NIRVANA SLASH ARCHIVE

"It's really shocking and there's so many horrible aspects of what happened and what people have done to each other [in Bosnia-Herzegovina]. I think that's an aspect of it that a lot of people have ignored, like, rape wasn't even considered a war crime, like even in Nuremberg, nobody was tried for rape. You know, and I was hearing stories in refugee camps about how women rape victims were just kind of lumped in with everybody else and they weren't really having any special needs and I think that's just an indicator of people's perspective towards women.

"The band has an organization. It's kind of my pet thing, it's called the Balkan Women's Aid Fund and what we do is solicit foundations for grants and ask people for individual donations, too, and we did some work with the Italian Red Cross and we got some money to the Autonomous Women's House working out of Zagreb. And all of these organizations that we work with they have, like, a feminist perspective and we think that's important because you get those kind of values across, you change people's values overall."

-Krist, March 1994, MTV News

""Those guys [Kurt and Courtney] went off into their own world and they were kind of thought of as vampires because they'd be gone and sleep all day," says Chris.

They barely spoke for five months, even at rehearsals.

But Chris was very upset about what was happening to his old friend. He would rant at Dave or Shelli, "Kurt's a fucking junkie asshole and I hate him!" Chris was angry with Kurt, he says, "Probably because I felt like he left me. I was really concerned and worried about him and there was nothing I could do about it. I was just taking my anger out on him.

"It was hard to understand," says Chris, "I couldn't get over the whole hurdle of heroin."

Part of the problem was that as usual, Chris didn't confront the problem with Kurt directly. "We've never really communicated very well when there's been a problem between us," Kurt says. "We never talk about it, we just let it pass. We've never confronted one another about things that piss each other off.""

-Krist and Kurt (1993), Come As You Are by Azerrad, page 255

"I was politicized in high school. I had an open mind and didn’t really care for Reagan. I cut my teeth on radical punk rock – the Dead Kennedys, Maximumrockandroll, and MDC. Those were the few anti-Reagan voices at the time, especially if you were in Aberdeen [Wash.] and were 18 years old. I didn’t feel like reading dry political analyses. I needed something that spoke to me, that I could understand.

"The state of mind I was in was just anti-establishment and feeling awkward. I realized that “It’s not me, it’s those people [who have a problem].” They totally bought into mainstream culture, and I disassociated myself from it. Republicans – even Democrats – it was like “What do I care?” But I did vote when I was 18. I voted for Walter Mondale, and I’ve voted in every presidential election since.

"[...] Nirvana was always political. We talked about things and how we felt. There was Operation Desert Storm in early ’91, and it broke my heart that people bought into that. I was living in Tacoma, Wash., a real meat-and-potatoes town, and it was scary and surreal, the hypocrisy of the government and people buying it. Six months later, the mainstream culture that was duped by Desert Storm was all over us. We were repulsed. We were like “Who are these people?” It took us a long time to deal with that."

-Krist, 8 Feb 1996, Rolling Stone magazine

Kurt: Now some white trash mothers are gonna sue us after they beat their children for a few years and neglect them, and then they kill themselves and blame it on us.

Krist: That's right. 'I gave him a good Christian upbringing. What happened?'

Kurt: 'I tanned his ass every day. He should have turned out just fine. If it wasn't for that record...'

-10 Aug 1993

Interviewer: If I can ask you a question just about the government and political system in USA. Are you agreeing with what's happened in USA, with government and what they're doing all the time?

Kurt: Oh, absolutely not.

Int: Yeah, I know. [laugh] Just want you to explain your view maybe a little bit.

Kurt: They're just carrying on the traditions of what they started with trying to destroy the Indians. They're totally gluttonous, they don't care about the future, they're raping the land, they're trying to get as much as they can, they don't care about the next generation, and it's completely corrupt.

It's just like most governments, though, you know? The average man gets into power, he doesn't have anything else to look forward to other than getting as much money as he can. You know? It's just a dog-eat-dog world.

-Interview with Viv Morrison and Ann Catherine
Paris, Hotel Royal Fromentin
November 1991

Krist: We're not Americans! We are the children of a genocide that was perpetrated against the natives many years ago. We have inherited all of this, but we are not stupid enough to accept it.

Dave: You can't call yourself American. You know, all of us are from--Kurt and I are German and Irish, Chris is Yugoslavian. There's no such thing as an American.

Kurt: The Americans are the Indians.

Krist: That was genocide, what happened to the Indians.

Dave: They're native Americans.

-Interview with Gian Carl Chirico
Rome, 1991

"All people are inherently bisexual."

-Kurt, exact date unknown (Nov 1991-Feb 1992)
from Kurt's handwritten list "TOP TEN REASONS KURT COBAIN IS GAY"

"So, about two days ago I got really sick. I got this really bad cold, you know, like a flu...like illness, whatever. And uh, the doctor gave me this stuff to drink and I think it's Chinese herbs, and it has cow sperm in it. And it's got, like, lizard penis scrapings, and I still feel really sick, but it just makes me feel good to know that I've been drinking cow semen."

-Dave telling a random batshit story mid-gig, 19 Feb 1992
(Kurt then updated School's lyrics to reflect Dave's charming tale)

"I'm a fan of rap music, but most of it's so misogynist that I can't even deal with it. I'm really not that much of a fan. I totally respect and love it because it's one of the only original forms of music that's been introduced, but the white man doing rap is just like watching a white man dance. We can't dance. We can't rap."

-Kurt, when asked his opinion on white rap, 20 Sept 1991

"The whole thing seemed sort of surreal, and it raced by in a heartbeat and it seemed like a dream. It’s not unlike these recurring dreams that I’ve had for the past 24 years, y’know.
I still dream that Nirvana is still a band, and Kurt just appears – like he’s been in hiding (laughs). We look at him and go, ‘What the fuck?! Where have you been?’

And we’ve got a gig in an hour, and I get this feeling, like, ‘Oh my gosh, I get to play these songs again.’ I have that dream at least once or twice a year and have done for the past 24 years. Getting up to play those songs is like living in that dream."

-Dave, on the 2018 Cal Jam Nirvana reunion, Kerrang Magazine 3 Jan 2020