Top Ten Songs by Nirvana
(1) My favorite song by Nirvana can be found on the band’s Incesticide album. The song is Sliver and it was reportedly recorded in approximately one hour on July 11, 1990. The song has a powerful sound, which nicely contrasts its simple yet raw lyrics. Sliver is about a young boy who gets dropped off at his grandparents’ house and he sure as hell doesn’t want to be there. He kicks and screams, forces down his dinner, goes outside and rides his bike and kills his toe. He eats ice cream and falls asleep, wakes up in his mother’s arms. The boy wants to be home and wants to be alone. Who can blame him?
(2) Rape Me, which can be found on In Utero, is a famous song about poetic justice. A woman is raped, and the man who does the deed gets his payback in prison, where he is raped. Lyrics were reportedly added after the song was a success that hinted at the media’s rape of the band.
(3) Released well after Kurt Cobain’s death, You Know You’re Right is a tremendous track that speaks to the depth of Cobain’s pain. In fact, Kurt Cobain screams the word “pain” several times under the “You Know You’re Right” outro vocals.
(4) All Apologies is a famous song that hints at Kurt Cobain’s giving up. In the song, he decides to accept all the blame, for everything. Cobain’s strong and raspy vocals lift this track to one of Nirvana’s top ten.
(5) The dreamy lyrics of Dumb take me back to my days in college. The theme, of course, seems to be ignorance is bliss, a notion every intelligent being has toyed with. Cobain sings again about a broken heart and getting high, themes that are in no way alien to Nirvana.
(6) About a Girl is believed to be addressed to a woman named Tracy Marander, who was one of Kurt Cobain’s first girlfriends. She apparently threatened to kick Kurt Cobain out of the house if he didn’t get himself a job. “I’ll take advantage while you hang me out to dry. But I can’t see you every night.”
(7) In Charles Cross’s biography of the late great Kurt Cobain, he states that it is believed that Been a Son is about Kurt Cobain’s father, who wanted a typical son that participated in sports and other more masculine activities than the art, including music and other forms, that interested Kurt Cobain. In the song, Kurt Cobain refers to himself in the feminine: “She should have been a son.”
(8) Something in the Way is one of Nirvana’s mellow tracks that ends their album, Nevermind. Interpret the song as you wish, Something in the Way can be likened to a crash after a high, a come down from the wild, raw sound of the rest of the Nevermind album.
(9) How can someone not love a song that starts: “Monkey see, monkey do.” The rapid fire lyrics and sheer intensity of Stay Away pull you into the song and never let go. This song was originally titled Pay to Play (and there is a version of the song with this title). Pay to Play referred to the unpopular trend that bands actually pay money to the owners to play at certain venues for exposure.
(10) Of course, what list of top ten Nirvana songs would be complete without the band’s most well-known hit, Smells LikeTeen Spirit? Opening the Nevermind album, Smells Like Teen Spirit was an anthem for youth in the grunge nineties. Reportedly, Kathleen Hanna of the band Bikini Kill once wrote “Kurt smells like teen spirit” on one of Kurt Cobain’s walls, referring to his deodorant. Kurt Cobain thought Kathleen Hanna was referring to the “teen revolution,” so he took it as a compliment.
Kurt Cobain inferred in his suicide note that he never wanted to be a rock star. Ironically, Kurt Cobain was the quintessential rock star, a wild spirit that partied with the same zeal with which he played. He was a troubled vocalist whose demons included heroin and chronic depression. There are very few nights I vividly remember from my college years, but the night we learned of Kurt Cobain’s death is one which I will never forget.
