The mystery of Courtney Love

It was all the chanting she did...........

In the words of Patti Smith, they were 'just kids' .......

well she really isn't relevant in 2019.

I saw Courtney perform at a small venue in the LA area a few years ago. I got there early, when the place was practically empty, and there she was warming up with her band, unlit to the point of practically in the dark, with no one paying attention. Took me a minute to realize it was her. She was semi-singing something very 60s-sounding, psychedelic-trippy. Eventually she slowly collapsed to the floor, still clutching the mike (the motion seemed deliberate). It was quite a moment to witness, and I said, nobody but me was watching. Later she bounded onstage and rocked out! Anyhoo, that's my lil story.

We see a pattern of domination and control in these older fish who latch onto young rockers. Yoko Ono was older than John Lennon too.

I think the media and wider public give you a bit of a pass if you are truly iconic.

Kurt was a feel sorry for me wimp. He wanted CL to control him. But, as the saying goes, be careful what you wish for. She was over domineering and along with a overwhelming persona. He broke apart due to the obvious mental issues AND living with HER! She didnt kill him outright, but she helped kill his spirit.

How cool that you apparently were close friends with them, R7

At 1st it was...not so much now.

Didn't she show up on Empire for a few episodes??

Her music holds up.

She did put out memorable music, OP. Live through this and celebrity skin were both great and so was pretty on the inside.

she has talent

Frances Bean says she's buried the hatchet with her mother. She says Courtney can be a great mother at times, but is a trainwreck at other times, so she's just selective when she allows Courtney to be around her. Frances requested to be emancipated from Courtney when she was 16.

White trash incarnate.

Murder for hire.

Well-connected, sinister, and would do anything for power and money. Jeffrey "Lolita Express" Epstein had all of her contact information and phone numbers in his little black book, making me wonder if she procured young girls for him and his perverted crew of millionaires.

She has talent. Her music is incredibly good. Her acting is not horrible, when she puts the effort in. She has star quality and presence. Seeing her live was electric. Doesnt mean I would want to be married to her or be her daughter!

r17 = Bible Humping 50 Year Old MidWestern Nubian Incel Schizophrenic LSA Frau

I saw her in the late 90's during her Celebrity Skin album and thought she was awful. She barely performed, maybe 40 minutes but was babbling throughout about hating cops. A complete waste of my time.

Kurt wrote the first Hole album & Billy Corgan the 2nd. Love is really not talented. She is a manipulative witch however.

R19 = Courtney Love, or an ignorant fucktard who debates such incendiary matters such as "RuPaul's Drag Race."

I think she totally masterminded Nirvana. Kurt had some ambition, but like the other two he was introverted, unsophisticated and content to play little clubs for his friends, then get high.

She saw some talent, schmoozed with the right people, charmed their way in, negotiated She's no dummy.

She deserves her share of the credit.

R23 ? Nevermind pre-dated Courtney

She may be trashy and annoying but i'll give her credit for her ambition. The same kind of i'll-do-ANYTHING hunger for fame and success that J.Lo and Madonna had, but she somehow managed it without their conventional beauty and an even worse singing voice than those two. As well as coming from nothing (I think she was actually homeless or a ward of the state as a kid).

She was great in the Larry Flynt movie though. And as someone who grew up with that music, i'd still rather listen to 'Live Through This' or 'Celebrity Skin' than any Nirvana or Pearl Jam album. Her lyrics are more poetic, her screams more primal and convincing, and there's a more sardonic, mischievous tone to Hole's music that set them apart from their more maudlin peers (Soundgarden, PJ Harvey, L7, etc.).

I remember that "I went to school in Olympia" song about how everyone from that city "fucks the same". LOL. She was also the first one to call out Harvey Weinstein publicly in 2004 or so but nobody wanted to listen to her.

I forgot about that, Its true about Weinstein! She has some balls, I give her that.

Everybody loves to watch the antics of a train wreck, hot mess, Cluster B clusterfuck. Remember her barging in on Madonna’s interview and babbling gibberish until she just fell right off her chair and sprawled around on the floor?

I guess R21 was in the room with Kurt and Corgan when they wrote those albums.

I liked "Doll Parts." She's not afraid to say something. She was "warning" women about Harvey Weinstein back in 2005.

New music?

I love Courtney Love. Hole produced great albums and she is one of the greatest lyricists pop has ever produced. Can act too. I want my rock stars messy and talented like her. He is very interesting

She had some natural talent. Unfortunately, drugs killed a lot of it and the intense scrutiny she was under helped.

She's crazy, but in her case I give her a pass. She was raised by wolves.

Can't say I'd want to be in a relationship with her, but Hole made great albums in the 90s. Live Through This is as good as any Nirvana and her worst toss off is better than Corgan on a good day.

Live Through This and Celebrity Skin are both really great.

She has a great rock voice for a frau!

R35 I wouldn't put her in the frau category.

Courtney = Yoko

The woman who gave her mom up for adoption was Paula Fox. Fun fact! They only met once, and they didn’t like each other.

Courtney Love is Brenda Chenowith. There were many, many allusions to it. Same background, death of young husband, left with little girl. Seattle. Psychiatrist mother.

Kurt told Amanda de Cadenet that Courtney was the best sex he'd ever had. I think that explains a lot.

She certainly look's like her father's daughter here (pre-surgery), rocking a Madona-inspired look.

R40 ugly girls work for it.

Tear the pedals off of YOU!

Make you tell the TRUTH!

Met her. Insane crass negative manipulative name-dropping lying narcissist. Ignores everybody except those with money and power - sucks up to them shamelessly. Alcoholic now too.

She got away with murder (by proxy).

I said this at R16, but not quite as explicitly enough.

And here's who El Duce thought whacked Kurt, on Courtney's instructions: Allen Wrench.

Better link than the one at R46.

#44, she sounds just right for Datalounge!

Her Plastic Surgeon was the true artist. She was quite unattractive before her first time under the knife.

I think she’s pretty much forgotten- I never got her- I just thought she was mentally ill and occasionally felt sorry for her.

She’s a fascinating woman. I wouldn’t get near her - she’d decimate me - but she’s interesting to observe from afar. Crazy, genius, balls-to-the-wall, destructive to everything. I think Kurt was attracted to her the way wimpy men are attracted to tornado women - she did all the things he couldn’t.

I wonder who she’s fucking now.

I love her music. It got me through the worst time in my life then. It still holds up. She apparently had what Kurt needed and made him feel what he wanted to feel about himself.

Wow! Super ugly.

The whole Courtney murdered Kurt thing is utter BS, on the level of Alex Jones.

She's a manipulative cunt, but she's not a murderer.

When she laughs, you can see her face collapse into all the crevices where bone and cartilage used to be. They must have hauled away a pound of flesh.

She doesn't even look like the same person.

I think she looked her best in the late 90s.

Talented. Hole was signed before Nirvana. I would never, ever want to meet her. Toxic and mentally ill.

Here’s a link to an interview she did with Rollerderby back in the day.

Here’s my favorite snippet and it probably explains a few things. (Even then you can feel the mental illness jumping off the page):

“COURTNEY: I have a tip! I lost 40 pounds, and I have a real tip> I was fat from 14 to 24. When you’re fat like I was – which is five feet, eight inches and 150 to 170 pounds – you do not get to fuck the boys you want to fuck. Right? Right? Lisa: Perhaps. COURTNEY: The minute I got skinny and got a nose job and became photogenic, and all of a sudden I had a bidding war, and every boy I ever wanted, wanted me. Lisa: What’s your tip? COURTNEY: The thing you gotta do is – A! Stop counting calories! Okay? B! DO not get on a scale! ‘Cause lean muscle weighs more than fat. All right? I cut out FAT! That’s all you gotta do. FAT! No cheese. That’s it, Lisa. Period. NO CHEESE. I told this to KROQ, I told this to my nanny. People I tell this to lose ten, 30 pounds. STOP CHEESE. You know why the Orientals are not fat? ‘Cause they look on cheese as this gross, Western habit – it’s like sour milk LARD. They don’t want anything to fucking do with cheese. If you’re gonna eat cheese, take it out on a picnic, cut it up carefully, and really taste it – with wine or something. Don’t melt it on shit. And I lost 40 POUNDS by not eating cheese. And I even ate a little mayonnaise. All right. Skip the butter and skip the cheese and you will lose weight. I swear to God, Lisa. I was a fat girl my whole life. No one would fuck, and when they did they’d do things like fart in front of me. I told my friend that this guy farted in front of me, and you know what he said? Lisa: Nn-nn COURTNEY: He said, “Well, look at her; wouldn’t you fart in front of her?”

Maybe she isn't the same person.

R60, wow. Imagine if Madonna gave an interview like that. "Those orientals".

LOL R60 I literally just cut that part and was about to paste it here.

there was a sign saying ORIENTAL in my grocery store until 2012.

She enjoyed her good fifteen minutes of fame after Kurt's death, because people were fascinated with whether she was responsible for it or not, and because she gave a very giood performance playing herself in The People vs. Larry Flynt. And her album with Hole after Kurt's death, Live Through This, was far better than anyone expected.

But no one wanted to work with her because she's a childish, irresponsible, needy trainwreck--the Nancy Spungen of the 1990s. You can;tt work with a BPD junkie, so the offers dried up almost immediately, and she could not get her act together. The news about how disgusted her daughter was with her did not help her image, either.

People have a fascination with attractive twentysomething girls who are train wrecks, and a few of them get their acts together somewhast and can stay on top for a while (cf. Angie Jolie, Kim Kardashian). But most of them don't understand why the offers stop coming and people stop being fascinated by them when they grow into their thirties and forties and still haven't cleaned up their acts: the world passed Courtney Love by, just as it also passed by Noni Ryder and Elizabeth Wurtzel (two other 90s BPD phenomena) and Paz de la Huerta (a 00s BPD poster child).

R21

That's actually Hole's 2nd and 3rd albums. Kim Gordon wrote the 1st.

R65 Did the offers really stop coming though? It's not like she's a pariah these days (though that may have been true at one time). She recently got acting roles on shows like Revenge, Empire and Sons of Anarchy. You act as if she's unemployable but If HBO, ABC, and FOX are willing to cast her then it's not totally lost. I also saw her in the trailer for the new JT Leroy movie with Laura Dern and Kristen Stewart.

I agree she doesn't have the same public recognition she used to, but she's still at least able to get work. I think she also recently did some sold out runs with Lana Del Rey. And she'll always be able to tour off the generation that her music meant so much to - even less successful female 90s bands like Babes in Toyland, L7, Veruca Salt, and The Breeders are selling tickets for their reunions.

R65/OP, a big reason she was in the media is because, a) she was married to Kurt Kobain b). She did drugs while she was pregnant AND PUBLICLY ADMITTED THIS TO A MAGAZINE c). she attempted to clean up her act in the mid/late 90s after Kurt's death. For a while, it looked like she would turn it all around. She even dated Ed Norton. Then, by the early 00s, she seemed back to her old self like nothing had changed. So she became a joke in the media after her failed turnaround.

Cuntney Love

[QUOTE] She even dated Ed Norton.

Oh, well all is forgiven then.

Yeah it seemed she cleaned up her sct then fell further down then she was before - remember the picture of her letting some random street dude suck her titty? Mess.

She was a train wreck on that roast of Pam Anderson that aired years ago.

Courtney Love said that Pam Anderson lived in a trailer park in Malibu. I thought that was funny.

Cobain was a junkie, that’s how.

Here's a clip of Allen Wrench, sounding very cocky while being quizzed about whether he was involved in Cobain's murder. It reminds me of O.J. writing "If I Did It". Talk about chutzpah!

When he wasn't being filmed, Wrench supposedly admitted to killing Cobain ("off the record").

Also, there was an interesting comment from a junkie saying that no junkie would ever commit suicide while they still had any drugs to take. There was a bag of smack found near Cobain's body.

They kill themselves after they've had all the drugs.

Wrench also gave a chilling description (in that clip at R75) describing how someone "might have" aimed the shogun blast from the mouth to strike the neck, destroying evidence of any neck injuries due to strangulation. A strange thing for someone to speculate if they weren't involved.

Sorry, forgot to link the clip:

It's interesting that Courtney is in the JT Leroy film, given she was one of the celebrity fans suckered into the fraud.

she sounds tone deaf to me and her songwriting is amateurish. add to this her immature junkie put on persona in performance and I say she's a phony. a dangerous one.

Bad URL Timestamp, R77.

Not sure what you mean, R80. The link works fine for me. You just have to click on the volume icon (it is muted at first).

I have a friend who ran in that circle back in the day. Everyone adored Kurt. Courtney was...not well liked.

She may be the least mysterious, most transparent person in show business.

What exactly was Kurt Cobains attraction?

[quote] [R65]/OP,

I am not OP.

R84 Boyish, I think it's that 'broken wing' syndrome. Women and older gay men like to take on the brittle / broken young man and make him better. He was extremely good looking - more cute, then handsome. I also think he wasn't overly worldly when he was younger and women saw him as a project to make better of his potential.

[quote]That's actually Hole's 2nd and 3rd albums. Kim Gordon wrote the 1st.

Funny how Gordon writes about Kurt and Courtney in her autobiography, but never mentions that little detail.

Because she didn't write their first album. Courtney begged her to produce it because she wanted a female producer and also wanted Sonic Youth's street cred.

Kim has admitted in interviews that she only showed up two or three times and (unsurprisingly) Courtney already had her own ideas about what the album would sound like.

If you listen to it, it doesn't sound very 'produced' at all lol.

I know she didn't, R88. Gordon really liked Cobain, but avoided Love. It's in her book.

I don't understand posters who make shit up, like, what's the point.

There is no mystery about Courtney Love. Talented, narcissist, addict but most importantly

she is RICH AS ROCKEFELLER.

Money is how she survives and in her own way thrives.

I really adored her when I was a kid in the '90s, and watching her struggles over the last two decades has been sad. I confess to wishing she'll put out just one final, well-written album; that she'll have just one more film performance recognized as great... but maybe her mental health is more important than that sort of thing.

I like her.

I remember the breaking MTV News when she punched Kathleen Hanna (was it at Lollapalooza?)

I liked Live Through This but Courtney was always such an uncool Top 40 version of the female musicians who were making the kind of stuff I listened to (I realize that makes me sound like an asshole, but I don't have a nicer way to put it).

I follow ex Hole drummer Patty Schemel on IG. After she got booted from Hole she ended up in DTLA turning tricks to get drug money. It's amazing she managed to get her shit together. I'm glad for her and the Deal sisters. Her IG is kind of boring though; mostly hippyish, lesbian mommy stuff in Silver Lake.

Some friends and I drove to Vancouver one day while at a conference in Seattle. None of us had been there before, so we went to bars and got tips on good places to eat.

Ended up at a seafood bar (great food and lovely owners), and who should waltz in with an entourage but Ms. Courtney Love herself.

Tried to pull rank and skip line but honey, the owners were not having IT, so she got pissed off and stormed out.

The clip from R77 starts at 37:01 below:

R94 I loved her documentary. I think it was called “Hit it hard”. She had a pretty happy ending

"Hit So Hard"

R98 Very good doco, even if you aren't into the music, or music per se, it is a great watch.

she's crazy, a hot mess, and probably deadly toxic to be around, but i love her music (better than Nirvana sometimes) and she never gave a boring interview. Big fan here.

She was rude to Madge. That's enough for me to hate her forever.

Everyone’s rude to Madonna, Mary.

^yes, because Madonna is always so nice and sweet to everybody...

Courtney has a "cameo" in the Gucci ads with Lana Del Rey and Jared Leto. She plays the waitress starting at 00:15- Surprised she accepted that.

Omg! Love looks terrible in the Gucci ad!

Courtney and Madonna seem about similar levels of awfulness. And I say this as someone who liked them both. Pretty sure Madonna wanted to sign Hole to Maverick, but of course she went with Kurt's label.

Madonna is GLOBAL bitches. Love is a nobody in comparison.

R100 better than Nirvana no times.

R107, Madonna is the stinky GLOBAL in my britches!

Just reading her bio. Man. Fucked up childhood.

Elliott Smith's dad was a psychotherapist too.

I love CL, love Hole. Nobody's Daughter (album) from 2010 is just as good as her earlier albums. My favorite songs from that album are Pacific Coast Highway, Samantha, Someone Else's Bed, Skinny Little Bitch. The whole album is fantastic.

That was a decade ago r111. I don’t think she can do another album unless she goes mellow. I’d love to see her in many films but after seeing her in the Gucci ad, I think the plastic surgery has derailed her acting career.

I like that she did something silly and meaningless like that R104. It's fun, and why the fuck not?

She was amazing in The People V Larry Flynt.

Nobody's Daughter got middling reviews, didn't have a proper music video for at least a year, sold around thirty thousand copies total. It was definitely not terrific. Never mind the fact it took her six years to produce and was composed largely of songs fans had heard for years before via YouTube.

I will credit Courtney for being a professional and touring the hell out of that album, but if it hadn't sucked, she wouldn't have needed to rely so heavily on the Live Through This and Celebrity Skin material in performance.

That said, I truly hope she does release another great record as a "fuck you" and flips all the haters off as she rides into the sunset.

In the Gucci video, she looks-- trying to be kind-- bloated. Someone on this thread said she's an alkie now, and I was wondering, "How does an alcoholic stay so skinny?" I guess the answer is: she doesn't.

She was also good in “Man On the Moon” surprised she doesn’t get more mention for that role.

R116 To be fair she is 54, and she's gotten thicker in the middle over the last couple years. It happens. It's not usually so extreme looking... but then again, the uniform looks deliberately ill-fitting, plus the makeup is so harsh. It actually kind of reminds me of a late era Marianne Faithfull/ Debbie Harry look.

Mystery? She's charismatic because she's a psychopath and unpredictable because she's an addict.

Courtney Love wishes she were Debbie or Marianne.

Another like for Courtney here.

She’s so mean and doesn’t care about her fans but I love her so much.

She is my idol.

R104 Courtney Love is very Amanda Lepore awkward in that advert.

I saw her late last year and she looked amazing. I admire her ballsy attitude. Some men fear strong opinionated women. But I just love the bitch.

I'm surprised she's still alive.

I really liked live through this and celebrity skin, but I must not be that big of a fan, because I could care less about her newer material

I liked when she went to Wendy's and let that black homeless guy suck on her titties.

That photo traumatized me for years, r126.

Her Little Bo Peep panties really bring the whole photo together.

Courtney is just simply "lookin' out for the cookout" @ R128. Thoughtful lady sharing her jug.

According to one of her biographies, Courtney and Kurt went to see Madonna's Truth or Dare together and became obsessed with her, I think Madonna pissed Courtney off because she didn't pay her any mind

Look at the 1995 MTV VMA interview and Courtney's desperate for Madonna's attention and to make an impact.

Here's a story you won't hear anywhere else. Heard through a friend of a friend who was often an unwilling "assistant" to her antics in her mid/earlier days. This was late 90's.

She was in NYC for fashion week and was the temporary new face of Versace (remember that?) She was carted all over paparazzi-town and parties with Donatella in-arm and sat wherever she wanted at seat-arranged celebrity dinners, pissing off lots of people. She apparently wasn't into the fashion scene. When the few-days ordeal was over she had to get back to LA for something important, and our friend was frantically waiting early in the morning for her to arrive back from hanging out all night at Tom Ford's house so they could rush to the airport. She showed up at the last possible second in an original Tom Ford(?) dress, wrinkled to hell. They'd both been up for days and exhausted. They made the plane just in time, and as they took their seats Courtney hailed a first class attendant and told her she wanted "Two steak dinners and two pieces of chocolate cake." (for herself). After take-off our friend pulled a blanket over himself and promptly passed out. Mid-flight he woke up and looked over at Courtney, passed out in her window seat. Her face, and now-ruined dress, were covered in chocolate cake and steak juice. There was food *everywhere.* In one hand she had a piece of chocolate cake, and in the other a whole steak.

WOW, R132. And to think this was during her “stable” years.

I really like her.

I think she's fabulous.

I love it! R132. Had mutual friends with her at the end of the 90s. No idea if they’re still in touch. I know my friends were massive coke heads back then. Declined an invitation to meet her myself. I had an overwhelming sense that we’d end up in a fist fight. Not sure I would have come out on top.

I think she's tremendous

I always wondered if her relationship with Edward Norton was genuine or was strictly PR.

I see what you did there in the thread title, OP

Stipe still loves her.

I still love her too, I just want her to DO stuff again.

R141 I wrote to Courtney Love some years ago, with no reply. I suggested she write a musical version of the movie 'Teeth', using her music for the production. I thought it was a good idea, and it would have put her in Cyndi Lauper territory.

That movie sounds wild, R142. I have to check it out!!!

She lost that spark behind the eyes.

Nirvana’s manager, Danny Goldberg, just came out with a book about Kurt to mark the 25th anniversary of his death. What’s funny (?) is Goldberg’s wife is Rosemary Carroll, who was Kurt and Courtney’s lawyer. Carroll had her suspicions about Kurt’s death and vocalized them to Tom Grant, the private investigator that Courtney hired right before Kurt was found dead.

Is rosemary any relation to her mother? R145.

She was always a fame whore, she did an interview in the 90s where she said she and Kurt Cobain went too see the 1991 Madonna documentary and Kurt said to her, supposedly, the whole film, "That's so you, you're just like Madonna".

She then claimed that everyone calls her "the Madonna of grunge rock" and she's gotten that "my whole life"

She's exhausting

She was obsessed with Madonna. She followed her career pattern: couldn't make it as an actress so she decided to use music as a tool for becoming famous. Learned very few chords on the guitar, spent more time in the photo studio than the recording studio. Once they achieved fame, they tried to go back to their original career choice: acting.

Both are very, very smart, but Madonna has way more discipline and self control.

R147 is there a link to that?

Sociopaths can easily achieve fame because they will (non-blinkingly) say and do things others will not.

R146 - No relation that I’m aware of. Rosemary was previously married to Jim Carroll (author of Basketball Diaries).

R149 it was a print interview in VOX or NME magazine

She did bring up her and Kurt seeing the Madonna Truth or Dare documentary at the infamous 1995 MTV Awards post interview, the one she crashed with Madonna and Kurt Loder before she took a dive

R148 I don't know, EVERYONE whom Madonna has ever worked with goes on and on about her insane work ethic and how she's the first one in the recording studio and the last to leave and how she's a perfectionist with every little detail

People like David Foster, Babyface, Nile Rodgers etc

Even her estranged brother in his otherwise tell all book said that Madonna was a control and 24/7 work freak who never touched drugs and was obsessed with perfection, she would go over songs and choreography on her tours over and over again , she even fired Gene Kelly because he was hired to choreograph one of her tour sections and she didn't like his ideas, she lost her shit when the current that opened up her Girlie Show tour wouldn't open up the "right way" etc.

I was watching live when she crashed that Madonna interview. It was riveting, out-of-control TV, the kind you don't often see. She was a hilarious hot mess at the height of her notoriety, and when she fell over, her legs went straight up in the air like a cartoon. Made Madge look like the Queen of England. I loved it. Kudos to Kurt for ignoring Madonna's pleas and inviting Courtney to take a seat. Let's see if I can find the clip. Ah, here it is - still a hoot.

R151 now my mind us blown that someone married Jim Carroll. There really is lid for every pot.

Shit, I'm always accidentally posting links in the "posted by" space. Anyhoo here's the clip:

R156, thanks for that. Shit was BONKERS.

I don't know...that collapse at the end looks kind of intentional.

Drugs

When she first sits down, Courtney and Madonna acknowledge they've met and chatted before, and Courtney says "but we disagree on _______". Anyone able to catch what that was?

Madonna tried to sign her to her record label, I wonder if that had something to do with it?

R160, I think Courtney tells Kurt Loder, "I disagree with her A&R guy a little bit." She's talking bout Madonna's record company, Maverick. Then they start talking about Alanis Morrisette whom Madonna had recently signed to Maverick.

Oh, I see. Now - when she's "apologizing" to Tabitha, who's the "psychopath" she's referencing, I wonder? Anyone know this backstory?

Today marks the 25th anniversary of Hole's "Live Through This."

I need to find the article, but within the past few years Courtney was asked to list her 50 obsessions and sex was number 1 and her daughter was number 2. I thought “yeah, she would totally prioritize getting laid over her own kid.”

I think the original article is gone but here’s the recap...

Madonna wanted to sign Hole to Maverick.

Courtney thought it would be so "cool" and raise her star power to snub Madonna and sign with Geffen.

Madonna signs and pushes Alanis who dominated the mid to late 90s while Courtney ended up trying to sue Geffen over something or other.

For years...years Courtney would bitch about Alanis in print and say, "that could have been me."

Love is nothing if not incredibly self-defeating.

But doesn't that make her the realest, r167? Courtney is so flawed and impulsive and that's her appeal.

It wasn't impulsive at all...it was incredibly calculated but not a smart move.

Is the new Elizabeth Moss movie about Love?

Yeah it seemed like professional jealousy when Courtney said "Alanis... there's some pipes" in the MTV altercation with Madge. Alanis had the type of sales Courtney dreamed of, by doing what Courtney did in a more prettily packaged way. But I never once saw Courtney say "that could have been me" in print... quotation marks are dangerous things.

I'm sure she was jealous, but I think she was also a bit embarrassed that in much of the media, Alanis was representing women in rock 'as a group' (even though she doesn't really have 'rock' credentials and used pop producers for Jagged Little Pill). Courtney Love had been howling poetic lyrics over 'real', UGLY guitar distortion since the late 80s, and PJ Harvey a few years later, but it must have hurt to see Alanis get so much credit for watering down the groundwork they had laid (for the record I really like Jagged Little Pill) and become a cultural icon.

People started to market them all together as these 'angry women of the 90s' or 'rock chicks of the 90s' (this was all over MTV and VH1) but the faces were all these prissier singers like Fiona Apple and Alanis and Sheryl Crowe and Natalie Imbruglia and Shirley Manson.

I remember Sandra Bernhard did a stand up bit about the whiny, bathtub-dwelling Fiona Apple / Alanis generation and praised Courtney and Bikini Kill and co.. "Give me a real loud, badass, big-titted bitch of rock and roll." I'm guessing Courtney felt the same way. In addition to being classically jealous of course.

R167 I believe Courtney was quoted as saying "The world isn't big enough for Madonna to be my boss."

I still really, really, really want Madonna and Courtney to star in a remake of "Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?"

One actual quote I remember is that is it easier to be her (Courtney), because no one wants to be her, but Madonna has lots of people wanting to be her.

R60, that’s skizoprenia

R60 She lost weight because of the metric fuck ton of Heroin she was taking. I seem to remember Michael Stipe saying " Thank God she put on weight , means she's sober."

Kurt was gorgeous underneath the stubble and dirty hair. Frances Bean inherited his amazing blue eyes.

She looks good with dark hair, I wonder why she never actually used it for a period of time. Could have gotten her less typecast acting roles.

amy winehouse would have turned into courtney love if she didnt od

R153 People like Madonna use an insane work ethic to make up for their lack of talent.

madonna is very mediocre talent wise, she is good at marketing

R181 oh God, here we go....

I actually have MORE respect for people that don't have insane amounts of talent and that work harder to get where they're at

Interesting though, how ALL Madonna's former producers go on and on about how much talent she has and what a great songwriter she is, Babyface for instance, even Streisand and Celine Dion's producer David Foster said the same thing in his autobiography about her

R174 I would have been more interested in Feud if Ryan Murphy had cast those two as Bette and Joan.

R184 like Madonna would ever do a TV show, she'll make a fortune (again) with her next tour

Courtney would, she was already on Empire

R185 I guess you're right, too much risk and too little reward for someone like Madonna. But Courtney can act. I hope she gets another chance to really show off those talents.

courtneys acting is legit,way better than madonna, who sucks at acting.

Irrelevant. The young kids don’t even know who she is

^ who cares what young kids think? They're morons.

R188 Young kids LOVE Courtney LOVE!

See what I did there?

By the way, is that her real name or a stage name?

There was a BI about her several years ago that she accosted some guy at the restaurant patio in LA and made a public scene screaming at him that "he gave her HIV". Make of that what you want. When it comes to Courtney Love, nothing would surprise me.

It is pure luck Madonna didn't get HIV, since she slept with hundreds of men in NYC when she was a struggling unknown.

R192 raises an interesting point. Perhaps she has that natural immunity to the virus.

Courtney Love is fascinating but I would avoid her like the plague in real life.

R192 you know that for a FACT,? You were there? Amazing!

Just amazing!

"I always wondered if her relationship with Edward Norton was genuine or was strictly PR."

I suspect the latter, or that they were never more than platonic close friends, simply because of the lack of drama in the "break-up." That's just not the way it goes down with Courtney.

R194 I've read biographies and seen documentaries about her. People like Camile Barbone and Steven Bray discuss how promiscuous she was. He even said she was seeing 12 other people behind his back.

I've been watching "Montage of Heck" about Cobain... He and Courtney love were both DEFINITELY molested as kids right?

R197

Why do you say that?

I recall reading Lenny Kravitz laughing about her being naked in their building's elevator.

God this site is so pathetic now. None of you know anything or have been anywhere.

As I shared many years ago: Love & Norton were real. She kept the mattress she and Kurt had shared through her time with Ed. His medicine cabinet was stocked with Viagra.

Why don't you people leave fucking rural Tennessee and move somewhere interesting? Why are you even commenting on a gossip site when you have no information or insight to share because you've never met anyone?

[quote]As I shared many years ago: Love & Norton were real.

I can confirm that Ed was looking for a film that the two could do together. He ever arranged screen tests for the two of them (I saw one tape).

[quote] I recall reading Lenny Kravitz laughing about her being naked in their building's elevator.

Kravitz and Kidman were an item, briefly.

R197 Without a shadow of a doubt. She was a stripper at 13 and he was drawing pornography at school at 7.

I mean her dad was a road manager for the Grateful Dead and legally lost custody of her for giving her LSD when she was 4 years old.

She was given away by her mother, arrested for stealing a KISS t shirt when she was 8 (put in Juvenile hall) and I think eventually was either homeless as a teen or a ward of the state.

Kurt sexually assaulted a mentally disabled girl in his teens to lose his virginity.

So both of them obviously have some issues stemming from their childhoods... It's a miracle she's still alive really. I recall on her 40th birthday she tried to kill herself and was taken to hospital on a gurney. All the papers had started writing her obituary, the NYT one actually leaked at the time.

What did Courtney Love think of PJ Harvey back in the day?

Kurt was a beautiful, greek like featured specimen on the outside,and all rot and mold on the inside.

[quote]It is pure luck Madonna didn't get HIV, since she slept with hundreds of men in NYC when she was a struggling unknown.

Wonder if she ever sucked anonymous cock through the hole in a bathroom stall in a public toilet?

I think the person she tells Tabitha is a psycho is Amanda de Cadenet

Courtney always insisted she was a virgin when she was a stripper in Alaska. It's such a crazy statement that i think it might be true.

In the Kurt & Courtney doc her father comes across as a POS. He was positive Courtney had Kurt killed.

Frances's description of Courtney's "mothering" characterizes her as having Narcissistic Personality Disorder with a twist of Borderline Personality Disorder.

I'm glad Frances is not beholden to her mother's instability and toxicity.

/203

I remember this whole sequence of events vividly. I lived in NYC and every other week she was on the local news for this stuff. I think the apartment was in Soho or the NYU area. It felt like the local press just camped out on the street waiting for her to have another public breakdown. Once she was sitting in the open window calmly playing guitar for them and THAT was on the news. This, I recall, wasn't reported as a suicide as much as an attempt to get out of going to court for being arrested for assaulting a fan, like she cut herself and faked it, but didn't, or something. She was supposed to appear in court for being arrested for assaulting a fan at an unannounced show at Don Hill's, which had been all over the covers of the papers weeks prior, and was the same day she was in the news for letting a homeless guy suck her tits at the Union Square Wendy's... aye-yi-yi it just went on and on...

R204, I remember Courtney Love (and Madonna) saying she really liked PJ Harvey's music. Kurt also listed Dry (Harvey's debut) as one of his favorite albums).

That's great to know, r212.

r213 It's nice seeing you on DL, Polly Jean.

R213, I also remember Courtney saying she didn't really consider Liz Phair in the same category as PJ Harvey, or even the riot girls (like L7, for instance). The way the quote reads, it comes off like she's saying Phair isn't good enough to be compared to those types. Which is complete BS. Sure, Phair isn't punk or avant garde like those women, but her debut was better than any of those by Harvey or the riot girls.

R203, as the only KISS fan on DL, I have to be a pain in the ass and correct you. There's no way Courtney shoplifted a KISS T-shirt when she was 8, because that would mean she did so in 1972. KISS were still working on the lineup of the original band that year, never mind being famous enough to have their own T-shirts in stores. It is literally impossible. If she was 12 when she stole the shirt, that would make more sense, as they finally broke through in 1975 and the following three years they were one of the most famous bands in the world.

Everything else about her is plausible. However, the story about Kurt molesting a "retarded" girl (as he put it in "Montage of Heck") was sort of discredited by some of his close pals as being part of the twisted persona that he rather enjoyed cultivating.

R216 thanks for the correction, I may have been misremembering the age. I think it was in the Poppy Z. Brite book about her.

[post redacted because linking to dailymail.co.uk clearly indicates that the poster is either a troll or an idiot (probably both, honestly.) Our advice is that you just ignore this poster but whatever you do, don't click on any link to this putrid rag.]

R203 Love her or hate her, she really has had the most unusual background and life.

R216 Per Wikipedia, she was arrested for shoplifting a tshirt from Woolworth's at age 14.

She was born in 1964, so in 1978 she would have been 14. Out of boredom (and procrastination) I tried to confirm if it was indeed a KISS tshirt but no luck. Per Wikipedia, confirmation might be in a 2006 The Times UK article but I cant find it on my phone; citation:

Iley, Chrissy (October 22, 2006). "Courting disaster". The Times. London.

she's disgusting - imagine how awful her stretched out vag must look - and smell

I wonder how menopause will affect her. Will she get crazier or will she calm her tits?

Why would it be stretched out? Having sex with different guys instead of one guy doesn’t magically make their dicks the size of a baby’s head or something.

Yes, Courtney was neglected by her flaky hippie parents and her revolving door of stepparents, and she was picked on at school, but once you’re grown, you need to take responsibility and get the help you need to become a decent person instead of using your bad childhood as a 007 license that gives you carte blanche to injure other people at whim.

Her mom was a Psychotherapist.

So was Elliott Smith's dad.

Starting to think Freudians shouldn't have kids.

Elliott Smith didn’t live with his dad till he was 14, so I think any formative-years damage can probably be blamed on his mom and/or stepdad.

R226 definitely the stepdad. He wrote songs about the guy that make my skin crawl. Apparently he accused the guy of sexual abuse shortly before he died.

As for Courtney according to Wikipedia "At age nine, a psychologist noted that she exhibited signs of autism."

Which...to be fair...might explain a few things.

distorted feedback guitar and screaming into the mic does not an artist make. She can't write a decent melody so she's never had a hit song.

She has a couple of platinum albums, though.

Celebrity Skin was a hit.

Also in retrospect clearly about Harvey Weinstein.

Yeah, he was the only sleazy producer Hollywood ever came up with.

R231 The only one she publicly slandered.

R232 Don't look at us! We didn't know anything at all.

I just object to the idea Celebrity Skin is "about" Harvey. I find it's about Courtney's personal journey and the pretty/ugly dichotomy Hole was working with from the beginning.

R234 I agree

As the biggest Nirvana fan ever, I have very mixed feelings about CL. Do I think she killed him? Eh. No. But I wouldn't be surprised if she did. I also fully accept he most likely offed himself.

If anyone doubts he helped her write Live Through This? I just can't believe it. Total Nirvana songs. And the fact that Pretty On the Inside and Celebrity Skin are so sonically different makes it even more apparent. She can hardly play a guitar.

I do think Live Through This is a masterpiece and whether it was Kurt or her? Job well done.

Who produced Live Through This? I heard she wrote Doll Parts before she even met Kurt, but you never know what rumors to believe.

On one hand, I think it is incredibly misogynistic to give Kurt all (0r any) credit for the album. But I don't it was much to do with her. Maybe the other co-writers, producers, musicians?

On a side note, I don't see grunge holding up well over time, It was so dark and depressing I hardly ever listen to it anymore.

LOL. A Nirvana fan is mocking Courtney's guitar skills. Courtney focused on changing Hole's sound to keep it refreshing on every album that's why "Pretty on the Inside" and "Celebrity Skin" sound different from Live Through This. All these Nirvana fans are delusional they can't even give Courtney credit on her damn album just because it's better than any Nirvana album and its lyrics didn't suck too.

I don't think Live Through This sounds anything like Nirvana.

If Live Through This sounded like Nirvana it would be a much worse album...

The only similarities I can think of are the fact that it's 'melodic' rock (see Pearl Jam, Smashing Pumpkins, Sonic Youth, and literally every other band at the time), and they use the loud-quiet-loud structure on certain songs. Which was pioneered by the Pixies, not Kurt Cobain (as he admitted).

The guitars sound different (Hole's have that crystallish, murkier, blurred sound combined with the traditional strummed chords as they had 2 guitarists, Nirvana's was more traditional clean Butch Vig distortion with big solo lines). The lyrics are much better than Kurt's moody sarcastic teenager fodder. The perspective is very female, and the songwriting is FAR less traditional than the four-chord Nirvana formula (look at the dissonant melodies and sidewinding structure on a song like 'I Think That I Would Die', the biblical chant before 'Credit in the Straight World'). It's both heavier and softer as an album than anything Nirvana released, and plays with that messy/delicate dichotomy. Courtney has used similar lyrical themes in all her work before or since (like the references to milk and motherhood).

At the time, I dismissed her as a hot mess who got to where she did because everyone was in love with her tits, mesmerized by her NPD antics.

I didn't think she was as compelling musically as Kim Deal, The Slits, PJ Harvey, Kim Gordon, and Lauryn Hill.

I'll give LTT another listen to see if it holds up.

I don’t think she has very much in common with Kim Deal or Lauryn Hill. Why not compare her to Jane’s Addiction or Sebadoh or something?

R237, I don't think the vast majority of people accusing Cobain writing the songs are being misogynist. Many of those same people listened to a lot of the indie/alternative music from that time. Think about it--when has anyone ever accused Liz Phair, PJ Harvey, Kathleen Hanna, Alanis Morissette, Tori Amos, etc. of having ghost writers? Never. Because it's not the least bit believable and anyone who made the accusation would be looked at as an idiot. With Courtney Love, it's different. She is notoriously someone who will do whatever she can to get any kind of attention to achieve stardom. She seems like the type that would steal your money when you aren't looking.

Hole was signed before Nirvana. Before she knew Cobain. She has also been rumored to be the co writer of songs like Heart shaped box. She was a homely, fat girl thrown away by her family. She worked as a stripper to support herself. Her rage and anger, her point of view, comes through clearly in Hole's music.

Cobain both overdosed on heroin and blew his brains out. He killed himself.

Love is problematic. But she's not untalented and she's not a killer.

She killed her daughter's pets. She's a super gross woman and needs to die ASAP.

Never-published details from Frances Bean's deposition in support of her temporary restraining order:

In December 2009, after a physical fight with her mother, Frances filed a restraining order against Love in LA superior court. Backed by testimony by her male nanny and others, the judge granted her request. Despondent over her relationship with Frances Bean, Courtney said, “It’s hard to understand what I did to make Frances treat me like this. We slept in the same bed till she was 14.” But the sealed deposition papers provide a look at Frances's harrowing life at the time.

• In a sworn statement to the court on December 10, 2009, Frances recalled accompanying her mother to the home of a former boyfriend, James Barber, years earlier. “She took me in a taxi to his house in the middle of the night, and from outside the house, in her bare feet, she screamed at him, threw rocks at the house, and threatened to burn his house down. His children were inside the house, but that did not stop my mother.”

• “My mother is obsessed with uncovering fraud and spends much of her day raging about the fraud that has been perpetrated on her and on me," her statement continued. "She incessantly rages about her many theories relating to the supposed incidences of 'fraud.' She slams doors, breaks things, stomps around the hotel or apartment and spends hours on the phone, yelling.”

• Love “has taken drugs for as long as I can remember. She basically exists now on...Xanax, Adderall, Sonata and Abilify, sugar and cigarettes. She rarely eats....She often falls asleep in her bed while she is smoking, and I am constantly worried that she will start a fire (which she has done at least three times) that will threaten our lives."

• According to the deposition, Love once threatened to jump off a balcony while her daughter watched.

• Frances further claimed that her cat died after getting entangled in piles of Etsy fabrics, boxes of paperwork, trash and other possessions, and that a dog died after swallowing a pile of Love’s pills. In addition to keeping Courtney away from Frances, Frances' grandmother and Frances' aunt, the restraining order also prevents Courtney from contact with Frances’s dog, Uncle Fester.

People are just stupid, though. The rumor has been around that Kurt wrote Live through this despite evidence to the contrary.

Like no one believes Madonna writes or produces her own songs, despite what all her collaborators have said. Yet they believe Gaga and Adele "right l their own song" when they work with co-writers and co-producers.

“Malibu” sounds to me like it was written by whoever was responsible for “Miss World,” “Doll Parts,” and whatever that song about Olympia was, and Kurt Cobain didn’t write “Malibu.”

R246 No ones arguing she isn't a total psycho.

Billy Corgan has stated that he wrote many of Hole's songs, and he was uncredited, but he says he forgives Courtney for it. Linda Perry wrote the songs on at least one of her most recent albums.

If you're a boyband or pop act who exists solely on looks or style, or if you have a beautiful voice, then it's expected you will have someone write your songs for you. But it you are supposedly a musician with a message to communicate, then you are expected to write your own damn songs, regardless of whether your face or voice is perfect.

R250 I know he was heavily involved but Corgan actually was on Howard Stern some time in the last two years saying that despite his help, she's very undervalued and underrated as a musician.

Most of the Linda Perry songs were shelved for that album in the end. Only 'Letter To God' remains that was written by her, and she has two other songs she co-wrote with Courtney and Micko Larkin.

I don't think she's exactly a Stevie Wonder level musician, or a Joni Mitchell style sole-songwriter. And these days she really can barely play that guitar AT ALL (I saw her live a few years ago). She's admitted she needs help with her songs. But I think she's always had a good ear, good taste, and strong musical/melodic sensibilities. As well as being an amazing lyricist. Every Hole album has been a result of her vision and ideas, from their early messy noise punk, to the poppier years.

Beyond vile what she has put Frances through. I cant even imagine.

I think Billy has basically made the claim he wrote Malibu in its entirety. He's always been a credited co-writer on that song, but it seemed to me he was, in the last couple of years, hinting at having done much more.

Frances and CL seem close again now? Will Frances ever be free?

Courtney seems way more chill now, though, in this new #MeToo / Born this Way / Love trumps hate generation. I guess she finally realized it wasn't working for her emotionally or financially to be such a bitter person. She publicly made peace with Dave Grohl, among others... and suddenly acting opportunities opened up again as she began to release new solo music. I'm sure it's still a dark place inside that mind of hers, if she's not careful... and I wonder why her comeback has stalled again. But I'm glad she's not in the headlines for negative bullshit too much anymore. I hope her memoir, if she ever releases it, addresses both the devastation of Kurt's suicide and the conspiracy theories on her life.

In R246's post, I was surprised to see Courtney was on Abilfy.

She's very smart...when she's lucid.

"I think the media and wider public give you a bit of a pass if you are truly iconic."

Who are you talking about? Surely not Courtney Love. Nothing about her has ever been "iconic?" She was/is a trashy, toxic, train wreck personality, not unlike Roseanne Barr. That was her appeal; some people considered her unabashed, insane behavior interesting. Kurt Cobain was like that; he said it was "exciting" to be with somebody who would smash a glass on a table for no reason at all.

Kurt Cobain was weak. She ran ripshod over him and took control. And he rather liked that. It was similar to John Lennon and Yoko Ono; Lennon LIKED the fact that Yoko was the boss, the one who made the decisions. John Lennon, although infamous for getting physically violent and having raging tantrums, was essentially weak emotionally. Just like Kurt Cobain was.

Courtney Love achieved some success by glomming onto people with real talent and taking what she could from them. But she have never had any real talent at all, just a pathological desire to be noticed and be seen with the right people. Although she occasionally pops up in the news by doing or saying something crazy or stupid, she's essentially over now. Good fucking riddance.

Abilfys for Schizophrenia isn't it?

Also bipolar disorder.

And delusional disorder. It sounds like she was suffering from it because she was obsessed with the "fraudsters".

Here is the video of her isolated guitar sound. I’ve always been of the opinion that the lyrics are pretty much all hers but other people have handled song composition. I could be wrong but that’s always what I’ve felt.

"She has been all at once way too much and never enough to fit in anywhere; she is the archetypal outsider, too punk for Hollywood, and too Hollywood for punk, too vulgar for the feminists, too female for conventional rock and roll. The Riot Grrrls rejected her for, well, for not being one of them. She’s too ugly to be pretty, too pretty to be ugly, too undisciplined to be intellectual and too loud to be listened to. But it is the sum of all of these things, all of her stupid mistakes, her fame-hungry vulgarity, all of her blistering intelligence, grace and charm, her pure unfiltered honesty, her impeccable taste, style and courage that makes her so unique. Primarily, she is an artist and a poet, lyrically and visually she has evoked an entire universe, combining feelings of desire and alienation with themes of bloody vanity, lust and motherhood. She created a sound and aesthetic that is uniquely and aggressively female."

R261, that sounds awful.

She's had better performances, but why is playing the guitar a big deal? Mick Jagger, Michael Stipe, Morrissey, so many other male rock stars do not play an instrument on stage. If she pantomimes now, I don't care, it doesn't take away her authentically rock and roll life she's lived or the presence she brings.

Love Skinny Little Bitch, wish she weren’t unhinged because I think she really could spill some secrets. No way she killed Cobain..she would have blabbed about it.

"She's had better performances, but why is playing the guitar a big deal?"

If you can't play the guitar (and she surely can't) then you shouldn't be up on a stage pretending to play one. Actually, Patti Smith, who also cannot play any instrument, did the same thing. She would handle a guitar on stage but wouldn't actually play it, just flail at it and dance with it. It was a theatrical prop.

Didn’t Elvis do the same thing?

Yes R267. I thought so too. Frankly, I think Courtney just wants something to do with her hands while she's onstage, and this is a bit of a rock tradition (for some performers), to play-act with an instrument.

I've seen Patti live and she played ok.

And SO ARE YOU!

In Olympia, ya, ya, ya, ya

Alanis Morrissette did have a ghost writer ... for the songs she is most famous for, anyway.

Elvis could play the guitar and piano. More so in te early years. Once he was famous the guitar was a prop.

R272 *the

Not being able to play as well as other people in your band, or well enough to be anything more than a passenger while simultaneously distracting yourself from your duties as a frontman, doesn’t mean that you can’t play well enough to write songs or accompany yourself at home. Basic proficiency isn’t that hard.

Have you guys seen 'Her Smell'? I like Elisabeth Moss, in general, but I didn't think she had enough sharp edges in this. Maybe it was the direction. I'm not sure. I'm not sure I've ever really seen her play angular.

"Not being able to play as well as other people in your band, or well enough to be anything more than a passenger while simultaneously distracting yourself from your duties as a frontman, doesn’t mean that you can’t play well enough to write songs or accompany yourself at home. "

That might be. But it doesn't apply to Courtney Love. Her songs have always been the result of getting "help" from people who actually have talent.

No matter what else she contributed to those Hole songs, I’m convinced that those are her lyrics. She’s a clear, vivid writer when she doesn’t sound like she’s having a crazed manic episode, which admittedly has been much of the time. But even then there’s usually a voice in there somewhere.

Does she have siblings?

If you want a serious answer rather than just Love bashing, OP, here’s my go at it.

First, she has made memorable music for many of us. Hole’s music from the 90s is era defining, and while Love’s voice can’t be called beautiful and isn’t the sort of female voice that makes for pop songs, she had powerhouse screaming vocals and was a strong and unique vocal performer. No one sounded like her and she embodied a very specific persona that a lot of people found riveting. So that is why she has retained fans from that era.

Depending on your perspective, if you know about her relationship with Kurt Cobain, she is either famous for it or notorious for it. There’s not a lot of in between. People’s opinions about her influence on him and the tragedy of how his life ended left people interested in the mystery, and the only place to look for answers is Courtney Love. And so that has given her a lasting mystique.

Love then morphed into a kind of ideal public figure using all that background as a foundation. She had been married to an era-defining musician who died in a dramatic way. She was an era-defining rock vocalist herself. She carries an OJesque “did she or didn’t she?” history that people love to debate, which keeps her in conversation. She was an obvious drug abuser, which then loaded her with the potential of an overdose, and people watched and waited because pop culture fans love that shit.

And then she inched toward imminent tragedy by beginning to cosmetically alter herself into someone almost unrecognizable. Again, whether that looks good or not in a conventional sense, people talk about it and it gave her staying power in popular conversation.

And then she followed the celebrity playbook and did what must be done: she reinvented herself via a whole new persona. People expected tragedy and instead she manifested Courtney Love, the conventionally attractive actress in The People vs. Larry Flint. And she could act! And she played a character who was like the rumored version of who she was, which titillates the public, as when Madonna was Evita and Lady Gaga was A Star is Born.

And then Love showed up on feature film red carpets looking stunning, and anyone familiar with her remembered the chubby, bulbous-nosed, big-chinned scream-singing junkie accused by many of murdering her husband, and here was a statuesque, classically attractive woman who was clean and composed and articulate and that is the sort of persona makeover the public lives for. It’s a literal Cinderella story.

Courtney Love is as much a lesson in pop culture currency as Madonna is, just a different kind of story.

It’s understandably not everyone’s type of music, but this song is a classic and definitive of a specific era of the 90s. I thought Hole was just noise for a while but I came to appreciate their music and also Love’s unique performance style. It’s a bit too easy to dismiss her as just the wife of Kurt Cobain without any redeeming talents of her own.

This was another big hit of its time, and in the context of the album it belongs to, it’s a meaningful song.

Here she is being an intoxicated mess and fucking with Madonna, for which I will always appreciate her.

OK, listen, yes, Barbara Walters had a dark side, but you have to give her credit for sitting down and asking questions like the ones here after 4:00. “Are you on heroin? Are you a good mother? Do you do drugs in front of your child?”

Can't believe this hasn't been posted yet.

Frances looks strikingly like both of her parents, albeit less like Courtney now after their divergent cosmetic surgeries.

Her and Frances had such similar faces before their respective plastic surgeries.

Courtney punched me out, for no reason, decades ago. I let it go just because. I actually wish her well even though she has been cruel to me throughout the years.

Courtney: I wish you good health and happiness, and extend those wishes to your beautiful daughter.

There is a God who can heal our pain, Courtney. I know you chant. I hope you find peace. I need God too.

Courtney, our dads brought us pain and suffering but our REAL FATHER IS IN HEAVEN.

[quote] Her and Frances

Oh, dear...How embarrassing for you.

[quote] Courtney, our dads brought us pain and suffering but our REAL FATHER IS IN HEAVEN

She clearly left you with a pretty severe head injury.

R289. Naw, that was Carrie, lol.

Courtney: I saw you with your dad way back in the 1970s. I remembered you. I felt for you. You were shy and sensitive. Cute, too. Peace.

Kathleen Hanna, is that ypu at R287?!!

No, I am nobody.

I imagine the list of people Courtney has punched is not short.

American has always loved women of the pole.

I hope that’s the first sentence of your unauthorized biography “Courtney Love: The Pole and the Hole.”

"And then Love showed up on feature film red carpets looking stunning, and anyone familiar with her remembered the chubby, bulbous-nosed, big-chinned scream-singing junkie accused by many of murdering her husband, and here was a statuesque, classically attractive woman who was clean and composed and articulate and that is the sort of persona makeover the public lives for. It’s a literal Cinderella story."

You are INSANE. "Statuesque, classically attractive woman, clean and composed and articulate?" "Stunning?" You are fucking NUTS.

Of course Kurt wrote most of LTT. And Billy wrote most of CS. Courtney wrote Pretty and it showed. Eh, life goes on.

She looked really good (not just for her, but objectively) during the Larry Flynt period. I don’t remember how long that lasted.

I always liked to listen to Hole more than Nirvana.

We all have taste issues. Nirvana is icon. Hole is super fun, but come one.

She looked great @ Glastonberry '99.

Only Courtney Love would write these lyrics:

"I don't do the dishes / I throw them in the crib"

Paints a great image / notion, in a sharp and memorable way.

From "Plump"

Love had her moment, R296, whether you like it or not. She was styled beautifully and she was well spoken and seemed to have gotten her act together for a little while.

yep, between 1997 and 1999, I don't think she took a bad photo. And then I remember thinking "uh-oh" when she showed up to the Golden Globes in 2000 in that garbage bag dress, acting high as fuck. And by 2003 she was no longer recognizable.

So what happened to her brilliant movie career? From what I understand she had ONE movie success; her role as the skank to end all skanks, Althea Flynt. It wasn't much of an acting stretch. Flynt had been a stripper (so had Love), was bi-sexual (so was love) and a junkie (so was Love). So essentially she was just playing a version of herself. Supposedly she was up for the role of Marla Singer in "Fight Club." The role was that of a crazy, nutty, bitchy woman who wore raggedly thrift shop clothing and smoked a lot; sounds like a perfect role for her, right? But she didn't get it, which is surprising since her boyfriend at the time was Ed Norton, who starred in the film, so that should have given her a leg up when it came to getting cast. Anyway, there was always talk of her starring in other movies, but nothing really panned out. I guess that was because she was so unpredictable and difficult to work with. The stories about her acting like a cunt are innumerable.

The radical fairie boy and I had a 3way with her. That gopro was actually a good investment, for we caught Courtney singing the tv theme to It's A Living!

I doubt she really had the discipline for a sustained movie career. She didn't really even have the discipline for a sustained music career.

Frances has her mother's eyes.

I think Frances Bean has her father's eyes. Otherwise, she looks remarkably like Courtney before all the plastic surgery, except not as unattractive. Photos of Courtney Love before all her surgeries show her to be incredibly fugly.

Taken from a concert bootleg: "You only love me 'cause you don't know about evil things yet. When you grow up and learn about evil things, it'll be all over." I dunno. It disturbs me. What do you think she meant?

Courtney as a bag lady, introduced by Debbie Harry.

Courtney has had some excellent plastic surgery. It's hard to downsize the chin because of the nerves that run through it. Also, decreasing the size of the jawbone is very difficult. Most people who have that surgery go to Asia, where it's more commonly performed.

I was also impressed when she showed up looking great, dressed by a stylist, and speaking in complete, coherent sentences without swear words. She's obviously very smart, but she knows that's not the ticket to stardom.

I've always been annoyed by her because I feel like we still don't know who she is between the drug effects and the thirsty efforts to be shocking for the sake of notoriety. Also, when someone in their 20s is in a band but doesn't know how to sing or play their instrument, it's kind of cute or creative/edgy. But when they're in their 40s or older, it's not so cute anymore.

People overlook her connections through her dad, who was a road manager to the Grateful Dead and knew a lot of people in showbiz. She's no accident or self-made woman.

Kurt wasn't the only rockstar she tried to control, before Cobain she dated Billy Corgan and tried to take over the artistic direction of the Smashing Pumpkins, but Billy wasn't having it. Surprisingly enough he still produced and wrote many song to her album Celebrity Skin. He talked about this on the Howard Stern Show a couple of years ago, according to him she was a nightmare to be around and she did to Kurt what she couldn't do it to him.

She had a plan.

R313 Her dad didn't have any contact with her after she was a child (he literally lost custody for giving her LSD), and was more of a drug connection to the Grateful Dead and other groupies and hangers-on than an actual employed road manager. He's basically a derelict groupie himself who has actually been trying to hang on to Courtney's fame and smear her reputation for monetary gain despite having nothing to do with her.

I won't deny she hung on to several men and tried to reap the benefits of association (Ed Norton, Billy Corgan, Kurt, etc.), but Hole were bigger than Nirvana at first (they were one of the first US grunge groups to impact the UK) and she built her success from the ground up. Like the similarly questionably-talented Jennifer Lopez, you can't deny her sheer hustle. You can see [online or in print] all the writings she made in her diary as a kid about how she was determined to be famous, the rejection letters from the Mickey Mouse Club (where she read a Sylvia Plath poem in her audition), receipts from her work on film sets and in plays trying to get her foot in the door.

From appearing in a Ramones video, to briefly fronting the band Faith No More, to working in the costume departments on film sets, travelling to England and finessing her way into a connection with Julian Cope, finding the address of director Alex Cox and personally mailing him a video tape to be in Sid and Nancy, scrounging her way onto Andy Warhol's TV show with an intro from Debbie Harry before she was even well known or good-looking. She stripped to make enough money to get nose jobs, instruments, press clippings, and publicise her bands, actually begun several other bands in the process (including Babes in Toyland), wrote to Kim Gordon and various alternative magazines to break through, courted German record labels like City Slang... the list goes on.

Frankly (not unlike her frenemy Madonna) she would have done ANYTHING to 'make it'. I don't think it's fair to suggest she had any nepotism or benefited from 'showbiz connections'. If she did she wouldn't have been stripping in front of white trash at Jumbo's Clown Room for a few extra $$. By the way Billy Corgan also said on Howard Stern that she was very underrated as a musician. He's also an egotistical twat (and I say this as a big Pumpkins fan) so that probably explains that he felt he was immune to whatever 'treatment' she gave Kurt (if he was then why does he still keep coming back?). Kurt and her used to make fun of him for being bald and pear-shaped.

A former boyfriend of hers said Courtney wrote out a list of things for her to do in order to make it in the music business. One of the things on the list was "make friends with Michael Stipe." She knew she would have to glom onto certain people in order to get them to help her in her quest for stardom.

R174 This is about the closest we'll get.

Round about 2000, I figured Courtney love would marry a very rich English Lord and life in a huge Georgian or Palladian pile, for at least a decade.

I have to tell this story about Courtney. My cousin is a makeup artist. His friend texted him that he was having a meeting with her. He got to her mansion. He about died. She had trash everywhere. It was so gross. This beautiful mansion, bags and bags of garbage. She throws nothing out. Hoarder. She doesn't get out of bed till about noon. He had to sit and wait for her. She has lost it or is on drugs again. Creepy.

R314 Which Ramones' video was it?

I Wanna Be Sedated.

Here she is in the background wearing a wedding dress I think (a recurring motif for her).

How recently was this, R318? I remember reading excerpts from Frances’s deposition back when she got a restraining order against Courtney. She said what you said: Courtney is a big time hoarder.

"She had trash everywhere. It was so gross. This beautiful mansion, bags and bags of garbage. "

When she was married to Cobain it was the same way. They would be living in a luxurious hotel room or in that big house that they bought and it would be filthy. I think it could be referred to as "junkie squalor." I don't know if it's hoarding exactly; I think it's just that she's a very nasty person who just leaves garbage and God knows what else lying around. I remember some book about them claiming that a maid had been called in to clean up their living quarters (she was married to Cobain at the time) ; she supposedly got a look at the filth and ran out screaming "Satan lives here!"

R322 Here's the couple's LA rental apartment post the famous duos departure. I think it's available on AirBnB.

I remember reading an interview with her (I think when she and Frances were estranged) and she talked about needing to be taught basic life skills. The things that people do for themselves everyday, she just doesn’t know how to do. I always got that impression, too. I can’t picture her cooking anything, loading a dishwasher, using a vacuum, etc. I know she doesn’t know how to drive, and she even talked about living in Los Angeles for years and years and not knowing how to drive.

It was about a year ago. He texted pics to cousin. It's so crazy to me. She wears these dresses worth thousands of dollars. But lives in a trash dump.

How does one live in junkie squalor and filth with that kind of $? Doesn't she have a housekeeper or three?

[quote] Kurt and her

Dude, c'mon...

Also, it's really not difficult to live in various stages of squalor. You just need to have interests other than cleaning and a willful blindness to that which disinterests you. Also, people without routines are immune to frauey desires for making nurturing nests. Can you imagine someone like Courtney Love ever actually wanting to be complimented on how homey her house feels?

"How does one live in junkie squalor and filth with that kind of $? Doesn't she have a housekeeper or three?"

When she was with Kurt they would hire nannies and housekeepers much like themselves, that is, druggie trash. I'm surprised poor Frances Bean survived past infancy. The poor kid had to live in filth and her nannies were druggies like her dear Mom and Dad.

Courtney was "raised" by counterculture parents, and her mom seemed to have been too self-involved to really parent her. I know Courtney's younger half siblings all turned out to be pretty successful in conventional ways; her sister is a lawyer who graduated from NYU and lives in Oregon. It seems like her mom started getting more serious about parenting with her subsequent children, but Courtney was kind of left by the wayside and resorted to being a hellion.

In any case, she is a brilliant lyricist and has churned out some great songs. I think Pretty on the Inside was 10x more interesting than anything her peers put out at that time, and Live Through This and Celebrity Skin are both lyrical masterpieces. Haters will hate, but she has a way with words.

Will she ever take her wig off onstage?

People ask Courtney questions.

i like her music and Hole's a lot. She's also one of the few successful cases of total plastic surgery on the face. I mean, she really was unfortunate looking at the beginning, but i find her beautiful in her big years, middle 90s to early 00. Great doctors, she chose.

Who knows why but she virtually stalked Carly Simon. In a two year period she sent Carly Simon over 200 postcards and letters. Then it just stopped.

After reading this I appreciate my conversations with Elizabeth Taylor even more.

I had genuinely heartfelt talks with her, and I am a 'nobody.' But that was how she rolled, if she liked you, she liked you.

My impression was that Elizabeth Taylor merely tolerated Debbie Reynolds. Debbie was no real friend to any woman, she was ultra competitive which she hid under a veneer of phony wholesomeness.

Elizabeth Taylor was genuinely kind, and its cruel of Courtney Love to refer to her as looking "ugh" in her wheelchair. As for having "bloodshot" eyes, the woman was in pain, and not cool to talk about her meds either, Courtney.

Carrie was a full-on mess in her final years. Her bad life choices finally caught up with her, and she was suicidal a year before she died.

Do I think Carrie committed suicide?

Yes. I do.

Again, she made her own choices in life and i dont blame anyone else for her demise.

But give it up. No one was happy with that crowd, they were all destroying themselves, the party was over.

It was sad to see Carrie struggle to breathe and chew her food, all due to soft tissue damage due to decades of cocaine and heroin use. Did Carrie have one real friend in her life, ever? Seems to me that all her 'friends' were her drug suppliers who contributed to her septum and upper palate disintegration. At the end she really couldn't eat anything hard enough to chew. She was close to having to eat soft foods like a baby. That was minor though, compared to being unable to breathe, or walk for more than 10 minutes. SUICIDE

Billie Lourd was on WWHL recently and it came out that she and Frances Bean were close friends (like Courtney and Carrie were).

Given their upbringings I wish the best for both of them. Neither seem totally 'stable' but at least there don't seem to be drugs involved at this point.

I need more details on this, R333. I love Courtney and Carly, but never would've thought Courtney would have any interest in her.

"Who knows why but she virtually stalked Carly Simon. In a two year period she sent Carly Simon over 200 postcards and letters. "

She "stalked" a lot of people. Anyone she thought would be of use to her she would glom onto them as much as possible.

After Kurt Cobain died she wanted Trent Reznor to be her boyfriend. She called him, she faxed him , she showed up at his hotel and beat on hid door. I heard he escaped her by jumping out a window. It made her mad that he didn't want her, and she started telling lies about their nonexistent "relationship", saying that she had become pregnant by him ("that would have been the second immaculate conception", he said). The nonexistent baby was aborted or miscarried. She dissed him in articles; she was quoted as saying "Nine Inch Nails! More like three inch nails." He said "I didn't want to be her boyfriend and now she harasses me."

When Russell Crowe was hot she came after him, too. For a while he indulged her attention (he claimed they were never lovers; I believe him). But he didn't want to be her boyfriend and that mad her mad. At some Hollywood function she ran after his limo, beating on the windows and screaming "You're a hypocrite! You're a hypocrite!" She later said she had become pregnant by him. The nonexistent baby was aborted or miscarried.

For a while she began calling Ann Wilson of Heart. Wilson said she had no idea how she got her number but she kept calling, seemingly trying to get into Wilson's good graces. She babbled on the phone, called Ann WIlson "the Queen." I guess she thought Wilson would write her some songs and sing on on album with her. Ann said she never returned the calls.

She had more luck with Ed Norton. I guess they hooked up on the set of that Larry Flynt movie. They were actually in a relationship for about three years. That certainly shows how crazy Ed Norton must be.

I can just imagine someone like Carly Simon, who has breathed rarefied air he whole life, reacting to someone like Love trying to get into her inner-circle. Did she think she was going to be invited to Martha's Vineyard to sit on porch chairs with Jackie and Carly?

I have very mixed feelings on Courtney. I think Hole was a phenomenal band, and she was one of the most interesting frontpeople I've ever seen. She's a great lyricist as well, and she's quite funny. However, I can also see why people are repulsed by the attention-seeking side of her, which comes off as extremely unpleasant. If you watch more recent interviews with her, she is a chronic name dropper, to the point that it's embarrassing.

Her music career peaked with Celebrity Skin, and today it seems the fashion world has taken her in and kept her connected. She's always at fashion events, mixing and mingling with everyone—even people the Kardashians. I would love to be a fly on the wall in those social settings to see what she's like around these people. She's extremely intelligent, but also frenetic and obnoxious. I've sometimes wondered if these people are nice to her face but whisper "look, there's crazy Courtney" when she shows up. I feel like a lot of people in the Hollywood community have probably treated her that way, and it sort of makes me sad to be honest, because she is clearly a hypersensitive, hurt person.

She can really throw a punch, I'll give her that much.

R341 = Kathleen Hanna

I found this.

R293 especially compared to the number of Dick's she sucked and/or took up the ass to get her initial success and any that followed.

Now she probably does the same for drugs

you just know she smells like cigarettes and dried flakes of menstrual blood.

Best bit from r331's link:

[quote] HARI NEF: Describe the ideal woman.

[quote] LOVE: I’ve started reading this lesbian, urban, feminist lit criticism. Virgins and demons and monsters and metallic urban lesbian vampires. Right now, I’ve become really ensorcelled by this Venusian fertility cult in the Valley. They’re beautiful women, all related to each other. [Ed note: Love is referring to the Kardashians.] I’m seeing all of these connections to poet warrior men and great jewels and all the wealth. It’s like, “Oh my god, you women did it. And you did it by doing the chores that courtesans used to do.” Fuck, it’s amazing. People insulted these women. They’ve done nothing but put these women down, and yet these women are laughing all the way to the fucking bank, as well they should. They’re geniuses. I feel like Camille Paglia should have saved it for them instead of wasting it on Madonna. No offense, Madonna, but what the fuck?

Why do so many rockstars fall in love with ugly women. Yoko, Courtney, Tameka, Tiny. The list goes on & on. That is the real mystery.

...asks the balding, obese incel with cheeto dust and jizz coating his sausage fingers…

R346

I... I love her.

R346 - That part was hilarious. She can be very funny, and I think a lot of that has to do with being an intelligent and perceptive person. I don’t think I could spend a lot of time with her, though. I think her insecurities get the best of her, hence the incessant name-dropping. If you have a person in their life who talks AT you rather than WITH you, you know how exhausting that can be.

She is incredibly intelligent and quite knowledgeable, R350. I've listened to a number of interviews with her, and her depth of music knowledge and general cultural/artistic literacy would surprise most people. I'd bet that in most social settings, she's the smartest person in the room; the problem is she also happens to be a train on fire about to derail at any turn. This is part of what makes her so fascinating.

I've noticed over the years that she tends to bring up the fact that she isn't formally educated and how she wishes she was; I think it is a weirdly a serious insecurity for her because it makes her feel like invalidated despite the fact that she's highly intelligent. I remember her saying some years back that she was desperate for Frances to go to college, have the experience, and get a higher education. She wanted her to go to Bard IIRC. It never happened, but it was very evident Courtney wanted it for Frances because she didn't have that herself.

At least now we know where all Courtney's fans (in the dozens, I'm sure) reside on the interwebs--the Datalounge!

R352 I can never tell if she's even THAT 'disliked' elsewhere on the internet, because her haters have always been VERY loud. There's a strong contingent of 90s alterna bros who never grew up and never respected any female artists (aside from maybe PJ Harvey) and of course some psychotic Kurt fans who don't have much of a grip on reality and write death threats on everything that features her name. She has plenty of reasons to be disliked but I wonder if it's just a screechingly loud minority.

When I went to her concert a few years ago it was mostly peaceful gay guys and straight women who grew up with Hole's music, and then a few younger people who were dressed very 'out there'... goth makeup, kinderwhore dresses, facial piercings, etc.

Regarding her intelligence, I loved when she gave an address in the late 90s or early 00s about the rise of Napster and digital music, record companies robbing their artists blind, the future of the industry, content providers, sponsorship, equity for artists, the destruction of traditional access, and ownership of intellectual property. She had really done her (legal) research and put everything so eloquently and concisely, she also predicted a lot of trends. I can't imagine many other 'trashy' rock singers doing the same.

Courtney has a big loyal following of teenage 4th wave feminists on Tumblr. So I wouldn't say she's that disliked, not on the internet at least.

Take it from me, she is VERY disliked by many. And the reason for that is very simple: she treats other people very, very badly. She treats other people like shit.

very interesting perspective r353. Thanks for sharing.

#353, I bet she was bitching about people stealing Nirvana music- not Hole music. Nirvana royalties are her bread and butter.

No, R357, if you actually read the article, she's very pro-democratization of music platforms, and basically breaks down how artists make pennies on the dollar while signed to record conglomerates anyway; she explicitly states she doesn't care if kids were pirating her music.

Of course, that 2000 article means nothing now

I believe at one stage, Courtney did some university courses - I think in Philosophy.

I wonder how many wigs she owns. There's that lyric "And my wig's on crooked".

She audited classes at Trinity College in Dublin, R360, while she was living there with her dad as a teenager. She also apparently took classes at Portland State studying English and philosophy, but obviously never finished. I'd imagine she took a couple classes at most. Discipline is/was not one of her strong suits.

Can't wait for the Hole reunion.

I hope they reunite, R363. She's teased it several times over the years and never delivered. She seems to be terrified of being considered an "oldies" act (ie no longer contemporary relevant). Hole has enough of a following that she could make some money touring if they got back together. Her voice is thrashed though from the years of screaming/chain-smoking. She seems to struggle singing a lot of their older hits these days.

Which is weird (the not wanting to be considered an 'oldies act') because it's not like she's been the most prolific artist since Hole. If she wants to be relevant she could always put out more music - some of her more recent songs like 'You Know My Name' and 'Killer Radio' were very decent even if I wish she'd get away from those big glittery hard rock anthem type songs and do something artsier again.

I think she made pretty big bank (without having to share it with other Hole members) and had a lot of fun touring with Lana Del Ray though. I mean she plays all those Hole songs anyway, did nice modern venues, and played to young hip audiences and got a lot of positive press (probably because of LDR's popularity). I can see why she'd rather do a deal like that than get Hole back together again.

It's not like they were all childhood best friends either... alll 4 of them were pretty miserable during their peak years for various reasons (mostly drugs).

She had a spotty history with Eric Erlandson after Hole broke up, and alleged all kinds of things in recent years (such as that he stole and sold guitars that belonged to her and Kurt). I don't know it's true, but they seem to be amicable now. I think all of them (Patty, Melissa, and Eric) would regroup in a heartbeat if she asked--they'd be stupid not to. I saw her live a few times in the past 10 years--both as "Hole" and solo, with the same backing band. She was good, but there was a synergy with the previous Hole members that was missing.

I saw her live with her recent guitarist, Micko, the English Mick Jagger-looking twink. They were good, but there was a lack of primacy to their renditions of those old Hole songs.

Micko the twink guitarist was kind of cute

I saw Micko outside smoking and talking to fans after one of her shows in 2013. He was cute in person, and I remember noticing he had a nice, round, fuckable little ass on him. I didn't talk to him because he was being mobbed by a bunch of her female fans who were taking pictures with him.

Her pussy has teeth.

Would def lick Micko's shitter

You'd be better off getting a blow job from him R371. Boy's got lips that were made to suck dick. I thought he might be gay just based on photos of him, but in interviews he comes across as 100% hetero.

This was NOT a good look for her

R72 I remember watching the Pamela roast with Courtney, and feeling so ashamed for feeling that greasy zilch Tommy Lee was hot in a trashy way and even kind of funny.

Fuck him for hitting Pammy and her cute sons, though. Courtney hates him and Nikki Sixx and I fully support her in that hateship.

Never enough. She's joining the lawsuit against UMG for lost tapes.

She's like the wind

Courtney’s assistant was a trans that was cute as a guy, but hideous as a woman. She’d show up to the salon wearing wrinkly granny dresses with Birkenstock’s and great big hairy toe knuckles heaving out the sides.

She also neglected to mention she was on Rogaine to fill in the male pattern baldness, so when they highlighted her hair it broke right off

Regain affects bleach, r377?

*rogain

Mary! ROGAINE EXCUSE ME!

Courtney is like a cockroach. A gross, nasty thing, it gets stepped on, squashed, but it still keeps moving.