Dad dancing and rampant misogyny: why Kurt Cobain couldn’t “even deal with” rap music
Kurt Cobain was a complex figure. Despite his slight frame, the Nirvana frontman carried something of an outsized influence, driven by his staunch punk ethos and deeply held convictions. In an era where many artists of his stature exploited their fame, Cobain stood apart, a beacon of authenticity who led by example in spirit, if not always in practice. While his struggles with addiction cast a shadow over his legacy, there’s no denying that Cobain reshaped the role of the famous musician. He tore down the walls of celebrity mystique, bringing humanity to a space often defined by excess and detachment.
Until the very end, Cobain always was a realist. He knew exactly what he could and couldn’t do musically and was very aware of his place in the world as a straight white male. This, coupled with his punk spirit, made for a mighty cultural force, who often used his time in the media to decry the jocks that turned up to his band’s shows after Nevermind blew up, homophobia, racism, and sexism, with him the most prominent male feminist out there.
While he addressed many societal blights in his time, one irksome thing Cobain needed to get off his chest concerned the rap genre. Now, he might not have looked like a rap fan, but he was, in some instances. He named Public Enemy’s 1988 second album, It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back, among his favourite records of all time.
In 2018, a rare 1991 radio interview with Cobain emerged, and in it, he made his thoughts about rap clear. The interview was held on September 20th, 1991, only four days before the release of Nevermind, and was hosted by the 21-year-old DJ Roberto LoRusso at his college radio station CHRW in London, Ontario. LoRusso even admitted that the interview was quite awful due to his work as a novice journalist, and it featured some raw, unprepared moments, including the elementary question asking Cobain how much he hated boring radio interviews.
However, some elements remain interesting. One of those saw Cobain openly discuss signing with Nirvana to the major label DGC after leaving Seattle indie powerhouse Sub Pop. He revealed that he had received “more money than I’ve ever had in my life” but that he didn’t have a home at the time and that most of the funds had gone to others.
“$175,000,” Cobain said. “33% tax bracket, 15% to our lawyer, 10% to our manager, $70,000 to Sub Pop, left us with about $20,000 to buy equipment. I don’t have a place to live at the moment.”
Later, the ill-prepared LoRusso opted to ask Cobain why he enjoyed hip-hop, and it was then that the frontman took the opportunity to decry white men rapping. With Vanilla Ice releasing the corny hit ‘Ice Ice Baby’ the year prior and a pre-Hollywood Mark Wahlberg outfit, Marky Mark and the Funky Bunch releasing the comically bad number one single ‘Good Vibrations’ that July, it’s safe to say that Cobain’s point was substantial.
Cobain said white men can’t dance or rap and that he also had such a problem with rap in a broader sense when its misogynistic tendencies pushed him over the edge.
He explained: “I’m a fan of rap music, but most of it is so misogynist that I can’t even deal with it. I’m really not that much of a fan. I totally respect and love it because it’s one of the only original forms of music that’s been introduced. But the white man doing rap is just like watching a white man dance. We can’t dance, we can’t rap.”
