10 Years After Nevermind

Of course, as with so many literary figures, his suicide has also made Cobain a romantic figure. His death can be naively read as a rejection of fame or popularity, or even of the world itself, with all its unbearable affronts, slights and insults, all its inevitable, wearying compromises. No doubt, there are young kids now who hear Nirvana's music only in this way.

But, finally, it was a personal decision. Cobain simply couldn't live inside his own skin any longer; the suicide genes that he half-seriously believed were part of his family's legacy exerted too powerful a hold on him. And is it necessary to mention all the drugs? He took the only exit he believed was available to him. He wanted to erase himself, and to an unfortunate extent he succeeded in that goal.

Nevermind has sold more than 10 million copies. It's an acknowledged masterpiece, and it appears on all the official and unofficial lists of the most important albums in the history of popular music. But through his death, Cobain achieved what may possibly have been one of his goals: making Nirvana a cult band once again. Among Nirvana's contemporaries, Cobain's death made ambition unseemly, and to that degree abandoned the charts to the pop and hip-hop kids who don't share his reluctance about fame and success.

Even among current rock bands, where is Nirvana's influence? Those bands would certainly say respectful things about Nirvana, if asked, but they're far more likely to have been genuinely influenced by Dr. Dre, Jane's Addiction or even Guns N' Roses (a band, ironically, that Cobain despised) than Nirvana. A band setting out to emulate Nirvana must feel as if it's heading for a dead-end. Or worse.

That will change over time. As the shadow of Cobain's dark final act recedes, Nirvana's music will once again come to the fore. Even now, it is quietly finding the listeners who need to hear it, the fans who can find release and succor in the bands brutal roar and soothing melodies, in the cryptic beauty of Cobain's lyrics and the howling intimacy of his singing. Eventually the feuds — so Beatle-like that one only hopes Cobain is getting a perverse kick out of them, wherever he is — that have prevented Courtney Love and the surviving members of Nirvana, Dave Grohl and Krist Novoselic, from agreeing to release the long-awaited Nirvana box set will be settled, and the band's music will have another important opportunity to assert itself in the world.

For now, though, anything having to do with Nirvana must stir up complicated, contradictory feelings in anyone who cared at all about the band — and who is honest enough not to turn away from the darkness. Every anniversary, good or bad, will be, at least in part, a memorial service, and every celebration of a triumph will also be haunted by an event that everyone knows occurred and that, in its anger and absolute conviction, just can't be put to rest.