Got No Right." Courtney Love's band, Hole, did an "Unplugged" version of the song they called, "On The Mountain." A subsequent studio version of the song supposedly surfaced in May of 2002. A European fan claimed to have lifted it from a CD of Probot (i.e., a Dave Grohl project) material sent to him by a friend. On September 21, 2002, word began to spread across the internet that a bootleg of the song had leaked. Two days later, it was airing on worldwide radio stations and being exchanged as an online mp3. (I know this to be true, as I own a copy of it.) Many believe the leak was a publicity stunt.
"YOU KNOW YOU'RE RIGHT;" THE MUSIC & LYRICS:
"You Know You're Right," the album's first track, plays and reads like a Cobain suicide note set to grunge.
The simplicity of the chord structures and composition, the steady, ostinato bass line, the angsty feedback riffs on the pre-choruses and choruses, and Cobain's dark vocals, which range from a menacing, hypnotic chant on the verses and bridges, to a raging, primal wail on the pre-choruses and choruses, convey an earlier, pre-"Nevermind" Nirvana sound. As much as it celebrates the uncompromising grunge of Bleach or Incesticide, the band's post-punk, pre-MTV/pre-Nevermind/pre-commercial pop albums, its lyrics are even more pointed and jarring; Cobain’s rage, more focused and specific. For this reason, fans who jumped on Nirvana's Nevermind bandwagon may be disappointed by the comparatively "unfinished," and "unpolished" Metal harmonics that characterize this track.
The music is intro'd by a simple, metallic teardrop of plucked harp or comparable guitar harmonic, repeated seven times. This is picked up by a hypnotically-lilting and palm-muted, but driving bass riff; the song's defining signature. Grohl's bass drum patterns double the steady, common time (4/4) beat of the ominous bass-line and accent its tension as Cobain chants the first verse:
1ST VERSE:
"I will never bother you
i will never promise to
I will never follow you
I will never bother you"
The first verse crescendos into the 1st bridge:
1ST BRIDGE:
"Never say that word again
I will crawl away for good"
The pre-chorus decrescendos into the 2nd verse and 2nd pre-chorus:
2ND VERSE:
"I will move away from here
You won't be afraid of fear
No thought was put into this
Always known it would come to this"
2ND BRIDGE/PRE-CHORUS:
"Things have never been so well
I have never failed to fail"
The 2nd pre-chorus crescendos into the feedback-underscored 1st chorus, which climaxes with Cobain wailing the song's pervasive theme:
The 1st chorus abruptly yields to the 2nd verse, which coda's the song's initializing hypnotic bass line:
3RD VERSE:
"Need someone to co-incide
I no longer have-to-hi-ide
Let's talk-about someone else
Stinging Silver begins to melt"
3RD BRIDGE:
"Nothing ever bothers her
She just wants to love herself"
4TH VERSE:
"I won't move away from here
You will be afraid of fear
No thought was put into this
Always known it'd come to this"
Unlike the 2nd bridge, which maintains the 1st verse's steady mantra, the 4th Bridge follows the 4th verse with a rising crescendo which effectively (and I believe intentionally) heightens its lyrical/vocal emphasis:
4TH BRIDGE/PRE-CHORUS:
"THINGS HAVE NEVER BEEN SO SWELL!
I HAVE NEVER FAILED TO FAIL!"
The 2nd Chorus, like the 1st Chorus, climaxes with a feedback-riff emphasized Cobain wailing:
As Cobain growls the 11th "you know you're right" refrain, a 2nd Cobain vocal track comes in with a back-up chorus of:
BACK-UP CHORUS:
PA-A-A-A-A-A-I-I-N-N-N! (repeated 4 times)
The chorus of "you know you're right" continues to refrain over the back-up chorus seven more times, before yielding to one resonating final chorus of:
3RD CHORUS:
"PA-A-A-A-A-A-I-I-N-N-N!
The song decrescendos and ends with the same desolate, metallic-sounding pluck of guitar harmonic, doubled by Grohl's closing drum beats.
A COMPARATIVE INTERPRETATION OF YKYR'S LYRICS:
I've studied the lyric variations of the 3 incarnations of YKYR I previously noted. The modifications that distinguish the "Nirvana album" version of You Know You're Right" from either Hole's "On The Mountain" rendition, or the band's "Chicago, October '93" variant, are significant for the overall shift in thematic emphasis, from Cobain's bitterness over his relationship with Love (literally and figuratively,) to his overall resignation and disgust for the "inescapable failure" he believed he had made of his life; only one part of which was his spiraling "Love" relationship. In the "Nirvana" album cut, "YKYR" the following modifications from the "On The Mountain" version which preceded it, are noted:
"If I say that word again
I would move away from here"
changes to:
"Never speak a word again
I will crawl away for good"
The sense of open possibility represented by OTM's use of "If," has shifted to the closed inevitability of YKYR's "Never." OTM's "would" becomes "will" in YKYR. Cobain's threat changes from "moving to a new location," in OTM, to "crawling away for good" in YKYR. Not only is "permanence" signified in the "for good," but the change from "moving" to "crawling" is suggestive of dying as well.
Further on, OTM's:
"I am walking in the piss
Always knew it would come to this
Things have never been so swell
And I have never felt so well"
changes to:
"No thought was put into this
Always knew it would come to this
Things have never been so swell
I have never failed to fail"
Once again, the lyrics shift from open possibility; "am" (i.e., present tense,) to the retrospective finality of "was." All hope for the future has disappeared in the respective shifts from, "I am walking in the piss" to "No thought was put into this," and "And I have never felt so well" to "I have never failed to fail."
"Let's talk about someone else
she justs want to love herself
She just moves away from here
she just wants to love herself
And I wont move away from here
you wont be afraid of fear"
The bulk of this OTM verse has "She" as its subject. Its presence in OTM colours its surrounding lines and the song's overall meaning, in a manner that places Cobain's "Love" relationship as the central theme of OTM. Its conspicuous absence in YKYR shifts its focus to Cobain's "failed attempt to live life."
This is further reinforced by the transformation of the following verses:
"Whistle and I'll come inside
I no longer have to hide
Let's talk about someone else
She just wants to love herself"
changes to:
"I'm so warm and calm inside
I no longer have to hide
There's talk about someone else
Sterling silver begins to melt"
The change of overall meaning is dramatic. In the first version, Cobain appears to refer to Love's relegation of him to a person of inferior or "lackey" status. He is forced to "hide," perhaps to prevent him from stealing her attention. Like a trained dog, he is conditioned to "come inside" at the sound of a "whistle." Cobain prefers to shift the focus of conversation to "someone else" (line 3,) than dwell any further on Love's intolerable self-love (line 4.)
In the YKYR rendition, Cobain appears to have adopted a fatal solution to compensate for his "lack of Love;" shooting heroin (line 4.) Love only appears tangentially here (in line 3,) where it is suggested that Cobain has gotten wind of the existence of an outside "Love" affair. Aided by his drugged-induced euphoria, he "no longer has to hide" (line 2,) presumably from the truth, which has been rendered academic. His smack has made him so "warm and calm;" so accepting of the inevitable, he no longer cares about diverting Love-related conversation. The central focus now, is watching the "sterling silver" of the needle "melt," and with it, his life.
CONCLUDING THOUGHTS:
You can't go wrong purchasing anything created by Nirvana. Cobain's music and lyrics are simple, basic and timeless. In the ideal world, "You Know Your Right" would be released as a single. Then again, in that same world, Cobain would still be alive jamming out brilliant music, so we wouldn't be forced (as Cobain had been,) to cave in to Courtney Love's greed or (as Cobain had been,) exploitative commercial interests, like Geffen Records, who line their corporate pockets packaging Cobain's remaining scraps in mediocre, formula doggy-bags, simply because they know the consumer has no other means of gaining access to the product. Nirvana's "Nirvana" proves that even a rock star's "dying before he turns into Pete Townshend," sometimes isn't enough to prevent the same fate from occurring to his surviving legacy.
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