Shortly before he began working with Nirvana on Nevermind, co-producer and engineer Butch Vig got a phone call from Kurt Cobain. "He said, 'I've found the greatest drummer in the world,'" Vig recalls. That drummer was Dave Grohl, an Ohio native and a veteran of the Washington, D.C.-area hardcore scene with the band Scream. Grohl's move to the Northwest in August 1990 ended Nirvana's troubled parade of drummers — five since 1987 — and brought a forceful groove to the serrated radiance of Cobain's songs. An aspiring singer-songwriter, Grohl made bristling one-man-pop tapes during his Nirvana years and, after Cobain's death in 1994, formed Foo Fighters, now among the few thriving survivors of the Nineties alt-rock revolt. But Grohl remains best known for his thunderous tom-tom roll at the start of "Smells Like Teen Spirit," which sent the song into overdrive and announced Nirvana to the world.

When was the last time you listened to Nevermind all the way through?
Six or seven months ago. It's funny to listen to it back-to-back with other albums from the time, like Jane's Addiction's Ritual de lo Habitual and the Smashing Pumpkins album Gish. It's easier to think about production values than to think about the emotional value that Nevermind has for me — not in a negative way, just in an overwhelming way. That time was such a whirlwind.

But that was the greatest achievement of my life. I celebrate it every now and then. Krist and I actually listened to a little bit of it recently as we were mixing a new Nirvana track, just to compare.