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Kurt Donald Cobain (pronounced
/koʊbeɪn/, /kʌbeɪn/; February 20, 1967 –
c. April 5, 1994) was an American songwriter and
musician, best known as the
lead singer and
guitarist of the
rock band
Nirvana.
With the lead single "
Smells Like Teen Spirit" from Nirvana's second album
Nevermind (1991), Nirvana entered into the mainstream, popularizing a subgenre of
alternative rock called
grunge. Other Seattle grunge bands such as
Alice in Chains,
Pearl Jam, and
Soundgarden also gained wider audiences, and as a result, alternative rock became a dominant genre on radio and music television in the United States during the early-to-middle 1990s. Nirvana became considered as the "flagship band" of "
Generation X", and Cobain, as its frontman, found himself anointed by the media as the generation's "spokesman."
[Azerrad, Michael. "Inside the Heart and Mind of Nirvana." Rolling Stone. April 16, 1992.] Cobain was uncomfortable with the attention and placed his focus on the band's music, believing the band's message and artistic vision to have been misinterpreted by the public, challenging the band's audience with its third studio album
In Utero (1993).