Nirvana In Utero CD

Nirvana: Kurt Cobain (vocals, guitar); Kris Novoselic (bass); Dave Grohl (drums).
Additional personnel: Kera Schaley (cello).
IN UTERO was nominated for a 1994 Grammy Award for Best Alternative Music Album.
"All Apologies" was nominated for 1995 Grammy Awards for Best Rock Performance By A Duo Or Group With Vocal and for Best Rock Song.
Nirvana: Kurt Cobain (vocals, guitar); Dave Grohl (vocals, drums); Krist Novoselic (bass).
Includes liner notes by David Fricke.
All tracks have been digitally remastered.
Personnel: Kurt Cobain (vocals, guitar); Kera Schaley (cello); Dave Grohl (drums).
Audio Mixer: Scott Litt.
Illustrator: Alex Grey.
Photographers: Michael Lavine; Neil Wallace; Charles Peterson ; Karen Mason; Kurt Cobain; Robert Fisher.
The long-awaited single-disc anthology of Nirvana's work, simply titled Nirvana, has all the hits and many of the radio favorites, plus the very good previously unreleased final recording, "You Know You're Right." ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine
Ignore the legal wrangling, bad blood, feuds, even Kurt Cobain's suicide, behind the release of this long-awaited single-disc anthology of Nirvana's work, simply titled Nirvana, and focus on one simple thing: does it do its job well? Does it capture the essence of the most influential band of the '90s, the most storied band since the Beatles? Does it have all their best songs on one disc? The answer: kinda. The inherent problem with the disc is that it's difficult to compile Nirvana's best material by any chart-based yardstick, the way that the Beatles 1 -- Cobain's widow made no bones about the fact that she wanted this collection patterned after that hit, and to be as successful a catalog item -- did, since they didn't have that many singles, nor did their career need to be condensed like the Rolling Stones' Forty Licks since they only recorded for five years. Nirvana's best tracks -- not necessarily the same thing as Cobain's best songs, although they frequently overlapped -- were buried on album tracks, B-sides, stray singles, so there's no good criteria for why, say, "Dumb" makes the cut and "Aneurysm" doesn't. Even more problematic, Nirvana's three proper albums, along with the rarities compilation Incesticide and the acoustic MTV Unplugged, all have different personalities and sonic characteristics that don't necessarily fit well together, whether it's the gleaming Nevermind, the ragged indie pop band on Incesticide, or the stark despair of In Utero. So, what you wind up with is a record that has all the hits and many of the radio favorites, plus the very good previously unreleased final recording, "You Know You're Right," in a collection that is less than the sum of its parts. At 50 minutes, it's all too easy to concentrate on what's missing: "Something in the Way," "Polly," "Serve the Servants," "Verse Chorus Verse," "Dive," "Negative Creep," "Love Buzz," "Territorial Pissings," "Drain You," "School," "Lake of Fire," "Where Did You Sleep Last Night?," and, most egregiously, the aforementioned "Aneurysm" are all prime candidates to fill out the remainder of the disc. Not all could have fit, but the presence of a few more tracks, along with placing "You Know You're Right" at the end where it belongs, would have made this collection not just stronger, but possibly definitive. As it stands, it feels like a bit of a cheap compromise and a wasted opportunity. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine
Nirvana probably hired Steve Albini to produce In Utero with the hopes of creating their own Surfer Rosa, or at least shoring up their indie cred after becoming a pop phenomenon with a glossy punk record. In Utero, of course, turned out to be their last record, and it's hard not to hear it as Kurt Cobain's suicide note, since Albini's stark, uncompromising sound provides the perfect setting for Cobain's bleak, even nihilistic, lyrics. Even if the album wasn't a literal suicide note, it was certainly a conscious attempt to shed their audRolling Stone (5/13/99, p.53) - Included in Rolling Stone's "Essential Recordings of the 90's."
Rolling Stone (9/16/93, p.63) - 4 1/2 Stars - Outstanding - "...Cobain essentially works according to one playbook, but it's a winner no matter how he runs it....IN UTERO is a lot of things--brilliant, corrosive, enraged and thoughtful, most of them all at once..."
Spin (5/01, p.109) - Ranked #13 in Spin's "50 Most Essential Punk Records".
Spin (9/99, p.126) - Ranked #18 in Spin Magazine's "90 Greatest Albums of the '90s."
Spin (10/93, p.99) - "...IN UTERO is as reckless as anything since Rocket From the Tombs went down in flames....it's not liberation but its absence that gets illuminated in Nirvana's songs....setting out to make the last punk album, [IN UTERO] sounds like the first one instead..."
Entertainment Weekly (12/31/93, p.115) - Ranked #5 in Entertainment Weekly's list of `The Best & Worst Records Of 1993' - "...In unleashed wails that truly sound like someone giving birth, Cobain does more than wrestle his demons in public--he strangles them...."
Entertainment Weekly (9/24/93, p.90) - "...IN UTERO makes it clear that the trio now has a signature sound ready for the patent office....Cobain writes terrifically punchy songs and [the band] ravages them into beautiful, brutalizing clatter..." - Rating: B+
Q (7/01, p.90) - Included in Q's "50 Heaviest Albums of All Time".
Q (10/01, p.73) - Ranked #20 in Q's "Best 50 Albums of Q's Lifetime"
Q (12/99, p.76) - Included in Q Magazine's "90 Best Albums Of The 1990s."
Q (1/94, p.82) - Included in Q's list of `The 50 Best Albums Of 1993' - "...a mature, progressive, marvelous new record..."
Q (10/93, p.114) - 4 Stars - Excellent - "...[IN UTERO's] songs confirm Cobain's genius with a tune....If this is how Cobain is going to develop, the future is lighthouse-bright..."
Melody Maker (1/1/94, p.77) - Ranked #26 in Melody Maker's list of the `Albums Of The Year' for 1993.
Melody Maker (9/4/93, p.31) - "...the history of the last two fraught years weighs mighty heavily upon IN UTERO....it occupies a middle ground between the metal-edged, scum-punk spite of BLEACH and the 10-million selling, grunge-with-gloss killer that was NEVERMIND..."
Musician (10/93, p.88) - "...IN UTERO is a living, breathing, crapping beast of a record that eats expectations for breakfast..."
Village Voice (3/94, p.5) - Ranked #2 in the Village Voice's 1993 Pazz & Jop Critics Poll.
Mojo (Publisher) (p.66) - Ranked #13 in Mojo's "100 Modern Classics" -- "[U]ncompromising, uncomfortable, exhilarating art."
Mojo (Publisher) (3/03, p.76) - Ranked #40 in Mojo's "Top 50 Punk Albums" - "...Cobain's voice is frightening, like Rotten 17 years on..."
New York Times (Publisher) (9/19/93) - "...IN UTERO nearly topples under the weight of contempt and vitriol....there is a clear authorial voice on [the album] detailing a life in transition....Mr. Cobain [has been] turned nearly nihilistic by good fortune..."
NME (Magazine) (8/12/00, p.28) - Ranked #4 in The NME "Top 30 Heartbreak Albums".
NME (Magazine) (12/25/93, p.67) - Ranked #30 in New Musical Express' list of `The Top 50 LPs Of 1993' - "...this attempt to re-invent the Seattle-ites as an unknown, low-fi punk group was doomed--Kurt Cobain's sense of melody was just too strong to be drowned in dissonance and noise...."
NME (Magazine) (9/4/93, p.31) - "...IN UTERO is a profoundly confused record...neither totally a self-destructive squall of hardcore nihilism...nor NEVERMIND II....As a document of a mind in flux, Kurt should be proud of it..."