Credit: Far Out / Apple Music

The only 1990s albums Kurt Cobain actually liked

Wed 19 March 2025 16:45, UK

By the time Nirvana hit it big, Kurt Cobain had already solidified his taste in music. He was more than willing to highlight anyone that he thought sounded great, but most of the time, the purpose of his getting on MTV was to rid the world of the kind of sleazy hair-metal acts that had been promoting the worst excuse for rock music that anyone had ever heard. What they were doing was not from the heart, and as the 1990s turned a corner, heart was half the battle with Cobain.

Because listening to any of Nirvana’s records, Cobain was far from the best guitarist in the world. Although many aficionados were claiming that Nirvana was terrible strictly because of the fact that he couldn’t play like Yngwie Malmsteen, the classical rock guitarist would never even dream of playing like Cobain, either, especially utilising feedback and crunchy power chords the way he did to create tunes like ‘On a Plain’ or ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit’.

But even by Cobain’s heavy standards, he always had a soft spot for art rockers like Half Japanese. While the art punks from Maryland were far from the biggest names in the world, their album We Are They Who Ache with Amorous Love was still dripping with emotion. Even when listening to the rough production of their record, it’s easy to hear the spontaneity of something like In Utero from what Cobain heard in them.

If you know anything about Cobain’s beliefs, though, it was about giving everyone a platform regardless of their place in the world. And since the biggest names in rock and roll had all been the same boring white guy strutting across the stage, the frontman knew that the future of the genre lay in female rockers like PJ Harvey.

While Cobain would later work with Steve Albini around the same time Harvey was making Rid of Me, he could hear her genius one album before on Dry, taking the kind of Bob Dylan-esque lyrics and demanding to be taken as seriously as everyone besides her. And since the Pixies were now defunct, The Breeders were the next best thing for Cobain’s alt-rock fix, outdoing most of Frank Black’s solo material with albums like Pod.

But even though Cobain was interested in all waves of punk like LiliPUT during this time didn’t mean that he was all about aggression. No one makes the beautiful melodies of his tunes without someone to look up to, and when it came to something a bit softer, She Hangs Brightly by Mazzy Star was the perfect way of balancing out Cobain’s listening habits. Compared to the caustic side of rock, this was pure dreamy pop years before everyone else got on the hype train with ‘Fade Into You’.

While Cobain had a rough outline of how he wanted his music to sound back in the days of Nevermind, In Utero was where he started pulling from his new influences. There were a handful of songs that were nothing more than pure outlets of anger, but a track like ‘All Apologies’ has the same hazy atmosphere as Mazzy Star, and the confessional lyrics of ‘Dumb’ would have probably never existed if he hadn’t something as blunt as PJ Harvey during that period.

So despite everyone wanting Nevermind Part 2: Still Cynical, Cobain’s taste in modern music was already leading him towards something different. All music must change for someone to continue listening, and even if his 1990s record collection was a bit rough around the edges, Cobain was always willing to give it a shot if he felt some genuine passion between the notes.