Nirvana is one of those bands that, as the years grind on, have become less about their music and more about an image. They’re the band that made the 1990s the decade of flannel and ripped jeans. They’re the comatose smiley face plastered on Kohl’s t-shirts. They’re that band that ended with a tragic suicide. We live in a world where alternative rock is a fading institution rather than the explosive counterculture.
But for some of us, Nirvana was a band that still means something even two decades after Kurt Cobain’s suicide. They were a band that showed that music could be more than what came over your friends’ pop stations and your dad’s classic rock station. Though they basically wrote pop songs with loud guitars, Nirvana was an introduction to punk, grunge and music so much less refined. It was life changing.
People can point to “Smells Like Teen Spirit” or “In Bloom” as the moments they found Nirvana. Others might credit “Heart-Shaped Box” or “All Apologies” as the songs where Nirvana finally clicked. For me, that song was “Sappy.”
“Sappy” isn’t quite a rarity. It’s actually a fan favorite, an entry level deep cut that showed Cobain’s handle on pop’s tight structures and rock’s unwinding aggression. Topped off with a flash of guitar anti-heroics, it stuck with me in a way that “Smells Like Teen Spirit” just couldn’t. Less than a month later, Nirvana was one of my favorite bands.
The “Sappy” showcased now isn’t the same “Sappy.” It’s the same words and the same chords, but Cobain’s solo delivery isn’t as scrappy. Nirvana’s “Sappy” would rip and tear through speakers, but this “Sappy,” from Montage of Heck: The Home Recordings (out Nov. 13), sounds more like a ghost. Cobain moans over his acoustic guitar, sighing in surrender. It’s haunting, almost terrifying; it’s the call of a dying man.
Personally, I haven’t decided if Montage of Heck is more cash grab than memorial, but hearing “Sappy”’s droning sough between those arpeggioed chords gave me an empty feeling, one that grieves for the lost soul behind the riffs, groans and crooked smiles.