Project 3: The Death of Kurt Cobain
For my third project, I did research on Kurt Cobain's tragic suicide and the events and aspects that lead up to it.
English
For the English aspect of my project, I read and annotated Kurt Cobain's published book called "Journals". I gave my views and opinions about certain lines and statements that he made in his journals that I thought were relevant.
- “One night last month, Chris and I dropped acid and we were watching the late show (rip off of Johnny Carson) and Paul Revere and the Raiders were on there, they were so f****** stupid!” I noticed that Kurt seemed to always be doing drugs while he was writing. He talks about his opinion on the certain people that were on the Late Show, he talks about how he hated how the Raiders, and Paul Revere were acting, so he destroyed every album of theirs that Chris owned. I feel as if he was dropping acid in order to stop feeling things, so he became numb to everything. I think that is the reason he started doing drugs in the first place; to feel numb.
- “The Late 1980s” “This is a subliminal example of a society that has sucked and f***** itself into a rehashing value of greed.” In this statement Kurt wrote, I feel as if society has not changed much yet, we are still greedy and privileged to a point of no return. The world is not as accepting and equal as we want it to be. There is still hate, violence, and bias.
- There is a letter to Dave Grohl that takes up three pages, basically explaining that he needs to choose if he wants to drum in the band or not. One of the pages in the letter explains how they are sorry that they are ready to replace him, and that they are too cowardly to kick him out to his face. Although, they never went through with kicking him out. “You’re a great drummer, and we hope you pursue another band very soon. We expect you to be totally pissed off and hate our guts and we don’t blame you, because this is very sudden and we have not tried to warn you that this was happening.”
- “In this particular state of mind I forget to think and it becomes strictly observatory. I notice things very sensitively like if I focus really hard I can see really small transparent blotches of debris on the outer shell of my eyes.” While I was reading this paragraph, I actually can relate to this kind of state of mind. This state of mind tends to be quite observant while one is spaced out. I, for one am almost always spaced out. I could relate to his observations because I also do the same things; I notice the small blotches of debris on the shell of my eyes and my mind wonders.
- “On a Saturday night I got high and drunk and walked down to the train tracks and laid down and waited for the 11:00 train and put 2 big pieces of cement on my chest and legs and the train came closer and closer. And it went on the next track beside me instead of over me.” This story about Kurt’s high school experience makes me think about each person’s story. Everyone has a different background. Kurt’s background was very rough and overall bad. He had a mentally abusive home, and he didn’t have any friends because he hated everyone. I feel that the train was a sign that he was meant to stay alive, because God had a plan for him. After this experience, his depression had gotten better, and he started to get his life back on track.
- “My lyrics are a big pile of contradictions. They’re split down the middle between very sincere opinions and feelings that I have and sarcastic and hopefully - humorous rebuttals towards cliche- bohemian ideals that have been exhausted for years.” I absolutely love these sentences because it is nothing fake. It it Kurt’s raw personality, untouched, and true. He wasn’t afraid to express his opinions about certain topics because he didn’t care what anyone thought about him, and I think that was extremely brave. I, myself am so scared of being judged for who I truly am and I wish I could change this about my personality.
- “Rock Trivia. God I’m so sick of Rock Trivia, big deal it’s like what am I going to do when I’m old and I know everything about Rock ‘n’ Roll by the time I’m 19? God only knows there’s no facts to be learned about all these worthless rip off nostalgic bands of the 80s. Oh yeah, I decided to eventually become an H addict and slowly decay in the streets of Idaho or some middle of the road state like that.” I think this paragraph was extremely ironic, because he was joking about becoming a Heroin addict, and about Rock ‘n’ Roll trivia. This is ironic because Kurt became one of the most infamous rock stars in history. Along with his music, his suicide and Heroin addiction also went down in history as one of the most tragic celebrity deaths.
- “Dumb” “ I’m not like them- but I can pretend
the day is done- but I’m having fun
I think I’m dumb- or maybe just happy” The song lyrics for a song called “Dumb” gave me an insight of how Kurt felt about himself. He thought that he wasn’t smart, that he wasn’t normal, and that he was just dumb. This song gives a good perspective into Kurt’s mind and mental state. He wrote these lyrics because he wrote about real problems with sincerity, but he also liked to have fun with it. So he tried to mix them both together.
- This entire page- to me- is so important. He talks about the importance of the arts and how society destroys any meaning or ability behind the arts. Especially for punk rock music.
- In this page, Kurt talks about bias thoughts. He mentions that he didn’t ever really listen to news, because it would give him biased thoughts - or as he called it “jaded attitude.” I for one believe this is how we should all act, but unfortunately there are people who enjoy categorizing and rationalizing others based off of appearance or rumors.
- “Punk is musical freedom. It’s saying, doing, and playing what you want. Nirvana means freedom from pain and suffering in the external world and that’s close to my definition of punk rock.” There are several definitions of punk to certain people. The genre of punk to me is almost armor. It helps me get through the good and the bad days. Music to me is like a shield that protects me from the problems of the world. It may not be temporary, but it sure will help me get through the problem. Kurt felt the same way about punk music. I believe that is why he called the band ‘Nirvana’ anyways.
- “It’s hard to decipher the difference between a sincere entertainer and an honest swindler.”
- “I’m really bored with everyone’s concerned advice like: “Man you really have a good thing going your band is great. You write great songs, but hey man you should get your personal s*** together. Don’t freak out and get healthy.” Gee I wish it was as easy as that but, honestly I didn’t want all of their attention but I’m not freaked out which is something a lot of people would like to see. It’s an entertaining thought to watch a rock figure self destruct, but I’m sorry friends I’ll have to decline.” It’s almost as if Kurt didn’t enjoy the attention he got, considering that his rise to fame occurred rapidly. Maybe his drug abuse reflected on his anxiety issues or nerves and drugs were his rock, instead of a person.
- Kurt mentions that he started to use heroin daily to help soothe the pain in his very weak stomach. This information relates to most of his drug addiction because he was trying to relieve the pain.
- Kurt’s life seemed to be going better, now that he was clean on heroin and since he had Frances. He loved Frances more than anything in the world. He was willing to leave Courtney if it meant that Frances was happy and safe.
Social Studies
For the Social Studies aspect of my project, I made another mind map that showed the events leading up to his death, and the events that occurred after his death. I also color coordinated the different aspects that I believed were the main causes of his suicide.
Art
For the artistic aspect of my project, I created a painting based off of one of Kurt's most iconic photographs. In the black and white photograph, Kurt is smoking a cigarette. Using my reasoning thinking skill, I decided to paint the smoke in the color blue, which represents how the drugs were one of the biggest contributor to his death.