1. LiveNIRVANA.com
  2. Sessions History
  3. Studio Sessions
  4. July 11 & 24, 1990 - Reciprocal Recording, Seattle, WA, US

LIVE NIRVANA SESSIONS HISTORY July 11 & 24, 1990 - Reciprocal Recording, Seattle, WA, US View in Google Maps

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Artist

  • NIRVANA
    • Kurt Cobain (vocals, guitar)
    • Krist Novoselic (bass)
    • Dan Peters (drums)

Crew

  • Jack Endino (producer, engineer)

Set

  • [X] Sliver instrumental
  • [O] Sliver

Format

  • Audio: 1-inch 16-track analog magnetic tape (session tape)

Best available sources

Source ID Quality Complete Runtime Lowest Gen Tracks Featured Notes
SBD #1a 10.0 0:02:15 Official CD (Incesticide)
  • Sliver (take 2)
  • Mixed by Jack Endino, 1990. Mastered by Howie Weinberg.
SBD #1b 8.0 0:02:13 ANA(X)>SHN
  • Sliver (take 2)
  • Mixed by Jack Endino, 1990. This source is sometimes referred to as the Colin tape. It features some pre-song ambient noises not found on SBD #1a, but is of inferior sound quality overall.
SBD #2 10.0 0:02:16 Official Video Game DLC (Guitar Hero: World Tour)
  • Sliver (take 2)
  • Stem mix by James Murray, 2008.

Notes

NIRVANA recorded the basic tracks for Sliver on borrowed studio time, while producer Jack Endino was mid-session with labelmate, TAD. (1)

Jonathan [Poneman] called up and was begging, We want NIRVANA to cut this one song really fast while they're in town. And is there any way they can use TAD's equipment? And Tad was like, This is our time, we're trying to record something here! Endino recounts. He was kind of testy about it. And I was like, Well, you guys go and eat dinner. I'm sure we can do this in an hour! (2)

With TAD's equipment conveniently rigged, NIRVANA managed to track two takes within the hour. (2) Cobain would then return to cut his final vocal at a second 10-hour session on July 24th. (3)

The spontaneity and simplicity of the recording complemented the song perfectly, It has a massive naïveté to it, Cobain enthused. It was done so fast and raw and perfect that I don't think we could capture that again if we decided to re-record it. It's just one of those recordings that happened and you can't try to reproduce it. (1)

References

  1. Azerrad, Michael, 1993. Come As You Are: The Story Of Nirvana. Doubleday. ↑
  2. Gaar, Gillian G., 1997. Verse Chorus Verse: The Recording History Of Nirvana, Goldmine, [online] Available at: http://www.nirvanaclub.com/get.php?section=articles&file=02.14.97.html. ↑
  3. Gaar, Gillian G., 2004. Mondo Nirvana, Tablet Siffblog, [online] Available at: http://siff.tabletmag.com/other/mondo_nirvana_002003.html. ↑
© Alex Roberts. Last modified: August 28 2022