Editing Kurt Cobain (section)

== Artistry ==
[[File:Kurt Cobain, Smells Like Teen Spirit guitar, EMP Museum.jpg|thumb|upright|The Lake Placid Blue [[Fender Mustang]] played by Cobain during the filming of the video for "[[Smells Like Teen Spirit]]", shown at the [[Museum of Pop Culture]] in Seattle]]
According to Grohl, Cobain believed that music comes first and lyrics second; he focused primarily on the melodies.<ref name=classicalbums>{{cite AV media |title=Classic Albums—Nirvana: Nevermind|medium=DVD |publisher=Isis Productions|date=2004|quote=Kurt used to say that music comes first and lyrics comes second, and I think Kurt's main focus was melody}}</ref> He complained when fans and rock journalists attempted to decipher his singing and extract meaning from his lyrics, writing: "Why in the hell do journalists insist on coming up with a second-rate [[Sigmund Freud|Freudian]] evaluation of my lyrics, when 90 percent of the time they've transcribed them incorrectly?"<ref name="cross-2001" />{{rp|182}} Though Cobain insisted on the subjectivity and unimportance of his lyrics, he labored and procrastinated in writing them, often changing the content and order of lyrics during performances.<ref name="cross-2001" />{{rp|177}} Cobain would describe his own lyrics as "a big pile of contradictions. They're split down the middle between very sincere opinions that I have and sarcastic opinions and feelings that I have and sarcastic and hopeful, humorous rebuttals toward cliché [[Bohemianism|bohemian]] ideals that have been exhausted for years."<ref>''Sliver: The Best of the Box'' album booklet.</ref>

Cobain originally wanted ''Nevermind'' to be divided into two sides: a "Boy" side, for the songs written about the experiences of his early life and childhood, and a "Girl" side, for the songs written about his dysfunctional relationship with Vail.<ref name="cross-2001" />{{rp|177}} [[Charles R. Cross]] wrote, "In the four months following their break-up, Kurt would write a half dozen of his most memorable songs, all of them about Tobi Vail." Though Cobain wrote "Lithium" before meeting Vail, he wrote the lyrics to reference her.<ref name="cross-2001" />{{rp|168–169}} Cobain said in an interview with ''[[Musician (magazine)|Musician]]'' that he wrote about "some of my very personal experiences, like breaking up with girlfriends and having bad relationships, feeling that death void that the person in the song is feeling. Very lonely, sick."<ref>Morris, Chris. "The Year's Hottest Band Can't Stand Still". ''Musician'', January 1992.</ref> While Cobain regarded ''In Utero'' as "for the most part very impersonal",<ref>Savage, Jon. "Sounds Dirty: The Truth About Nirvana". ''The Observer''. August 15, 1993.</ref> its lyrics deal with his parents' divorce, his newfound fame and the public image and perception of himself and [[Courtney Love]] on "Serve the Servants", with his enamored relationship with Love conveyed through lyrical themes of pregnancy and the female anatomy on "[[Heart-Shaped Box]]."
[[File:Fender Jaguar II.jpg|thumb|upright|Cobain's model of Fender Jaguar|alt=]]
Cobain was affected enough to write "[[Polly (Nirvana song)|Polly]]" from ''Nevermind'' after reading a newspaper story of an incident in 1987, when a 14-year-old girl was kidnapped after attending a punk rock show, then raped and tortured with a [[Blow torch|blowtorch]]. She escaped after gaining the trust of her captor [[Gerald Friend]] through flirting with him.<ref name="cross-2001" />{{rp|136}} After seeing Nirvana perform, [[Bob Dylan]] cited "Polly" as the best of Nirvana's songs, and said of Cobain, "the kid has heart".<ref name="cross-2001" />{{rp|137}} [[Patrick Süskind]]'s novel ''[[Perfume (novel)|Perfume: The Story of a Murderer]]'' inspired Cobain to write the song "[[Scentless Apprentice]]" from ''[[In Utero]]''. The book is a historical horror novel about a [[perfumer]]'s apprentice born with no body odor of his own but with a highly developed sense of smell, and who attempts to create the "ultimate perfume" by killing virginal women and taking their scent.<ref>Gaar 2006, pp. 42–43</ref>

Cobain immersed himself in artistic projects throughout his life, as much so as he did in songwriting. The sentiments of his artwork followed the same subjects of his lyrics, often expressed through a dark and macabre sense of humor. Noted were his fascination with [[physiology]], his own rare medical conditions, and the human anatomy. According to Novoselic, "Kurt said that he never liked literal things. He liked cryptic things. He would cut out pictures of meat from grocery-store fliers, then paste these orchids on them ... And all this stuff on [''In Utero''] about the body—there was something about anatomy. He really liked that. You look at his art—there are these people, and they're all weird, like mutants. And dolls—creepy dolls."<ref>{{Cite magazine|url=https://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/krist-novoselic-on-kurts-writing-process-and-the-in-utero-aesthetic-20131003|title=Krist Novoselic on Kurt Cobain's Writing Process|magazine=Rolling Stone|access-date=June 4, 2018|archive-date=June 14, 2018|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180614021242/https://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/krist-novoselic-on-kurts-writing-process-and-the-in-utero-aesthetic-20131003|url-status=live}}</ref>

Cobain contributed backing guitar for a [[spoken word]] recording of beat poet [[William S. Burroughs]]' entitled ''[[The "Priest" They Called Him]]''.<ref name="cross-2001" />{{rp|301}} Cobain regarded Burroughs as a hero. During Nirvana's European tour Cobain kept a copy of Burroughs' ''[[Naked Lunch]]'', purchased from a London bookstall.<ref name="cross-2001" />{{rp|189–190}} Cobain met with Burroughs at his home in Lawrence, Kansas in October 1993. Burroughs expressed no surprise at Cobain's death: "It wasn't an act of will for Kurt to kill himself. As far as I was concerned, he was dead already."<ref>{{cite book|last1=Miles|first1=Barry|author-link1=Barry Miles|date=2015|title=William S. Burroughs: A Life|publisher=Weidenfeld & Nicolson|isbn=978-1-7802-2120-5|pages=621}}</ref>