Montage of Heck [Deluxe Edition]

Simultaneously billed as the first Kurt Cobain solo album and the soundtrack to Brett Morgan's 2015 documentary Kurt Cobain: Montage of Heck, this mangled beast of a record is indeed both. No other records are credited to Kurt Cobain, and this album, in either its single- or double-disc edition, wouldn't exist if Morgan hadn't stumbled upon a cache of homemade cassettes when researching his film. An unflinching, intimate portrait of the young artist at work, Montage of Heck is cobbled together from home recordings, some previously leaked on Nirvana bootlegs in the '90s (mainly the Outcesticide series), that come tantalizing close to taking the form of a rough demo but are amorphous enough to be called "free form" or "experimental." Cobain made these tapes with no expectation they'd ever be heard. Based on a few, including the opening "The Yodel Song," it's likely he never considered the tape again after he pressed the stop button. Certainly, there's some historical merit in exploring early drafts, demos, and outtakes from an important figure, particularly when it comes to the handful of demos ("Clean Up Before She Comes," "Sappy," "Frances Farmer Will Have Her Revenge on Seattle") here. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine