Earlier than his dying in 1994, Kurt Cobain wrote up an inventory of his high 50 favourite albums of all time. KEXP’s podcast The Cobain 50 dives into a special album from the checklist for every episode.
SCOTT DETROW, HOST:
This month marks the thirtieth anniversary of the dying of a legend Kurt Cobain, the singer and guitarist of the pioneering rock band Nirvana. Primarily based out of a small city in Washington state, they’re mentioned to have introduced punk to the mainstream. Earlier than his dying by suicide in 1994, Cobain wrote up an inventory of his high 50 favourite albums of all time, and it consists of artists you may already be acquainted with just like the Beatles and David Bowie and Aerosmith, in addition to some deep cuts like The Vaselines and Beat Occurring.
To have a good time Cobain’s legacy, member station KEXP in Seattle is producing a podcast referred to as The Cobain 50. Every week, the present takes a deep dive into a special album on the checklist and its affect on Cobain as a musician. This is a style from Episode 3, wherein KEXP’s Dusty Henry guides us by the gritty sound of the Pixies’ 1988 album “Surfer Rosa.”
(SOUNDBITE OF NIRVANA’S “VERY APE”)
DUSTY HENRY, BYLINE: Frenzied guitars, an unmistakable manic voice, catchy hooks lathered in distortion, dynamics that jumped from quiet to loud to quiet once more. Sure, after all I am speaking in regards to the Pixies.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, “BONE MACHINE”)
PIXIES: (Singing) This can be a track for Carol.
HENRY: Coming off of “Come On Pilgrim,” the Pixies had been wanting to get again into the studio. Their label, 4AD, beneficial they work with a brand new producer this time round, a man by the title of Steve Albini. Today, Albini has a fame as probably the most prolific and influential producers of underground music. He is produced over 1,500 albums, starting from Songs: Ohia and PJ Harvey to Joanna Newsom and Slint.
(SOUNDBITE OF SLINT’S “NAN DING”)
HENRY: Again when he met the Pixies, although, he’d solely simply begun producing data, working with acts like Urge Overkill and Blatant Dissent. In 1987, Albini might need been finest recognized for his function because the chief of the band Massive Black.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, “KEROSENE”)
BIG BLACK: (Singing) Kerosene round, set me on fireplace.
HENRY: Albini first met the Pixies at a cocktail party simply weeks after “Come On Pilgrim” was launched. They hit it off so properly that all of them headed to the studio the very subsequent day. Albini performed a vital function within the careers of each the Pixies and Nirvana. He additionally goes by a really strict code of ethics. He could be paid a price and never acquire royalties, a apply frequent in most business offers. In a letter he later despatched to Nirvana, he wrote, I wish to be paid like a plumber. I do the job and also you pay me what it is price.
Within the practicalities of recording, Albini prefers to file the band in the identical room, enjoying along with minimal overdubs. It is a huge a part of what makes “Surfer Rosa” sound the way in which that it does.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, “BREAK MY BODY (2007 REMASTER)”)
PIXIES: (Singing) Break my physique. Maintain my bones. Maintain my bones. Break my physique. Maintain my bones. Maintain my bones.
HENRY: Albini’s mission is to seize the band as true as attainable to how they sound within the room. It is his perception that, quote, “99% of the sound of a file must be established whereas the essential take is recorded.” In different phrases, help the band. Get out of the way in which. And let the musicians categorical themselves. “Surfer Rosa” is the proper complement to the band’s songwriting that veers in the direction of macabre imagery of damaged bones, bone machines and sexual deviancy. It is the Pixies’ first masterpiece and positively not their final.
And once I say masterpiece, by the way in which, I do not imply that it is pristine. The truth is, what makes “Surfer Rosa” so sensible is its uncooked nature. It is the purpose after we see the band actually coining the patented loud, quiet, loud dynamics. Simply take a hearken to the Kim Deal-led single, “Gigantic.”
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, “GIGANTIC”)
PIXIES: (Singing) Hey, Paul. Hey, Paul. Hey, Paul. Let’s have a ball. Hey, Paul. Hey, Paul. Hey, Paul. Let’s have a ball. Hey, Paul. Hey, Paul. Hey, Paul. Let’s have a ball. Gigantic. Gigantic. Gigantic. An enormous, huge love.
HENRY: It is a easy thought. Play your verse extra subdued, extra restrained, then explode on the refrain. This distinction has an enormous impact. It makes the excessive moments really feel particularly big and powerfully emotive, and vice versa is a strong impact going from these huge choruses again down right into a quieter verse. That is positively one of many strategies that Nirvana lifted in their very own songwriting.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, “HEART-SHAPED BOX”)
NIRVANA: (Singing) I want I might eat your most cancers while you flip black. Hey. Wait. I received a brand new grievance. Perpetually in debt to your priceless recommendation. Hey. Wait.
HENRY: “Surfer Rosa” won’t have been a business smash, but it surely thrilled indie rock followers throughout the globe. This album grew to become a guiding gentle for artists with equally legendary careers. Kurt was clearly a religious fan, proudly owning as much as the truth that his songwriting was indebted to the Pixies. Nirvana had already cemented themselves as icons with their on the spot basic sophomore album “Nevermind” in 1991. When it got here to comply with it up, the band went in a special course. Whereas Butch Vig’s clear and polished manufacturing of “Nevermind” made them superstars, they craved a extra rawer sound, in order that they approached the producer of “Surfer Rosa,” the exact same Steve Albini. This is Nirvana’s Chris Novoselic and Dave Grohl speaking in regards to the affect of “Surfer Rosa” with Conan O’Brien in 2023.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
CHRIS NOVOSELIC: It should have been like 1989, 1990. And we had been cruising on this van. And I believe we had been listening to “Surfer Rosa.” After which Kurt was sitting there within the chair, and he raises his finger and makes a decree. And he goes, this shall be our snare sound.
(LAUGHTER)
DAVE GROHL: We had all the time listened to data that Steve had made. I keep in mind once I first moved in with Kurt, I believe he solely had like 4 data. It was like – He had a Mark Lanegan file. There was “Surfer Rosa.” There was The Breeders’ “Pod” and The Jesus Lizard file. And that was simply the sound that we felt most that we liked.
HENRY: It is arduous to emphasize how radical of a transfer this was for Nirvana on the time. After the success of “Nevermind,” Nirvana shortly grew to become the largest band on this planet, and but they employed a producer who in contrast himself to a plumber. Nirvana knew precisely what they had been doing.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, “SERVE THE SERVANTS”)
NIRVANA: (Singing) Teenage angst has paid off properly. Now I am bored and previous.
HENRY: You hear the spirit of “Surfer Rosa” immediately on Nirvana’s final file, “In Utero.” With Albini’s steering, the band carried out the identical studio practices that the Pixies used when making their file. “In Utero” combines the rawness of “Bleach” with the songcraft of “Nevermind.” In my view, it is the totally realized model of Nirvana’s sound.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, “TOURETTE’S”)
NIRVANA: (Singing) Mayday, each day, my day. Might’ve had a coronary heart assault, my coronary heart. We do not know something, my coronary heart. All of us need one thing honest, my coronary heart. Hey.
HENRY: Kurt by no means hid his love of the Pixies. He brazenly mentioned that Nirvana was greater than indebted to the Pixies, together with on their breakthrough hit “Smells Like Teen Spirit.”
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, “SMELLS LIKE TEEN SPIRIT”)
NIRVANA: (Singing) With the lights out, it is much less harmful. Right here we are actually. Entertain us.
HENRY: In a 1994 interview with Rolling Stones’ David Fricke, Kurt mentioned, quote, “I used to be principally attempting to tear off the Pixies. Once I heard the Pixies for the primary time, I linked with that band so closely. I ought to have been in that band or at the least in a Pixies cowl band.” In Michael Azerrad’s Nirvana biography, “Come As You Are,” the band brazenly fearful in regards to the track, saying, this actually sounds just like the Pixies. Persons are actually going to nail us for this.
Quick-forward to 2013. Frank Black of The Pixies lastly gave his tackle the difficulty. His sarcastic response is, quote, “being authentic, influencing Nirvana so they might rip off a track. I will admit it. If Kurt fessed as much as it, f*** it. I will agree with it. You ripped us off.”
(SOUNDBITE OF PIXIES’ “TONY’S THEME (2007 REMASTER)”)
HENRY: With “Surfer Rosa,” the Pixies created the template for a brand new wave of mutilation in punk and indie rock. Nirvana took that gritty sound to the lots, and your entire sphere of rock music basically modified internationally. With out the Pixies, there won’t have been Nirvana, at the least not in the way in which that we all know them. For KEXP, I am Dusty Henry.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, “TONY’S THEME (2007 REMASTER)”)
PIXIES: (Singing) It isn’t my superhero title, Tony. It is referred to as “Tony’s Theme.”
DETROW: That was an excerpt from KEXP’s weekly podcast sequence The Cobain 50. The station additionally produces a Spanish-language companion to the present, El Cancionero de Kurt, which explores the affect of Nirvana in South America and vice versa. You’ll be able to be taught extra at kepx.org (ph). And you’ll find each of these podcasts on the NPR app or wherever you hearken to podcasts.
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