Mary Lou Lord: Kurt Cobain didn't smell like Teen Spirit

Published Sep 21 2011, 02:09 PM by Carly Carioli

Photo by Mary Lou Lord, via Facebook.

How does MARY LOU LORD know what KURT COBAIN smelled like? If you're asking that question, you're obviously not a Nirvana superfan. For an introduction to the story of how Mary Lou met Kurt, check out this excerpt from Everett True's NIRVANA: THE BIOGRAPHY, which picks up the story exactly 20 years ago today. It's September 21, 1991, a couple days before Nevermind is released; Nirvana is in Boston to play WFNX's birthday party; and after a food fight involving MARK KATES (now of ye olde FENWAY RECORDINGS and related enterprises), Kurt is trying to sneak into the Rat to see the Melvins. Mary Lou is quoted as telling the bouncer that Kurt is Jesus (she disputes the Jesus part), and the rest is history: their brief but intense relationship, Courtney Love's crazy phone calls and faxes, and one of the great star-crossed subplots of the grunge years.

However, that still won't tell you what Cobain smelled like. Today, on the anniversary of their meeting, Mary Lou took to Facebook for an epic thread in which she offered memories of Kurt, including one that we couldn't help but pass along. As everyone knows, "Smells Like Teen Spirit" was Kathleen Hannah's scrawl about Kurt; punk rock would never be the same.

Mary Lou, however, remembers the scent of Cobain distinctly differently: "I can tell you EXACTLY what he smelled like," she wrote in the above-mentioned thread, "So, if you want to smell like him (and I still remember) . . . it's something made by Aveda called 'Confixor' . . . . He called it 'montey [sic] juice' cause Monty [Wilkes], their engineer, had it and he kept stealing it. Smelled like Heaven."

There you have it. Revise the history books:

NEWSFLASH: Kurt smelled like Aveda Confixor