November 5, 2004

CRITIC'S NOTEBOOK
Behind pain and promise
Nirvana's 'Lights Out' shines where the spotlight on Kurt Cobain couldn't reach.

By Robert Hilburn, Times Staff Writer

There's a startling moment in "With the Lights Out," a rich trove of unreleased Nirvana tapes due out 
this month. It comes just before Kurt Cobain begins singing "Rape Me" a song so full of dark, violent 
imagery that MTV executives once warned him they'd switch to a commercial if he sang it on an awards show.

But the surprise on this studio rehearsal tape doesn't come from lyrics such as "Hate me / Do it again and 
again / Waste me, taste me my friend." Instead, it's a totally unexpected juxtaposition of domesticity 
against the angst: the sudden, sharp cry of a newborn baby.

The image is striking and poignant - the most important figure of his generation in American rock, 
weeks-old infant on his lap, singing the wounded reflections of a man who felt violated and betrayed.

There's no explanation in the liner notes as to why Cobain's daughter, Frances, was at his side that day, 
so the moment is left to tug at your imagination:

Was Cobain, who was shuttled between relatives after his parents divorced, eventually sleeping in 
apartment hallways when no one would take him in ? keeping the infant at his side to make sure she 
felt the love he'd missed? Did her presence strengthen him to dig deeper to express the anguish and 
alienation of the song?

Thanks to intimate and evocative moments like this, "With the Lights Out" is a modern pop rarity: one 
of the few retrospectives that doesn't seem like merely a greedy marketing device. It's a warm, absorbing 
chronicle of the creative process of a writer whose introspective songs examined the uncertainty and 
longing of adolescence with an uncommon understanding and grace.

Later in the five-hour collection, it's equally disarming to hear Cobain sing an early version of one 
of his most moving songs, "Heart-Shaped Box."

Like many of his tunes, this one deals with the conflicting moods of comfort and conflict in relationships, 
but its tenderness is often lost because of the unsettling imagery of its key line: "I wish I could eat 
your cancer when you turn black."

As a songwriter, Cobain strove to break through the politeness of mainstream pop-rock to startle listeners 
and convey the intensity of his feelings. He got the idea for the cancer line after being deeply touched 
by a TV documentary about a child with a terminal illness.

In this early, 1992 version of the song, we see the craftsman in Cobain experimenting with alternative 
words to describe caring for someone so fully that you'd do anything for her. He starts off singing, 
"I wish I could catch your cancer ...," then shifts to "I wish I could kill your cancer ...."

It was only later that he would come up with the word he felt captured the desperate obsession he 
wanted to describe.

In addition to its various home tapes, studio practice recordings and radio station appearances, the 
boxed set, which will be released Nov. 23 by Geffen Records and UME, uses more than an hour of video 
footage to follow Cobain's musical growth.

There's engaging 1988 footage of the early Nirvana lineup having fun rehearsing for the first time 
in a messy living room. Among other things, Cobain plays a ragged rendition of Led Zeppelin's 
"Immigrant Song" with no greater goal, perhaps, than having fun and maybe getting to play in 
a local club.

We also see a 1989 performance by a still unknown Nirvana at Rhino Records in Los Angeles. 
And we hear the band, two years later, play its signature tune, "Smells Like Teen Spirit," 
for the first time publicly in a Seattle club.

Cobain hated it when he was called the "voice of a generation" - a frequent label after 
Nirvana (whose core lineup included bassist Krist Novoselic and drummer Dave Grohl) began 
selling millions of albums. Yet the lesson of these 81 recordings is that Cobain was always 
on a mission.

Even in the ragged recordings from the band's infancy, you sense Cobain searching for a way 
to tell his own story, not just fit in with the rock scene. "Nirvana has never jammed on 
'Gloria' or 'Louie Louie,' " he said in an early interview reprinted in the liner notes. 
"Nor have they ever had to re-write these songs and call them their own."

Placed back to back, these songs, some of which never appeared on Nirvana albums, show how 
Cobain honed his style by combining the melodic charm and delicious pop hooks of the Beatles 
with punk defiance and a vulnerability that was rare at the time in hard rock.

It's also apparent in these tapes that Cobain wasn't interested in writing straightforward 
narratives. More like an abstract painter, he mixed seemingly unrelated thoughts and 
images in hopes of finding some greater, elusive truth. We hear the evolution of Cobain's 
vocal style, as he delivers seemingly heartfelt emotion with a sarcastic edge or expresses 
upbeat lines with a sad helplessness. Life for him was too complex to be presented in orderly fashion.

The boxed set ends with a particularly moving version of "All Apologies," a song that would 
appear on Nirvana's 1993 album, "In Utero." It includes the lines:

I wish I was like you
Easily amused
Find my nest of salt
Everything is my fault

After finishing the song, Cobain reaches over and turns off the tape recorder and the 
silence is jarring, a reminder of all that was lost when he committed suicide at 27.

There has been so much shameless repackaging in the music industry that there's reason to be 
suspicious of retrospectives such as this.

But "With the Lights Out" is a special case, and not just because it carries the blessings 
of Novoselic, Grohl and Cobain's widow, Courtney Love.

Thousands of musicians were so inspired by Cobain's music that they started their own bands, 
though most never got beyond copying his sound. Much of Cobain's greatness came from his 
insistence on seeking his own voice. The wonder of these tapes is they let you follow him on that search.

Robert Hilburn, pop music critic of The Times, can be reached at Robert.hilburn@latimes.com