Nirvana Legacy

The live record shows the lengthy gestation period leading into what became Nevermind. Polly arrived first as part of Cobain’s acoustic ‘experiments’ from 1987-1988, then Breed as part of the fuzzy sounding punk tunes appearing in late 1989. The 1990 record shows two distinct phases, firstly, the flurry of Lithium, Stay Away and In Bloom in March-April, then the first appearance of Something in the Way later in the year.

 

Seven of Nevermind’s thirteen songs were then drip-fed into the set between January and August 1991:

That single November 1990 show at The Off Ramp in Seattle tops LiveNirvana’s Overall Best Shows list for good reason given the cornucopia of thrills on offer. The show was a real statement from the band with new songs and rare old songs flung into the set with abandon. It looks like Nirvana’s victory lap; it must have really stretched and tested them performing so much material that was so rarely a part of their shows, or that had only just come into existence. With thirty-one songs performed in total it’s also the longest show the band ever performed barring the far less cheerful occasion of Sao Paolo in January 1993. This was their party and listening to it now, the enthusiasm, the “we’ve made it!” happiness is so audible.

The overall trend commenced in 1989 remains solid throughout 1990 and 1991; there’s a new Nirvana original entering the set every single month. Still accepting the limitations of the record (64% of 1990’s set-lists are known and 75% of 1991’s) the regular refreshing of the pool of songs is remarkable. These were the peak years of Kurt Cobain’s writing and each year 1989-1991 twelve new Nirvana songs can be proven to have entered Nirvana’s set.

Looking at the 1990-1991 live arrivals also shows the transition in Nirvana’s sound very clearly. In 1989 Bleach’s grunge dirge phase passes away to be replaced by a lighter tone, yet still the Nirvana ‘formula’ verse-chorus dynamic hasn’t yet clunked into place. The three tracks that appear in early 1990 inaugurate the spell during which the stereotype ‘Nirvana sound’ holds sway. Usually one thinks of Nevermind and In Utero as separate objects but listening to the songs appearing in the spell from March 1990 through November 1991 brings a lot of similarities into tighter focus. The furthest the band went from the norm in that time was going quiet (Something in the Way, Dumb) or going all out noisy (Radio Friendly Unit Shifter, Curmudgeon.)

The record of covers being played over these two years continues to show the musically omnivorous nature of Nirvana —  they’re grabbing at songs from across the spectrum of rock; their punk tastes are a firm presence in 1990; they’re chucking brief snatches into the set-list spontaneously alongside more practiced and full renditions.

Despite the break in performance in late 1990-early 1991 the band continue almost as if this two year spell is all one long trek, there’s no change in the patterns. One intriguing decision is to start using either Jesus Wants Me for a Sunbeam or L’Amour Est Un Oiseau Rebelle as the set-openers. It seems to be a way to defuse the craziness in the moshpit, starting with mellow songs to calm everything down before ratcheting things back up as the performance proceeds.

These years were the pinnacle of Nirvana as a live experience and as creative musicians. The sheer quantity and quality of what they were throwing on stage, this is a million miles from the bands that tour a single barely shifting set-list across a hundred shows. The band are showing such complete enthusiasm and love for performing and for music, it’s part of the buzz around Nirvana, the much-vaunted ‘energy’ that they were bringing to stages at this point in time. It also shows their self-assurance, that they were such skilled masters of the stage by this point that they could deviate from the script at will, could shift gears at a moment’s notice. It’s such a busy two years it takes me two screen shots to capture it:

This was a band that could do anything.

 

The regular arrival of fresh covers reinforces the point made in yesterday’s blog that, particular in the early days, while new songs may not have arrived too swiftly in 1987, the set could still be spiced up a little. What is noticeable is that, though accepting that there are gaps in the record, there’s no evidence of the band displaying the punk side of its tastes — they stay solidly reliant on hard rock and pop despite the inclusion of quite a few late Sixties-early Seventies oddities. This seems in part a fair reflection of the band’s own taste and also a crowd-pleasing match for the Led Zeppelin worship prevalent in the Seattle scene of the day.

Nirvana’s work is full of wonderful symmetries, some coincidences, others not. One I particularly like is that Do You Love Me’s performance in June marks the passing of that early hard rock spell in Nirvana cover songs. November then marks the new life, Lead Belly arrives in the set-list, The Vaselines; the songs that would mark the alternative identity the band was happier to place on vinyl after that time. A second passing took place at the same time, however. In the early spell, with the exception of the tribute to Led Zeppelin’s Moby Dick, the band were playing mainly full, if ragged, covers. With certain key exceptions over the years to come (i.e., the songs that made it onto Incesticide or that were reprised for MTV Unplugged) an awful lot of Nirvana’s live covers became brief bass jams, or snippets covering up restringing, retuning, other on stage logistics and live administration.

Seeing the first two years, originals and covers altogether, emphasizes how hard-working this band was in their performances:

Similarly, 1989 — this was a band working exceedingly hard learning, practising and performing new songs month after month. It can’t have come easy, this was a triumph of will and the desire to excel in performance. They could have simply whacked out the same set-list over and again but instead there’s a visible striving to do more:

This week we’ve been looking at the graphs showing the trends in Nirvana’s introduction of new songs to live performances. To be fair, the sheer quantity of material Nirvana are pulling out of the hat, the amount being created or learned in a relatively tight period of time, it’s unsurprising that sustaining the pace of 1987-1991 would prove difficult if not impossible. Some other time we’ll compare Nirvana’s live touring to that of other bands but, as a statement of belief, Nirvana never exactly spent a vast amount of time on the road, they had many breaks, plenty of time off. That perhaps allowed them the time to learn more material than the average band so while their live ‘presence’ might be lower than that of other bands, the originality of those performances was untouchable for a long time.

In terms of cover songs, the band introduced some 64 songs to their known performances though shreds of other songs did appear (i.e., The Who’s I’m a Boy, Bette Midler’s The Rose for example.) The table below shows every cover song listed on NirvanaGuide.com:

Given the sheer number of songs the band attempted live it’s likely that the unknown set-lists and missing recordings actually conceal a significant number of other renditions. I don’t have that faith that many unheard Nirvana originals are hidden there, but I’m fairly comfortable believing that the band attempted other covers — they seemed to use cover songs as a way of covering up the ‘logistics’ of stage performance whether restringing guitars, checking equipment and so forth. Many of the performances are just snatches, not full songs, but the quantity is impressive. On the other hand, reading the list, it’s hard to equate the hard rock orientated direction with the declarations of punk or alternative rock fidelity — The Wipers, Fang, The Knack, Viletones, The Clash, Black Flag, Melvins, that’s it on the punk front, the rest is firmly mainstream, solidly pop rock.

Sao Paolo, sadly, features as both the most extensive set of covers the band ever did live…But it’s famed as a concert the band could barely be bothered to play. One element I’d draw attention to is that, once fame hit and the Nirvana experience went sour, quite a few of the covers were increasingly sarcastic, sneering jibes aimed at the band’s own success; My Sharona, the whole of the Sao Paolo event, The Rose and The Star-Spangled Banner, The Money Will Roll Right In. It’s a shame the use of cover songs lost so much of its happiness. MTV Unplugged in New York was also another performance of that year that depended on covers but we’ll discuss it later today.

The sheer quantity of songs the band introduced is incredible. At first there’s a cover used in every early month for which a set-list exists which suggests the band was bulking out their set with covers. But the run the band goes on from late 1989 through 1991 is impressive; half of the live covers appear between November 1989 and December 1991.

Nirvana played some 67 original Kurt Cobain/Nirvana compositions in the seven years the band performed live. Yet it becomes very clear how low on fresh material the band were getting in the years post-fame. A grand total of 58 of those new additions to the set-list came prior to the end of 1991. To borrow a phrase from the British monarchy, it emphasises that 1992 was Nirvana’s annus horribilis with only Tourette’s, a song that almost counts as Nirvana’s only officially released instrumental (the lyrics aren’t exactly a priority with that track), entering set-lists. 1993 rapidly ran out of steam too but that’s well-known; post-October not a single new Nirvana original. What concealed the weakness of Nirvana’s archive was the way so much material was carried over from prior to fame, enough material to fuel half of the In Utero era releases. It also emphasises how many of the new songs developed in late 1992/early 1993 were considered throw-aways even by the band, jammed together at the last-minute thanks to an album deadline; Moist Vagina, I Hate Myself and I Want to Die never enter the set as far as can be seen.

It’d be more understandable if performances of new songs in the early years were missed; there are greater gaps in the available record of set-lists. Post-1991, however, at least 75% of set-lists are known for each year – it’s far less likely there’s an error or that fans have overlooked a song. As the clearest example, as described in the book Dark Slivers, it’s highly likely that Big Long Now was played sometime in the first half of 1989 given other supporting evidence and despite the absence of an actual live recording.

Nirvana were also comprehensive in their use of the live arena to road-test material. In fact every Nirvana song released on a compilation or single appeared in concert…Until 1993 where we’re missing Marigold, Moist Vagina and I Hate Myself and I Want to Die – only the well-known (and persistent) Sappy reappeared. In the early years it’s only the songs that Kurt never shared with the band – Don’t Want it All, Beans, Creation/Bambi Slaughter/Bambi Kill (unknown real name) – that don’t appear though Mrs. Butterworth never, apparently, made it out of the rehearsal room. That desire to enliven the band’s own experience playing live, by playing songs they hadn’t attempted before or often, was a very strong feature of the ‘fun years’ of Nirvana. But it apparently went missing on the In Utero tour…The stability and lack of freshness is so clear.

Around May I started working on a spreadsheet showing each month in which a Nirvana song appeared. Understandably other priorities (i.e., writing, re-writing, re-re-writing Dark Slivers) took over and it was unlikely I was ever going to finish.

…Until that is my friend, Mr. Shrikant Kabule, took a shot at it. My absolute gratitude to Shrikant for his hard work on this! I was thrilled to see it! He focused on one objective – showing when Nirvana played a new song or cover:

As you might be able to tell, we’re going to have to take it piece by piece, but what I wanted to focus on today was the overall pattern; essentially Nirvana played a new original, or a new cover song (or slice thereof) almost every month during which they performed live throughout their entire career for which a set-list, or part thereof, exists.

Using the stats at the Nirvana Live Guide (check it! It’s brilliant – thanks to Kris and Mike) its amazing to see how many of Nirvana’s setlists are known in full (241 of 369 shows):

The gaps in the record of the early years make it likely that covers and originals have been overlooked (see Dark Slivers chapter Songs The Lord Taught Us for discussion of Big Long Now) but the later years are heavily covered, particularly 1992 and 1994. This makes the trend stand out even more – up until 1992 there had only been two months (December 1988 and March 1991) in which no unheard material was performed. Suddenly in 1992 the band perform in seven months yet there are five months in which they play no new songs. In 1993 there’s at least a fresh flush of covers and originals but again, it tails off until, from December 1993 onward the covers of My Sharona and My Best Friend’s Girl are the only things they can come up with.