MTV Unplugged in New York [Live]

Editorial Reviews
Amazon.com essential recording
The last Nirvana collection recorded before the untimely death of Kurt Cobain, Unplugged caught many by surprise with its stripped down, neo-acoustic offerings with a bridled fury. When Cobain sings, "I swear I don't have a gun, I don't have a gun" with clenched teeth (instead of an open howl) and when the haunting strains of "About a Girl"--from their earliest LP--chills even with quieted guitars, you discover a new appreciation for the nuances of one of the greatest bands of recent times. Highlights include covers of three Meat Puppets tracks (featuring special guests Curt and Kris Kirkwood of that influential "college rock" band), the weepy cello on the Vaselines' "Jesus Doesn't Want Me for a Sunbeam," and their cover of David Bowie's "The Man Who Sold the World." --Lorry Fleming --This text refers to the Audio CD edition.

Album Description
120 gram vinyl/original artwork. --This text refers to the LP Record edition.

Tracks:

About A Girl
Come As You Are
Jesus Doesn't Want Me For A Sunbeam
The Man Who Sold The World
Pennyroyal Tea
Dumb
Polly
On A Plain
Something In The Way
Plateau
Oh Me
Lake Of Fire
All Apologies
Where Did You Sleep Last Night

Amazon.com essential recording

The last Nirvana collection recorded before the untimely death of Kurt Cobain, Unplugged caught many by surprise with its stripped down, neo-acoustic offerings with a bridled fury. When Cobain sings, "I swear I don't have a gun, I don't have a gun" with clenched teeth (instead of an open howl) and when the haunting strains of "About a Girl"--from their earliest LP--chills even with quieted guitars, you discover a new appreciation for the nuances of one of the greatest bands of recent times. Highlights include covers of three Meat Puppets tracks (featuring special guests Curt and Kris Kirkwood of that influential "college rock" band), the weepy cello on the Vaselines' "Jesus Doesn't Want Me for a Sunbeam," and their cover of David Bowie's "The Man Who Sold the World." --Lorry Fleming

Album Description

120 gram vinyl/original artwork.

Customer Reviews:

The most classic Nirvana show.......2007-07-18

This CD is about the first MTV Unplugged, that was really unplugged, really acoustic, it was live, you can see the history in rock music changes with this show, the actual MTV unplugged are comercial and taped. If you like rock and Nirvana you must have this album

Nirvana's Defining Moment.......2007-06-18

This is the album that made me a Nirvana fan for life. I had listened to the radio hits of Nevermind...and bought In Utero for Heart Shaped Box and All Apologies, but this is the album that really made me realize the greatness of this band. With the removal of the loud guitars and distortion, you can hear the greatness in Nirvana's songs and the passion in Cobain's voice. Yes, the songs are not always played perfectly and sometimes Cobain is off pitch, but that is what makes this performance so real and genuine. Let's not forget this was not a studio performance but a concert setting. On top of that, unlike most other bands on MTV Unplugged, Nirvana did every song with just one take. About A Girl is a beautiful Beatleesque pop song, Pennyroyal Tea proves to be a beautiful song minus the loud raging guitars, and All Apoligies is haunting and brilliant (I must say I like the In Utero version better however.) What also makes this album great is the covers from David Bowie's "The Man Who Sold the World" to the incredable Leadbelly cover of "Where Did You Sleep Last Night" The end of this song is one of the best performances I have ever heard by an artist. The passion and angst is there...and it's not fake for the TV cameras but truely Cobain's dark inner pain. This is what makes this album great. The passion and thought put in to each and every song by Kurt Cobain. This is not to take away from the rest of the band who do a great job keeping each and every song going, including to addition of cello and accordian to some of the songs.

Nirvana-MTV Unplugged in New York (an unbiased review).......2007-06-17

First, let me start off by saying that this is an unbiased review. I'm not a fan of the band nor do I dislike the band. I'm a fan of all types of music. I also won't be comparing this album to any other albums from the band. This review will be strictly on this particular album. Now onto the review.

Here's a rundown of the songs (as well as my rating for each song):

About a Girl-4.5/5
Come As You Are-4.5/5
Jesus Doesn't Want Me For A Sunbeam-3/5
The Man Who Sold the World-3.5/5
Pennyroyal Tea-2.5/5
Dumb-4/5
Polly-4/5
On a Plain-3.5/5
Something in the Way-4/5
Plateau-3/5
Oh Me-3.5/5
Land of Fire-3/5
All Apologies-4.5/5
Where Did You Sleep Last Night-4/5

Picture this: Kurt Kobain, 3 acoustic guitars, a set of drums, and a cello. What could me more perfect than that? This album is a set of 14 songs from Nirvana's second album all played acoustically. The only thing better than a greatest hits album is an album with live, acoustic music from the band. Here's where the band hit (and missed) with this album.

So what's to like about this album? First, aside from a few pitchy spots here and there, Kobain's vocals are top notch and send chills down my spine. I personally prefer his recorded vocals to his live vocals but I'm sure a lot of people out there love the rawness of his voice when he sings live. The way he sings shows a ton of emotion as though each word that comes out of his mouth means the world to him yet he remains mellow with an "I don't care about anything" type of attitude.

Second, although the grungy sound is gone due to the lack of electric guitars, the hardness is still there in my eyes. With 3 guitars going at the same time, the band is able to achieve a great mixture of sounds while still maintaining the "you can feel it in your stomach", loud, hard, beats. "Come As You Are" doesn't lose its great intro or guitar solo. Kurt just plugs in his acoustic guitar and the sound is just like the original. Another stand out song in terms of guitar work is "The Man Who Sold the World". It's great to hear a band that can not only play their songs acoustically but can also make them sound so complex, giving a whole new sound to their songs. Equally impressive is drummer Dave Grohl's background vocals.

Third, as mentioned above, the band uses a cellist alongside their guitars and drums. Although it's sometimes hard to miss, you can certainly hear it in "All Apologies". This helps to create a more bluesy sound with some of the songs.

Fourth, those who don't know much about Nirvana's music (myself included) will be thrilled to see that "About a Girl", "Come As You Are", and "All Apologies" are on this album. You also may recognize "Dumb" and "Polly". All of these songs are done superbly. And you will be pleasantly surprised that there are a lot of great songs on this album that you haven't heard of. From the haunting "Something in the Way" and "Oh Me" to the incredibly sad "Where Did You Sleep Last Night" (my new current favorite Nirvana song) to the blast-worthy "Plateau", you'll find a lot of great new material on this album.

And what's not to like? Not much. As mentioned above, there are some pitchy spots throughout the album but that's expected. Some of the songs are a bit on the short side which isn't a huge turn off but just something I observed. In terms of songs I didn't like, "Pennyroyal Tea" isn't all that great and "Lake of Fire" and "Plateau" are both too country-sounding for my taste.

My rating: 4/5 stars. I probably would've given 4.5 stars if I could. The reason for taking 1 star off is that I find it hard to play every song on this album. I tend to skip over maybe 4 or 5 of them. Other than that, this album is perfect and Nirvana fans as well as fans of great music in general will equally be impressed with how this live album turned out. Be sure to pick it up!

Necessary for any music collection.......2007-05-31

It doesn't matter whether you're into grunge, or even if you like Nirvana that much, this album is a winner in every sense. The tracks from previous studio albums are cast in a new light, but the timing is not too different that you can't belt out your best Kurt Cobain with all those intonations you know so well. Also, the covers are masterfully done; it's plain to see that the band has a lot of respect for the tracks and their original artists.
If you're getting into more Unpluggeds, check out Neil Young and Eric Clapton. The Korn Unplugged that just came out recently might be worth it too if you have a basic enjoyment of their music.

Best Nirvana album EVER.......2007-05-22

Yes this is better than Nevermind, far and away. If you (as my dad) think Nirvana is just pure noise, listen to this and your mind should be changed. Nirvana's better in an acoustic setting than plugged in - they're good plugged in too, but I prefer Cobain the acoustic guitarist to Cobain the electric one - listen to his work on songs like Something in the Way or Lake of Fire.
Other than the fact that every song is top quality but Jesus Doesn't Want Me for a Sunbeam (which is terrible) is the variety of song selection. They mostly skip over their hits - Pennyroyal Tea, About a Girl, Come As You Are and All Apologies make appearances, but so do three near-obscurities from Nevermind. Now, Something in the Way and Polly were great songs in the first place, but I never liked the studio take of On a Plain - I saw it as one of the several generic speedy punk-grunge rockers that took up space on the album's second side (others include Lounge Act, Stay Away and Territorial Pissings). But it's one of my favorites in this setting. The melody comes into full view, there's an added backup vocal from Dave Grohl similar to the one on Heart Shaped Box, and it's set to a nice toe-tapping rhythm. Very cool. And this version of Pennyroyal Tea is also better than the familiar hit one (which is hard to beat), getting even MORE raw emotion from the chorus. Not to mention their high-profile cover of David Bowie's The Man Who Sold the World, which actually isn't unplugged but who cares?
Stick around for the last five songs, too. Three are covers of Meat Puppets (who, if you don't know them, are a fairly high-profile college-rock band - high profile for a college-rock band, that is). Lake of Fire has the aforementioned good acoustic picking and is probably my favorite song about hell ever written (sure beats similar songs by Slayer or Slipknot!), Plateau has a good back-porch vibe, and Oh Me, strong vocals.
And if this was just the last two songs, I'd still give it five stars. I love the studio take on All Apologies as much as the proverbial next guy (assuming he's a Nirvana fan, of course), but this one's even better. The perfect song for an all acoustic setting. And Where Did You Sleep Last Night (originally a Leadbelly song called In the Pines) is, I think, my favorite Nirvana song ever. Especially the ending. The group had gotten into a killer quiet, swaying mood for awhile, and then all the sudden Kurt loses all control and starts screaming, "MY GIRL, MY GIRL, DON'T YOU LIE TO ME, TELL ME WHERE DID YOU SLEEP LAST NIGHT". Whoa... whoa, whoa, and whoa.
You can just see Nirvana going in an all-acoustic direction had Kurt not killed himself (of course, he might not have killed himself had he not been FORCED into stardom by frickin' MTV) when you listen to this.

Average customer rating:

Oops import!

MTV Unplugged in New York

ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

General | Alternative Rock | Styles | Music

Pop Rock | Pop | Styles | Music

Alternative Rock | Imports | Stores | Music
ASIN: B000F6YP5U
Release Date: 2006-05-23

Customer Reviews:

Oops import!.......2007-06-26

I didn't mean to order the import of this. I guess I spaced when choosing it. I think the only thing that is differnt about the import is an additional insert. With that said, this recording is, in my mind, one of the most imporant recordings in Rock history. Besides the import thing, this is 5 stars all the way.

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