The Secret History of Rock

The Day Dave Grohl Quit Nirvana

After Nevermind broke big and Kurt Cobain got deeper into drugs (and when Courtney Love was on the scene), being in Nirvana wasn’t a lot of fun.

There was a lot of internal tension, including between Kurt and the new guy, drummer Dave Grohl.  The story goes that the band was on a flight to between Seattle and Los Angeles sometime in 1993 when Dave overheard Kurt tell someone that he thought Dave was a crappy drummer.  

On the ground, Dave brought this up to bass player Krist Novoselic who kind of confirmed that Kurt preferred another drummer’s style.

That’s when he Dave called the tour manager and said “I want out.”  Dave was eventually talked into staying, but in less than a year, Kurt would be dead.

Alan Cross

is an internationally known broadcaster, interviewer, writer, consultant, blogger and speaker. In his 40+ years in the music business, Alan has interviewed the biggest names in rock, from David Bowie and U2 to Pearl Jam and the Foo Fighters. He’s also known as a musicologist and documentarian through programs like The Ongoing History of New Music.

Alan Cross has 38034 posts and counting. See all posts by Alan Cross

6 thoughts on “The Day Dave Grohl Quit Nirvana

  • No quotes, no attributions, no links..you could at least point out this random bit of trivia comes from the upcoming biography.

    Reply
  • What happened to citing sources, Alan? Without being able to offer the story's origin for all anyone knows you made it up.

    Reply
  • Sorry. It's in the new Dave Grohl bio that just hit the stores. That's a straight script from the radio show, hence no links or sources. I'll work on that.

    Reply
  • You should know better than to accuse Alan of making up this stuff. Does the long career of looking up information like this not have any merit?

    Reply
  • Don't work on anything. You're freakin Alan Cross!! Stay awesome, sir.

    Reply
  • I ended up picking up the book after searching to figure out where you got that anecdote from, so it's all good in the end 🙂

    Reply

Let us know what you think!

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.