In Honor Of 20 Years Without Kurt Cobain, Here Are The 20 Best Nirvana Songs

In case you couldn’t tell by the deluge of news of late, including Kurt Cobain’s weeping statue, the Seattle PD being sued over Cobain’s suicide photos, and Courtney Love doing her confusing Courtney Love thing, 2014 is an important year for Nirvana fans. The happy news: the band is being inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. The bad: this Saturday marked the 20th anniversary of Cobain’s death.

So like any good Jesus Krist worshiper who doesn’t skip the blank space between “Something in the Way” and “Endless, Nameless,” I’ve ranked what I think are the 20 best Nirvana songs (note: I didn’t include any live tracks or covers, which explains the absence of “The Man Who Sold the World” and “Molly’s Lips”).

20. “On a Plain”

Nirvana rarely bothered with vocal harmonies, but they’re used effectively here (with either Kurt or Dave, or both, going, “Oooooh”), subtly at first before fading away into album closer “Something in the Way.”

About a Song: one of nine million Nirvana songs that could be about heroin, but probably isn’t.

19. “Dive”

One of the few songs on this list that doesn’t appear on Bleach, Nevermind, or In Utero, “Dive” shows Nirvana at their poppy sludge-rock best, like the Melvins covering Pixies, which was kind of the point.

About a Song: Courtney Love’s favorite Nirvana song.

18. “Pennyroyal Tea”

In “Pennyroyal Tea,” a song that practically drips with self-hatred, you can hear something Nirvana was able to pull off that most bands couldn’t then and still can’t now. Kurt sounds worn out and beaten down when he moans, “I’m so tired I can’t sleep/I’m a liar and a thief,” but the band as a whole is plugged in when the chorus begins, like they’re being slapped with paddles loaded with electricity. It’s an intoxicating juxtaposition.

About a Song: What is “Pennyroyal Tea”? According to Kurt, it’s a “herbal abortive.”

17. “Negative Creep”

“I’m a negative creep and I’m stoned.” During the live versions of the hard-chugging “Negative Creep” on Live at Reading and Live at the Paramount, you can practically hear the bros in the audience latching onto that line, like it’s something to be proud of and not a living nightmare. No wonder Kurt hated touring.

About a Song: Kurt always thought of himself as a “negative person” and a “creep,” so…

16. “Lithium”

The quiet-loud-quiet aesthetic as its finest? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah yeah.

About a Song: Nirvana began working on “Lithium” in 1990, before signing with DGC Records, but they couldn’t get down a perfect take. In fact, original drummer Chad Channing’s inability to record exactly what Kurt wanted is considered the beginning of the end of his tenure with the band.

15. “In Bloom”

“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.” Few frontman had as complicated a relationship with his band’s fans as Kurt did, so I can’t imagine he was pleased when “In Bloom” was released as a single and became a minor hit. Maybe he was impossibly trying to have it both ways — to write a song about ignorant poseurs…on a major label album — but from one ignorant poseur to another, at least the MUSIC VIDEO IS AWESOME, BRAH.

About a Song: “In Bloom” originally had a bridge, but producer Butch Vig got rid of it by cutting the master tape with a razor blade.

14. “Come As You Are”

The Scottie Pippen to “Smells Like Teen Spirit”‘s Michael Jordan. “Comes As You Are” assists Nevermind‘s biggest hit without ever overshadowing it.

About a Song: the chords are remarkably similar to the ones heard on Killing Joke’s “Eighties.” A lawsuit was mentioned but never filed, and Dave thanked Killing Joke by drumming on one of their later releases.

13. “Aneurysm”

No.

About a Song: “Love you so much, makes me sick!” is literally about Kurt loving his ex-girlfriend, Bikini Kill’s Tobi Vail so much, it made him puke. Gross.

12. “Do Re Mi”

An acoustic deep cut from With the Lights Out, “Do Re Mi” is unfinished and sung by a broken man. Kurt’s falsetto voice sounds weary and strained, like Michael Stipe after a weekend bender, which is pretty much the greatest compliment big-time R.E.M. fan Kurt ever could have hoped for.

About a Song: the title might actually be “Dough Ray Me.” No one’s really sure.

11. “Rape Me”

The most unsettling Nirvana song, and the one that gets misinterpreted ALL the time. Easily offended critics are quick to dismiss “Rape Me” based on its title alone, but an examination more in-depth than HE SAYS RAPE THEREFORE I HATE IT reveals that it’s about justice, or to quote Kurt in Spin, “It’s like she’s saying, Rape me, go ahead, rape me, beat me. You’ll never kill me. I’ll survive this and I’m gonna f*cking rape you one of these days and you won’t even know it.” A message as blunt and powerful as the song itself.

About a Song: “Rape Me” was changed to “Waif Me” in big-box stores like Walmart.


10/9. “Lounge Act”/”Drain You”

These songs are back-to-back on Nevermind so I’m combining their entries. Anyway, growing up, I thought “One baby to another says, I’m lucky to have met you” was the funniest thing ever. Apparently I was laughing so hard that I stopped paying attention before Kurt got to “I travel through a tube and end up in your infection” and “vacuum out the fluids.” “Drain You” sounds much more lighthearted than it actually is, and it fits in nicely between the throat-ripping “Territorial Pissings” and the rumbling, rapid “Lounge Act.”

About a Song: the weird squeaking noise in the “Drain You” middle section is a rubber duck.

8. “Sliver”

The lumbering “Sliver” bassline would get along really well with the Rob Ford tuba.

About a Song: Mudhoney’s Dan Peters provides the drumming.

7. “Heart-Shaped Box”

“Heart-Shaped Box” begins sounding like it’s been submerged in sludge. It lurks along, out of the “magnet tar pit trap” and past the heart-shaped boxes, before shedding the cancerous ooze during the chorus. It’s ugly and beautiful, a dynamic that Nirvana mastered as well as wearing ironic shirts.

About a Song: in 1994, Courtney Love reminisced to Rolling Stone about when Kurt was working on “Heart-Shaped Box.” She said, “We had this huge closet. And I heard him in there working on ‘Heart-Shaped Box.’ He did that in five minutes. Knock, knock, knock. ‘What?’ ‘Do you need that riff?’ ‘F*ck you!’ Slam. He was trying to be so sneaky. I could hear that one from downstairs.”

6. “You Know You’re Right”

Did I buy Nirvana the day it came out, and then spend the next three months of my life coloring in every page of my middle school notebook with black rectangles before writing “NIRVANA” in Wite-Out? Yes, yes I did. I regret nothing. “You Know You’re Right” was an explosive and dark reminder of What Could Have Been. It takes the band’s sound to previously unseen depths: no longer did the words “loud” and “quiet” do Nirvana justice; the loud on “You Know You’re Right” is snarled pain, while the quiet bubbles with anticipation.

About a Song: Hole covered “You Know You’re Right” long before Nirvana was released.

5. “Smells Like Teen Spirit”

If you’re like me, you find it hard to remember what it was like hearing “Smells Like Teen Spirit” for the first time, unless this is your first time, in which case, I AM YOUR MUSIC GOD NOW. Ahem. “Teen Spirit” has lost of its some generation-defining influence, considering how often it’s played on the radio, in movies, and via jukeboxes, but when Kurt guitar begins that opening riff and Dave’s drums kick in, you want to get up out of your seat and do…something. It sounds like a shot of heroin must feel (too soon?).

About a Song: the only song credited on Nevermind to Kurt, Dave, and Krist.

4. “All Apologies”

“All Apologies” is a perfect song, and it’s only their fourth best. Whenever I hear it, I think back to a scene from Six Feet Under. It’s the day Kurt Cobain committed suicide, and a young Nate Fisher is smoking weed and playing “All Apologies.” When his younger sister walks in and gives him a sad, confused look, he says, “He killed himself. He was just too pure for this world.” That’s something a grieving, stoned 25-year-old WOULD say, but while listening to “All Apologies,” a tragically frail song trapped by an indestructible wall of sound, you can almost understand the sentiment. All in all is all we are.

About a Song: “All Apologies” lost to Aerosmith’s “Crazy” for the Grammy Award for Best Rock Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal in 1995.

3. “About a Girl”

The greatest, fuzziest song the Beatles never recorded. Kurt Cobain could write hooks for days, and “About a Girl” is just about the hook-filled track in Nirvana’s discography.

About a Song: Kurt wrote “About a Girl” after spending an entire day listening to Meet the Beatles on repeat.

2. “Breed”

In which Dave Grohl sounds more machine than man. I’m not sure if it’s possible for a song on an album that’s sold over 30 million copies to be overlooked, but if so, that song is “Breed.” The lyrics are fairly simple — it’s about feeling trapped in middle-class America — so it’s the music that does the bruising, primal work.

About a Song: The “she” in “she said” is rumored to be Bikini Kill’s Tobi Vail.

1. “Serve the Servants”

“Teenage angst has paid off well/Now I’m bored and old.” No single line sums up Nirvana better than the one that kicks off In Utero‘s “Serve the Servants.” It’s darkly funny and loaded with self-hatred; it lures you in then kicks you out. It’s not a particularly complex song, but one that, thanks to Dave’s determined drumming and Kurt’s squiggly guitar solo, rapidly gets to the point: Nirvana seemingly had it all, financially and otherwise, but their at-war-with-himself frontman considered their fame and his story a bore. Even if Kurt had lived, Nirvana wouldn’t have been together much longer. All that angst paid off well, and he paid the price.

About a Song: In Utero‘s working title was I Hate Myself and I Want to Die. Subtle.

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