Test your knowledge of Nirvana's biggest hits, deep cuts and iconic moments.
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The Nevermind singles give themselves away the moment the guitar kicks in, but a moody grunge clip could be Pearl Jam just as easily. See how fast you can pin the song on Nirvana.
A deodorant scrawled on a wall that named 'Smells Like Teen Spirit', an engineer who refused the producer credit on In Utero, and an Unplugged set stacked with covers. The questions here live off the singles.
Bleach, Nevermind and In Utero were recorded worlds apart, from a cheap Sub Pop debut to the raw sound of Steve Albini. Start with the hits, then see which album trips you up.
Start with the easy points. The rock radio staples from Nevermind are the ones almost anyone can place: Smells Like Teen Spirit, Come as You Are, Lithium, In Bloom and Polly. If a Nirvana quiz opens with one of these, it is handing you a point before the catalog gets deeper.
This is where the quiz sharpens. Nirvana defined a whole Seattle sound, so a moody, distorted guitar clip could just as easily be Pearl Jam, Soundgarden, Alice in Chains or Stone Temple Pilots. Telling Cobain's band apart from the scene it inspired is the single trickiest round, and it catches out players who only know the singles.
Nirvana made only three studio albums, and each was recorded to sound completely different. Bleach (1989) is murky and cheap, cut for the Seattle label Sub Pop. Nevermind (1991) is glossy and radio-ready thanks to producer Butch Vig. In Utero (1993), recorded with Steve Albini, is raw and abrasive on purpose. Naming the record from its texture alone is a real test.
The final curveball is MTV Unplugged in New York. Half the set was covers, not Nirvana originals, including David Bowie's The Man Who Sold the World, Lead Belly's Where Did You Sleep Last Night and three Meat Puppets songs. Players who assume every track is a Cobain composition give away the point.
Two things. Nirvana inspired a whole Seattle scene, so a distorted clip could be Pearl Jam, Soundgarden or Alice in Chains instead. And their three albums were recorded to sound different, so telling murky Bleach from polished Nevermind and raw In Utero is its own test.
Expect the Nevermind singles, Smells Like Teen Spirit, Come as You Are, Lithium and In Bloom, plus Heart-Shaped Box from In Utero and deeper cuts like About a Girl and Aneurysm that separate the real fans.
Not always. Their MTV Unplugged set leaned on covers like David Bowie's The Man Who Sold the World and Lead Belly's Where Did You Sleep Last Night, and sound-alike grunge bands are easy to confuse with the real thing.
Kurt Cobain (vocals, guitar), Krist Novoselic (bass) and Dave Grohl (drums, from 1990). The band formed in Aberdeen, Washington, in 1987 and became the center of the Seattle grunge scene.
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