On this day, music legend Kurt Cobain was found dead in his home.
Throughout the 1990s, Cobain was the lead singer of the grunge band Nirvana, which has since become one of the best-selling bands of all time and an enduring influence on rock culture. Cobain was known to prioritize the melodies of songs above the lyrics, often complaining when critics or fans attempted to glean a “second-rate Freudian” meaning from them, as he told music journalist Charles Cross. His notable style of gravelly and raw vocals, as well as his anti-rock star persona, catapulted him and Nirvana into fame.
Other notorious aspects of Cobain’s life were his addiction to heroin and severe depression, with both being subjects of numerous songs. A month before his death, it was reported that Cobain had a failed suicide attempt in Rome via overdose, which prompted his stay at a rehab facility.
On April 1, he scaled a six-foot perimeter wall of the facility and fled, later going to a local gun shop and purchasing shotgun shells. The gun itself, a Remington Model 11 20-gauge shotgun, was purchased by his friend, Dylan Carlson, after Cobain feared California’s red flag laws would lead to police seizing the gun. Red flag laws permit the removal of weapons from anyone deemed a danger to themselves or the community.
Cobain’s body was discovered by an electrician inside his greenhouse. The weapon was laid across his lap. His suicide note was also discovered in a flower pot nearby, where he expressed his love for his daughter, Frances, as well as reflecting on music and his depression.
In the years since Cobain’s death, it is almost unanimously accepted that his death was the tragic result of drug addiction and external pressures. In the months before his suicide, Cobain felt out of control with his fame, personal life, and mental health. Cobain defined a generation with music stripped of glamor or pretension. Nirvana created art that bled with the same feelings of alienation and emotional turmoil that, ironically, brought millions together. Kurt Cobain died on April 5, 1994. He was 27.
His memory is defined by his final letter’s sign-off: “peace, love, empathy.”
