Letters To Kurt by Eric Erlandson

By Emily Carney

Whether you liked Nirvana or not, if you grew up in the 1990s, your cultural map was dotted with the band’s landmark accomplishments. I vividly remember the debut of Nevermind in 1991, the Sassy magazine with Kurtney on the cover (Kurt Cobain had pink hair and he and Courtney Love both looked like elegant street urchins), the band’s MTV Unplugged, Kurt’s first horrifying suicide attempt in Rome (my best friend told me about it the morning it happened at the bus stop—we had just turned 16), and the world premiere of Hole’s “Miss World” video about a week later.

Then April 8, 1994 swung by. Along with it, the awful news of Kurt Cobain’s suicide by gun. My best friend again called my house after school and told me authorities thought they’d found Kurt’s body in his house. Of course, that nomenclature is never good. Even though I was not a super-fan, I was genuinely saddened by the awful manner of Kurt’s demise. The grief was only exacerbated two months later by the overdose death of Hole’s bassist, the beautiful, gifted Kristen Pfaff. It felt, genuinely, like all of my era’s talents were being plucked off, one by one.
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Best Of 2011: Emily Carney

Saint Winehouse
© 2010 Vicki Berndt

1. New Albums by Robyn, The Black Keys, Amy Winehouse, and Charlotte Gainsbourg

This past year boasted many new releases by some of my favorite all-time artists. Technically, Robyn’s Body Talk trilogy came out in 2010, but her career blew up stateside this year, culminating in her appearance on Saturday Night Live in December.
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Destroy All Movies!!! The Complete Guide To Punks On Film

By Less Lee Moore

Any marginalized subculture bristles at being misinterpreted on film. Then again, the punk subculture is by now so fragmented and unrecognizable, one hesitates to even attempt to define it, much less depict it on the screen.

Yet best friends Zack Carlson and Bryan Connolly spent five years documenting each and every appearance of punks on film. They were inspired to undertake this monumental task after re-watching Penelope Spheeris’s quasi documentary Suburbia and then shortly thereafter, seeing Joysticks, a video arcade comedy from 1983, for the first time.
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“And Then It All Went Wrong”—VH1’s Behind The Music

By Emily Carney

Finally, the Rock Gods have heard my prayers, and they are bestowing unto us an episode of VH1’s infamous rockumentary series Behind the Music on. . . the Rock Widow of the Ages herself, Courtney Love.

This show will debut on June 21, and previews have shown it to be, well. . . interesting. At two hours length, I am curious if it will fill the void left from the 2006 Return of Courtney Love documentary from the UK’s Channel 4; will it address her musical output instead of her many tabloid travails over the last decade?
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1991: The Year Punk Broke Screens At Hot Docs

By Less Lee Moore

The title of this film—which documented the 1991 European club festival tour of Sonic Youth, a pre-world-famous Nirvana, and other bands—was intended as an ironic comment on the music industry. Although the film came out in 1992 and it was released on VHS shortly thereafter, it is still not available on DVD. How is this possible?

“It’s not on DVD because the rock & roll industry is full of shit,” quips filmmaker David Markey. “There I said it. Also, I totally blame Lady Gaga and her fans,” he adds sarcastically. In fact, Markey prepared a “deluxe” DVD package in 2004, including bonus live performances by Sonic Youth and Nirvana, audio commentary by Markey and Sonic Youth’s Thurston Moore, and a 2003 panel discussion of the film at the Arclight in Hollywood with Markey, Moore, and others.
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Torch Songs for the Heroin(e): Hole, Nobody’s Daughter

By Emily Carney

“You don’t understand how damaged we really are.” This is a lyric from the opening track of the “new” Hole album, Nobody’s Daughter, which seems like it has been 1,000 years or so in the making. (Well, it certainly has been feted by Courtney Love for the last five years or so). This is the “comeback” album, the one that has weathered all the setbacks, like drug issues, family problems, bad hair weaves, and ill-advised plastic surgeries.
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An Open Apology to Courtney Love

By Emily Carney

In a recent issue of Popshifter, I wrote an excoriating article about Courtney Love, (Way Past Almost Golden: Courtney Love In The 2000s ) in which touched upon her most recent problems with drug addiction. I am writing this to apologize to Ms. Love (even though I doubt she will ever read this or anything else I commit to writing).
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Way Past Almost Golden: Courtney Love In The 2000s

By Emily Carney

It’s late 2009, and the endless enigma of the singer and musician we know as Courtney Love has still not spawned a new album or a record deal. The general populace has now come to view Courtney Love as the rock version of Anna Nicole Smith. She has been regularly photographed by paparazzi looking like an anorexic, drugged out mess. In one recent video from TMZ she ranted on for a few minutes about things that made no sense, and syringes were seen in her handbag (I seriously doubt she has any form of diabetes).
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Great Expirations: Top Five Deaths Under Suspicious (Or Nefarious) Circumstances

By Emily Carney

5. Jimi Hendrix: Rock star

Manner of death: Victimized by his own vomit

On September 18, 1970, Jimi Hendrix joined the Great Rock Supergroup in the Sky when he died at age 27. It was initially assumed he probably died of a drug overdose, since he was a casual abuser of drugs; suicide was even bandied about as the probable cause of his death. However, the doctor who attended to him at the death scene concluded he had died because his lungs had filled with red wine vomit.
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Top Five Music Scandals Which Never Actually Happened

By Emily Carney

Author’s note: This piece is almost entirely fictionalized. Enjoy.

5. Midge Ure’s Backstage Throwdown With Bob Geldof, 1985

In the 1980s Midge Ure was best known as the lead singer of mope rockers Ultravox, while Bob Geldof was best known as the husband of Paula Yates and a guy who really, really liked money. He also did some philanthropist work. In 1985, both men mobilized their talents for the massive rock concert known as Live Aid.
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