Courtney Love and Melissa Auf der Maur to Play Together Again in 2026
Nineties sirens Courtney Love and Melissa Auf der Maur, whose band Hole changed my life, will play music together in 2026, Love said last week, while tempering the buzz around a full-scale Hole reunion.
However, level of collaboration between the rocker moms — when? where? how? — is still shrouded in mystery, between Love’s new album (and documentary) and Auf der Maur days away from releasing her much-awaited memoir, Even the Good Girls Will Cry, on March 17th (her birthday). The former bandmates turned friends teased a reunion earlier this month on Instagram, shortly after Love rejoined instagram, sending Gen X grunge-lovers into a bit of a tizzy.
Love posted a video of former Hole bassist Melissa Auf der Maur, set to Hole’s 1999 hit “Malibu.” (off Celebrity Skin), with the caption: “So do we tell the kids about the tour @xmadmx ?” Auf der Maur responded in the comments: “it starts with eternal love ….”
We’re so stoked for a summer of Love (and Auf der Maur), however it looks! In the meantime, I plan to spend next Tuesday night absorbing every last chapter in what will be the greatest binge read of a rock memoir.
If this recent New York Times writeup is any indication, Auf der Maur has some serious nineties tea to spill (she’s also a delightful human — I met her at the Black Cat in D.C., in the early 2000s). Her story of rising from obscurity as an art student to Billy Corgan’s muse to Love’s sidekick is a fascinating one and brings me right back to September 1994, when I first saw Hole on their Live Through This tour. As everyone knows, Kurt Cobain’s suicide followed by Hole bassist Kristin Pfaff’s heroin overdose fueled Love’s cathartic, emotional live shows, and Auf der Maur’s presence felt like the yang to Love’s yin — the sunny balance that filled out the band in new and exciting ways.
While Auf der Maur only recorded one Hole album with Love and founding guitarist Eric Erlandson — 1998’s Celebrity Skin — she was exactly what Hole needed, with her pretty, vocal harmonies and low-key persona.
The years that followed — music, marriage, and motherhood — have given her much needed perspective. I can’t wait to read more about it in her own words.
[SEE RELATED: Courtney Love, Rockmommy, Inspired me to Pick up a Guitar]
