There's an interesting and timely bit from The Observer's readers' editor about how the media cover the anniversary of Kurt Cobain's death:

Samaritans remind us that suicide accounts for more deaths than road traffic accidents, particularly in people under the age of 35. They have done much to make the media aware of the effect of insensitive reporting, producing very clear guidelines that state: "There may be a higher risk of unintentionally glamorising suicide in the case of celebrities or high-profile individuals... Various characteristics of the reporting of suicide are thought to increase the risk of imitative or 'copycat' behaviour. These include: information about the method of suicide, prominent or repetitive reporting, or where the person involved is a celebrity. Young people are particularly vulnerable to 'copycat' suicides. Research shows they are the group most likely to be influenced by the media."

Media references to Cobain's suicide certainly come under the heading of repetitive: a database search of all national newspapers reveals that 237 pieces have been published in the past year, which, coupled with similar articles in magazines and online, reinforce the myths that surround young death and help create such questionable phenomena as the 27 Club – an online litany of musicians who have died, either by their own hand, accidentally or as murder victims, at the age of 27. They include Brian Jones, Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin and Jim Morrison and, most recently, Amy Winehouse.

Oh, Sarah Beeney. Oh, Martin off of Homes Under The Hammer. You think you know how to add value to property, but have you ever managed to make a $67,000 house increase in value to $500,000?

All you need to do is have Kurt Cobain grow up there. And maybe update the tired carpet in second bedroom.

Cobain's mother is selling the place, mattress and all:

"We've decided to sell the home to create a legacy for Kurt, and yes, there are some mixed feelings since we have all loved the home and it carries so many great memories," Cobain's sister, Kim Cobain, said in an emailed statement.

"But our family has moved on from Washington, and (we) feel it's time to let go of the home."

Martin off Homes Under The Hammer writes: Of course, not every developer can have Kurt Cobain in the attic bedroom adding value, but later in the programme we'll be meeting Kevin and Keveena to see if their plan of installing Eddie Vedder in the family bathroom has helped them make a profit on their Camberley terrace house."

Bruce Pavitt wanted to recall how he could see the end coming for Nirvana. Which is fine, he was running their label. But could he have chosen his words more carefully?:

Nirvana were "pretty lifeless" at the end of their career.

The 'Heart Shaped Box' band's live shows were known for being past paced, ferocious and full of energy, but by Christmas 1993 - four months before frontman Kurt Cobain committed suicide - their former record label boss Bruce Pavitt could see signs of burnout.

Pretty lifeless maybe not the words you want to use about a band which ended when their leader killed himself.

It looks like the Magic Kingdom has finally reached the early 90s:

Yes, that's Grunge Mickey.

[via Stereogum]

Courtney Love has left the management of End Of Music, which controls the exploitation of Kurt Cobain's image, in return for a massive loan from Frances Bean Cobain's trust fund.

You know, this sort of seven-figure deal over who signs-off the crappy tshirt designs was probably what Kurt was hoping would be the final outcome when he went off to the conservatory that day.

Yikes - has Courtney Love really told that woman off the annoying Marks And Spencer advert that she can do a Nirvana song? Gordon's Lucy Connolly says so:

X Factor Janet Devlin’s Nirvana go-ahead

Except then he admits that the story is really "Courtney does @tweet":

WILD rocker Courtney Love has come up with a plan to help Janet Devlin win The X Factor – by letting her sing a Nirvana track.

The widow of the grunge band's frontman Kurt Cobain — whose ancestors are from the same part of County Tyrone as flame-haired Janet — tweeted Simon Cowell yesterday to suggest the idea.

The Hole singer posted: "@SimonCowell you want some Nirvana songs? @JanetJealousy is from same town as Kurt? I have the perfect idea for that, call me babe."

I'd have thought that basing a news story on a tweet from Courtney would be like pitching a tent on Brighton beach - uncomfortable to begin with and certain to be washed out to sea before the night was out.

Gordon picks up some claims from a bloke with a book to sell:

SINGER COURTNEY LOVE wanted to snort the ashes of husband KURT COBAIN, a new book claims.

Author NICK STRAUSS says Love had the idea shortly after the NIRVANA frontman was cremated following his shotgun suicide.

He alleges Love, 46, who has battled drugs, offered him a bag of ashes at her Los Angeles home and told him: "Say Hi to Kurt. Too bad you don't do coke, otherwise I'd suggest taking a straw to it."

Is it just me, or does this sound less like an actual invite to snort Kurt's ashes, and more like a slightly macabre joke?

The worst thing, though, is that even if it happened, this sounds like a bit of a weak anecdote to make the key plank of a book about Courtney Love. This is Courtney Love, dammit, who runs up and down the street naked save for a duck costume, and who seizes every new form of electronic communication to spread claims and libels. And the best you have is a weak joke about how ashes look like coke?

Kurt Cobain wrote an angry letter to MTV, complaining about how it strangled creativity. He never sent it.

"Dear Empty TV/ the entity of all Corporate / GODS / We will survive without you/ easily - - the / oldschool is going / DOWN FAST/ my lifes Dedication/ is Now to Do Nothing/ But SLAG something / Kurdt Kobaineee professional Rock musician."

With no apparent sense of either irony or shame, it's now turned up in an auction. Rage repackaged for the highest bidder.

In a wonderful piece of misguided stunt casting, Robert Pattinson has been lined up (apparently) to be Kurt Cobain in the biopic of his life. What an insane suggestion. Who would be so bats as to think that works?

R-Patz has been in regular contact with Kurt's widow COURTNEY LOVE, who has been handed a key role in the production by bosses at Universal Pictures.

The HOLE singer wanted R-Patz as Kurt and SCARLETT JOHANSSON to portray her. My graphics team have mocked up Rob and Scarlett as the hellraising pair.

Maybe there is more to Pattinson than mumbling and taking his shirt off, but it seems hard to believe it. Perhaps Love has added the direction 'Kurt squints a little'.

For once, I think Gordon's analysis might be spot-on:

I have to say, the 14-year-old in me was a little bit sick when I found out a Twilight vampire was playing a rock idol.

But at least it's an improvement on the man lined up to play Kurt in the West End - Footballers' Wives star GARY LUCY.

It's a bit like the Comic Strip's Strike, only with Alexei Sayle's miner encouraging the drafting in of the likes of Meryl Streep.

[UPDATE: Thank you to the young person who pointed out that I'd mistakenly called Robert Pattinson Robin. I'm afraid the other error contained in this article - the suggestion that Pattinson is an actor capable of portraying Kurt Cobain is beyond my powers to update.]

Admittedly, there'd be no reason why a clean-cut actor couldn't go on stage and make a convincing job of playing Kurt Cobain.

But Gary Lucy is hardly an actor, is he?

The star said: "Playing Kurt Cobain would be far removed from the glitz and glamour of doing Dancing On Ice."

You think, Gary?

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Inspiration is always a good thing. Nice to have something to aim for. And so why should we all react with stifled giggles when NME announces where Kasabian's ambitions lay?

Kasabian have said their next album will draw on Nirvana and Pink Floyd as influences.

Apparently Serge has had a go at that RockStar game thingy and reckons that he's mastered the Cobain bloke doing the Bon Jovi song, so they're all set.

Seriously: Pink Floyd and Nirvana? Come on, you're struggling with sounding a bit like a Hard Fi tribute act. Ambition is great, but let's be a bit realistic.

"Sergio Pizzorno has got a body of songs that are sounding great," frontman Tom Meighan told BBC 6Music. "There’s one that sounds like Nirvana, which is really grungy, a big riff."

And... the Pink Floyd "influence"?

"It’s nothing like what we’ve done on this record, it’s really old school grunge. There’s a lot of Pink Floyd, 'Dark Side Of The Moon', piano-based songs at the minute."

Note the cautious use of the phrase "at the minute", as if aware that a back door must be left ajar to allow an embarrassed 'well, we took all of them off in the end' should the collective ear of the nation hear the record and say "wasn't there meant to be some Pink Floyd going on here? Because all I can hear is Keane?"

Although Courtney Love's predicted climbdown by Activision has yet to appear, more grumbling about the clumsy use of Kurt Cobain turns up. This time, Bon Jovi Jon out of the Jon Bon Jovi Band is saying he thinks it stinks, too:

"I don't know that I would have wanted it either," Jon Bon Jovi told the BBC.

"To hear someone else's voice coming out of a cartoon version of me? I don't know. It sounds a little forced."

Okay, "a little forced" rather than "stinks", but it's the same sort of thing.

However, Jon does offer something that leans towards collaborating Courtney's claims that she didn't know how the characters - by which I mean 'real people' - would be used in the game:

"I had the paperwork, they wanted me to be on that game and I just passed," he said.

"But no-one even broached the subject with me that I would be singing other people's stuff. I don't know how I would have reacted to that. I don't know that I would have wanted it either."

The paperwork probably mentioned it; and - had you been going ahead and signing - 'how will this avatar be used' would be an essential question to ask. But it doesn't look like Activision were being upfront with the information.

Last night, we saw how Courtney Love insisted she couldn't have burned through all the money that Kurt earns ("all the money that she earns") because she's frugal and shit.

I'm not sure if spending over $10,000 a month on security is actually a sign of not being that good at avoiding pissing away your money, or the claimed non-payment of the bill shows that she is actually quite canny. I'm not sure I can wade through the Tweets that will attempt to explain the situation.

In other Courtney news, unless I've missed it, Activision don't seem to have fulfilled her prediction of a withdrawal of the cartoon Kurt video game.

No, really, there was a line in the suicide note which said "my only regret is that I die before I get the chance to take part in a tribute to Bon Jovi; if only there was still a way". Genuine fact:



Everett True responds to this delightful desecration:

Um. Grohl and Love sanctioned this one for the new Guitar Hero. So respect due to Grohl and Love then. Fucking corporate cock-sucking memory-destroying fret-wanking MTV-supporting fame-chasing money-grabbing grave-turning publicity-loving vacuous spoiled jaded cunting rock whores.

Apart from the question of whether it should have been attempted at all, there's a wider question of if the people who made this confused Kurt Cobain with Fred Durst.

That noise? That's Yoko ringing up the Rock Band people with a great idea for next year...

Or, at least, if Kurt hadn't, specifically, wanted there to be a glitzy double-disc 20th anniversary reissue of Bleach, he'd at the very least have mentioned that in his suicide note, wouldn't he?

A lovely idea of an unofficial park remembering Kurt Cobain has run in to trouble, as the man behind it, Tori Kovach, has selected eight Cobain quotes he'd like to display in the park. And one of them has a rude word in.

The Associated Press explains:

Aberdeen city officials are upset about the quote that says, "Drugs are bad for you. They will f--- you up." The marker contains the full F-word.

There's an interesting philosophical digression here, as to if it's accurate to say the quote says something, and then not publish what the quote actually says. But let's leave that aside.

The council will decide if such profanity should be allowed to be seen in cold, hard granite, or if it should have them removed and invite passers-by to add the fuck back in.

Local drug dealers are also said to be upset. One told us: "Hey, how am I meant to be selling my shit down here with a big sign saying they fuck you up? It's like forcing McDonalds to put a sign up saying 'will make you fat', or Pizza Hut stick a label on their boxes saying 'won't actually fill the hole in your life, you know'. Couldn't they at least tone it down? 'Some drugs might be bad for you. They might mess you up, if you're not careful and buy from an undesirable source, like that Sammy The Fish down on the Civic Square, because I know for a fact what he says is E is actually ex-lax cut with Vim.' Something like that, I could maybe live with."

Courtney Love is about to start the massive task of getting back the millions of dollars she reckons have been stolen from her. The money Kurt earned, obviously. Her lawyer is already busily overselling the case to any gossip column in the US with a vague grasp of contempt of court:

"I have never seen such greed and moral turpitude. This case is going to make Bernard Madoff look warm and fuzzy," Love's lawyer, Rhonda J. Holmes, of Gordon & Holmes in San Diego, told Page Six.

"We will be filing civil cases . . . within the next 30 days. There are many, many millions missing. We've only been able to track down $30 million, but there is more. And then there is the real estate."

Civil cases? But surely, m'learned friend, if this moral turpitude at its most, uh, turpitudinous, shouldn't the boys in blue be involved? First, obviously?

This isn't, of course, about the money. It's the principle. Indeed, Holmes has already pledged the real estate to a good cause:

"There is now a web of homes which were bought, flipped and used to launder money -- up to $500 million worth," Holmes said. "Any of the property we can get back will be donated to people who have lost their homes in foreclosures."

How's that going to work, then? In February alone, there were over a quarter of a million foreclosures. Either those homes have got a shit load of bathrooms, or it's going to get quite crowded each morning in them.

And, since the people buying the alleged money-laundering flipped houses are, themselves, presumably victims in this mess, is it really a good deed to kick them out just to install some other innocent victims in there? Isn't trying to somehow confuse Love's dereliction of her own duty with the financial crisis in the US a somewhat cynical move?

The big question, of course, does come back to 'shouldn't Courtney have noticed all this going on'? Do you have an explanation, Mr. Holmes:

"Courtney noticed the money was gone when there wasn't any left. It's no secret she struggled with substance-abuse issues, but in the last year she's taken a more serious approach to sobriety and started noticing things were wrong. She hired private investigators, accountants and me."

Regular readers of Courtney's MySpace and Twitter accounts will have seen the last year's worth of a more serious, sober Courtney, and can only wonder at what the years previous to that must have been like.

But, yes, the authorities will get involved, eventually:

"We are also working with local and federal authorities," Holmes said. "When Mr. Cobain died in 1994, he left his enormously wealthy estate behind for the benefit of his mother, two sisters, a brother, his wife and young daughter. Many of those [involved with] the estate's coffers mismanaged, stole and outright looted it shamelessly."

And, you know, you can let that sort of thing go on for fifteen years, but sooner or later you've just got to know when to say when, right?

The gentle ruffle of a PR email brings news of an attempt to cash-in on Kurt Cobain's, erm, 42nd birthday:

On Friday, February 20th, former Nirvana frontman Kurt Cobain would have turned 42. The iconic alternative-rock legend, who died tragically in 1994, was an innovator and trendsetter, not just musically but stylistically as well, wearing a succession of thrift-store, punk-rock or homemade T-shirts. This year you can remember Cobain wearing one of the singular, striking shirts he incorporated into his own unique sense of fashion. Choose between Kurt's ironic "Grunge is Dead" shirt; his "Hi, How Are You," shirt sporting a design from outside musician Daniel Johnston; his vintage "Motorbike" shirt, sporting the slogan "Live to Ride, Ride to Live"; his "Sounds" shirt, featuring the logo from the magazine of the same name; and his "Olympia Beer" shirt, a nod to one of the music scenes that ultimately fostered Nirvana.

Hopefully, the puzzlement at why anyone would start to treat a 42nd birthday like a bicentenary would have stopped most people reading on to through the rest of it.

The thicket of 'why not imitate his homemade-thrift shop look by, erm buying a t-shirt from a tshirt company' would probably have proved enough of a logical conundrum to claim other travellers moving wearily through the release.

Any who survived would have perished, at their own hands, at the description of Daniel Johnston as an "outside musician". Isn't an outside musician a busker?

Still, there you have it: Pay tribute to a man with a unique look by dressing like you've chosen to go as him to a fancy dress party.

Whatever else you can say about that artist's plans to smoke Kurt Cobain, she's managed to smoke out something else.

Like a denial that his ashes were ever taken in the first place:

Love's representative Alan Nierob has now retracted Love's previous comments, claiming Cobain's remains "were never taken" and that the story of the burglary had been "erroneously reported", according to Gigwise.com.

To be fair, anyone who believes anything they read in Courtney Love's blog probably doesn't bother with the news and just waits for the stories to turn up on Wikipedia, but you've got to love the diplomatic way that Nierob attempts to frame an admission that his employer wasn't exactly posting live from reality the day she told that story? It's not that Love just stuck a bunch of horsefeathers on the internet, it was that the phrase "I can't believe anyone would take Kurt's ashes from me" was erroneously reported by other people.

It's not a million miles from the Republican defence of Sarah Palin's inability to answer a question without making a hash of things as suggesting that the fault lay with the question, and not with the candidate.