Okay. Sit down. Hydrate. Stretch your neck. Because Nevermind is not an album you casually press play on. This is an album that grabs you by the collar and screams “FEEL SOMETHING” into your soul and then somehow makes you hum along while emotionally combusting.
This record is chaos with choruses. Therapy but louder. Teenage confusion wrapped in distortion pedals and served at maximum volume. It is sarcastic. It is furious. It is tender when you least expect it. It is the musical equivalent of screaming into a pillow and then immediately apologising to the pillow.
Every track feels like a different flavour of internal meltdown. Existential dread. Jealousy spirals. Romantic obsession. Anti authority tantrums. Quiet despair. Loud despair. Creative despair. And the thing is. It should not be this catchy. It has no right being this catchy. You are out here yelling about nihilism with a tune stuck in your head for three business days.
So yes. We are going track by track. I have thoughts. Many thoughts. Buckle up.
1. Smells Like Teen Spirit
Okay listen. LISTEN. This song does not start. It materialises. That riff hits and suddenly you are standing in a sweaty gymnasium full of existential dread and flannel shirts whether you asked to be there or not. The verses creep around, muttered and sarcastic, like someone rolling their eyes while lighting a cigarette. Then the chorus detonates. Absolute eruption. Chaos with melody. Fury with a hook you can whistle while questioning the meaning of everything.
I’m worse at what I do best
Nirvana, “Smells Like Teen Spirit”
And for this gift, I feel blessed
Our little group has always been
And always will until the end
What makes it legendary is how slippery it is lyrically. Nothing is pinned down. Everything is vibes, slogans, nonsense poetry, cultural static. Which is exactly why everyone saw themselves in it. Teenage boredom. Political disillusionment. Identity crisis. Vaguely wanting to overthrow something but not being sure what yet. It is all there, blurred together like emotional soup.
The quiet loud dynamic is doing Olympic level storytelling. Repressed frustration versus screaming release. Internal monologue versus public meltdown. You can practically hear the emotional pressure cooker whistling.
You do not casually enjoy this song. You scream it in your bedroom mirror. You air-drum to it in traffic. You suddenly understand why entire genres pivoted in its direction overnight.
2. In Bloom
Now THIS one is sly. Because musically, it is almost… cheerful. Big chorus. Bright guitar tone. You could bop to it in All Mart. Meanwhile the lyrics are absolutely dragging people who pretend to understand rebellion while missing the whole point.
It is basically saying “you like the aesthetic but not the substance” and then wrapping that critique in one of the most singable hooks on the album. Passive aggression but make it chart friendly. Weaponised melody. Sonic side-eye.
He’s the one
Nirvana, “In Bloom”
Who likes all our pretty songs
And he likes to sing along
And he likes to shoot his gun
But he knows not what it means
There is so much smirk in this song. You can feel the irritation bubbling underneath, the frustration with poser culture, with shallow fandom, with people yelling lyrics without clocking the anger behind them. It is not screaming rage. It is rolling-your-eyes-so-hard-they-see-your-brain irritation.
Which is honestly sometimes more devastating.
3. Come as You Are
This track oozes. It slinks. It drips mood. That watery riff loops like a thought you cannot shake, like pacing the same hallway over and over while overthinking one text message.
On the surface, it sounds inviting. And yet the tone is murky, suspicious, almost eerie. It feels like kindness delivered through fog. Like someone opening their arms while standing in shadow.
Come as you are, as you were
Nirvana, “Come As You Are”
As I want you to be
As a friend, as a friend
As an old enemy
Take your time, hurry up
Choice is yours, don’t be late
The repetition makes it hypnotic, almost mantra-like, but the contradictions keep poking through. Be yourself. Do not trust anyone. Be honest. Also maybe everyone is lying. Warmth and paranoia spooning.
It is gentle in volume but unsettling in spirit, which is such a signature move for this album. You are lulled into calm and then suddenly realise the lyrics are quietly spiralling.
4. Breed
No time to process. We are sprinting.
“Breed” is panic with a drum kit. It barrels forward with zero patience, zero reflection, just raw adrenaline. The guitars feel claustrophobic, like walls closing in while society keeps asking what your five-year plan is.
Even if you have, even if you need
Nirvana, “Breed”
I don’t mean to stare, we don’t have to breed
We could plant a house, we could build a tree
I don’t even care, we could have all three
It taps into that suffocating fear of domestic expectations, of suburban sameness, of being shoved into adulthood whether you are ready or not. Marriage. Kids. Lawns. Routines. Corporate clocks ticking ominously. All turned into sonic whiplash.
The vocals snarl rather than sing. This is not contemplation. This is flight-or-fight mode set permanently to fight.
Short, brutal, exhilarating. The musical equivalent of running because your own thoughts are chasing you.
5. Lithium
Ah yes. Emotional whiplash. My favourite song.
The verses feel hollowed out, almost numb, drifting along in that unsettling calm that comes after crying too much. Then the chorus crashes in with manic intensity. Shouting joy. Shouting belief. Shouting survival like it might fall apart if you stop shouting.
I’m so happy ’cause today I found my friends
Nirvana, “Lithium”
They’re in my head
I’m so ugly but that’s okay ’cause so are you
We broke our mirrors
Sunday morning is everyday for all I care
And I’m not scared
Light my candles in a daze ’cause I found God
It wrestles with faith, medication, mental health, clinging to something, anything, just to stay upright. It sounds like trying to convince yourself you are okay in real time. Which is frankly far too relatable.
The tonal switches are genius. They mimic instability, the swing between emptiness and overwhelming feeling. You never settle. You are constantly bracing for the next emotional surge.
It is uncomfortable. And brilliant. And weirdly catchy. Which feels illegal given the subject matter.
6. Polly
(Trigger Warning)
And now. Silence falls. Sort of.
Acoustic guitar. Flat vocal delivery. No distortion to hide behind. And the story is horrific.
This song is about the actual kidnapping of a 14-year-old girl. In 1987, she was returning from a concert in Tacoma, Washington when she was abducted by a man named Gerald Friend. He took her back to his mobile home and raped her … She managed to escape when Friend took her for a ride and stopped for gas. He was arrested and sent to jail.
Nirvana played some benefits to help rape victims, including the “Rock Against Rape” concert in 1993, which raised money for a women’s self-defense organization.
From Genius.com
What makes “Polly” so disturbing is how restrained it is. There is no dramatics, no screaming, no sonic cues telling you how to feel. The horror is delivered plainly, almost clinically. The calmness is what freezes your blood.
It forces you to listen. Forces you to sit with the narrative instead of moshing past it. In the middle of an album full of loud chaos, this track is a quiet punch to the throat.
It is one of the most unsettling placements in tracklist history. You are not allowed to escape it.
7. Territorial Pissings
Okay NOW the album is flipping tables.
This is pure punk energy. Barely contained. Aggressive in the way of someone who has had enough of macho nonsense, posturing, fake toughness, and whatever fresh nonsense society is serving today.
Never met a wise man
Nirvana, “Territorial Pissings”
If so, it’s a woman
The guitars sound feral. The vocals sound like they are about to physically fight the microphone. It is a two minute temper tantrum with philosophy hidden in its pockets.
After the chill of “Polly”, this feels like emotional whiplash again, but in the opposite direction. Rage surging back into the bloodstream.
Cathartic. Chaotic. Glorious.
8. Drain You
WHY is this one so sweet and so horrifying simultaneously.
It is framed like a love song, but everything about it screams obsession. Dependency. Losing yourself inside another person. Romance portrayed as bodily invasion. Affection with claws.
The chorus is huge and melodic, which tricks you into singing along before realising what you are actually chanting about. And that middle breakdown where everything collapses into noise before snapping back into tune feels like a mental overload rendered sonically.
One baby to another says, “I’m lucky to have met you”
Nirvana, “Drain You”
I don’t care what you think unless it is about me
It is intimate in a way that borders on uncomfortable. Like standing too close to someone and not stepping back even when you should.
Deeply catchy. Deeply alarming. Ten out of ten emotional malpractice.
9. Lounge Act
Enter jealousy, wearing boots.
That bass line stalks through the song like resentment doing laps around your bedroom while you stare at the ceiling replaying conversations from three weeks ago. The lyrics drip with insecurity and possessiveness, that ugly underbelly of love no one likes admitting to.
And I’ve got this friend, you see
Nirvana, “Lounge Act”
Who makes me feel
And I wanted more than I could steal
Caring too much. Hating that you care. Resenting the person for having this much power over you. A vicious little triangle.
It is bitter. It is petty. It is painfully human. The kind of honesty that makes you flinch because you recognise yourself in it.
10. Stay Away
This one has elbows. Sharp ones.
Distortion everywhere. Paranoia baked into the rhythm. A giant screaming DO NOT TOUCH ME sign set to music. It feels defensive, cornered, furious at authority and intrusion and expectations.
Monkey see, monkey do
Nirvana, “Stay Away”
I don’t know why
Rather be dead than cool
I don’t know why
Every line ends in rhyme
I don’t know why
Less is more, love is blind
I don’t know why
Personal boundaries screamed at stadium volume.
There is no subtlety here and that is the point. It is pure rejection of being controlled or categorised or told how to exist.
Short. Loud. Hostile. Therapeutic.
11. On a Plain
Suddenly we soften again. Relatively speaking.
This track feels like peeking behind the curtain. Fame anxiety. Creative dissatisfaction. Feeling stuck inside your own head. Smiling while quietly collapsing inwards.
I love myself better than you
Nirvana, “On A Plain”
I know it’s wrong so what should I do?
The finest day that I’ve ever had
Was when I learned to cry on command
The melody is bright compared to the lyrics, which adds that classic Nevermind tension between sound and subject. Cheerful tune, internal screaming.
It feels resigned rather than explosive, like someone shrugging and admitting they are not okay but too tired to dramatise it. Low-key devastating.
12. Something in the Way
Okay. Deep breath. This is where the album goes eerily still.
Everything here feels underwater. The vocals barely surface, the guitar trudges instead of moves, and the strings hover like cold fog at dawn. No explosive chorus. Just a slow, heavy emotional pull dragging you into isolation. This is not anger. This is exhaustion. The kind that settles into your bones and refuses to leave.
Underneath the bridge, tarp has sprung a leak
Nirvana, “Something In The Way”
And the animals I’ve trapped have all become my pets
And I’m living off of grass, and the drippings from my ceiling
It’s okay to eat fish ’cause they don’t have any feelings
Lyrically, it sketches poverty, loneliness, and emotional abandonment. Nothing flashy. Nothing metaphorical enough to soften the blow. The repetition makes it feel trapped, like pacing the same thought in a dark room with no windows. Survival mode, set to loop.
After all the distortion and fury, the album suddenly strips everything away and leaves you alone with the quiet. Pain without spectacle. Despair without screaming.
This is lying on the floor in the dark music.
And honestly, that restraint is exactly why it wrecks you.
13. Endless, Nameless
SURPRISE AGAIN. YOU THOUGHT WE WERE DONE. Hidden track jumpscare. Total sonic annihilation. Screaming. Feedback. Instruments being emotionally assaulted.
There is no structure here. No melody to cling to. Just meltdown preserved in audio form. Catharsis through destruction.
It sounds like the album imploding under the weight of everything it has been holding in for forty nine minutes. A perfect, feral, terrifying final exhale.
Taken together, Nevermind is a beautiful mess.
Loud and quiet. Furious and fragile. Catchy and deeply uncomfortable. It invites you in with melodies and then drop kicks you with reality.
It understands boredom. Rage. Love. Fear. Alienation. Wanting to burn systems down and also wanting to be held. It captures youth without romanticising it and adulthood without pretending it is fun.
Decades later it still feels alive. Still radioactive. Still capable of making people scream along in sweaty rooms or into hairbrush microphones in their bedrooms.
This album did not age.
It mutated.
In the best way, and if you agree, you should read more at Her Campus at MUJ.
Anyway. I, Niamat Dhillon at HCMUJ, am going to go lie down now because talking about this made me want to listen to the whole thing again at unsafe volumes.
You are welcome.