Nevermind was released thirty years ago today, so now is as good a time as any to write my own review of it. It's a record that changed things, perhaps the last Rock and Roll album to genuinely be able to make that claim. I bought it at the time. You had to if you had more than a passing interest in music of any kind. On a recent trip to Canterbury I was told that my original vinyl copy is probably worth £100 or more. Nice and slightly astonishing to hear. Not that I'm planning on selling it any time soon.
I was twenty six turning twenty seven when this record came out. That 'stupid club', 'the twenty seven club' that Kurt was to join soon. I was off to Dortmund, Germany where I would meet the biggest Grunge fan I would ever meet, just as that particular movement came into its own, thanks largely to Nevermind. That friend, like Kurt is no longer with us.
'He's the one, who likes all our pretty songs. And he likes to sing along. And he likes to shoot his gun. But he knows not what it means.' Lyrics from In Bloom, Nevermind's second track. Like so many of the lyrics on the album they resonate with fresh meaning thirty years on.
'I don't have a gun', on third track and third huge smash single from the record Come As You Are. A bassline pinched from Killing Joke's Eighties. Nirvana were magpies essentially, picking the pockets of hugely contrasting moments from Rock and Pop's past and making them all work in a new way. Punk, Black Sabbath and The Beatles were Kurt's main sources of inspiration, and he understood them all innately, chucked them all in the pot, mixed them up and spat them out with gleeful intent like no-one had ever quite done or has done. Before or since.
After Breed's full throated howl comes Lithium, probably my favourite song on the whole album. 'I'm so happy. Cos today I've found my friends. They're in my head.' 'That's OK. My will is good.' This one has always struck me as having almost religious fervour. That's no revelation. 'Light my candles. In a daze. Cos I've found God.' More than any other Nirvana track to my mind this makes me think of religion and our quest for meaning. Sadly, (no tragically), drugs are clearly there too.
Then Polly, a song about abuse and a perfect way to end a perfect side of music. Anguish, pain, an open wound. There's no consolation here. Unlike elsewhere, not a hint of irony.
Flip the record. Side Two. 'Come on people. Smile on each other. Everybody Get Together. Try to Love One Another. Right Now.' A steal from The Youngblood's utterly idealistic and utopian Sixties hit single, 'Get Together' sung in a high pitched girly voice by bassist Krist Novolesic before the drums kick in. Like many of the tracks on Nevermind, this one's a bit difficult to listen to now with hindsight. 'Just because you're paranoid. Don't mean they're not after you...' It's been drained of its original rage and joy by the passage of time. Fine track mind.
Talking of draining, on to Drain You another of the album's finest tracks to my mind. 'Now it is my duty to completely drain you...' Plenty of Bi-Polar wisdom. Potfulls of pain. 'A love song. Or rather a song about love.'
Lounge Act one of the few songs on the album that sounds like an album track. Probably the weakest track on the record but it still sounds damned fine. Nirvana by numbers, if such a thing is possible.
Stay Away, another album track but the record isn't treading water. You can almost see the crowd surfing. Then on to On A Plain, another personal favourite. Grohl's backing vocals. 'Love myself, better than you.' Grunge Beach Boys. This has always struck me as a surfer song.
Something in the Way. Another comedown song like Polly on Side A. Quiet resolution and then the record's done and we can go home. It's a good one, that's for sure. Age hasn't withered it. A couple of years later, I sat one Friday afternoon in my Grunge mates' flat watching events unfolding in Seattle on MTV until the news was finally announced that Kurt was gone. It was difficult to find any genuine meaning in such utterly tragic news. It's difficult to find any all these years later. RIP Kurt. 'Oh well. Whatever. Never mind...'
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