All Star Band: Hole

This April on Buzznet is All Star Month, where people post about their favorite bands, actors, tv shows, movies, etc. For this All Star Month post, I thought I would enlighten you of my love for one of my favorite bands, Hole! You can ask anyone in my family, I listen to Hole constantly, annoy them by talking about Courtney Love all the time, and I am a proud owner of all four of their albums. When people talk about Courtney Love, they usually only connect her with being married to Kurt Cobain, but she was famous for much more than that.

It all started in 1989, when lead singer, Courtney Love, formed the grunge/rock band, Hole. Two years later, the band released their debut album in August of 1991 titled ‘Pretty On the Inside’. This album has a very raw and loud sound and you can really tell that Courtney poured out the pain of her troubled childhood into the album. Courtney once stated in a documentary about her life, “After all I had been through, it just felt good to scream”. I love the sound Courtney projects when she sings because it sounds nothing like the other singing voices out there.

In February of 1992, Courtney married the lead singer of Nirvana, Kurt Cobain. The band’s next album, ‘Live Through This’ was released in April of 1994. This is by far one of my favorite albums of all time. On this album, Hole had more of a soft rock. Every lyric on this album has such deep meaning, like “I want to be the girl with the most cake” to “I’ll make my bed I’ll ly in it, I’ll make my bed I’ll die in it”. The album cover of this album also amazes me because I love the meaning behind it. Courtney stated in an interview “I wanted to capture the look on a woman’s face as she’s being crowned… this sort of ecstatic, blue eyeliner running, kind of ‘I am, I am— I won! I have hemorrhoid cream under my eyes and adhesive tape on my butt, and I had to scratch and claw and make my way up, but I won Miss Congeniality!’

This album received exceptional reviews and landed the 460th spot on Rolling Stone’s Best 500 Albums of All Time. Ironically, the title of the album forshadowed the pain Courtney would be feeling in the future when four days before the release, Kurt Cobain commited suicide. In June of that year, Hole’s bassist, Kristen Pfaff passed away. This album really helped launch Hole’s career. Here are two of the music videos for ‘Live Thorugh This’.

One of the most popular songs on ‘Live Through This’ was ‘Doll Parts’ and it also had some of the most powerful lyrics.

‘Miss World’ set the whole theme of the album and I love how the music video is like the movie Carrie.

In September of 1998, Hole released their third album ‘Celebrity Skin’. Many people had the idea that Courtney was going to write the songs aimed at Kurt and portray the desperate widow figure, but they were completely worng. Instead, this album could be described as a love letter to Hollywood, telling them that she will survive through everything she had been through.This album was nominated for four Grammys. A hit song on this album was ‘Celebrity Skin’

Here is the music video for ‘Celebrity Skin’.

Overall, in Hole’s career, there have been fifteen members that have come and gone, but one of my favorite members that inspires me was the bassist during part of ‘Live Through This’ and ‘Celebrity Skin’. She also played for The Smashing Pumpkins. She is Melissa Auf Der Maur. Melissa has had an outstanding career, and the reason I have always admired her is because she never lets being a woman in rock and roll intimidate her. All women should watch this inspiring interview she did on the subject. Melissa also has a great solo career with two albums.

After years of not making an album, Hole, in 2010, released their album, ‘Nobodys Daughter’ which had more of a soft sound and the lyrics also showed Courtneys pain. For me, this album was a perfect come back for Hole!

Here is one of my favorite music videos for the song ‘Samantha’.

Courntey Love is one of my role models because she has been through so many horrible tragedies in her life, but she has always overcome them all. In my opinion, she is the queen of grunge. I can’t even explain how much Hole’s music has impacted me through their touching lyrics. There is always a song I can listen to that relates to the situation I’m in. Hole will always be one of my favorite bands that I will always love. Here is a playlist of all of my favorite songs by Hole.

XoXo,

Katelyn