(Credits: Far Out / Alamy)
One listen to Nevermind marks clearly that Nirvana were gunning for the charts, but the alternative explosion they’d usher in was no more a surprise than to their frontman.
Kurt Cobain was eager to ride the swelling interest in the music underground. Forged in the bustling Seattle scene, the big label attention pulled toward rock’s fringes by the likes of Pixies and Sonic Youth offered a tangible record deal and route to financial security for a teenage Cobain who was just another punk in Washington’s working-class logging city.
Following 1989’s Bleach debut, Nirvana looked to their peers like Alice in Chains and Pearl Jam, despite a dislike for the latter, and similarly courted the majors, signing to DGC and formalising their contract in 1991. In came bigger budgets, plusher studios, and Butch Vig for the producer’s chair, beefing up Cobain’s increasingly hooky popcraft with a radio-friendly rock attack destined for the mainstream more than anybody in the team Nirvana could have realised.
It was the record’s second single, ‘Come As You Are’, that was deemed to wield the widest mainstream appeal. Yet, with the grunge dam swelling to bursting point behind them, all it took was ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit’s jabbing attack to unleash Seattle’s teeming rock community all over the charts. More than just a ‘base building’ effort, Nirvana’s major label debut has pushed their Nevermind sophomore to the top of the Billboard 200 only a few months after its release, knocking Michael Jackson’s Dangerous off the top spot.
The mainstream already had all eyes on Nirvana before ‘Come As You Are’s drop. Extra attention also brought anxieties. Whether by accident or just a little bit of artistic pilfering, Nevermind’s second single’s opening riff bore an eyebrow-raising similarity to a number from UK post-punks Killing Joke seven years earlier. If sped up, Cobain’s introductory jangle echoed Night Time’s ‘Eighties’ far too closely.
Any possible legal challenge was hinted at by Killing Joke’s guitarist. Speaking in 1994, Geordie Walker stated he was “very pissed off about that, but it’s obvious to everyone. We had two separate musicologists’ reports saying it was. Our publisher sent their publisher a letter saying it was, and they went ‘Boo, never heard of ya!’, but the hysterical thing about Nirvana saying they’d never heard of us was that they’d already sent us a Christmas card!”
Killing Joke shaman-come-frontman Jaz Coleman was more magnanimous, reportedly losing the will to pursue legal action after Cobain’s death, and stating, ”It’s a short fucking life mate, we could be going fishing or something sensible”. It was later pointed out that the ‘Eighties’ distinctive riff itself may have been inspired by The Damned’s ‘Life Goes On’ from Strawberries three years earlier, a replica intro that too invites an accusation of plagiarism.
Bygones became bygones, however. Killing Joke’s second bassist, Paul Raven, after founding member Youth, had mentioned over the years that he and Dave Grohl had “a few laughs” over the copycat riff, and the Foo Fighters frontman would lend his drumming heft to the post-punk pioneers’ self-titled album return in 2003.
Related Topics
