No Kurt Cobain Solo Tracks Says Butch Vig

Producer Butch Vig denies rumours of unheard material, saying Nirvana mainman Kurt Cobain was concentrating on Hole before he shot himself.

Nirvana producer Butch Vig says rumours that Kurt Cobain was working on a solo album before his suicide are not true, and no unheard recordings of the Nirvana mainman exist.

Speculation increased recently when former Hole guitarist Eric Erlandson stated he’d heard “raw, rough acoustic” tracks had been laid down and added: “There is stuff that has not been put out.”

But Vig insists Cobain didn’t make any such recordings and was far more interested in working with wife Courtney Love’s outfit Hole in the months before he shot himself in 1994.

The producer tells NME: “He was working on songs, but they were just in his head. He might have just played some songs to Eric.

“Around that time period he only wanted to talk about Courtney’s album. I never heard any of his new songs.”

Vig was behind the desk for Nirvana’s genre-smashing album Nevermind and he last year reunited with Dave Grohl and Krist Novoselic to produce the Foo Fighters’ Wasting Light album. The three recently collaborated again on a documentary about Sound City, the LA studios where Nevermind was recorded.

He admits he didn’t like talking about Nirvana for years following Cobain’s death, explaining: “I got tired of answering questions. Then time goes by and I started working with Dave and Krist about getting the box set together, and you learn to appreciate it again.

“You sort of have a different take on it, and we’re all so immensely proud and lucky to have made that record.”