Serving the Servant: Remembering Kurt Cobain

by Danny Goldberg

As this book is being written, the news media is filled with reports of a new “opioid crisis,” but in the realm of the arts, and especially among musicians, there has been a heroin crisis for as long as anyone alive can remember. There are various theories about why the rate of drug abuse is so high among artists and performers. One factor is that much of a performer’s professional life revolves around late nights in clubs and concert halls, at which there is no “boss” like a conventional employer. An artist who is on the road endures long, boring drives and an uneven sleep schedule, and there are emotionally disruptive contrasts between the euphoria of performing a good show and the self-hatred that comes with a bad one, and between soaking up the adoration of an applauding crowd and the loneliness of a hotel room. There is also a theory that the sensitivity that foments creativity is somehow aligned with the aspects of the brain that are prone to an excessive desire for painkillers.