HOWZAT

As the tenth anniversary of Cobain’s death on April 5, 2004, approaches, however, his legacy has been subject to more open-ended interpretations. These days, Nirvana’s music is everywhere: accorded the status of classic rock by radio stations and magazines, yet also held up as the essence of iconoclasm and irreverence by young musicians. As a result, the underlying meanings of Cobain’s brief life seem fantastically varied. A recent issue of Q magazine, for example, claimed that he “put Seattle on the map way before Starbucks”, “gave rock a cause to fight for”, “nudged Michael Jackson towards oblivion”, “brought back smack”, “painted the whole world punk”, and “pioneered the celebrity dad” (his daughter, Frances Bean, was born in August 1992). Not bad for a man whose time in the spotlight lasted not much over 30 months.

It is Cobain’s wholesome(ish), family-man side that seems to be defining an increasing part of his posthumous influence and its more unlikely manifestations. It may sound a little misplaced, but David Beckham seems to have been turning himself into a Cobain lookalike: bleaching his hair, spurning shaving, developing a fondness for woolly hats. His new look suggests that for men of a certain age Cobain may have morphed into an icon of sensitive, reconstructed, slightly feminised masculinity (throw in that Cobain was married to a pushy aspirant star whose celebrity was sustained as a result of their partnership, and the Beckham comparisons become too good to be true).

Of course, whole swaths of Cobain’s history seem diametrically opposed to all that: his heroin habit springs to mind, as does the nihilistic impulse behind much of his music. On the latter score, however, those who would like to strip him of his more troublesome aspects and recast him as the patron saint of Baby Gap and house husbandry will have no trouble finding a suitable soundtrack. Unplugged in New York, released six months after his death, is occasionally acclaimed as one of Nirvana’s best albums, showcasing a cerebral, subtle, wonderfully warm side of their music that may well have flowered had Cobain lived. With its abundance of acoustic guitars and a splendid version of David Bowie’s The Man who Sold the World, it contains moments that might even deserve a world like “cosy”.

On Monday, the kind of thirtysomethings who see Cobain as an emblem of their reckless youth may well dim the lights and use that album to commemorate both the anniversary of his death and their own passage into responsible adulthood. Kurt Cobain, in other words, will be enshrined as a permanent fixture on the modern coffee table. Really, who would have thought it?

Kurt Cobain’s life and times

February 20, 1967 Born in Hoquiam, Washington State, US

1976 Parents divorce; Cobain goes to live with his father in a trailer park, but returns to his mother two years later.

1984 Leaves home, works as a hotel cleaner. Sacked for sleeping in the rooms.

1987 Forms Nirvana with high-school friend Krist Novaselic on bass guitar.

June 1989 Debut LP Bleach, made for $606.17, is released.

June 1990 Cobain sacks drummer Chad Channing. “I felt like I’d just killed somebody”. Dave Grohl eventually replaces him.

September 1991 After signing with Geffen Records, Nirvana release their second album, Nevermind, to rave reviews.

Febuary 1992 Marries Courtney Love in Hawaii; their daughter Frances Bean born in August.

August 1992 Nirvana headline at the Reading Festival.

March 1993 In Utero, the band’s final studio album, is recorded in two weeks.

February 1994 Tickets for a spring UK tour sell out in a day.

March 1994 Cobain goes into a coma for 20 hours after overdosing on Rohypnol and champagne.

April 8, 1994 Cobain is found dead from a self-inflicted shotgun wound at his home in Seattle — it is thought that he had died three days earlier. About 5,000 people attend his memorial service in Seattle and hear Courtney Love read from his suicide note.

Benjamin White