By Dawson Barrett / Portside

In recognition of the anniversary of the death of Nirvana leader Kurt Cobain, a host of retrospectives will recognize both the raw potency of Cobain’s songwriting and the tragedy of his heroin use and suicide. They will hide that Nirvana was a band of rebels.

This April marks twenty years since the death of Nirvana leader Kurt Cobain, one of the most iconic cultural figures of the late 20th century. In recognition of that anniversary, a host of retrospectives will recognize both the raw potency of Cobain’s songwriting and the tragedy of his heroin use and suicide. Echoing the tired, sexist tropes of “John and Yoko” and “Sid and Nancy,” many will also associate Cobain’s downfall with his wife, Courtney Love. These tabloid narratives will overshadow Nirvana’s political and cultural significance. They will hide that Nirvana was a band of rebels.

A year before his death in 1994, Kurt Cobain expressed hope that his generation could reject the “Reaganite bullshit” that was forced upon them during their childhoods. Indeed, from the growing popularity of countercultural music (both “alternative” rock and hip-hop) to the rise of the global justice movement, the 1990s seemed to offer a youth-led counterbalance to the racism, sexism, and homophobia that swept Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush into office a decade earlier. Twenty years later, however, America’s culture wars remain very much alive, and boastful opposition to so-called “political correctness” is used to justify intolerance and oppression in many forms.   [Read more…]