Heavier Than Heaven: The Biography of Kurt Cobain

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Charles R. Cross heeft zich voor zijn boek gebaseerd op meer dan 400 interviews en had inzage in massa's authentieke documenten, waaronder correspondentie en dagboeken van de zanger. Hoe hij uit die verscheidenheid aan bronnen zo'n consistent en uitgebalanceerd verhaal kon puren, is mij een raadsel. En hij doet dat zonder enig waardeoordeel, maar eerder als een bevoorrechte getuige, een verslaggever, een onzichtbare toeschouwer. Tussen de grote verhaallijnen en gebeurtenissen door geeft hij een schat aan anekdotes, petites histoires en citaten mee, waardoor het verhaal letterlijk geen seconde verveelt. Enkel op het einde, in het laatste hoofdstuk ( "Een hiernamaals als dat van Leonard Cohen, april 1995 - mei 1999) verandert de toon, wordt hij wat (melo-)dramatisch en gaat hij soms kort door de bocht. Wat jammer is, maar na meer dan 400 pagina's leesplezier vergeef je dat de auteur maar al te graag.

For starters, it really is too detailed. It's hard to get through because the text is really dense and it reads like a super long Wikipedia article. Some parts were overdone and unnecessary, and I had to take one star off. But, that being said, I liked how objective it felt, without trying to sugar coat anything. Cross portrayed Kurt as a moody, disturbed and depressed person who had a serious addiction problem, which is more or less who Kurt was. Charles R. Cross recalled the following in his 2001 Kurt Cobain biography, titled Heavier Than Heaven: Lccn 2001024187 Ocr tesseract 4.1.1 Ocr_detected_lang en Ocr_detected_lang_conf 1.0000 Ocr_detected_script Latin Ocr_module_version 0.0.5 Ocr_parameters -l eng Old_pallet IA19371 Openlibrary_edition IvyPanda. "Heavier Than Heaven - the Story of Cobain’s Life." April 27, 2020. https://ivypanda.com/essays/heavier-than-heaven-the-story-of-cobains-life/. The short unhappy life of Kurt Donald Cobain now has its worthy biographer. — Seattle Post-Intelligencer John Marshall

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In May 1968, when Kurt was fifteen months old, Wendy's fourteen-year-old sister Mari wrote a paper about her nephew for her home economics class. "His mother takes care of him most of the time," Mari wrote. "[She] shows her affection by holding him, giving him praise when he deserves it, and by taking part in many of his activities. He responds to his father in that when he sees his father, he smiles, and he likes his dad to hold him. He makes his wants known by yelling loudly at first, then crying if the first technique doesn't work." Mari recorded that his favorite game was peekaboo, his first tooth appeared at eight months, and his first dozen words were, "coco, momma, dadda, ball, toast, bye-bye, hi, baby, me, love, hot dog, and kittie."

It was clear Cross had much interaction with the Nirvana frontman during his rise to fame but I was eager to find out what kind of relationship he had with Cobain. “Even as his biographer and someone who knew Kurt, I wasn’t his best friend. And I was editor of a music magazine. We were always gonna have the kind of relationship where he was gonna be sort of suspicious. He clearly respected what I did. I had the benefit of a biographer of going through Kurt’s personal effects and things. He kept copies of my magazines and articles that I had done among his stuff. That, I guess, is the ultimate compliment that a music star could pay a journalist. So, I was respected in the world he was in”. Ik weet nog dat ik toen, net de twintig gepasseerd, iets gelijkaardigs voelde. En ook nog precies waar ik was toen ik het nieuws te horen kreeg dat de frontman van één van de bands die mijn adolescentie en mijn verdere muzieksmaak mee vorm gegeven hebben, zichzelf voor de kop geschoten had. "Heavier than Heaven", de naam van de Europese tour van Nirvana in 1989, kon geen passender titel zijn voor dit boek. Voor mij was het de eerste biografie die ik ooit gelezen heb, en ik heb het me nog geen seconde beklaagd dat het die van Kurt Cobain was. He lived in Olympia with his girlfriend at the time, Tracy Marander, who supported them both by working in a cafeteria. Cobain didn't have a steady job, so he naturally didn't have a steady income. He usually slept until noon, ate something, and then played the guitar for hours. Recuerdo que yo era una niña cuando en 1994 se anunció por todos los medios de comunicación que Cobain había sido encontrado muerto en su casa (se había pegado un tiro en la cabeza con una escopeta) creo que se podría decir que prácticamente toda mi generación quedo en silencio, fue uno de esos momentos que sabes son realmente históricos porque representan un punto de inflexión del que no se puede regresar jamás. Yo había ahorrado lo que podía de mis recreos para comprar mi primer cd, cuando fui a la disco tienda le pregunte al vendedor cuál de los álbumes de Nirvana (estaba segura del grupo) le recomendaría a una persona que seguramente solo podría comprar uno durante el resto de su vida, me dijo sin dudarlo “In Útero” es el mejor pero el más histórico es “Nevermind” quédate con ese último porque será algo memorable que querrás tener por siempre y así lo hice. Esto lo cuento para que se hagan a una idea de lo representa este grupo de Grunge (género al que prácticamente dieron inicio) para las personas que crecimos en esa época. Cobain's depressive tendencies and withdrawal symptoms even affected the band's performance. Once, before performing in front of 110,000 people, Cobain mixed pills and alcohol, making it difficult for him to play chords. The whole show was a mess. A Brazilian magazine had harsh comments about the show, saying, “They were not the real Nirvana at all; instead it was only a depressing Cobain making noise with his guitar.”

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I know Kurt is your spiritual animal homie and soul mate...so please don't slay me for abandoning and not loving this thing... He was strikingly lonely, but he did not want to let anybody into his own world. His father insisted on his going in for sports which could make him fit into the reality. However, Cobain made everything to quit sport though he was good at it. More so, in one of the interviews Cobain pointed out that he even pretended to be homosexual to make people leave him alone.

De alguna forma el libro me recuerda a la película Requiem for a Dream de Darren Aronofsky; esa no la ponía de chicos y al final la terminaron por convertir en una especie de amenaza, si tomas drogas, si te apartas del camino, si sueñas este será tu final) He makes his wants known by yelling loudly at first, then crying if the first technique doesn't work. Having grown up and considering myself a child of the 1990s, Nirvana was a staple my youth. With that came the legend and myth that was Kurt Cobain. We all knew he had taken his own life at young age, but not many of us truly knew much about the man. What was fact and what was fabrication. So that reason is why ‘Heavier Than Heaven’ had been on my radar for a while now. this book is almost equal parts fiction and Courtney Love approved versions of "actual events." it gives some information, but it should be taken with a grain of salt. there are TONS of proven historical errors. i don't blame the author for the misinformation, however, as he had to have everything cleared by Courtney Love. he did lose his credibility, though. i can't believe they used him on "busted circuits and ringing ears: the TAD story" dvd that came out a year ago.Cobain diaries to be made into film". TheGuardian.com. October 19, 2007 . Retrieved September 19, 2023. Buat yang ngaku fans berat Kurt Cobain (dan otomatis Nirvana juga -lu ga bisa nyebut Kurt Cobain tanpa Nirvana, dan sebaliknya), buku ini harus dibaca! Ambil sisi postifnya, buang jauh-jauh sisi negatifnya -yang banyak itu. Jadiin buku ini sebagai satu pelajaran: jangan pernah, JANGAN PERNAH sekali pun -bahkan untuk coba-coba- make narkoba! GA ADA gunanya sama sekali. The parts about the song writing/lyrics were very interesting and made me want to get out those Nirvana Cds and listen to them with the context given by the book. As anyone casually familiar with Cobain knows, he was constantly trying to strike a balance between his strong punk sense of morality and his desire to get his music out to a large audience. Deeper than just a creative marketing ploy, Cobain seemed genuinely torn between stardom and artistic integrity. This can be seen in the way it effected him in not only his professional life but his private life as well. Cobain seemed to always be a best friend or a bitter rival, with little in between. He hated being a junky but couldn't live without heroin. Furth, Charles. "A Review: Heavier Than Heaven - The Biography of Kurt Cobain". LiveNirvana.com. January 14, 2003.