i got bit by the nirvana bug and now officially i'm here lmao.
🌙 q / quartz • 26 • they/them and ghost/ghostself • white • nonbinary queer
🌙 this is a sideblog! i follow/like from goldenrosetea. main sideblog; @starburnedkisses
🌟 art/writing tagged here under #mine
🌟 my ao3 (i currently write all my fics for nirvana under a pseud on my main acct.)
☀️ #1 kurt/krist enjoyer. get more insane about them, i'm begging y'all.
☀️ read my opinion piece on kurt being bisexual please and thank you <3
✨ new to nirvana? here's a list of resources to get you started!
this account may not be nearly as active as i'm hellbent on not being on tumblr all the time. so posts may be sparse. i've been into nirvana since i was 16, this hyperfixation is recent (blame my gf, leah). they are a very important band to me, but i will not hold them up on a pedestal. i will NOT be discussing kurt's suicide here, that's a very touchy subject for me.
please talk to me!!! i'm always open to conversation and wanna find new nirvana buddies ^^ !!
fifth up on the list for the nirvana doc project is "nirvana: up close and personal", directed by bob carruthers and released in 2007.
quick summary; conducting interviews with those who knew, worked with or knew of the band with supplemental archival footage provided alongside, director bob carruthers retells the history of nirvana, their rise, fall and subsequent legacy after kurt's passing.
thoughts; this was...fine i guess? i think this is the first doc i'm truly, actually ambivalent about. i don't have strong feelings like with other entries we've covered such as "soaked in bleach" or "about a son". i think the best i can give this is a shrug. it feels like a made for tv documentary for those who want to get up to speed on the history of nirvana and also know maybe some more tidbits about kurt they weren't already aware of. they do bring up krist and dave briefly but don't delve further. it's very kurt centric like how nirvana docs usually are. how kurt ran the band, how it was his vision, how he felt, etc. when it would be really refreshing to hear about, yknow, the significance of the other two's contributions. yes i'm glad you brought up how krist was mistaken for the manager of the band because of how he kept track of finances and booked gigs and such in the beginning and also was the mouthpiece during interviews but can we talk about how important krist really was to the sound of the band? he's irreplaceable. there would be no nirvana without krist novoselic, point blank period. also dave's there i guess. he hits hard. when like--there's so much else we could delve into. they gave some nod to chad, which i'm happy about, but once again didn't bring up the other drummers they went through (which is kinda insane cause you'll bring up chad's contributions but not dale crover???? THE guy that was important in the beginning of the band??? alright). the interviews that were conducted were fine, they got the typical roster of people low budget documentaries get when they can't actually interview the main players (even though the letterboxd description claims they did interview them, false advertising?). beware, though, this doc features a charles r. cross jumpscare. really bogs down everything when he's shown but he's not being a shit so i guess that's something. not very keen on the interviews they conducted with kurt's paternal grandfather, leland cobain, either. he's part of the "kurt wasn't suicidal" crowd and i'm not particularly fond of that notion. just because he didn't appear visibly suicidal to you doesn't mean he wasn't suicidal. also worth mentioning that the scene transitions and editing were very early 2000s and obnoxious. there's also a cover band that they use to feature songs occasionally, both with blurred footage in a recording studio and audio, that they lie and say are actually the band. it isn't, that clearly isn't kurt's voice. you can't lie to me, carruthers. overall, i'd say this is a pretty forgettable doc. i'm probably gonna forget about it by tomorrow. i'm already losing information as we speak.
is the information in this doc accurate?; somewhat. i'd say the vast majority of it is accurate with some minor inconsistencies here and there. such as asserting kurt's parents, wendy and don, divorced when he was a teen when they divorced around the time he was 7/8 or calling their music pop adjacent when they're more in line with punk rock or straight rock with minor pop elements. also bringing up kurt being clean before 91 is kinda silly and spreads the lie kurt himself conjured of only really getting into heroin at the height of nevermind. he was a pothead as a teen, dabbled in prescription drug abuse and also occasionally injected heroin but his addiction didn't worsen until their meteoric rise. there's also some courtney hate and conspiracy sprinkled in for good measure, but not overly obnoxious about it as past entries have been prone to doing. they discuss briefly the potential of kurt losing custody of frances, the ever looming rumor of divorce and speculated he was rewriting his will to exclude her when there's no true evidence of this. it's word of mouth, as i've stated before, and we will never truly know if any of these claims are true. though to claim those are a few of the reasons why he might've become suicidal and taken his life is a bit extreme. there's also talk of kurt ghostwriting hole's breakthrough album live through this and how it's an open secret. i've never been able to find concrete proof of this and courtney has discussed often that he had no involvement in the writing of that album, which i'm inclined to believe. he's not secretly spreading a message through songs on his wife's album, that's absurd. they also bring up how grunge died when nirvana disbanded. i've not gotten into this really because it's unimportant to nirvana on the whole but the label of "grunge" was a joke term bruce pavitt, cofounder of sub-pop records, coined when he was in college to describe seattle bands sound at the time that spiraled out of his hands after nirvana skyrocketed to fame and put seattle on the map for the greater public. there's no such thing as actual grunge. other than that, i'd say it's pretty solid information wise (even if it features untrustworthy sources such as charles r. cross and leland cobain).
final rating; 3 out of 5
where can this be watched?; currently "nirvana: up close and personal" is free to stream off tubi and amazon prime.
fifth up on the list for the nirvana doc project is "nirvana: up close and personal", directed by bob carruthers and released in 2007.
quick summary; conducting interviews with those who knew, worked with or knew of the band with supplemental archival footage provided alongside, director bob carruthers retells the history of nirvana, their rise, fall and subsequent legacy after kurt's passing.
thoughts; this was...fine i guess? i think this is the first doc i'm truly, actually ambivalent about. i don't have strong feelings like with other entries we've covered such as "soaked in bleach" or "about a son". i think the best i can give this is a shrug. it feels like a made for tv documentary for those who want to get up to speed on the history of nirvana and also know maybe some more tidbits about kurt they weren't already aware of. they do bring up krist and dave briefly but don't delve further. it's very kurt centric like how nirvana docs usually are. how kurt ran the band, how it was his vision, how he felt, etc. when it would be really refreshing to hear about, yknow, the significance of the other two's contributions. yes i'm glad you brought up how krist was mistaken for the manager of the band because of how he kept track of finances and booked gigs and such in the beginning and also was the mouthpiece during interviews but can we talk about how important krist really was to the sound of the band? he's irreplaceable. there would be no nirvana without krist novoselic, point blank period. also dave's there i guess. he hits hard. when like--there's so much else we could delve into. they gave some nod to chad, which i'm happy about, but once again didn't bring up the other drummers they went through (which is kinda insane cause you'll bring up chad's contributions but not dale crover???? THE guy that was important in the beginning of the band??? alright). the interviews that were conducted were fine, they got the typical roster of people low budget documentaries get when they can't actually interview the main players (even though the letterboxd description claims they did interview them, false advertising?). beware, though, this doc features a charles r. cross jumpscare. really bogs down everything when he's shown but he's not being a shit so i guess that's something. not very keen on the interviews they conducted with kurt's paternal grandfather, leland cobain, either. he's part of the "kurt wasn't suicidal" crowd and i'm not particularly fond of that notion. just because he didn't appear visibly suicidal to you doesn't mean he wasn't suicidal. also worth mentioning that the scene transitions and editing were very early 2000s and obnoxious. there's also a cover band that they use to feature songs occasionally, both with blurred footage in a recording studio and audio, that they lie and say are actually the band. it isn't, that clearly isn't kurt's voice. you can't lie to me, carruthers. overall, i'd say this is a pretty forgettable doc. i'm probably gonna forget about it by tomorrow. i'm already losing information as we speak.
is the information in this doc accurate?; somewhat. i'd say the vast majority of it is accurate with some minor inconsistencies here and there. such as asserting kurt's parents, wendy and don, divorced when he was a teen when they divorced around the time he was 7/8 or calling their music pop adjacent when they're more in line with punk rock or straight rock with minor pop elements. also bringing up kurt being clean before 91 is kinda silly and spreads the lie kurt himself conjured of only really getting into heroin at the height of nevermind. he was a pothead as a teen, dabbled in prescription drug abuse and also occasionally injected heroin but his addiction didn't worsen until their meteoric rise. there's also some courtney hate and conspiracy sprinkled in for good measure, but not overly obnoxious about it as past entries have been prone to doing. they discuss briefly the potential of kurt losing custody of frances, the ever looming rumor of divorce and speculated he was rewriting his will to exclude her when there's no true evidence of this. it's word of mouth, as i've stated before, and we will never truly know if any of these claims are true. though to claim those are a few of the reasons why he might've become suicidal and taken his life is a bit extreme. there's also talk of kurt ghostwriting hole's breakthrough album live through this and how it's an open secret. i've never been able to find concrete proof of this and courtney has discussed often that he had no involvement in the writing of that album, which i'm inclined to believe. he's not secretly spreading a message through songs on his wife's album, that's absurd. they also bring up how grunge died when nirvana disbanded. i've not gotten into this really because it's unimportant to nirvana on the whole but the label of "grunge" was a joke term bruce pavitt, cofounder of sub-pop records, coined when he was in college to describe seattle bands sound at the time that spiraled out of his hands after nirvana skyrocketed to fame and put seattle on the map for the greater public. there's no such thing as actual grunge. other than that, i'd say it's pretty solid information wise (even if it features untrustworthy sources such as charles r. cross and leland cobain).
final rating; 3 out of 5
where can this be watched?; currently "nirvana: up close and personal" is free to stream off tubi and amazon prime.
i'm unsure of if this is really a rarepair, but dave/krist i'm quite fond of. kurt/pat is also nice if it were ever to be explored properly. pat w/ any of the nirvana guys really since pat is underutilized in rpf or just completely doesn't exist. also been swirling tracy/shelli in my head for a few months now. i need the masses to get on my level with that one
waves hello everyone, i've returned from my week out w/ my gf. good to see you all <3 i'm exhausted and sad that she's gone so give me a little while to process before i start posting again. love you all, take care of yourselves <3
