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Nirvana: The Chosen Rejects
 
 
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Nirvana: The Chosen Rejects [Paperback]

Kurt St. Thomas (Author), Troy Smith (Author)
3.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (13 customer reviews)

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Book Description

April 22, 2004
"Basically, this is the real thing. No rock star contrivance, no intellectual perspective, no master plan for world domination. You're talking about four guys from rural Washington who wanna rock..."--Everett True, Melody Maker, March 18th, 1989

In 1992, Nirvana's breakthrough anthem, "Smells Like Teen Spirit," introduced a new underground sound to the mainstream music world. The record-breaking sales and global recognition that followed should have been a welcomed payoff for the hard-working punk band. Instead, that bright optimism quickly faded into bitter dissatisfaction, as the trio became conflicted about their unexpected success, and about having an audience that was the epitome of everything they had attempted to rebel against.

Nirvana's sonic catapult from obscurity to international stardom and their chart-topping success changed the face of rock music world-wide. In Nirvana: The Chosen Rejects, the authors have used a wealth of sources, including personal interviews with Kurt Cobain, Krist Novoselic and Dave Grohl, in order to reconstruct Nirvana's meteoric rise and the subsequent fall of their troubled lead singer. The result is a front row perspective of the musical influences that helped nurture Nirvana's seminal sound, the stories about the creation of their albums, and the ideas that shaped their songs. Nirvana: The Chosen Rejects also contains a comprehensive discography and an A-Z listing of every Nirvana song officially released.

Kurt St. Thomas and Troy Smith were an award-winning programming team at WFNX-FM, Boston (MA), one of the nation's top alternative radio stations in the early 1990's. The pair wrote and produced the definitive Nirvana interview compact disc, Nevermind, It's an Interview, as well as interview CDs for Paul Weller, The Breeders, and Frank Black. St. Thomas lives in New York City, and Smith resides on Cape Cod, MA.

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Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

When Kurt Cobain died, fans proclaimed him the generational equal of John Lennon, thereby causing wholesale angst and distress among Beatlemaniacs. Ten years later, St. Thomas and Smith offer more nuanced assessment of Cobain and his band Nirvana's career. Admitted fan St. Thomas was definitely in thrall to Nirvana, but the band's black mood when he spoke with its members a couple of years after their meteoric rise to stardom via the seminal "Smells Like Teen Spirit" suffuses this look at the end of the band, in which it is lamented and celebrated more or less simultaneously and special emphasis is put on band members' disappointment at the hollowness of success. The inner torture that drove Cobain to suicide may be unknowable, but the book provides some reasonable insights. Mike Tribby
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

About the Author

Kurt St. Thomas, a former radio programmer, is a music industry player, and an award-winning filmmaker who runs his a film production company. He lives in New York City.

Troy Smith works in the radio industry and lives in Cape Cod.

Product Details

  • Paperback: 320 pages
  • Publisher: St. Martin's Griffin; First Edition edition (April 22, 2004)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 0312206631
  • ISBN-13: 978-0312206635
  • Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6.2 x 0.9 inches
  • Shipping Weight: 13.1 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
  • Average Customer Review: 3.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (13 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,439,663 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

13 Reviews
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Average Customer Review
3.4 out of 5 stars (13 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
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11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars Kurt St. Thomas+CAYA=plagiarism, December 20, 2004
By 
ikari (westabridge) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Nirvana: The Chosen Rejects (Paperback)
Kurt St. Thomas sure likes to throw around how legitimate he supposedly is. He loves pointing out that he interviewed Nirvana for "Nevermind, It's an Interview". He even included a photo of him and the band as the first thing we see when we open the book. And for someone so concerned with credibility, you'd figure Kurt St. Thomas could write his own material. After all, he spent all that time with the band... right? Apparently not, because he actually uses Michael Azerrad's material from Come As You Are. I've read CAYA, Heavier Than Heaven, and Journals, and by the time I got to the end of chapter two of Chosen Rejects, I knew Kurt St. Thomas was going to continue taking entire passages from Azerrad's book. Sure enough, that's all Chosen Rejects "offers"; Michael Azerrad's passages chewed up and spit out by Kurt St. Thomas, sometimes word-for-word.
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5 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars not as good as it could have been, February 1, 2005
By 
Mary Ann Aquilino (Churchville, New York United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Nirvana: The Chosen Rejects (Paperback)
When I first started reading this book, I thought it was good but lacked a little in detail. It skimmed over some parts when discussing various events the band experienced. At first, I thought this was because so much has been written about these before. But as I read on, it appears more that the author either didn't do his research, or didn't do enough of it. When it comes to Kurt's experiences with Courtney, no mention is made of Courtney's actions, leaving the reader to believe Kurt was always at fault. Also, it glossed over the heartbreak Kurt suffered when Frances was taken away and what they both went through to get her back. Considering what an impact this had on all three of them, the lack of information is questionable, at best. He also never mentions the fact that the doctor who treated Kurt during the Rome incident said there was no evidence Kurt had swallowed ANY, let alone 50, Rohynols. He simply goes by Courtney's comments around this event. When it comes down to Kurt's death, not only does the author always refer to it as a suicide, which has not been 100% proven to many people, but he gets his 'facts' wrong. Kurt was not disfigured so badly that he could only be identified by his fingerprints. He did not barricade himself in the greenhouse; the stool in front of the back door - where there was no way of gaining entry as it was a balcony - was a small barstool that couldn't block anything even if someone could scale the balcony. Kurt's wallet wasn't lying open next to his body; a policeman stated HE had opened the wallet and put it there when they were taking pictures. Also, Wendy didn't make the missing person's police report; Courtney has admitted that she called the police pretending to be Wendy. The author states that Wendy, Courtney, and Krist decided where Kurt's ashes would be spread. As far as anyone knows, besides Courtney, some of Kurt's ashes were made into several tsatsas by monks in Ithaca, NY, some were buried under a tree at the Lake Washington house (both of these according to Courtney), and some were allegedly spread on the Wishkah River. No one really knows what happened to Kurt's ashes, except for Courtney. When one looks at these items the author either didn't include, or made major mistakes about, it makes it hard to take any of the rest of the book as truth. While it's a good read - at least the first part of it - there are many other books out there about Kurt that are much better.
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3.0 out of 5 stars Text Book, November 21, 2011
This review is from: Nirvana: The Chosen Rejects (Paperback)
If you want a text book read of Nirvana, then get this.

The book is very dry, but the author tosses in some fan-dribble attemping to build some momentum into a segment or chapter. The main problem with this book is it (admits) to using Michael Azerrad's Come As You Are as a source.

Source is an understatment - it's just a copy & paste of Azerrad's CAYA. Sure there are some extra details in Chosen Rejects but it just feels like a Wikipedia entry.

I would suggest ANY true Nirvana fan start with Michael Azerrad's Come As You Are, then read the Godspeed graphic novel, then Cobain Unseen, Chosen Rejects then Journals.
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Inside This Book (learn more)
First Sentence:
It was more than just a concert, it was an awakening, a new venture into a new world for the thousands of people who line the street behind Boston's famed Renway Park, desperate for a chance to see Nirvana play inside an eight-hundred- person club called Axiz. Read the first page
Key Phrases - Statistically Improbable Phrases (SIPs): (learn more)
unplugged version, scentless apprentice, teen spirit, studio version, picture disc, live version, new drummer, bonus track
Key Phrases - Capitalized Phrases (CAPs): (learn more)
Sub Pop, Kurt Cobain, Los Angeles, United States, Sonic Youth, Krist Novoselic, Love Buzz, Dave Grohl, Dale Crover, Frances Bean, Courtney Love, Pat Smear, Jack Endino, New York City, Spank Thru, Foo Fighters, Gold Mountain, Heart-Shaped Box, Rolling Stone, Black Flag, Endless Nameless, Negative Creep, Vanity Fair, All Apologies, Barrett Jones
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