Nirvana singer Kurt Cobain performing with the band at a taping of the
MTV show Unplugged in 1993. Getty Images/Frank MicelottaNirvana used extreme changes of tempo and volume
to express anger and alienation: a quiet, tuneful verse
switched into a ferocious, distorted chorus. In the fashion
of many 1970s punk groups, guitarist-singer-songwriter
Cobain set powerful rock against sarcastic, allusive lyrics
that explored hopelessness, surrender, and male abjection
(“As a defense I’m neutered and spayed,” he sang in On a
Plain ). Imbued with the punk ethic that to succeed was
to fail, Nirvana abhorred the media onslaught that accom-
panied their rapid ascent. Success brought celebrity, and
Cobain, typecast as a self-destructive rock star, courted
controversy both with his advocacy of feminism and gay
rights and with his embroilment in a sequence of drug- and
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