You Know You’re Right is the first song from Nirvana‘s eponymous greatest hits album, and the last song the band recorded before Cobain‘s death in April 1994. The single was officially released on October 8 2002 via DGC Records, eight years after the song was recorded, it is the last single credited to the band.
You Know you’re Right was written by Kurt Cobain in 1993 under the title Kurt’s Tune #1, and was recorded at Robert Lang Studios in Seattle, Washington, in what would be Nirvana’s last session, in January 30, 1994. The band booked the studio for three days in which Dave Grohl and Krist Novoselic recorded their material on the first two days, in which Kurt Cobain was absent. Cobain came to the studio on the third day to record his guitar part, voice and mix it with the material that his bandmates had recorded. Cobain recorded his part using a Univox guitar, a stomp box with a Boss distortion pedal, and a 50-watt Marshall amp.
After recording You Know You’re Right they recorded another instrumental song, titled Jam After Dinner. Kurt and the band planned to continue working in Lang‘s studio after their upcoming European tour, but Cobain died just over two months later, after canceling the tour and returning to Seattle. After Cobain‘s death in April 1994, You Know You’re Right was known only from a bootlegged live version, recorded on October 23, 1993 at the Aragon Ballroom in Chicago, Illinois, and a performance by the band’s song Hole during the band’s MTV Unplugged set on February 14, 1995.
For years after Cobain‘s death, the song was known only from a bootlegged live version, recorded in October 1993 at the Aragon Ballroom in Chicago, Illinois, and from a cover by rock band Hole, fronted by Cobain‘s widow, Courtney Love. Surviving Nirvana members Dave Grohl and Krist Novoselic had intended to release the studio version on a posthumous Nirvana box set, but Love blocked its release in 2001, asserting that a recording of such “extraordinary artistic and commercial value” belonged on a cheaper, single disc compilation instead.
In September 2002, You Know You’re Right was subject to a high profile Internet leak, which led to it being put into heavy rotation on radio stations around the world, despite cease and desist orders from DGC‘s parent company Geffen Records. Shortly after, it was announced that the lawsuit between Love and Grohl and Novoselic was settled, and that the song would appear on a Nirvana greatest hits album later that year. In 2002, You Know You’re Right reached number one on both Billboard’s Mainstream Rock Tracks and Modern Rock Tracks charts.
Tracklist:
- You Know you’re Right
A music video for You Know You’re Right was released in October 2002. Directed by Chris Hafner, it features a montage of band footage, drawn mostly from live performances and interviews, occasionally edited to give the effect of the song being performed. The video peaked at number two of the Billboard Video Monitor, a chart of the most-played clips as monitored by the Nielsen Broadcast Data Systems, for the week ending October 20, 2002.
Kurt Cobain (February 20, 1967 – April 5, 1994).
