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The Honolulu Advertiser
Posted on: Thursday, August 23, 2001

The Left Lane
Scenes from a celebrity wedding

Seattle journalist Charles R. Cross' documentary on the tragically brief life of Nirvana frontman Kurt Cobain, "Heavier than Heaven: A Biography of Kurt Cobain," includes some noteworthy trivia from the band's February 1992 Hawai'i concert stops at the height of the "Nevermind" album hoopla.

Diehard Nirvana fans know that in addition to being the occasion of the Nirvana's only Hawai'i concerts ever (at the now-defunct Kaka'ako nightspot Pink's Garage), the band's Honolulu jaunt also saw Cobain's wedding to Courtney Love on Waikiki Beach.

But Cross reveals that Cobain and Love, engaged since December, actually decided to get hitched during the Feb. 20 plane ride to O'ahu from Osaka, Japan, where Nirvana had just performed. Following the sold-out Feb. 20 and 21 shows, the couple was married at sunset on Feb. 24 by a local nondenominational minister. Love wore an antique dress once owned by actress Frances Farmer while Cobain sported blue plaid pajamas, a woven Guatemalan purse, and a slight heroin high, Cross writes. Cobain cried during the ceremony.

The wedding's eight guests included members of Nirvana's road crew and drummer Dave Grohl, but none of either Cobain's or Love's family members. Bassist Krist Novaselic — at the time feuding with Cobain — was not invited and left shortly after the Pink's concerts.

"Kurt was in his own world at that point," Novaselic told Cross. "After that, I was pretty estranged (from) him. ... There was really no direction in the band after that." Cobain and Love remained briefly in Hawai'i before returning to Los Angeles.

It would be four months before Nirvana performed together again. Cobain committed suicide in his Seattle home in April 1994.

— Derek Paiva, Advertiser staff writer