Courtney Love, Rockmommy, Inspired me to Pick up a Guitar
Courtney Love turns 61 today, but I’ll never forget her at age 29, in 1994. Fresh off the release of Live Through This, and still mourning the loss of her husband Kurt Cobain and former bass player Kristen Pfaff, Courtney Love took her band Hole on the road for one of the greatest rock tours I’ve ever experienced. I was lucky to score tickets to her September 28, 1994, show, at WUST in Washington, D.C. (which is now the 9:30 Club), and will never forget the moment she strapped on her Fender electric guitar, stomped her foot on the monitor, and launched into “Plump.”
That moment was nothing short of transformational. I’d never aspired to be anything but a poet before seeing Hole for the first time at that show, and I suddenly had a new goal: to play guitar like a badass. Less than 3 months later, on Christmas, I got my first guitar, a Yamaha acoustic. While took me another year to learn “Doll Parts,” and another five years to start an all-girl punk band, today I can play all the Hole songs. I can also play most Nirvana songs, too. I’ve been employed as a guitar teacher in two different music schools.
All because of Courtney Love and that moment.
I realize the irony is that Courtney Love never makes “top 100” lists for her guitar-playing abilities. But to see Love ripping through a fast-paced riff with such ferocity inspired me so much more than watching all the men I’d seen play guitar before that. There was no Nita Strauss or Sophie Lloyd in 1994. Guitar World magazine still hired model chicks (who didn’t play guitars) to pose with instruments on magazine covers. Only a handful of metal and classic rock ladies — Lita Ford, Jennifer Batten, and Nancy Wilson — commanded the same energy. But it was Courtney Love, defiant and fierce, who wielded her guitar like a weapon.
The show was searing and unforgettable — and thank God the Internet exists, because I can relive it here (below) — the cigarette dangling from her mouth as she strapped on the guitar, and pranced across the stage in her signature Mary Jane heels and babydoll dress.
It’s wild that she’s a grandmother now, and still so fierce and defiant.
One day, I hope I join her in those ranks as well. Happy birthday to the grunge queen and iconic Girl With The Most Cake!
