LIVE NIRVANA INTERVIEW ARCHIVE February 12, 1990 - Sacramento, CA, US
Personnel
- Interviewer(s)
- Bill Smith
- Interviewee(s)
- Kurt Cobain
- Krist Novoselic
- Chad Channing
Sources
| Publisher | Title | Transcript |
|---|---|---|
| Hot Spit #2 | NIRVANA | Yes |
Transcript
Nirvana, one of the progeny of the “Seattle sound”, live rock'n'roll. A power trio in the true sense, the Nirvana assault will bliss you out.
Hot Spit-You guys are a three piece now, but you were a foursome for a while?
Chris-For a little while.
Kurt-For six months. We were a three piece for two years before that. So it's nothing new to us.
Chad-Goldilocks split, now we're the three bears.
HS-What's the story behind that, why did you become a four piece after a three piece?
Chris-We thought it would make our sound beefier, but we just got more amps. We're just as beefy.
Kurt-We replaced him with speakers.
HS-More power behind you?
Kurt-We just thought it may give me more freedom since I have to sing and play guitar at the same time.
Chad-Gives us more porridge.
Chris-But it really didn’t, did it?
Kurt-No.
Chris-Kurt is not free.
Kurt-I just needed more practice, that's all.
HS-More practice and more power.
Kurt-More speakers.
HS-Are you guys originally from Seattle?
Kurt-The outskirts of Seattle, Washington State. I was born in a small logging community.
Chris-He was born a poor black child.
Kurt-I got no rhythm.
Chris-I was born in Compton, California, moved to Washington.
Kurt-Chad is a Gypsy child. He's lived everywhere. You just have to ask him where he hasn't lived. It's easier that way.
Chris-His parents travelled all over in a car.
HS-How do you like being a “Seattle band”?
Kurt-It's fine… it's great… it's beautiful.
Chris-Everybody's real cool and everybody knows each other and gets along. We're all loving brothers.
Kurt-Everybody likes the Stooges equally.
HS-That seems like a big influence up there, The Stooges.
Kurt-I don't know why, I don't know why everyone has the same tastes. That's the only thing I can think of why everyone sounds the same is that we all like the same types of music.
HS-Do you think it’s Seattle or do you think it's the Sub Pop label?
Kurt-It's definitely not the label. They didn't sit down and cultivate all these bands and put them together and say “You guys have to like the Stooges and Blue Cheer.” It's been a real favorite thing for a long time.
Chris-It's kind of a freak thing that all these bands got together. I don't think anybody really jumped on the wagon. All the bands were there.
Kurt-No one threw away their keyboards and said “Let's do the Seattle scene.”
Chris-All the bands were there. There'd be small clubs. It was like a little tiny club scene. Bands would play around every month and it got really big.
HS-It doesn't seem like Seattle would be a major music city but it has kind of turned out that way. Not like a Los Angeles or New York.
Chris-It's not an entertainment city for sure. But it rains a lot and people are indoors. Seattle has a lot of culture. It's a pretty nice city. There are arts communities around Seattle. Jimi Hendrix was from Seattle. The Sonics were from Tacoma. Who else?… Kingsmen...
Kurt-Heart.
HS-Some of the songs on your albums are slower, How do they sound live?
Kurt-Actually, we speed up our songs live because we're kind of nervous. The energy just starts flowing.
Chris-Not too fast.
Kurt-It doesn't turn into hardcore all of the sudden. A lot of the stuff we're writing now is equally as slow, but I don't think we're as slow as some Soundgarden songs or Tad's stuff. Two of the songs on the album are really slow, but we haven't written anything that slow or redundant for a long time.
HS-What are the ideas behind Nirvana?
Chris-Rock'n'roll.
Chad-Rock out dude.
Kurt-The lyrics are just kind of personal, they aren't any wide scale politics. It doesn't say “everyone should just love each other.” It's more of a personal thing, try and change yourself before you try and change anybody else.
Chris-We're pretty much in the band for the love of music, not for any social stands.
Kurt-The words are the least important things.
HS-What are the most important things would you say?
Kurt-The catchiness of the tune, the hook.
Chris-The melody… just to have an exciting song. That when you hear it, you get excited… like the first time you heard Black Sabbath or the first time you ever heard the Sex Pistols.
HS-The first time you ever heard something that you remember the first time you heard it?
Chris-Yeah… and you got excited.
Kurt-That's where I got the love of music… because of that excitement. It seems like that excitement is few and far between lately.
Chris-Rock'n'roll's kind of running its course. Now it's like rock'n'roll is everywhere. It's the music of the old generation and the new generation.
HS-Fifty year old rock'n'rollers.
Kurt-Our parents are listening to the same thing kids our age are.
Chris-It's not rock'n'roll anymore.
HS-It's not the rebellious thing.
Kurt-I thought that was the idea.
HS-Do you see a direction for music in general?
Chris-I don't know what the next thing is.
Kurt-I'm amazed that rap was invented. I thought there was nothing left to be invented before that, but something new did come out.
Chris-Rap is cool. Public Enemy, I really like them a lot.
Kurt-So you never know. There's only so many notes on the guitar, you know, there's like 24 frets and you're working in 4/4 time and standard rock drum beat. There's not much you can do after 30 years, or 40 years.
Chris-I don't know.
HS-You guys toured in Europe; what was that like?
Chris-It was alotta fun. We didn't see nothing. We were in Berlin the day after they tore the Wall down, er opened the Wall.
Kurt-We didn't see the Berlin Wall. We barely saw the Eiffel Tour. What else did we not see?
Chris-You name it, we didn't see it. Oh, we saw the Coliseum.
Chad-Yeah, Rome was right on.
Chris-Rome was cool; we got to see a bit of Rome.
Kurt-We had a day off in Italy — 27 shows in 30 days.
Chris-No way it was 36 shows in 40 days. We only had, like, three or four days off.
Kurt-And we were crammed in the same van with Tad.
Chris-It was like a Fiat van, all sitting like this [demonstrates] cussin', bitching, and smoking cigarettes, drinkin.
HS-You must at least get along with the other bands if you have to be that close with them.
Chris-Yeah, yeah.
Kurt-We had no choice.
Chris-Yeah, was no fight, really.
Chad-Yeah, they were great.
Kurt-Is this going to be on the radio?
HS-No.
Kurt-Good, cause it sounds pretty boring.
© Bill Smith, 1991