Nirvana - I Hate Myself And I Want To Die (1993)

'I Hate Myself and I Want to Die' was the original album title of what was to become 'In Utero', but was changed to avoid potential lawsuits. The band even took the title track off the album, with it eventually turning up on The Beavis and Butthead Experience soundtrack. The title was merely a bad joke, and unfortunately Kurt Cobain's dark sense of humor only fueled the myth of the suicidal rock star. By adding in a few outtakes and original mixes, we can attempt to get back to the original vision of Nirvana's response to the commercial success of 'Nevermind'. Sessions were held at Pachyderm Studios in Cannon Falls, Minnesota, over the course of two weeks in February, 1993. They held a few practice sessions in Brazil during their South American tour the month before, so the songs were ready to go. Produced by Steve Albini, they intended the album to be more raw and natural than Nevermind, much to the dismay of David Geffen, who was already counting the money. After hearing the album, Geffen said it was unreleasable, and ordered them to start over.  They compromised by having a few songs remixed by Scott Litt, who gave 'Heart Shaped Box' and 'All Apologies' a more radio-friendly veneer, as well as the single version of 'Pennyroyal Tea' later that year. So one of the obvious tasks is to reinstate the original Steve Albini mixes back onto the album, which is simple enough, since they are now included on the 'In Utero 20th Anniversary Edition'. Kurt even came up with a plan to release the original rough mixes on LP, cassette, and 8-track under the title 'I Hate Myself and Want to Die', then a month later release a remixed, radio friendly version called 'Verse Chorus Verse'. Thankfully, this never happened. I open with the title track, using the Pachyderm version found on 'In Utero 20th Anniversary Edition', followed by "Sappy," a song they worked on over the years, finally getting it right in Minnesota, but it failed yet again to make the final cut of an album. The remaining track sequence follows 'In Utero', and I've always thought that 'Serve the Servants' was not the best opening song anyway, so now it comes third. I also add in the Albini mixes of the two songs that were remixed. Then I sneak in Dave Grohl's 'Marigold' near the end, providing a nice prelude to 'All Apologies', and it's about time Dave got one of his songs on a Nirvana album, this being his second attempt at the track. This gives us 51-minutes of music, including every song recorded at the Pachyderm sessions.  51 minutes is on the long side for an LP, but this would have been mainly a CD release anyway, as well as 8-track. I wanted to keep the angel for the cover and found this online which seemed to be exactly what I needed.

Track listing

01 I Hate Myself and I Want to Die 

02 Sappy

03 Serve the Servants

04 Scentless Apprentice

05 Heart Shaped Box

06 Rape Me

07 Frances Farmer

08 Dumb

09 Very Ape

10 Milk It

11 Pennyroyal Tea

12 Radio Friendly Unit Shifter

13 Tourette's

14 Marigold 

15 All Apologies

From The Album Fixer December 2014 - all notes and opinions are his (apart from the cover comment).

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