Random People Responded To Kurt Cobain's Death (13 items)

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  (#1) Courtney Love Said She Wished She'd Been There

  Cobain's wife, Courtney Love, was incredibly emotional at a memorial service held for the singer. She read out his note and said:

  I'm laying in our bed, and I'm really sorry. And I feel the same way you do. I'm really sorry you guys. I don't know what I could have done. I wish I'd been here. I wish I hadn't listened to other people, but I did... Just tell him he's a f*cker, OK? Just say 'f*cker." "You're a f*cker." And that you love him.
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  (#2) Dave Grohl

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  The Nirvana drummer and close friend of Cobain explained his emotions upon hearing the news, saying:

  [It was] probably the worst thing that has happened to me in my life. I remember the day after that I woke up and I was heartbroken that he was gone. I just felt like, "Okay, so I get to wake up today and have another day and he doesn't.”

  Grohl also explained how the loss made him feel emotionless:

  When Kurt died I was lost. I was numb. The music I had devoted my life to had now betrayed me. I had no voice. I turned off the radio. I put away my drums. I couldn't bear to hear someone else's voice singing about pain, or joy.
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  (#3) Krist Novoselic

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  Krist Novoselic was Cobain's bandmate in Nirvana and longtime friend. He explained his feelings following the loss years later, saying:

  I used to be so cynical. But more than anything, Kurt’s death changed that. I still can’t make sense about what happened and I was truly shocked... I went to the funeral home to say goodbye and it was hard to see him like that. They fixed him okay, but you could see his head was busted up. They folded a kerchief over his eyes and forehead. I held his hand and it was so cold. I left feeling really bad...

  I got home and thought I was going crazy. Even after like 20 times at the sink, I couldn’t wash that cold off my hands. I called Dave and he said I wasn’t going crazy and that it was shock I was experiencing. That realization made me feel a little better. I crawled to bed dazed.
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  (#4) His Mother, Wendy O’Connor, Was Completely Devastated

  Wendy O’Connor was Cobain's mother, and only spoke to the media a few times. Through tears, she told journalists, "I'll never hold him again. I don't know what to do. I don't know where to go."
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  (#5) Michael Stipe

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  Michael Stipe of R.E.M. was a friend and contemporary of Cobain. He had also worked with him on a music project that never came to fruition. Stipe said:

  In the last few weeks I was talking to Kurt a lot. We had a musical project in the works, but nothing was recorded. He loved Courtney and Frances Bean, and he loved Krist and Dave and Nirvana. He really loved those guys. His death was a profound loss, and I just don't think I can say anything else right now.
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  (#6) Buzz Osborne Felt Partly Responsible

  Buzz Osborne helped start the grunge movement as the leader of the Melvins. He was an influence on Cobain, which is why he feels some responsibility for what happened. He explained:

  It’s very difficult to think about Nirvana without it being a very tragic memory for me. If I helped create what was going on with all that stuff - Nirvana getting involved in those sort of things - I also helped create his death. That is not something I take lightly. I would much rather have him unsuccessful and alive.
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  (#7) Mark Lanegan

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  Mark Lanegan, the lead singer from the alternative rock band Screaming Trees, never realized Cobain was depressed, stating, "I never knew [Cobain] to be suicidal. I just knew he was going through a tough time."
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  (#8) Anthony Kiedis

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  Anthony Kiedis, lead singer of the Red Hot Chili Peppers, felt a profound sense of loss when he heard the news. Writing in his autobiography, he said:

  One day we were working and got a call from Lindy, who informed us that Kurt Cobain had killed himself. The news sucked the air out of the entire house, I didn't feel like I felt when Hillel died; it was more like "The world just suffered a great loss."

  Kurt's death was unexpected... It was an emotional blow, and we all felt it. I don't know why everyone on Earth felt so close to that guy; he was beloved and endearing and inoffensive in some weird way. For all of his screaming and all of his darkness, he was just lovable.
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  (#9) Eddie Vedder

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  Eddie Vedder was a member of the band Pearl Jam, and had spoken to Cobain over the years as they toured. Speaking a few years after the loss, he said:

  It's so difficult to really believe he's gone. I still talk about him like he's still here, you know. I can't figure it out. It doesn't make any sense...

  One time, he told me flat-out, just delivered me a whole paragraph on the respect he had for what I did, and he realized it was pure. This was at the MTV Awards. "Tears in Heaven" was playing in the background, we were slow dancing. I remember going out surfing the next morning and remembering how good that moment felt and thinking, "F*ck, man, if only we hadn't been so afraid of each other..." Because we were going though so much of the same sh*t. If only we'd talked, maybe we could have helped each other.
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  (#10) Greg Sage

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  Greg Sage is a songwriter and musician who was something of an idol to Cobain. He had spoken to him shortly before his passing and shared his thoughts:

  Well, I can't really speculate other than what he said to me, which was, he wasn't at all happy about it, success to him seemed like, I think, a brick wall. There was nowhere else to go but down, it was too artificial for him, and he wasn't an artificial person at all...

  Actually, two weeks after he died, he was supposed to come here and he wanted to record a bunch of Leadbelly covers.
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  (#11) Lars Ulrich

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  Lars Ulrich of Metallica felt Cobain was a new type of performer who fans genuinely felt connected to. He stated:

  In 1991 there was a kind of shift in rock music in America - it was shifting away from all the hair bands in LA. And with Kurt Cobain you felt you were connecting to the real person, not to a perception of who he was - you were not connecting to an image or a manufactured cut-out. You felt that between you and him there was nothing - it was heart-to-heart. There are very few people who have that ability...

  As I said, I never met Kurt, and he's probably the only guy in rock 'n' roll that I have never met that I really wanted to - other than Bon Scott maybe. What a sad thing we can't hear the fourth Nirvana album. It would have been so great to be able to see how that would have evolved.
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  (#12) David Bowie

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  During the MTV Unplugged performance, Nirvana covered David Bowie’s song "The Man Who Sold the World." The legendary musician later remembered him, saying:

  I was simply blown away when I found out that Kurt Cobain liked my work, and I always wanted to talk to him about his reasons for covering "Man Who Sold the World." It was a good, straightforward rendition and sounded somehow very honest. It would have been nice to have worked with him, but just talking would have been real cool.
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  (#13) Leonard Cohen

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  Leonard Cohen was something of a hero of Cobain's. Cohen later expressed regret for not reaching out to him:

  I'm sorry I couldn't have spoken to the young man. I see a lot of people at the Zen Centre, who have gone through drugs and found a way out that is not just Sunday school. There are always alternatives, and I might have been able to lay something on him.

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