Even if you call yourself the biggest Nirvana fan that has ever lived, here are 5 things you may not have known about the group.

1. Teen Spirit = deodorant, but Kurt Cobain didn’t know this when a friend wrote “Kurt smells like Teen Spirit” on his wall.

Kathleen Hanna, notably of Bikini Kill and Le Tigre, got drunk off 40s and Canadian Club with Kurt Cobain back in August of 1990. Back at Cobain’s apartment, Hanna started writing things in Sharpie on Cobain’s rental apartment walls. She would later describe the behavior as “really kind of lame that I did that.”

Apparently Hanna’s bandmate in Bikini Kill and Cobain’s girlfriend at the time, Tobi Vail, used a now discontinued deodorant called Teen Spirit and after being with Vail, Cobain would smell like Teen Spirit. When Cobain learned that the reference was not a compliment it is said he became mad about his mistake.

2. “Smells Like Teen Spirit” was supposed to be a joke and when Kurt Cobain pitched it, the band initially hated the song.

Krist Novoselic, the bassist, called it “ridiculous,” but Cobain forced the band to play it for an hour and a half anyway. Nirvana felt the riff sounded like Boston’s “More Than a Feeling” and even played that song leading into “Smells Like Teen Spirit” live.

3. Nirvana got kicked out of the Nevermind release party for starting a food fight. They were known to pull many pranks and acts of mischief.

Music journalist Everett True recounts the release party night in his book “Nirvana: The True Story” and details how things got out of hand:

“Oh, there was always a food fight. It was inevitable. These guys were like children. There was egg throwing, food fighting, putting CDs in the microwave, it was just ridiculous. After we got thrown out of the ‘Nevermind’ record release party we all went over to Susie’s house and dressed the Nirvana guys up in dresses and put make-up on them and danced around the house and I think that was the night that Kurt was slingshotting eggs off of Susie’s porch at the neighbors’ cars.”

4. The Nevermind baby was originally supposed to be a full underwater birthing scene.

Thank goodness they didn’t, but members of the band saw a television documentary about the underwater birthing process and Kurt Cobain decided, “Let’s put that on the album cover.” The image was way too graphic, so they ended up going with a baby swimming instead.

5. Kurt Cobain was evicted from his apartment as “Nevermind” was released. He was forced to live in his car. 

Not the ‘lifestyles of the rich and famous’ kind of story you would imagine, huh? When Kurt Cobain returned home from recording Nevermind, his boxes were on the curb and he found out that he’d been evicted. Despite the forthcoming album release, Cobain spent many weeks living in his 1963 Plymouth Valiant.

Now don’t you just want to listen “Smells Like Teen Spirit” on repeat?

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