The Man Who Sold The World + Pennyroyal Tea –

Now that we’ve moved on from video game music, I wasn’t exactly sure what to pick for this week’s LP. In the end I decided to pick one of the records off of my “all-time favorites” list…

MTV Unplugged in New York (1994), by Nirvana. There are just a handful of albums that contain the same emotional quality that is present with this live performance.

Originally performed on November 18, 1993 and then aired on MTV the following month, the record from the performance would not be released until next November. This would be the first Nirvana release after Kurt Cobain’s tragic suicide in April earlier that year. This concert has a very special quality in as it provides both a glimpse into Cobain’s struggle with depression during one of his later performances and just how talented this band was.

Nowadays, this live performance is often held in very high regards, but it’s actually rather different than normal live performances. The performance is largely acoustic, the setlist (apart from one song) consists of lesser known Nirvana tunes, and to top it all off almost half of the songs are obscure covers of other band’s music. Nirvana was a band known for their abrasive, grunge rock. What fans would watch a show like this? Where were the crowd pleasers? Somehow, despite everything going against it, the concert was met with nearly universal acclaim from both diehard fans as well as others outside of the usual Nirvana circle. The striped down quality of the songs were able to highlight the quality of Cobain’s songwriting and emotionally charged vocals. In a rather ironic twist, these tracks have made a dramatic shift to become some of the most beloved Nirvana songs.

I really love the chosen setlist for this concert and I decided to highlight “The Man Who Sold The World” and “Pennyroyal Tea” which follow one another in the performance. The first track, “The Man Who Sold The World”, is a solid example of one of the covers they performed that night. The song is the title track of Bowie’s 1970 album by the same name, a record that Cobain listed in his diary as one of his all-time favorite records. The song features a man who is struggling with identity, eventually sells his soul (or his “world”), and has lost meaning his life. Cobain probably related very closely to the character from the song, and his admiration of the album is what probably convinced him to pay it tribute.

For a change of pace, Cobain handles the following track “Pennyroyal Tea” completely by himself on guitar. Stripped down to only Cobain, the song provides a much deeper impact through his sorrowful lyrics. The subject of the title, Pennyroyal tea, is a tea brewed from a natural herb that can be lethal to consume. While it is no longer professionally administered, it was used long ago by some women as a means for abortion. Cobain describes his own physical and mental health issues within the song, and drinks the tea in an attempt to make the pain go away.

Nirvana really nailed their performance that night in New York City and they did it all in just one take (which was actually unusual for MTV Unplugged). After the show, Cobain got into a disagreement with an MTV producer after the performance who wanted him to go back out and do an encore. In the end, Cobain argued that he had nothing that could possibly follow up the finale “Where Did You Sleep Last Night”, an old blues number from Lead Belly that often goes by the title “In The Pines”. This is a track I almost decided to chose to feature, but instead I opted to link footage of the song performed on MTV. The song is chilling all the way up until the end when Cobain briefly opens his eyes with an almost crazed stare before finishing the song.

Where Did You Sleep Last Night –