It's been fourteen years since Nirvana did their lauded Unplugged in New York performance at Sony Studios in New York, and since then, every ounce of the minutiae surrounding the show has been so well documented that those things feel as if they've taken on the same amount of fame and infamy as the performance itself. Everything from Kurt Cobain's stage fright before going on that night to the dose of heroin that left him comatose until right before the show to him telling the Unplugged stage designers to use lilies because he wanted a funerary vibe in the performance. Nirvana's one-take performance has been so exposed that even passing fans feel like they know every microtone and every image—except that, before now, the show has never been released in its entirety.
Not even the most dogged, rabid, completist fans have seen or heard everything that this DVD offers. Finally available here are the songs that were edited out of the original broadcast, "Something In The Way" and "Oh, Me," as well as the footage of five songs from their soundcheck and a lot of stage dialogue that neither made it to TV nor was included on the album upon its release in 1994. That additional dialogue—some banter, breaking into "Free Bird" while the band waited for the show's crew to "tune a harp," a few jokes, asking for requests and a couple of images of Cobain cracking a smile—are revelatory moments on this DVD. Since the singer's death, the miracles of editing for broadcast have made the show impossibly dour, heavy and look like it was conscious foreshadowing of what would happen less than six months later in the space above Cobain's garage, but that isn't true at all.
Unplugged was, at its core, a magical performance not because of the moribund circumstances that followed it, but because Nirvana willed it into existence. They were out of their element with acoustic instruments and the band went to great pains to make sure that the audience got something special. They clearly worked the set out carefully and rehearsed the arrangements as the soundcheck footage illustrates, and they knew not to try the big hit songs because it just wouldn't work. That sort of kneecapped the band—they knew they'd have to make an impression some other way. And they did. Unplugged showcased Nirvana as songwriters and the performance ended up being timeless because of that. Fourteen years later and the set is still vital and carries all the weight it did when they sat down to tape it. That is the mark of a great band and a great show.
Nirvana Unplugged in New york is out November 20, 2007.
Nirvana fans: www.nirvanaclub.com
Nirvana: “Plateau” from Unplugged
Nirvana: “Where Did You Sleep Last Night” from Unplugged
Nirvana: “The Man Who Sold the World” from Unplugged
