Nirvana bassist Krist Novoselic discussed Kurt Cobain’s lyrics in a new Bass Player interview.
“My approach was making things bigger and louder, because we were a trio. We had an intense singer and heavy drums, and I had to figure out how to fill things out a little. I have a few tricks that I used over and over, like I’m some kind of hack musician, but they always work. One of them is that there’s a time to follow the guitar riff, but the bass is not just a bastard stepchild of the guitar, and as a bass player you have to know that.
The kick drum is the boss and you have to follow it, but then you can riff off the guitar riff, or riff off the vocal melody, which a lot of times is the hook. And then if you can find the bridge between the guitar riff and the vocal melody and the rhythm of the kick, then you can pull something off that brings another dimension to the music that isn’t just the bottom end of the guitar. That’s one of my tips: Listen to the vocals.
If you can riff off the vocals, then you’re on to something. I was lucky because I had Kurt, who was a great lyricist and he was great at writing melodies, so it made doing that easy for me. And then I had Dave on drums and he made the rhythm part stick. I just had to find my place between the two of them within the song.”
