In the late 1980s and early 1990s, an unusually gritty guitar sound, now known to us as grunge, made its way into mainstream radio. The genre rested on sludgy strums, thrashing drums, and lyrical themes just as heavy as the instrumentation that accompanied them. Against the odds, it resonated with the masses, providing teenagers with a new, exciting sound to blast through their headphones. At the centre of it all was a Washington-born band called Nirvana.
Led by a new kind of frontman in Kurt Cobain, Nirvana forged a sound that was just as dreary as it was catchy. On future genre classics like ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit’ and ‘Come As You Are’, they buried memorable melodies under distortion and dismal lyrics, finding the perfect balance between the alternative scene they had spawned from and their growing universal appeal.
However, as the band gained popularity, their frontman began to struggle with the attention. Cobain was grappling with mental health issues and an addiction to heroin behind the scenes. In 1994, less than a year after the release of In Utero, the singer committed suicide. His death would mark the end of Nirvana.
At the time of Cobain’s passing, the band were out on the road promoting In Utero. The tour had kicked off in New York City in the autumn of 1993 and was scheduled to conclude in Dublin in the spring of 1994. However, the band’s disastrous show at a venue called Terminal One in Munich, Germany, which took place on March 1st, would, unknowingly, be their last.
True to the legacy they had amassed, the band afforded audiences a raucous final show despite the technical difficulties that plagued the show. They kicked things off with a cover of a new wave classic, ‘My Best Friend’s Girl’ by The Cars. The original tune is far bouncier and brighter than anything in Nirvana’s catalogue, but Cobain’s vocals and the band’s grungey guitar tones afforded the track a new edge.
The opening tune wasn’t the only cover in Nirvana’s set. They also performed their take on the titular track from David Bowie’s 1970 record, The Man Who Sold The World, as the opening track to their five-song encore. The rest of the setlist, perhaps expectedly, included a number of songs from their most recent album, including ‘Dumb’, ‘All Apologies’, and ‘Pennyroyal Tea’.
However, the setlist wasn’t limited to tracks from In Utero. The band also performed some of their most well-loved earlier offerings, including ‘About a Girl’ from Bleach and ‘Lithium’ from Nevermind. Their biggest hit, ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit’, was notably absent from the setlist. As the song gathered in momentum, Cobain grew tired of it, and even became too embarrassed to play it, so it’s no surprise that the band chose to exempt it from their live set, says https://faroutmagazine.co.uk/
After playing a mix of covers, big hitters, and tracks from the new album, Nirvana closed the set with the lead single from In Utero, ‘Heart-Shaped Box’. The band were scheduled to return to Terminal One the next night, but the tour was cancelled when Cobain fell ill. Just over a month later, he was dead, and the band’s Munich gig marked their final show.
Nirvana’s final setlist with Kurt Cobain:
- ‘My Best Friend’s Girl’
- ‘Radio Friendly Unit Shifter’
- ‘Drain You’
- ‘Breed’
- ‘Serve the Servants’
- ‘Come As You Are’
- ‘Sliver’
- ‘Dumb’
- ‘In Bloom’
- ‘About a Girl’
- ‘Lithium’
- ‘Pennyroyal Tea’
- ‘School’
- ‘Polly’
- ‘Very Ape’
- ‘Lounge Act’
- ‘Rape Me’
- ‘Territorial Pissings’
- ‘The Man Who Sold the World’ (encore)
- ‘All Apologies’ (encore)
- ‘On a Plain’ (encore)
- ‘Blew’ (encore)
- ‘Heart-Shaped Box’ (encore)
