So why is Nirvana’s With the Lights Out on this best 1,000 albums ever thing?
With the Lights Out was released in 2004, ten years after Kurt Cobain took his life.
Containing 61 tracks spanning three and a half hours, it’s a vast and even sprawling collection of Nirvana rarities, demos, B-sides, one-off singles, and other material that had not until that point been “officially released.”
Which naturally raises the question: why would this thing be classified as #23 of the best 1,000 albums ever?
To start with, I’ve taken an expansive rather than restrictive view of material that could be considered from this project. EPs, mashups, compilations, and so on are all collections of songs, so they all got thrown into the massive Earth-sized bin that I sifted through and cataloged over a five-year stretch.
But that doesn’t answer the question of why With the Lights Out made the Top 25.
Here’s the answer: there’s at least a full album’s worth of original songs within the 61 tracks that qualify as one of the greatest standalone albums ever produced. From my perspective, the fact that there are songs – like “Mrs. Butterworth,” pulled from a 1988 pre-Bleach era rehearsal, or a live cut of “Help Me, I’m Hungry” – that aren’t quite at that level don’t do very much to diminish the brilliant material.
Am I a Nirvana superfan? Clearly. Guilty as charged. Oh, the guilt, indeed.
Now let’s dig in.
With the Lights Out was released as a three-disc box set, with each disc roughly spanning a studio album – Bleach, Nevermind, In Utero – and an era in the band’s relatively brief run. While Disc 1 has some stunning stuff, such as a striking and slightly haunting acoustic version of “Clean Up Before She Comes,” it’s the latter two discs where the true gems lurk.
There was a period in the mid-2000s where I became full on obsessed with “Verse Chorus Verse.”
Maybe it says a little bit about me that I will spend time trying to figure out what “one song” is the perfect representation of a band. “So. Central Rain” versus “Losing My Religion” as finalists for R.E.M., perhaps? It’s a fun and obsessive little pop culture game.
“Verse Chorus Verse” often bubbles into the conversation for me with regard to the “one song” and Nirvana. It’s got a God Tier guitar hook for starters, and it’s catchy and immersive and mysterious and beautiful and miserably sad somehow all at once.
But you could say that for a goodly number of Nirvana tracks, which is what makes it my favorite band of all time if you catch me on the right day. “Verse Chorus Verse” also sits in that perfect mid-tempo rocker space that’s not “too loud” while being somehow explosive and somehow kind of wonderfully relentless at the same time.
Dave Grohl’s drumming on this track is out of control great. I particularly dig when the chorus launches, and we get what feels like a punk-meets-martial drumbeat. And within the relatively restrained sound production framework, it dazzles me every time I listen to it.
And then the chorus lands on these lyrics:
You’re the reason I feel pain
Feels so good to feel again
Who is Kurt Cobain as narrator of the song addressing? Courtney? The world? Himself? Is it something of a mission statement from Kurt Cobain? An ode to and warning label for his heroin addiction?
We’ll never know the answers, but the words pierce across decades and live on.
To bring things back to earth for a lighter moment: my wife and I lived in an apartment in a fantastic neighborhood in Pasadena, California after we got married. A cool shopping district was across the street on one side, and the gorgeous campus of Cal Tech was a few blocks away on the other.
I enjoyed jogging on grass in those days to protect my Achilles, and I’d find little fields within the campus where I could jog around the perimeter. I’m sure I looked plenty goofy to the students who cared to notice me, but then again they were all brainiacs with much weightier scientific and other academic concerns.
I mention this because there was one phase where I had an mp3 playlist that consisted of one single song that I’d play over and over again.
You guessed it: “Verse Chorus Verse.”
I hope this proves out my credentials when I talk about obsessions with pop culture.
Anyway, it’s magical that “Old Age” is the track that follows “Verse Chorus Verse” on With the Lights Out. It’s acoustic rock that’s driving and melodic and all the more powerful for it. If you want to pick out an incredible deep cut track from the band that most people these days have never listened to, you can do much worse than this one.
While it’s not included on With the Lights Out, I associate “Old Age” with the band’s cover of Terry Jacks’ “Seasons in the Sun.” The latter makes me ache in the best kind of way that music can touch you deeply.
I’m pretty sure I first caught the Nirvana version of “Seasons in the Sun” in the uneven and disturbing but nonetheless engaging Montage of Heck documentary. In any event, it’s worth watching it for the Brazil performance alone.
I like to think about the kind of music that Nirvana might have gone on to produce had Cobain somehow gotten clean and bested his demons. And it’s “Old Age” and “Seasons in the Sun” and the brilliance of the Unplugged album that come to mind.
But, as they say, who knows?
Okay, I’ll throw two more absolute gems into the same basket of dreams: “Marigold” and “Do Re Mi,” off Disc 3. Both are analog, subdued, gorgeous. The former was written and sung by Dave Grohl, who would go on to write and perform the brilliant Foo Fighters debut (#32 of best 1,000 albums ever) largely by himself.
In terms of the band’s more trademark aggressive sound, “Oh, the Guilt” is a fully functional battle station of caustic fury. It would have slotted in delightfully on Bleach, I’d wager, and if it had I’d wager it would rival “About A Girl” as the best song on that album.
“I Hate Myself and Want to Die,” which suffers under the burden of an off-putting song title and the fact that the first minute-plus of the track consists of guitar amp feedback – and then add in that it was originally released on the (really actually great) Beavis and Butt-Head Experience (#484) compilation album! – is nonetheless just one solid notch behind “Oh, the Guilt” in how intensely great it is.
And then “Even in His Youth” is equal parts raw and exceptional.
There are so many other songs floating around With the Lights Out that register as, “oh, that’s also arguably one of the best rock songs ever produced.” “Sappy,” originally released on the (also really actually tremendously great) No Alternative (#110) compilation album, absolutely qualifies here. The sound production on this one is just divine: warm, analog, fuzzed up, but with Kurt’s tortured, magnetic voice perfectly framed.
And I’d be remiss if I didn’t tuck in a mention for the gorgeous and fun cover of The Velvet Underground’s “Here She Comes Now,” which also showcases how wide and eclectic the band’s influences were.
I’ll end on “They Hung Him On A Cross,” which Wikipedia describes as based on an “American Negro Spiritual folk song” that’s also known as “He Never Said a Mumblin’ Word.” Lead Belly also recorded this song, which is how I imagine it got on Cobain’s radar.
The Nirvana version is a demo, and it sounds like it’s just Kurt and an acoustic guitar. Even in early version/demo mode, Kurt Cobain’s instincts for melody and performance are otherworldly.
Much like Frank Black on the acoustic half of Frank Black Francis (#89), the showcase of these musicians largely known for performing loud punk and alternative rock material in a quiet singer-songwriter setting delights me endlessly.
And likewise I hope I’ve proved out my thesis about the bounty of musical goodness that Nirvana serves up across this wide-ranging box set, making it worthy as one of the very best of the best 1,000 albums ever.
Some stats & info about Nirvana – With the Lights Out
- What kind of musical stylings does this album represent? Rock Music, Indie Rock, Punk Rock, Grunge, Alternative Rock, Seattle Bands
- Rolling Stone’s greatest 500 albums ranking – not ranked!
- All Music’s rating – 4 out of 5 stars
- When was With the Lights Out released? 2004
- My ranking, the one you’re reading right now – #23 out of 1,000
Nirvana’s With the Lights Out on Spotify
A lyrical snippet from Nirvana’s With the Lights Out that’s evocative of the album in some way, maybe
One more day to complain my servant. One more doubt here to find a servant.
What does the “best 1,000 albums ever” mean and why are you doing this?
Yeah, I know it’s audacious, a little crazy (okay, maybe a lot cray cray), bordering on criminal nerdery.
But here’s what it’s NOT: a definitive list of the Greatest Albums of All-Time. This is 100% my own personal super biased, incredibly subjective review of what my top 1,000 albums are, ranked in painstaking order over the course of doing research for nearly a year, Rob from High Fidelity style. Find out more about why I embarked on a best 1,000 albums ever project.