There are two kinds of people: those who understand that Nirvana – whether you personally like them or have bad taste – changed the face of popular music in the early 90s and those who are stupid. It’s like the people who say The Beatles are overrated; they’re allowing their own defectiveness of musical taste to get in the way of something that’s actually pretty factual.
And while other great but less-known bands like The Minutemen, The Flaming Lips and The Brian Jonestown Massacre get excellent documentaries made about them, the story of Nirvana has been left mostly off movie screens.
Until now. Sort of. AJ Schnack is in Aberdeen Washington right now, Kurt’s home town, filming footage for a documentary that will be narrated by Kurt himself. Sort of. This paragraph really contains lots of small, qualifying sentences. "The film is based on a series of interviews that Michael Azerrad conducted with Kurt while researching [Come As You Are, an excellent Nirvana book]" Schnack tells NME, the world’s most hostile sounding music magazine (this week’s cover band – some act you won’t remember in seven months!). "While I’m not sure that ‘narrated’ is exactly the right word, you will be listening in on conversations between Kurt and Michael, with Kurt telling his life story for that book," explained the director. "There are no additional interviews with other figures from Kurt’s life, just Kurt speaking, with an occasional question or comment from Michael."
The movie won’t actually be about Nirvana and their music so much as it will be about the bands that influenced Kurt, and some of his personal views. There will be no footage of the dead singer, and likely none of his band’s music.
Although that could change at a moment’s notice – rumor has it that Courtney Love is quite strapped for cash and is looking to sell the Nirvana song catalog. The one thing she’s done right with those songs is to not whore them out, and who knows what will happen when they get sold. This could be the grunge generation’s version of Michael Jackson buying The Beatles catalog and letting Nike use Revolution for a TV commercial.