Nirvana Boston: Part 4 - Axis
This year marks 35 years since the release of Nirvana’s debut album Bleach and it also marks 30 years since the passing of Nirvana leader Kurt Cobain. In honor of one of my Top 3 Favorite Musicians of All Time, I’m doing a multi-part series Nirvana Boston, in which I look at all of the concerts Nirvana did in Boston. Part 1 looked at their July 1989 show at Green Street Station, Part 2 looked at their April 1990 show at Man Ray and Part 3 looked at their April 1990 show at MIT.
The 4th installment looks at possibly their most legendary show they ever did in Boston and their first of the year 1991. Since the last time the band had played Boston a lot had changed. Drummer Chad Channing parted ways and the new drummer was Dave Grohl, formerly of Scream.
September 23, 1991: WFNX 8th Birthday Bash at Axis (Boston, MA)
show flyer (quite a lineup)
Lynn, MA independently owned and operated alternative rock station WFNX was first launched in 1983 on 101.7-FM. The radio station was one of my favorites in the 90s and I was so sad when they ceased operation in 2012. Prior to 1991, WFNX was one of the early supporters of Nirvana in the Boston area, which is why WFNX DJs Duane Bruce and Kurt St. Thomas were at the Man Ray Show in 1990. Nirvana's major-label debut album Nevermind was going to be released the next day on September 24, but just a few weeks earlier on August 29, St. Thomas played the Nevermind album in its entirety on-air for it's World Premiere. So when the radio station was gearing up for their 8th anniversary concert celebrations they set up shows with multiple bands at multiple venues on Boston's Landsdowne Street. At Axis, the bands included Cliffs of Dooneen, Smashing Pumpkins (their debut Gish was just released a few months earlier), Bullet LaVolta and finally Nirvana. Duane Bruce says "I feel bad for the other bands that were on the bill that night, like the bands that were playing over at Bill's Bar. They were all packed houses and nobody talks about those shows. I'd say there were close to 3000 people on Lansdowne Street that night if not more. Certainly 1500 were slammed into Axis." 1500 might be an exaggeration, but not far off.
Nevermind tour poster and Boston was the second stop
Nirvana arrived in Boston the day before on September 22. They stayed at the old Howard Johnson's Hotel on Commonwealth Avenue that has since become a Boston University dorm. Reportedly the band had dinner at Division 16 on Boylston Street with some Geffen Records and WFNX employees. Afterwards, the band went to The Rat AKA The Rathskeller in Kenmore Square to see their friends The Melvins, but they weren't on the guest list and it was local singer-songwriter Mary Lou Lord who urged the bouncer to let them in even though they weren't on the guest list. She formed a relationship with Cobain for a short time. In the documentary The Road to Ruane about The Middle East promoter Billy Ruane (that screened at IFFBoston earlier this year), Lord elaborated that she took Cobain back to Ruane's apartment in Cambridge that night and they listened to his record collection.
Cobain and Grohl doing press with WFNX earlier in the day (photo by Julie Kramer)
MTV News attended this show to film an interview with Nirvana and some backstage tomfoolery including a Twister game gone wild at Bill's Bar next door to Axis! Here is the raw footage of that wild Crisco Twister game with some of the members of Smashing Pumpkins and an interview with the band:
In my friend Jason Steeves' documentary We Want the Airwaves: The WFNX Story, DJ Angie C. noted that for several months the only live footage MTV had of Nirvana was of their coverage at the WFNX Birthday Bash, so every time MTV News did an update about Nirvana they cut to a clip of them onstage with the WFNX banner behind them, so it was like the radio station and the band were intertwined for a while there.
Axis had a capacity of 1000 and it was packed to say the least. Both Nirvana and headliners Smashing Pumpkins were not going to be playing clubs this size much longer. Boston's own Bullet LaVolta had built up a huge following by this point and were WFNX favorites. Their major label debut Swandive was released the same day as Nirvana's Nevermind, and they had toured with Smashing Pumpkins, Mudhoney and Soundgarden. Bullet LaVolta drummer Todd Philips says "For us, it was just another show playing Axis. We weren't even playing the biggest room, there was a bigger room next door at Avalon. Nirvana wasn't even the biggest band on the bill at the time." As Duane Bruce puts it "if the show was a steam train, then after the Pumpkin and Bullet LaVolta, by the time you got to Nirvana it was just pure black smoke". At midnight, headliners Nirvana's set began. Kurt St. Thomas did an intro. The band did a 49 minute set. They did songs off of Bleach and several from the about-to-be-released Nevermind.
Cobain on stage (photo by Steve Gullick)
Novoselic and Grohl on stage (photographer unknown)
Novoselic and Grohl (photo by Steve Gullick)
In terms of highlights, Todd Philips says "Sliver" and "Drain You", which he says "When I heard that, I said - holy shit, this is pop. This should be Top 40 music!" Very true! There is a reason some of the songs on Nevermind made the Top 40.
Here is the audio recording from YouTube:
Of the three times I saw Dave Grohl and Foo Fighters at Fenway Park (the most recent being this past July), I couldn't help but think he had played right across the street at Axis for that legendary show decades earlier.
Up Next: When a fan mentioned that he couldn't attend the WFNX show because he wasn't 18, the band decided to do a last minute show the next day at Axis that would be all-ages. Part 5 is the second Axis show in September 1991.