This is a Call (28 page)

On 30 September MTV introduced the ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit’ video as a ‘World Premiere’ on its flagship ‘alternative’ show
120 Minutes
. Two weeks later the video was moved into the channel’s ‘Buzz Bin’ slot, intended to showcase new talent: artists selected for the ‘Buzz Bin’ could expect to have their video aired between 12 and 30 times a day. With ‘Teen Spirit’ also riding high on the
Billboard
Alternative, Modern Rock and Top 40 charts, it was becoming increasingly difficult to avoid the Seattle trio.

‘It didn’t matter what time of day or night you turned on MTV, “Teen Spirit” was on,’ recalls Anton Brookes. ‘You’d walk down the street and you’d hear it on the radio. You’d walk into a shop or bar and it would be blaring out. Everywhere you went it was there. It was surreal.’

As Vice-President of his freshman class at Thomas Jefferson High, Grohl would introduce morning classes by playing Black Flag and Bad Brains over the school intercom.

Grohl (black shirt) and Larry Hinkle (yellow shirt) make a stand for personal freedom in their lacrosse team photo. ‘Dave told us he couldn’t come to every practice as he had a band,’ recalls coach Donald Butcher.

Grohl (in Necros T-shirt) at Lake Braddock Community Center, shot for the insert of the Mission Impossible/Lünchmeat Thanks EP.

With Reuben Radding and Dave Smith in Dain Bramage. ‘Playing with Dave Grohl was like having your ass lifted in the air as if by magic,’ says Radding.

Post-gig beers for the Scream team in Holland, spring 1988.

Keeping a low profile behind Kurt Cobain at Krist Novoselic’s house in Tacoma, Washington, 23 September 1990.

Repping Led Zeppelin in London, October 1990.

Recording a VPRO radio session at NOB Audio in Hilversum, Holland, 25 November 1991.

Grohl and Krist Novoselic take a break from Nirvana’s ‘tornado of insanity’ in 1992.

Nirvana in Belfast, 22 June 1992. The following day Cobain was rushed to the city’s Royal Victoria Hospital with a ‘weeping ulcer’.

Nirvana at Seattle’s Edgewater Hotel, August 1993, during the promo tour for the ln Utero album.