Courtney Love Fires Back! The Fight For Nirvana Rages On
By
Frank Meyer,
Contributing Editor
Tuesday, December 18, 2001 @ 4:50 PM
| Courtney Love responds To Nirv
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"What should have been a private business negotiation has become a very public lawsuit," says the letter. "There are many issues that were left unresolved after Kurt's death that we're finally trying to put in order. Other parties have talked about finding 'a personal sense of closure' with Nirvana's music. That's exactly the opposite of what should happen. We want to celebrate Kurt's life and music and make sure Nirvana finds as large an audience as possible. We want future generations of music fans to give the band its rightful place alongside the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, Jimi Hendrix, Led Zeppelin, and Bob Dylan."
…And so says Courtney Love in an open letter to fans responding to former Nirvana members Dave Grohl and Krist Novoselic’s denouncement against her attempt to wrangle all control of Nirvana away from them. Signed from the "The Family of Kurt Cobain," the letter maintains that Love is acting in her late husband's best interest by stalling the release of the proposed Nirvana box set -- something she sued to do in October of this year.
Love also scoffs at the duo’s claim that Nirvana was a three-way partnership equally split among its members. Love states that over 93 percent of the copyrights of the band's songs are in Cobain's name and that Cobain refused to sign a partnership agreement when he was alive. She alleges that any partnership since Cobain’s death was forced upon Cobain's heirs by attorneys citing a Washington law that would have forced Cobain's family to turn over all the band's interests to Grohl and Novoselic. "That assertion was untrue, but the threat was used to deprive the family of its rights to manage Kurt's legacy," she says. ."
"Kurt Cobain was Nirvana," she says. "He named the band, hired its members, played guitar, wrote the songs, fronted the band onstage and in interviews, and took responsibility for the band's business decisions." ."
On Wednesday, December 12th, Grohl and Novoselic responded to Courtney Love's lawsuit seeking to break up their Nirvana business partnership, accusing her of being "motivated solely by her blind self-interest." Attorney Kelly Corr filed defendants' answers, counterclaims, and affirmative defenses to the lawsuit that Love filed May 9th, which seeks to dissolve Nirvana LLC. Love originally created the limited liability company with Grohl and Novoselic in 1997 to control the unreleased music by the influential band. Any major decision regarding Nirvana or Cobain’s music requires a unanimous vote by all three parties.
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