ATLANTA -- It smells like teen spirit -- again.
On Tuesday, a greatest-hits CD by the seminal 1990s rock act Nirvana hit music stores. And that's just the beginning of a revival of interest in the definitive grunge-era band and its tortured front man, the late Kurt Cobain.
This week, Riverhead Books will release Journals, a much-anticipated collection of Cobain's unpublished diaries, memos, drawings, letters and other scribblings. Although this material was used extensively in Charles R. Cross' Heavier Than Heaven: A Biography of Kurt Cobain, the new book provides more of Cobain's firsthand accounts of his rise to fame, painful stomach condition and ambivalent feelings about success.
How would you like to spend several days with a humorless, enraged, paranoid, contemptuous, suicidal heroin addict?
For $30, fans may find out.
"I went on a three-week heroin binge after our last European tour," goes a typical missive. "Kicked it in a hotel, three days sleeping, vomiting and the worst gas you'll ever know."
The 280-page, oversized book reproduces scores of the late Nirvana star's letters, drawings, lyrics and drafts.
But the settlement of a lawsuit between Nirvana's record company, Universal Music, and Cobain's widow, Courtney Love, suggests that even more new Nirvana material could soon be on the way.
When Cobain killed himself in 1994, he left behind 109 tapes of unreleased material. Love says there are five to eight "solidly good" tunes on the tapes.
One of the songs from those tapes, "You Know You're Right," is the first single from the greatest-hits package. It's also the only new song on the set. The cut's slow, forbidding verses and growling choruses are classic Nirvana. "Right" is sitting at the top of Billboard magazine's Modern Rock chart, and the song's out-of-the-box popularity could mean big sales for the new album.
Interestingly, "You Know You're Right" -- and its hit potential -- provided the catalyst for the lawsuit between Love and Universal. The cut was scheduled to be included on a 45-song box set, scheduled for release last fall. But Love filed suit to block its release, arguing that "Right" has "extraordinary artistic and commercial value" and would be best included on a single CD as opposed to a pricier, diehard-fans-only box set.
To stop the box, Love had to sue the record company and the remaining Nirvana members, Dave Grohl and Krist Novoselic. The matter was complicated by another suit Love filed against Universal to free her band, Hole, from its recording contract.
In July 2001, a judge granted her an injunction to block the box set. But a series of events occurred this year making it prudent for Love to settle. In May, a judge dismissed many of the claims in her own suit against Universal. Then, the record company threatened to release a Nirvana greatest-hits CD with or without "Right." And, finally, "Right" began to leak out on the Internet, potentially diminishing its commercial value.
Love and Universal settled in September. The agreement freed Love from her contract and allowed Universal to release the greatest-hits collection including "Right."
The Knight Ridder / Tribune news service contributed to this article.