I appreciate the payola reference Daniel. "Stay Away" didn't resonate deeply enough. He had to reiterate in Scentless Apprentice in the chorus.

Kurt had a master plan and wanted to start a revolution, there is a lot of insight in his journals. Kurt had a strong sense of justice and hated materialism, punk rock turned him on to new ideas and wanted to share that with the next generation. His plan was involved using the mainstream as a way to infiltrate the system to destroy it from the inside out. He said for the first time ever "alternative" music was a commodity, and he could use that to get his foot in the door. Once inside the system he would release albums with a mix a pop and heavy punk songs. The idea was to have great pop songs that people would buy the albums for, then get exposed to punk rock as well. He wanted teens to get into punk rock and be "deprogrammed", to eventually rise up and start a revolution against the corrupt system. Ah, the dreams of being a young punk rocker, I can relate. Kurt did it, he infiltrated the system to bring punk rock to the masses and what did he get? Just people obsessed with his drug use, relationship, and personal life. People completely missed his point and all he did was feel like he sold out for nothing, he began to resent the fame and his fans for not understanding what he was really about. He kinda gave up on that eventually. The teen spirit video was symbolic of his vision, or should have been. He originally wanted looting of jewelry stores, vandalism of expensive cars, a pep rally for the revolution, and they burn all the jewelry as a symbol of destroying materialism. They didn't let him do it the way he wanted, and I'm sure the song just reminded him of his failed plan, like it was just mocking him.

Thank you Daniel. I love Pay to play and I love the different lyrics in it. It's basically the same song but has different lyrics and is a bit slower but not much. I had a boxed set called into the black back in 97 and it had a bunch of bootlegs and different studio tracks. Great stuff Daniel. Happy New Year man.

@DanielSarkissian

6 ай бұрын

Thank you John! Happy New Years to you too

id have to say it doesnt make any sense to buy into the "kurt wanted fans to stay away just because they were hip" and that the song was about "venues who had artists pay to play" when pay to play has a far broader meaning that actually references a lot about life. How kurt could go from pay 2 play to stay away shows that the underlining meaning of the song never had to do with money. It could have been about life. that one has to pay in pain to play in life. stay away to me is the amalgam of back and forth and the unsettling feeling of never being complete. That to me makes more sense in regards to the rest of the lyrics. One thing i noticed about people is there is a large majority of fans who buy into the idea that "kurts lyrics were just garbage poetry stuff" even when he says it himself. 1. hes being modest. 2. there is no way his lyrics are not connected by a root idea. Stay away does have some avoidance of cliches by dually noting them, but his matched anger and screams show his discontent for the entire idea. I imagine kurt was actually a step ahead of the punk/mainstream idea. He was over it before it even began. And whether you are on top of it or under it, theres always something you want to stay away.

As a big fan and a 16 year old at the time of their breakthrough, Kurt was a walking contradiction and a bit of a snob regarding who has the right to listen to his band. Too bad he didn't sort himself out before becoming famous because fame only added fuel to the fire.

@odiumimbues

6 ай бұрын

It's not always a bad thing being a snob, I mean how else are you going to upgrade your life?

@bigbadlust4403

6 ай бұрын

@@odiumimbues Not towards his fans. That's immature and futile because how can you control who likes your band? He said to Pavitt "We should be selling millions and be more successful" and the afterwards gets frustrated about all the people who are now their fans. Krist was the guy who would catch him in his contradicting BS all the time.

@odiumimbues

6 ай бұрын

its not really a contradiction to want to take money from people and also alienate your audience. This isnt like a contradiction that ails someone. its just business vs nature. i dont think i would call it "bs". @@bigbadlust4403

is it me or does Kurts Jaguar look different like more angular on the upper horn or something or is it because he's a small guy with a guitar bigger than him

Pay to play is on compilation cd its great

Pay to play demo was clearly inspired in Stay away from Charles Bradley, 99% borrowed lyrics. It was clever to finally keep the same name and just turned into a nirvana song... Cant imagine Kurt listening to funk music, 😅. Have a good new year! kzread.info/dash/bejne/qq2grsdradTVZ7w.htmlsi=U5EKoYzebIuYARoq

Let me get that straight: Kurt want to become famous, because of releasing his music, but not for people chasing him down the street for his status as a famous musician right?