Oh well... Whatever... Never mind.

Large12/29/2020 6:45 PM

FULL DISCLOSURE: This is kind of a music blog... I don't write many because I don't want to, but I like this one.

Nate was all over this story when it first happened WAAAAAY back in April (I will attach his blog in a little bit), but I never saw it, and I am assuming people with real jobs may have missed it also, so I am going to chat about it because I have some free time in between COVID tests.

Question:

How do you feel about the band Nirvana?

I wasn't a huge fan, but I certainly liked them.

Some people gush over them as if they were the greatest thing since sliced bread, while others think Cobain's greatest achievement was getting his whole face in front of the shotgun.

I fall somewhere in the middle.

I actually saw them live in 1990'ish… So somewhere in between their first album "Bleach" (1989) and their mainstream-hit album "Nevermind" (1991).

I was a DJ in college at the time (WVFI- Voice of the Fighting Irish), and we had access to local shows all over the bordering states of Illinois, Indiana, and Michigan. So a drive to The Blind Pig was an easy trip to see a band that was just starting to get heavy rotation on college radio.

"Easy drive" probably wasn't an accurate description of my commute to that show because it takes over 2 hours to get from God's country to that shit-hole known as Ann Arbor, but we did it anyway.

An even better drive and venue were when a handful of friends and I drove only an hour and a half to an ice rink in Kalamazoo, Michigan the day before Halloween in 1992 to see a terrifying Henry Rollins open up for a not-so-terrifying Beastie Boys… But now I am just reminiscing.

Peter Pakvis. Getty Images.

Back to that Nirvana show… I thought their live performance that night at The Blind Pig was AWFUL. You can watch the whole show on youtube and decide for yourself, or take my word for it… I really don't give a fuck.

But, in their (Nirvana's) defense, it was in a small venue that didn't have the acoustics nor the production value of the live performance MILLIONS of others saw almost 5 years later when MTV had the band perform 14 songs on their UNPLUGGED set.

That candle-laden UNPLUGGED soundstage went on to record live shows with Elton John, The Allman Brothers, Sting, REM, LL Cool J, Eric Clapton, Pearl Jam, Bruce Springsteen, Neil Young, Duran Duran, Stone Temple Pilots, Page and Plant, The Eagles, Bob Dylan, KISS, Alice In Chains, Oasis, Paul McCartney, George Michael, Jay Z, and, yes, even Ricky Martin… But it is now a storage space for Rob Dyrdek's old skateboards and other bits of random ridiculousness.

Man!… It would seem like there is either a TREMENDOUS demand for Rob Dyrdek, or MTV has just given-the-fuck-up, huh?

But back to that Nirvana UNPLUGGED performance…

They opened that show with a song from the aforementioned first album, Bleach… The only song they would play off of that album that night and my favorite Nirvana song of all time.

It's called About A Girl and I think it is VERY recognizable, but certainly not as much as some of the band's bigger hits… But here's the thing- Nirvana refused to play some of their biggest hits for the UNPLUGGED recording. So if you go to revisit that show today, you won't be hearing Lithium, or Rape Me, or Heart-Shaped Box, or even their mega-hit grunge anthem Smells Like Teen Spirit.

So About A Girl was a perfect song to open the show because it appealed to people who were on board since the first album (Nirvana had 3 studio albums by the time UNPLUGGED was recorded) and it was at least familiar to everyone else… Plus they fucking CRUSHED the performance.

So much so that, according to my good friend 'Dante The Don', this past May some asshole paid over a million dollars for the guitar Kurt played during that session AND last October some other asshole paid over $300K for the beat-up cardigan Cobain was wearing that evening.

--- COINCIDENTALLY… For any collectors out there, I have the ticket stub from when I saw Nirvana 30 years ago AND both the t-shirt AND guitar that Cobain was wearing and playing that night.

The latter two of those 3 items are in MINT condition… So mint that one might think I bought them right after someone agrees to pay me a million dollars for them… DM me with any inquiries and/or bids, and Dante gets a 10% finder's fee.---

But back to the recording…

Again… Take my word for it, or listen to/watch About A Girl here…

This is where I should probably note MTV's UNPLUGGED in New York with Nirvana was recorded on November 18th, 1993. Less than six months after the taping, and before the album was released on November 1st, 1994, Kurt Cobain killed himself with a shotgun blast to the face.

And this is where other people will point out he was 27-years-old when he pulled the trigger.

I am not sure why people are so fucking fascinated with the fact many artists died at the age of 27, but I pandered to their obsession by making that seemingly random fact a part of Twisted History's Holiday Playlist.

Maybe it is interesting to some that Jim Morrisson, Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, Pigpen McKernan, Amy Winehouse, etc. all died at the same age, but I think Cobain's death had more to do with his access to a firearm coupled with the high concentration of heroin and diazepam in his blood than the fact he was coincidentally 27-years-young.

Jesus Christ!… For a guy who is not a huge fan of Nirvana, I am 1,000 words into the band without yet mentioning an eight-month-old story that has a weak connection to the band itself… I will speed things up.

Here's where Nate's blog comes in.

Earlier this year, a band that had limited success in the post-grunge era of the early 2000s called Puddle of Mudd decided to create a tribute to Cobain and Nirvana by recording their own live version of About A Girl.

I never heard this version until yesterday (and maybe because I didn't want to hear it), but here it is for you to listen to/watch/hopefully compare to the original version I posted above…

Fucking YIKES!

I can never really fathom how a respected actor or actress can make a piece-of-shit movie like Wonder Woman 1984 without saying to themselves, "Hey… Gal Gadot… You are absolutely STUNNING but also really stuck in the middle of a piece of shit movie right now."

But I am quick to give women like Gal the benefit of the doubt because so much of what makes a movie great is what gets done in the editing room AFTER all of the scenes are shot. And I am sure that film editors have polished cinematic turds into Oscar-winning turds multiple times throughout history.

Giphy Images.

(Brokeback Mountain got ROBBED in 2006.)

But this is an unedited live recording in a small studio with 4 "musicians" and not one has the sense of Gal Gadot to say, "Hey, guys… How about we try a different song before this guy has a fucking aneurysm?"

As I mentioned before, Nate has some deeper perspective on the demons that Puddle of Mudd have battled throughout the years, but I will give my final two-cents on this recycled story by saying this band quickly went from a benign puddle of mud (with 1 "d") to a HUGE bucket of shitt after I heard a rendition of a song that has Cobain undoubtedly spinning in his grave and me reaching for the diazepam and heroin.

They should've tackled Rape Me because I feel violated right now… Even 8 months later.