A new Kerrang piece about “Come As You Are” quotes Dave Grohl. The article is about the Nirvana classic sounding similar to Killing Joke’s “Eighties.”
Danny Goldberg wryly admitted that Kurt “was right – Killing Joke later did complain about it”, though whether the group ever filed a plagiarism lawsuit remains a murky issue. But Killing Joke guitarist Geordie Walker was still fuming in 1994, telling Guitarist magazine that the group was “very pissed off about that”. He said, “It’s obvious to everyone. Our publisher sent their publisher a letter saying it was, and they went, ‘Boo, never heard of ya!’ But the hysterical thing about Nirvana saying they’d never heard of us was that they’d already sent us a Christmas card!”
Nirvana were indeed fans of Killing Joke, and rapprochement came some years later, after Dave Grohl met Killing Joke bassist Paul Raven backstage at a Pantera show. Killing Joke frontman Jaz Coleman later sang their song Requiem with Foo Fighters at a gig in New Zealand, and Dave laid down drum tracks for the group’s self-titled comeback album in 2003.
Come As You Are’s single release was accompanied by a promo video – shot two days before the group left for an Australian tour, while Kurt was attempting to kick heroin – that avoided showing his face. Dave Grohl later remembered the singer “looked bad, grey. He just looked sad, because he wasn’t using.”
