Interviewer: “You consulted on Gus Van Sant’s film ‘Last Days’ and advised Michael Pitt, who delivered a spot-on impersonation of your friend Kurt Cobain. Did working on the film help sew up some things for you?”
Thurston Moore:“Well, Kurt’s hardly the only person I’ve known through the years who’s gone by the wayside. I do find it almost hard to believe that he was even there, because it was such a short period of time. His ascendancy was so quick — all of a sudden everybody knew this person that we knew. And then all of a sudden it was over. It’s funny you mention it, because I actually just received this. [He digs through his hard drive and locates this Charles Peterson photograph of Cobain backstage with Kim Gordon.] I was looking at this the other day. He had a really deep soul. And even though he was just another one of the gang, everyone knew that he had just something a little extra going on.”
Interviewer: “Just look at his face — he’s really paying attention to Kim.”
Thurston Moore: “He respected her a lot. And he really adored her. I knew Kurt, but it wasn’t that intimate a relationship. I mean, we spent a lot of time together when we were on tour and we kept connected, but I think it [his death] was a lot more emotional for her. My thing with Kurt was a couple of goofy guys jumping around with each other, whereas they had something deeper. I remember having to make that phone call to Kim. She was doing a photo-shoot or something. And she was pregnant, and it was heavy — it was very, very heavy. I just remember going out and walking around…going to Manhattan, this record and video store ‘Kim’s Underground’ on Bleecker Street in a daze. Two or three hours after I got the call, the guy behind the counter at Kim’s got on the phone, and I could hear him saying, “Are you kidding me?” I could hear him getting the information. And it was just like, I gotta get out of here. And there was nowhere I could go.”
Jerome Gould Illustration.
Cover of a booklet for the Floor Corporation Ltd. (gas processing) From Graphis Annual 1961/62.
