Nirvana was one of the bands that have made an indelible name in the music industry. True enough, the band’s front man, Kurt Cobain, has since become one of the icons in the music industry.

Cobain was born on February 20, 1967 in the small town of Hoquaim, 140 kilometers southwest of Seattle. His mom was a cocktail waitress. His dad was an auto mechanic. Cobain soon moved to Aberdeen, a quiet and depressed logging town.

Cobain was very happy in his early childhood. All things started spiraling slowly downwards when his parents divorced. He was seven at the time. Cobain said that he never felt loved or secure after this incident. He became anti-social and increasingly difficult to deal with. He also said that this event fueled a lot of the anguish that are injected into Nirvana’s music.

He was captivated by the Sex Pistols when he was eleven. It was then when he started listening to British bands. This included Joy Division and is said to be where Nirvana directly descends from. The rock star’s iconoclastic attitude did not win him a lot of friends in high school. And he is sometimes picked on by the jocks. Cobain got even at them by spray painting the word, queer, on their trucks. In 1985, Cobain moved to Olympia. It was here when he started forming and reforming several bands. In 1986, Nirvana was born.

Nirvana was composed of Cobain, Krist Novoselic and Dave Grohl. In 1988, Nirvana began playing in shows and started having demo tapes go around. 1989 was the year when they first recorded thir first album Bleach under the independent Seattle label, Sub-Pop.

Nirvana received a lot of recognition in Britain. In 1991, their contract was bout out by Geffen. They were the first non-mainstream band to sign under the mega label. They then released, Nevermind, an album of different, screaming, crunching songs with Smells Like Teen Spirit as the carrier single. This boosted Nirvana to the mainstream. The single is the band’s most highly acclaimed and most popular song. Cobain wrote the lyrics of the song, using a seductive hook line to lure the listener in. the album sold 10 million copies and made 550 million US dollars in sales. Cobain said that none of them ever expected anything like what happened to them. It was quick to note that Cobain, a sickly and sensitive guy of 24 years old, was not going to cope well with the lifestyle that he is leading.

Cobain got hooked into heroin in the early 90’s. He was quoted to say that it was as shield against the demands of touring and to stop his pains due to stomach ulcer and an irritated bowel. Even while on tour, Cobain continued to write as they were on tour.

There was also an incident when 2 men raped a girl while singing Polly, an anti-rape song that Cobain wrote. This got Cobain terribly distressed as he was worried that his songs were interpreted wrongly. He appealed to fans on notes in the Insecticide liner. But this proved to be ineffective. He was afraid that the band was attracting the wrong type of fans, the type that used to beat him up as a kid.

Courtney Love and Cobain married in February 1992 in Hawaii. Love was already pregnant then. Cobain was later on admitted to the hospital for heroin abuse. Shortly after, their daughter, Francis Bean Cobain was born.

The band released Utero in 1993. It gained the top spots on the music charts. This album was widely acclaimed by the press and also contained what was said to be Cobain’s most passionate works. This contained the songs, All Apologies and Heart Shaped Box along with Scentless Apprentice.

In 1993, the band recorded an unplugged album with MTV. This was the last album that they will record before splitting up. On March 4, 1994, Cobain was rushed to the hospital for downing fifty prescription painkillers with champagne. It was officially called an accident and was not made public even to close friends and associates. Cobain entered a detox program after some convincing from his wife, friends and managers. But Cobain made an escape. On the 5th of April on the same year, Kurt Cobain ended it all.