Okay. I wanna tell you guys a story about a band called Nirvana
(You probably know this story already, but whatever)
They were a good band, man. A really good band.
Had this awesome third album
Lost them a lot of fans, though.
Had this great track on it called Tourettes that went
Ba-da ba na-na na na num na na-na na num
(Doesn't really work over these chords)
Anyway, I-- Totally lost my train of thought.
Uhhhhhh.....
--Oh yeah!
Kurt Cobain's dead and I'm reliably informed that
Courtney did it
She did it
Courtney did it
Oh, Courtney killed Cobain
She did it
Courtney did it
Courtney did it
Courtney killed Cobain
I don't know why we blame it on her
It seems easy to say: "Courtney Love is capable of MURDER"
Without having much of anything to back that up
I might be going out on a limb here... but, mmm
I think: Society doesn't seem to like women in the best of times, but we really get mad when they fuck our rock stars, y'know?
"Kurt Cobain belongs to us," we cried
So, naturally, when he died
Everybody said:
Courtney did it
She did it
Courtney did it
Oh, Courtney killed Cobain
She did it
Courtney did it
Courtney did it
Courtney killed Cobain
She raised that kid on her own
Yeah, Yeah, Yeah, Yeah, She's got problems.
Don't we all have problems that would be exacerbated by living life in the public eye?
Need I remind you, this poor human being lost her husband when she was barely 29?
And we repay her, how?
By hassling her on Twitter fucking seven hundred times a day
Her phone goes:
Ping. Ping. Ping. Ping.
99% of the time, saying the same thing, saying:
"Good Evening, Courtney Love, it is I - MKULTRATRUTHER99 and you will no doubt be nervous to learn I have been carrying out an independent investigation into the mysterious circumstances surrounding your husband's 'suicide'.
Kurt Cobain's suicide note is four paragraphs of a man preparing to leave YOU and retire from the music industry followed by four lines at the end in different pen, in different handwriting, in which he talks about suicide.
Pretty weird, Courtney. Pretty weird. Not INCRIMINATING on its own. However, following your husband's death, in your possession was found a piece of paper on which you had been practicing his handwriting. What had you been practicing? You'd been practicing the last fucking four lines, of his suicide note. How do you explain that? I'll tell you how I explain thaaaaaaaaat, oh
You did it.
You did it.
Just admit it.
You killed Kurt Cobain."
You did it. Pretty convincing, isn't it? I know I find it convincing more often than I don't but then I am particularly vulnerable to these... kinds of stories. There. Simple. Tidy, and most boring of all, it just makes sense. We are vulnerable to these kinds of stories. We are not taught how to deal with these things and so we are left to our own devices to come up with ways of distracting ourselves. Sex and drugs and rock and roll. That Courtney did it
Just admit it.
Just admit it.
You killed Kurt Cobain, Kurt Cobain, Kurt Cobaaaaaain, killed Kurt Cobain, Kurt Cobain, Kurt Cobain na na na na na naaaaaaaa...
The original video for Courtney has an extended section here, which ends in a repeat of the previous chorus
Y'know there is a question that I ask myself about once every... 18 months, once every... 2 years or so, and this is a question that smart people ask themselves every day, multiple times a day, I would go so far as to say it is the question that keeps a smart person smart, four words:
What if I'm wrong?
What if I'm wrong? What if-- What if reality is exactly as it seems?
What if 9/11 was not an inside job carried out by the American military-industrial complex against its own people to justify a series of power grabs in the middle east, what if it was just a reaction to decades of carelessness and aggression. Centuries of imperialism.
What if JFK was not assassinated by his own government, he was murdered by one man, one confused and lonely man who preferred the reality inside his head to the reality outside of it -- I can relate to that
Who wanted to be a hero -- I can relate to that, as well
Who probably died not understanding why he wasn't a hero and why everyone was so mad at him.
Y'know, Kurt Cobain had a genetic predisposition to, in no particular order: Subtance abuse, paranoia, depression, anxiety, not to mention he was a member of the music industry.
These qualities put a person at particularly high risk of: Suicide.
Partly because they make our world seem less chaotic, but also because if you stack enough of these stories one on top of each other you block out the bigger story
The story which is as terrifying as it is verifiably true and that is that we are marrooned out here, stranded on a rock in the middle of nowhere, and bad things are gonna keep on happening to good people until one day
One day the worst thing is gonna happen to all the best people at once.
An asteroid will hit
Or we'll start a nuclear war
Or, we won't put enough money into devloping new antibiotics, a supervirus will wipe us all out
And if we manage to avoid all of those things, one day the ice caps will melt, if we manage to survive that, one day the Sun's gonna explode, and there is no hope of rescue or escape because-- Who is there to rescue us? Where is there to escape to?
And that's just what works for most of us, for some of us, that is not enough, and those are the people who fly passenger jets into skyscrapers
Those are the people who kill presidents
Those are the people who load up on guns and splatter their brains out all over the family home while people like me,
ARSEHOLES
The intrepid keyboard detectives willing to say the things no one else is willing to say 'cause they can see the things no one else is willing to see
Will explain to anyone who will listen
With unbearable fucking smugness
and unrepented glee:
She did it
Courtney did it
Oh, Courtney killed Cobain
You raised that kid on your own
The Narcissist Cookbook has this way of making songs that have a sort of punk mood to them with this spoken word singing style. Not really exhibited in this track, but they do a lot of that principle from theatre: When the emotions are too much to speak, sing. I distictly remember showing this one to my sister once, thinking she'd like the commentary and sarcasm in the song, and she told me, after saying nothing, "I see why you like that song".
I don't show music to my sister anymore. It hurts too much to try. So, needless to say, this song is a vulnerable one for me to share. It makes me feel like I'm too up my own ass and dramatic for anyone to relate to me in my personal life, which is why I find myself with people on the internet all the time instead.
So I try to share this artist with people, in some effort to feel connection. This is one of their catchier tracks, and I do like it, but I prefer their other tracks more. They're just... more esoteric? Harder to fit into a playlist, and harder to put on a CD.
Upon reflection, this track is kind of outdated compared to his later works. It's just more, of its time for nearly 10 years ago and doesn't reflect the current mood and feelings as much as his later work does.