Hole's Live Through This versus Nirvana's Nevermind - Controversy!

Many people hold controversial opinions. I know. Prince told me, so it must be true.

I am going to swerve the bigoted or deeply stupid opinions of ill-informed musicians here. Because no one, but no one, has ever gone “rather than listen to scientists, I am going to go and listen to Van Morrison and Eric Clapton. They MUST be right. They wrote Moondance and Layla. They’ll know what they are on about as we face a global pandemic. Not the entire medical profession. Or that Professor Chris Whitty bloke. Of course I shouldn’t get vaccinated”. Ok, some people did listen to them. And they are thick as shit. If you are one of them, don’t read on. Fuck off.

Right, we are all on the same page. Let’s begin.

I shared a controversial opinion with some colleagues at work. Mainly to annoy my friend Daniel. And also because I am an attention-seeking only child. Lifetime habits are hard to break.

BUT. I do genuinely believe this. So here goes.

Live Through This by Hole is a better album than Nevermind by Nirvana. There, I have said it. Actually, I already said it at work. Because it is true. Hear me out…

I have bought more records and CDs than I care to imagine. I suspect I need to work at least a year longer to top up my pension because of this addiction. That said, when my old man and I discussed this in the 90s, he told me I needed to grow up and save. I told him I had never bought a packet of cigarettes. He thought for a moment and said, “Keep buying the CDs”. Paternal approval for my addiction - the old fella was a pragmatist, as am I.

But in the 41 years of buying physical media, I have never bought Nevermind. Ever. Not once. I have bought records I am ashamed of (I bought the cassette of Go West’s debut album - youth does not excuse this). I have bought albums multiple times. I reckon I have bought Power, Corruption and Lies by New Order five times. Ridiculous (though it is spectacular).

But Nevermind? Not once.

I saw Nirvana on The Word, Channel 4’s terrible late Friday night chat show, which counterbalanced some terrible interviews and features with some quite breathtaking live performances by Stereolab (see above YouTube video - a truly stellar live performance!), Oasis, L7, Blur, and more. 

Nirvana delivered a stellar version of Smells Like Teen Spirit, dedicated to Courtney Love, possibly the best fuck in the world Kurt pronounced to the world (ok, drunk British students in the early 90s on a Friday night). Still, a pretty bold declaration of love and the sort of thing The Word lived for. One of my housemates bought the album, and I definitely played it. I liked Come As You Are, though it is a rip-off of Eighties by Killing Joke. 

The rest of it? It’s trashy, quite good rock. But Pixies had done the quiet / loud / quiet thing with so much more class. It’s not a bad album. It’s pretty good. But it’s not that amazing. In terms of shouting, Black Francis’ death curdled scream leaves Kurt cold. There are some pretty run-of-the-mill, throwaway nonsense tracks like Stay Away. And it all sounds the same, Polly being the exception.  Not that amazing. In Utero is okay, again some great moments like Heart-Shaped Box or All Apologies. But the rest? It’s more of the same, a poor man’s Pixies. (PS Sinead O’Connor’s version of All Apologies is WAY better.)

To me, Nirvana are what corporate America imagined indie to be - scruffy, dirty, geeky, shouty rock, an extension of American poodle metal with less solos and hairspray. They were a vehicle to sell band t-shirts and ‘vintage’ lumberjack shirts to sheep. Somehow, marketing departments convinced British people to dress like Garth from Wayne’s World. Really. It’s tragic when you look back. Early 90s American indie rock is the sort of alternative rock that Donald Trump and his like would create to sell merch to idiots. God, I will get some stick for this…to be clear, they were a fuck of a lot better than Pearl Jam. And anyway one who bangs on about Soundgarden needs a slap.

I am sad that Kurt died by suicide and suspect he was severely damaged by the corporate machine that took hold of his life and his art. He would probably be alive and much happier with just some limited success and playing dive bars to genuine music fans. 

Whereas…Courtney Love wanted the fame. She craved it. There is nothing wrong with  that. I have always admired the talented who have drive and ambition. Less so, the talentless. 

Hole played a gig in Exeter with Therapy? which foolishly we didn’t go to. By all accounts, she was amazing, throwing herself into the moshpit, with aplomb. She wanted to make an impact, and whilst her songs then didn’t have the whack needed, she had it in bundles. She upstaged everyone else at that gig. And Therapy? were / are a great live band, so no mean feat.

Courtney had already established herself on the Liverpool scene, hanging around with Julian Cope, Ian McCulloch, and that post-punk vibe. She was an LA, trust fund lost child. She stole their clothes, their look, and their attitude. She had had a rough childhood, her dad apparently giving her LSD aged four. Her pain, her rage, her damage was real. She was bratty, obnoxious by all accounts, but who wasn’t an arsehole at 17, and with her background, it’s amazing she became anything.

She learnt lots from the Bunnymen and the Teardrops. How to write songs, even if it took her over a decade to translate that into a GREAT album. By the time she had finally mastered her look and songwriting, she was attached to Cobain. It was an easy dig to write her off as Nancy Spungeon 2.0. The drugs and bleached hair didn’t help. But still, it was an easy, idle dig. 

People cast doubt on who wrote the songs on Live Through This. (As they did later when it was suggested Billy Corgan wrote all of Celebrity Skin - there are co-writes, but these songs are hers, way better than his own massively overrated nonsense). This is lazy misogyny. 

Watch her on TOTP playing Doll Parts and singing live. She is driven, crazed, the real deal. It’s intense. Similarly, her appearance on Jools Holland’s Later. She is rushed by Jools or some lackey when she doesn’t start on time, but shouts back, “I need a second.” Then kicks in in her own time with a blinding version, rage and irritation finding an immediate outlet. She has poise, style, and looks more rock and roll than Jools could ever dream of. All of this, in the aftermath of her recent widowhood.  It beggars belief that she could do this. 

The album has standouts like Violet and Miss World that have more style and sophistication than anything on Nevermind. Her choice of cover (a version of Credit in the Straight World by Young Marble Giants) showed greater taste than Kurt ever managed. His plethora of covers of the Vaselines seemed almost like he needed to validate his own credibility but could only muster one (let’s be honest, not that great) Scottish band as a reference.

Courtney went on to survive the grieving widow image, coming back with an almost perfect pop rock album, more Fleetwood Mac than Smashing Pumpkins. Her career has been erratic, a bit lost, but her acting was great (her performance in The People Vs Larry Flynt was magnificent). I can’t imagine Kurt coming out fighting this way if the tables had been turned and it was he left behind by her death.

Live Through This is the best of a period I look back on and shudder, where we had forgotten what good British music sounded like. Britpop came roaring back, re-establishing a belief in our own songwriting geniuses like Lennon, McCartney, Davies, and Marriott. Whilst it was far from perfect, it was more varied, stylish, and colourful than its US predecessor. I’d listen to Suede rather than Nirvana any day. I would question your mental health if you are still listening to Screaming Trees or Tad (though the former’s Mark Lanegan did go on to make some great records later).

If you don’t think Courtney is capable of something incredible now, listen to last year’s version of Tim Buckley’s Song to the Siren. It’s stunning; her vocal is jaw-dropping.

I really hope she comes back with an album that meets the brilliance of Live Through This. She is, like so many female artists, undervalued, written off, and left in the shadow of an overrated man. Not a bad man, just not as game-changing as everyone thinks. 

There you go. I await flack!

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