At one point in this flannel-flyers' Bible, our Kurt C. ("That's Mr. Cobain to you") makes a pertinent aside. He asks what would happen if you crossed Black Sabbath and the Beatles. Nirvana? Not exactly.
But if you were in any question about the exact contents of any member of Nirvana's music library, Michael Azerrad answers them. In fact, every detail however minute makes its way into these pages. What we have here is an unreconstructed vomiting of facts and opinions by a near-sighted groupie unable to establish any critical distance between himself and his subject. He doesn't wonder why Nirvana, not the Melvins or HŸsker DŸ, who did it earlier and better, made it big. In fact, there is little mention of other groups experimenting with the same type of music at the same time. Nirvana is an interesting Phenomena (yes, capital "P") - what makes them popular? What does their ironic stance before corporations imply about the way we are shamelessly suckered into barking after "The Next Big Thing?"
Beyond the usual banalities which could have been the blurb on the cover, there is none of this. Indeed, his promised "close analysis" of each song reads like a bad English paper. You can tell this guy used to write for Rolling Stone.
So if a masturbatory tribute to the world's most unlikely superstars is what you want, come and get it. In fact, maybe Axerrad should have called it "Cum As You Are . . . " (Aziz Huq)