When I first read that the deluxe edition of In Utero was coming, I promised myself that I wasn’t going to care about it. Especially since there are going to be a trillion articles written on this 20th-anniversary re-release.
But honestly, I can’t help myself.
Like every kid in their latter years of elementary school and junior high I was obsessed with Nirvana.
When Kurt Cobain died the obsession just became worse. I spent the majority of my days between the age of 12 and 15 listening to all of Nirvana’s albums over and over. So as time passed and I kept spinning the same five albums (Bleach, Nevermind, Insecticide, In Utero, and the Unplugged album) and I started to slowly settle on a favorite which eventually became In Utero. This album is seriously so raw and aggressive. The drum sound and the low-end, almost inaudible bass combined with all the nonsensical guitar and feedback just drew me in.
The songs on In Utero are just so gnarly sounding.
They are total experimental noise-pop songs and the way the album is mixed by Steve Albini is so dirty and killer. I honestly haven’t heard a mainstream album released since this record that compares to In Utero’s brutal and echoed sound.
Another reason I loved In Utero was because I would sit and analyze the album and wonder what Nirvana’s next LP would have sounded like.
There seemed like so much promise in the progression of their sound from Nevermind to this album. The band seemed to be getting heavier and more aggressive and while Krist Novoselic’s parts started becoming less prominent and important, it was compensated for by Dave Grohl’s more involved and featured drum beats. It seemed like the band was really starting to meld and become a really cohesive unit.
I feel that if Nirvana would have made one more album it would have been so heavy, experimental, and probably just as cherished as all of their other records.
During my obsession, I was compelled to try and track down all the b-sides and outtakes from around the time of the recording of this album and the six months following the band’s end. I even went as far as to con my mom into buying me ridiculously overpriced bootlegs at the CD store, because I thought there might be some sort of unreleased material on them. Most of the time there wasn’t, the bastards usually just labeled the already released songs with different names. Total scam!
I eventually tracked down The Beavis and Butt-head Experience and found the misplaced “I Hate Myself and I Want to Die”.
I also made her spend a ton of money on the Nirvana singles collection and found “Marigold”, and “Moist Vagina”. I was able to track down “Sappy” on one of those insanely overpriced bootlegs (Outcesticde 5). However, this may be the worst, I found “Gallons of Rubbing Alcohol Flow Through the Strip” on the Japanese release of In Utero. Which my poor mother shelled out something like $30 dollars for a used copy, just for that one crazy noisy, half-song/jam.
So now 20 years after In Utero‘s release here comes another crazy overpriced-cash-cow deluxe release ($125).
I will go on the record now by stating I am not a huge fan of these re-releases. It just makes the music seem old. Re-releasing seems like a way to make a record more important than it originally was and it kills the magic that the original release once had. However, being such an old-school Nirvana dork I had to check this out. I needed to hear the two random untitled jams, the remixed version of the album, as well as a more consistently mixed version of the b-sides (All of which were already released on With the Lights Out).
I always wanted to find a solid mix of these b-sides so I could integrate them into In Utero and make some sort of ultimate edition of the album.
Well the “2013 mix” of this album and the b-sides pretty much suck. The reason being is they took all the distortion and dirtiness aways from it! The drums are missing that overdriven echo, the guitar seems like it was polished and put way too high in the mix, and the bass seems to have this glossy sheen that wasn’t there in the first mix. As cool as it is to hear different versions of these songs, it ruins it at the same time. I don’t mean to be one of those old lame-ass idealists that says “the original was better,” but in this case, it is.
The thing that makes In Utero special was the totally screwed-up mix and if you take that away the the album loses all of its mystique.
This video is a pretty good way to tell the difference between the mixes.
By now I am sure this may be coming across a bit mixed up and confused, which it is. I’m torn on this release. As much as I dislike this “2013 Mix” there are a bunch of cool things included in it that are worth listening to.
First, there are two new jams that I have never heard before, “Forgotten Tune (Demo)” and “Jam (Demo)” (super cool and creative names). These two lost demos are relatively entertaining and show that the band was beginning to really gel, but I wish there was some vocals on them so bad. Another cool thing about this re-release is the addition of Nirvana’s New Years Eve Live and Loud performance that they did for MTV.
It’s nice to actually have a quality version of this instead of my busted homemade VHS recording that I have probably watched over 25 times. Having an audio version of the concert is pretty cool as well, Grohl on the drums is an absolute beast throughout the entire performance.
So as much as I dislike re-releases and as much I hate to admit it, the In Utero super duper deluxe edition is actually pretty cool, even though it’s insanely overpriced.
It’s nice to have all the odds and ends, b-sides, and concert packaged into one release. It’s also nice to have consistent and quality mixes of the b-sides and long-lost demos. Even if the new mixing takes away all the passion and magic of the original sound. I can’t however, seem to ignore the fact that seeing a re-release of albums I loved so much in Junior High makes me feel old.
Also, the fact that I care enough to listen to it and do a write-up on it makes me feel lame, but In Utero is one of my top 10 favorite albums of all time so I had to.
Being nostalgic about music that you loved so much back in the day basically sucks. Anyway, I guess its not too long until I start collecting social security checks. I always wonder how Cobain would react to the way that Nirvana’s music and legacy has been handled since his death, the adolescent in me thinks he would probably despise it.
If you have 40 minutes to waste check this interview out with Grohl and Novoselic where they talk about the recording of In Utero and what they think of the re-mix. http://www.npr.org/blogs/allsongs/2013/09/09/220657501/dave-grohl-and-krist-novoselic-share-memories-unreleased-tracks-from-in-utero