Just dug this one out #35: Live at Reading by Nirvana

I was never a fan of Nirvana back then, I liked them enough to have bought their albums but not so much to bother going to see them live. I remember driving past the Astoria, when they were playing there with Mudhoney, on our way to some north London pub back room to see some unknown, and wondering if we maybe should be stopping there given the press they were getting... but no! I'm sure the proto-shoegazers we were undoubtedly off to see where just fine too!

After years of being bothered by Adam not being "into" music he suddenly is... and Nirvana are to him (at 13) what Motorhead where to me when I was 15. He currently can't get enough, constantly asking for new recordings. He got very excited when I dug out my vinyl copy of Nevermind and even wanted to know if I had any tracks by The Vaselines the other day.

Last week he came and asked for Live at Reading and it was only a fiver on AmazonMP3 so down it came (I love that - it took me years to build up my Motorhead collection, he pretty much has the full Nirvana catalogue sorted in a matter of weeks).

I'm not sure how Reading in 1992 fits into the grand scheme of things but the sound is impressive and the band's presence is astounding. Hearing the audience singing along to Lithium is chilling. It totally makes sense to me that this is exactly the sort of music a 13 year old should love - and I wonder what current acts have the power and presence to engender the passion that Nirvana did in the early 90s (and still do).

Listening to this album and it's clear that I probably should have stopped at The Astoria that night, having said that in 1989 I was 25 years old and had seen my first Galaxie 500 show. A month after the 1992 Reading performance Luna would play their second London show and Nirvana and I were already very far apart. The closest we got was probably as I drove up the Charing Cross Road in December 1989.