Unplugged in New York was released shortly after Kurt Cobain’s death in 1994. Their label DCG and the surviving members of Nirvana had originally planned to release a live anthology called Verse Chorus Verse, however the mammoth task of sifting through years worth of live performances so soon after Kurt’s death proved too emotionally taxing a prospect. Instead, the group offered Unplugged in New York to a mourning public. The stripped back, intimate nature of the set and Cobain’s easy candour between songs serve to highlight the intense bursts of emotion scattered throughout, the most electrifying of which ends the version of Leadbelly’s Where Did You Sleep Last Night, the final song and unquestionable emotional climax of the record. MTV were reportedly unhappy with the set list because it was too light on Nirvana’s hits – instead the band played an eclectic set heavy on covers – David Bowie’s The Man Who Sold the Wold, a handful of Meat Puppets tunes and the aforementioned Where Did You Sleep Last Night. Retrospectively, the set list seems apt – a thoughtfully curated selection of songs that many speculate offered a glimpse into where Nirvana’s sound was heading. Sadly, we never got to find out. Rolling Stone wrote that Cobain could have “revolutionized folk music the same way he had rock.” Unplugged in New York is a fitting epitaph to Cobain’s legacy – full of light and darkness, offbeat humour and gut-wrenching sincerity. It is a remarkable album by a remarkable artist standing at the crossroads between life and death.
Pete Whelan 