Come as You Are

The Story of Nirvana

By: Michael Azerrad

Narrated by: Kurt Loder, Michael Azerrad

Length: 11 hrs and 9 mins

Publisher's summary

“Amazingly raw and  candid . . . Come As You Are is as good as rock bios get.”—Billboard

Nirvana came out of nowhere in 1991 to sell nearly five million copies of their landmark album Nevermind, whose thunderous sound and indelible melodies embodied all the confusion, frustration, and passion of the emerging Generation X.

Come As You Are is the  close-up, intimate story of Nirvana—the only book with exclusive in-depth interviews with bandmembers Kurt Cobain, Krist Noveselic,  and Dave Grohl, as well as friends, relatives, former bandmembers, and associates—now updated to include a final chapter detailing the last year of Kurt Cobain's life, before his tragic suicide in April 1994.

©1993 Michael Azerrad (P)2019 Random House Audio

Critic reviews

“Amazingly raw and  candid . . . An unsparing and extremely honest depiction of the group’s highly tumultuous history . . . A wizardly combination of smart journalism and intelligent analysis, Come As You Are is as  good as rock bios get.”—Billboard

“Really takes you inside both the business and soul of rock ’n’ roll, providing the lurid details and lucid pop criticism, too.”—Los Angeles Times

“Come As You Are is the first [book] to comprehensively tell the band’s tale from Aberdeen, Wash., to world domination.”—Rolling Stone

Time Capsule

The majority of this audiobook consists of the chapters published by Azerrad in 1993. Listening to it today is an adjustment since it predates Cobain's passing and finishes with speculation on the coming response to In Utero. After scores of mythologizing biographies and articles over the past 25-years it's refreshing to have a book tackle Nirvana from the perspective of the moment rather than in hindsight. It does feature a thoughtful epilogue narrated by the author dealing with the suicide and outpouring of emotion that followed, but the majority of the book talks about Kurt Cobain and Nirvana in the present tense. A lot of the material is by now well worn from being retold in subsequent books, documentaries, and interviews, but Azerrad is a talented writer who makes band/scene histories compulsively readable (check out his excellent Our Band Could Be Your Life).

Choosing Kurt Loder to do the narration is truly inspired. It's hard to do better than have the book read by the voice of MTV News. Loder broke the news of Cobain's death and guided fans not only through the sadness of April 1994, but the entirety of the band's national rise. Loder's voice and Azerrad's prose work in unison as time capsule that made me feel like I was transported to the early-to-mid 1990s again. Great listening experience all around.

Highly recommend for Nirvana fans.

If you want to know the truth about the band this is the book to get. This book was written when Kurt was still alive so a lot of the info is coming straight from Kurt himself. There is a lot of good info in this book and is worth the read.

So much better than I expected

Come as You Are is a contemporary rock biography of Nirvana, meaning it was written in their era and not posthumously. I didn’t think it could match Heavier Than Heaven, but the access the writer had to Kurt, Dave, Kris and even Courtney, among others, really brought it to life. I didn’t learn anything I didn’t know from the other biographies and documentaries, but the way it was put together, and the vibrancy of Kurt really had an impact on me. Any Nirvana lover will love this book!

Great insight

Great insight in to the life of a band and it’s members. A reminder that all can be so fragile.

Incomplete Story

it's really great storytelling from a biographer who seems credible and actually knew Kurt. but the story ends before the Unplugged in New York album, despite saying that the book was released in 2019 because there's an added chapter where he speaks from the point of view of knowing that Kurt is now dead and he reflects on a bunch of interesting stuff. When I read a biography about Kurt Cobain, I want to hear stories about the unplugged album and learn some more insights about his last days. there was essentially none of that here.

Good read!!

I really enjoyed this book and would recommend it highly. I learned so much about Kurt and Courtney.

goodinfo good into to nirvana

worth the credit a good follow up tothe bsnd coild be your lifebook on 80s punk

Wow

It was interesting listening to this book. Being alive when all of this was going on brought up memories from everything that was going on with Nirvana. Very intense in a good way.

Well done...but...

I grew up idolizing Kurt Cobain, Layne Staley, Lanegan Cornell, Wood, the rest of the scene, but after listening to this about Kurt, I found him to be a little bit pompous and egotistical. To me, from what I gathered from this, he felt like he was the Alpha and Omega of rock and that his word was the endgame.

don't get me wrong, I still love his music, respect him as a human, but yeah, I feel he did Krist and Dave dirty, yes, he did write the songs, but who else would play drums and bass? anyone, that's the problem. Anyone would do it to "play in Nirvana" which would have gone against his standards. Nonetheless, he was still who he was, and he was a human.

Kurt Loder did a good job reading, albeit dry and a few mispronounced words, but otherwise, he did great.

its true what they say, never meet your heroes.

This was torture…gave up on it

If I wanted to fall asleep quickly, I would listen to or read this book. For someone who led a fascinating though too short life, this book is absolutely boring!!

The tone of the narration doesn't match the story

I've wanted to read/listen to this book for a while. I am finding this book hard to listen to as Kurt Loder is reading it as if it's a news report. The tone doesn't match what he is reading and this is a bit disappointing. It seems stiff and isn't flowing and I'm not able to focus on the words as I would be able to if the tone matched. I'm not sure if I will be able to finish it due to this.

Entertain Us. The story will, the narrator doesn't

The interviews and research are flawless and because this was written when the band were still going, this has something definitive about it. If you want the interviews for this book, watch About A Son which is the Cobain doc built on the audio recordings for this project.

The story of the boys is outstanding because it just was. But the narration is delivered with the energy of a grandad telling war stories in a care home between naps. I've heard this read by podcast hosts during Lockdown so I know it's possible to do it with vitality and spark.

It won't put you off purchasing. But it might make you think about returning it. This title benefits by being more balanced than the others you can read. The author isn't spinning a narrative because of a friendship with a widow, it's a title unburdened by the angle influenced by client journalism. The narrator is the author here, which means his delivery should be better because the words really are is. Indefensible really.

Great story, good book, get over the narration. It's so sleepy, that's okay coz so are you.