nirvana_slash_archive | Entries tagged with topic:incest

Interviewer: So, how did you guys meet? Come together?

Krist: Well, Kurt and I originally lived in this small community in Washington, and we just kind of found each other, because, uh...

Kurt: There's not too many people in that small community that like punk rock.

Krist: Yeah, yeah.

Kurt: It isn't too hard.

Krist: Yeah, yeah, it's like, you meet somebody and: "Oh, this is just another one of those fuckin' geeks." [makes chronic geek face] Then we fell in love. Yeah. It's been great. We're married.

Kurt: [sarcastic] Then we fell in love with each other's father's. [shakes head]

Krist: Yeah, it's like, father and son--fathers' and sons' relationships are really heavy. We like, swap fathers and stuff.

Kurt: We were part of the man-love-boy association.

Krist: We met through our fathers. Our fathers were kind of notorious in our town.

Kurt: [grins]

-18 Apr 1990

Archivist's notes: I love how Kurt finishes Krist's sentence here. Two black sheep sharing a vibe and a brain, apparently.

Just want to make note of the heavy sarcasm, black humor, and bullshittery going on here in the comments about their dads, since sarcasm doesn't translate well by text. For full body language cues, watch the complete interview on YouTube.

Interviewer: Some of the people who responded to the song, "Rape Me", said they were offended by it, in some way, or that they couldn't understand it. Could you explain the meaning of the song to perhaps clear up...

Kurt: Well, we're the cover boys of about ten different magazines this month and in every one of those magazines we explain it pretty good. It's an anti--let me repeat that--ANTI-rape song. I got tired of people trying to put too much meaning into my lyrics, you know, as being too...not making enough sense, so I decided to be really blunt and bold. I just thought, it's a kind of a funny, just reward for a person who rapes--like a guy, like a mean asshole who rapes a woman, violates her, then he goes into jail and get raped, you know. And I think it's a kind of justice, in a way.

Krist: Maybe being offended and not understanding it goes hand-in-hand.

Int: Yeah, well the only reason they were offended is that they obviously took it as a macho, you know--

Krist: They've been programmed by too many beer commercials, or something.

Int: Yeah, I mean, I don't really know how you would misunderstand something like that--

Kurt: I thought we made our stance on rape clear within the last year-and-a-half. Plus, anyone who knows about us would probably know that we are pretty much anti-rape, at this point, you know?

Int: Yeah, you'd think that would be clear, but I guess these were people who didn't know that much about you and were just listening to a record. I mean, you had trouble with Saturday Night Live, right? I mean, trying to get that song played. Why is that if it's this straightforward anti-rape song? Why are they having a problem with it?

Krist: Maybe you shouldn't be talking about it. It's like, taboo, you know? Daddy's bonking the little stepchild, "We don't talk about that here! Nope!".

Int: What's controversial about an anti-rape song? I guess it's the nature of...

Krist: It's a taboo.

Int: Taboo subject.

Krist: Yeah.

-24 Sept 1993

Laminated Effect
(Fecal Matter tape, 1986)
By Kurt Cobain

Johnny was a homo
Kept his body clean
Moved to San Francisco
Caught a big disease
Raped by his Daddy
Told he was at fault
Living life unhappy
Covered up his soul

We're living in a time of change
Too many things you feel afraid
Doing things against the will of God
Maybe someday soon they'll realize they're wrong

Lucy was a lesbian
No, no fun in the sack
Moved to Acapulco
Nothing goes in her hole
Then she met Johnny
They dated, went to formal
He and she got naughty
Found out that it's normal

We're living in a time of change
Too many things you feel afraid
Doing many things against the will of God
Maybe someday soon they'll realize they're wrong

Made not born
Made not born
Made not born
Made not born

Archivist's note: For another song featuring the lyrics, "kept his body clean", click here.

This song appears to be written from at least two different points of view: the narrator, who simply tells the story of Johnny and Lucy in the verses, and a moralising, judgemental voice that condemns the protagonists of the song in the chorus.

When teenage Kurt was homeless and living at a classmate's house (sleeping on their sofa as the father of the family recalls), he attended church with them, and was briefly enthusiastic about the experience until he realised they were preaching hate.

This song is likely repeating some of the things he heard at that church in the chorus. As for the verses, they seem to illustrate Kurt's confused understanding of bisexuality: he describes both characters, male and female, as homosexual, but then depicts them discovering an attraction to each other by the end of the story.

The first verse is interesting in that some of the themes in it are repeated in Even In His Youth, a song that reads as more autobiographical than Laminated Effect. In both songs we see a father and son pair with a highly dysfunctional relationship, and in this song the relationship is much more vividly abusive than in the other.

This is typical of Kurt's lyrics; in a number of cases he wrote demos with much more painful lyrics than the finished songs ended up being (Something In The Way and Sliver being two other examples which were toned down for the final recording). In each of these mentioned cases, the lyrics Kurt changed had to do with child abuse or neglect, both of which he experienced in his own family.

The topic of incest is also repeated very blatantly in the album title, Incesticide.

FUDGE PACKIN
CRACK SMOKIN
SATAN WORSHIPPIN
MOTHERFUCKERS

-Nirvana t-shirt designed by Kurt

( Click to view images )

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NIRVANA SLASH ARCHIVE

homo sex rules

Entries tagged with topic:incest

Quote: Krist feels married to Kurt (1990)

Quote: Nirvana On Rape (1993)

Lyrics: Laminated Effect (1986)

Quote + Photos: The four deadly sins (1980s)

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January 2024