| "Lithium" | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
 UK picture sleeve, with sonogram ofFrances Bean Cobain | ||||
| Single byNirvana | ||||
| from the albumNevermind | ||||
| B-side |
| |||
| Released | July 13, 1992 (1992-07-13) | |||
| Recorded | May 1991 | |||
| Studio | Sound City (Van Nuys,California) | |||
| Genre | ||||
| Length | 4:16 | |||
| Label | DGC | |||
| Songwriter | Kurt Cobain[a] | |||
| Producers | ||||
| Nirvana singles chronology | ||||
| ||||
| Nevermind track listing | ||||
13 tracks
| ||||
| Music video | ||||
| "Lithium" onYouTube | ||||
"Lithium" is a song by the Americanrock bandNirvana, written by vocalist and guitaristKurt Cobain. It appears as the fifth track on the band's second album,Nevermind, released byDGC Records in September 1991.
In a 1992 interview withCalifornia fanzineFlipside, Cobain explained that the song was a fictionalized account of a man who "turned toreligion as a last resort to keep himself alive" after the death of his girlfriend, "to keep him fromsuicide."[3] Nirvana biographerMichael Azerrad described its lyrics as "an update onKarl Marx's description of religion as the 'opiate of the masses.'"[4]
"Lithium" was released as the third single fromNevermind in July 1992, peaking at number 64 on the USBillboard Hot 100 and number 11 on theUK Singles Chart. It also reached number one inFinland and the top five inIreland andPortugal. The accompanyingmusic video, directed by American filmmakerKevin Kerslake, is a compilation of live footage from the band's October 31, 1991, concert at theParamount Theatre inSeattle, Washington, and from the completed but then-unreleased film,1991: The Year Punk Broke.
Written in 1990, "Lithium" was debuted at a video session at theEvergreen State College's television studio inOlympia, Washington on March 20, 1990. The full session, which also included versions of three songs from the band's 1989 debut album,Bleach, was directed by Jon Snyder and conceived by Cobain as a potential video release.[5] It featured the band performing live while a montage of television footage taped by Cobain at home playing in the background. To date, no full songs from this session have been officially released by Nirvana's record company, although videos for "Lithium" and "School," edited by Snyder and featuring additional footage and still photos, appeared on two episodes of1200 Seconds, a television show produced by Evergreen students. The episodes aired in the fall of 1990 on a local community access cable station.[6]
The song was added to Nirvana's setlist soon after, over a year before the release ofNevermind.Kim Thayil, guitarist of Seattle rock bandSoundgarden, recalled hearing it for the first time during Nirvana's show at the Off Ramp Cafe in Seattle on November 25, 1990, saying that "when I heard 'Lithium,' it stuck in my mind.Ben, our bass player, came up to me and said, 'That's the hit. That's theTop 40 hit right there."[7]
In April 1990, "Lithium" was recorded byButch Vig atSmart Studios inMadison, Wisconsin, during the recording sessions for what was intended to be a second album for the band's original label,Sub Pop.[8] However, the release was abandoned after the departure of drummerChad Channing later that year, and the eight-song session was instead circulated as a demo tape, which helped generate interest with the band among major labels.[9]
On September 25, 1990, Cobain performed a soloacoustic version of the song on theBoy Meets Girl show, hosted byCalvin Johnson, onKAOS (FM) inOlympia, Washington.
"Lithium" was re-recorded by Vig in May 1991 atSound City Studios inVan Nuys, California, during the sessions for what became Nirvana's second album and major-label debut,Nevermind. Preliminary attempts at recording the song's instruments were unsuccessful, in part because the band was having a difficult time maintaining a steady tempo, and kept speeding up.[10] After one failed take, the band abandoned the song as a "frustrated"[11] Cobain began playing the song, "Endless, Nameless" instead. This version of "Endless, Nameless" was released as the album'shidden track. The band's timing problems were immediately solved when their new drummer,Dave Grohl, took Vig's advice to play with ametronome; it was the only track from the album to be recorded to aclick track.[10][12]
The song's quiet verses and loud choruses dynamic also presented a challenge for Vig, who said that "getting the verses to sound relaxed and the chorus to sound as intense as possible, and make the transitions feel natural and effortless, was a hard one to do."[13] As Vig recalled, "Kurt wanted to be able to play the guitar very ... not methodical—it needed to have this space."[13] The dark sound of the distorted guitar was achieved by using aBig Muff fuzzbox played through aFender Bassman bass amplifier, recorded with what Vig believes was anU47 microphone that he usually used to record bass guitar. The vocals for the song's verses were recorded in two takes, with the second take being used as the master vocal track, although Vig used the second line of the second verse from take one. The chorus vocals were quickly recorded and double-tracked after.[13]
"Lithium" was performed live at the1992 MTV Video Music Awards on September 9, 1992, inLos Angeles. Cobain had wanted to play the then-unreleased song "Rape Me" instead, but this was met with resistance from MTV, who wanted the band to play "Smells Like Teen Spirit," and were possibly wary of the newer song's controversial title and lyrics. Cobain agreed to play "Lithium" as a compromise, over concerns that not playing the show might lead to MTV boycotting other acts on their label,Gold Mountain, or firing their friend at the station, Amy Finnerty.[14] "We didn't want to fuck everything up for everyone so we decided to play 'Lithium,'" Cobain explained in the 1993 Nirvana biography,Come As You Are: The Story of Nirvana. "Instead of bowing out and keeping our dignity, we decided to get fucked in the ass."[15] The performance, which featured Cobain playing a short part of "Rape Me" at the beginning "just to give [MTV] a little heart palpitation,"[15] ended with Nirvana bassistKrist Novoselic being struck by his bass after throwing it into the air and attempting to catch it unsuccessfully.[16]
The final live version of "Lithium" was at Nirvana's last show, on March 1, 1994, at Terminal Einz inMunich, Germany.[17]
"Lithium" is agrunge,[18]alternative rock,[19] andpunk rock song that runs for a duration of four minutes and sixteen seconds.[20] According to thesheet music published at Musicnotes.com byBMG Rights Management, it is written in thetime signature ofcommon time, with a moderatetempo of 124beats per minute.[19] "Lithium" is composed in thekey ofD major, with guitars tuned down a whole tone, and chord shapes resembling chords in the key ofE major, while Kurt Cobain'svocal range spans oneoctave and threenotes, from the low-note ofC3 to the high-note ofF4.[19] The intro, verses, and chorus have a basic chord sequence of D5–F♯5–B5–G5–B♭5–C5–A5–C5 and alternates between the chords G5 and B♭5 during the bridge. A transition from the bridge to the main chord sequence consists of a bar of C5 and a bar of A5. The sheet music makes no reference to the lowered tuning of the guitars and (inaccurately) shows theE majorkey signature.[19][21]
The arrangement is representative of the musical style Nirvana had developed during work onNevermind, alternating between quiet and loud sections.[22] In the song, Cobain fingers chord shapes on his guitar but varies between playing single notes anddouble stops on the instrument, giving the track a loose feel.[23] The song opens with bouncing guitar strums before Cobain starts singing his lines in an almost whispered manner.[24] His voice retains a measured calm during the verses, where low, open guitar lines trace the outline of the song's melody.[25] During the chorus, Cobain shouts "Ye-eh-eh-eh-eh" over five notes and distorted, towering riffs.[26][27] Cobain's thick, surging rhythm guitar meshes with Novoselic's melodic bass and Grohl's intense, snappy drumming.[28]
According to Cobain, "Lithium" was "one of those songs I actually did finish while trying to write it instead of taking pieces of my poetry and other things".[29]
In his 1993 biographyCome As You Are: The Story of Nirvana,Michael Azerrad described the song's title as "an update on Marx's description of religion as the 'opiate of the masses.'"[4] Gillian G. Gaar described it as "a song whose sing-along melody typically masks the disturbing quality of the lyric, which touches on the solace one can find in religion or madness."[30] As Cobain explained, "In the song, a guy’s lost his girl and his friends and he’s brooding. He’s decided to find God before he kills himself. It’s hard for me to understand the need for a vice like [religion] but I can appreciate it too. People need vices."[31]
InCome As You Are, Cobain acknowledged that the song might have been inspired in part by the time he spent living with his friend Jesse Reed and hisborn-again Christian parents. Cobain told Azerrad that he wasn't necessarily anti-religion, saying that "I've always felt that some people should have religion in their lives ... That's fine. If it's going to save someone, it's okay. And the person in ['Lithium'] needed it."[4]
| Review scores | |
|---|---|
| Source | Rating |
| AllMusic |   [32] |
"Lithium" was released as the third single fromNevermind on July 13, 1992.[33] Featuring a cover photo by Cobain, the single contained asonogram of the musician's then-unborn childFrances Bean Cobain,[34] as well as full lyrics for all the songs onNevermind. Cassette, CD, 12-inch vinyl, and British 12-inch vinyl picture disc editions included "Curmudgeon" and a live version of "Been a Son" (performed onHalloween the previous year) as B-sides. The British 7-inch and cassette featured only "Curmudgeon" as an extra track, while the UK CD release added a cover of theWipers' "D-7" recorded forBBC Radio 1 disc jockeyJohn Peel's program in 1990.[35]
John Sullivan forNew York Magazine described "Lithium" as a "flawlessly crafted hit."[36]AllMusic's Mark Demming remarked, "For all the sound and fury of Nirvana's epochal album,Nevermind, it's significant that the album's best and most affecting song is also among the quietest. ... The liberating force of Nirvana's inspired anger was rarely more powerful than in the service of this song."[25]Time music critic Christopher Farley praised the song for its "gorgeous guitarhooks," writing, "Its punk-inspired, we-couldn't-care-less ethos seemed to reflect the restless apathy some young people felt toward their times."[37]
"Lithium" was ranked the 20th best single of the year in theVillage VoicePazz & Jop critics' poll, tying with singles byMinistry,Lisa Stansfield, andUtah Saints[38] In 1993, it was voted at number 50 onSpin's Top 100 Songs of Our Time.[39] In Israel, it was voted in at number 4 on theIBA's "Voice of Israel" singles chart.[40]
In 2012,NME ranked "Lithium" at number 52 on its list of the "100 Best Tracks Of The '90s".[41] In 2013, it was voted first "by a pretty comfortable margin" inRolling Stone's reader's poll of "The 10 Best Nirvana Songs."[42] In 2019, the song was placed at number seven onRolling Stone's ranking of 102 Nirvana songs.[43] In 2023,Stephen Thomas Erlewine ranked it fifth onthe A.V. Club's "Essential Nirvana: Their 30 greatest songs, ranked" list.[44]
According toNielsen Music's year-end report for 2019, "Lithium" was the tenth most-played song of the decade on mainstream rock radio with 123,000 spins. All of the songs in the top 10 were from the 1990s.[45]
On April 10, 2014, "Lithium" was performed by surviving Nirvana members Grohl, Novoselic andPat Smear, with lead vocals and guitar by American rock musicianSt. Vincent, at the band'sRock and Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremony atBarclays Center inBrooklyn, New York.[46]
"Lithium" has been used as the goal song for Seattle'sNational Hockey League (NHL) team, theSeattle Kraken, sincetheir inaugural season.[47][48]
A live version of "Lithium," recorded at theParadiso inAmsterdam, Netherlands on November 25, 1991, was released as apromotional single inHolland in 1996, for the live compilationFrom the Muddy Banks of the Wishkah,[49] released in October 1996. The full show was released onBlu-ray andCD on the 30th anniversary "Super Deluxe" version ofNevermind on November 12, 2021.[50]
In October 2021, another live version, recorded atThe Palace inMelbourne, Australia, on February 1, 1992, was released as astreaming single ahead of its appearance on the 30th anniversary edition of theNevermind.[51][52] Reviewing the release forRolling Stone, Kory Grow wrote that "the real magic in the box set manifests during the band's Melbourne, Australia, gig on Feb. 1, 1992. Cobain urges the crowd to sing along with him on 'Lithium' — a track that hadn't even come out as a single yet — and the audience nearly drowns him out, gleefully belting his lyrics about feeling simultaneously happy and ugly and not caring who knows it. Cobain sounds so into it, he forgot to kick on his distortion pedal for the song's primal 'yeah' chorus".[53]
A live version of the song recorded during the band's headlining set at theReading Festival inReading, England, on August 30, 1992, was released as a promotional single from the albumLive at Reading, released in November 2009. Video of this version first appeared on the 1994 home movieLive! Tonight! Sold Out!!, although the audio was previously unreleased. In the liner notes toFrom the Muddy Banks of the Wishkah, Novoselic wrote that "hearing tens of thousands of people sing along with [the Reading version of] 'Lithium' was a very cool moment in the history of the band".[54][55]
Themusic video for "Lithium" was the second of four Nirvana videos directed byKevin Kerslake, who had worked with the band on the video for their previous single, "Come as You Are," and later directed the videos for "In Bloom" and "Sliver".[56][57]
The video featured a collage of live footage from the completed but then-unreleased home movie1991: The Year Punk Broke, which documented the band's two-week European tour withSonic Youth, and from their show at theParamount Theatre in Seattle on October 31, 1991. The footage fromThe Year Punk Broke was filmed at the 1991 Reading Festival on August 23, 1991, and atDe Doelen inRotterdam, Netherlands on September 1, 1991. According to Nirvana's manager,Danny Goldberg, in his 2019 Cobain biographyServing the Servant, Sonic Youth's vocalist and bassistKim Gordon initially opposed the inclusion of one scene from the film, which featured Cobain being carried on Novoselic's shoulders, but eventually relented after being reminded that Nirvana had allowed Sonic Youth to use five live performances in the film for free. As Goldberg explained, Gordon "was in love with the shot" and believed its inclusion in a music video would lessen its impact in the upcoming film.[58] The "Lithium" video also featured Cobain jumping into the drum set at the end of the Reading set, during "Endless, Nameless", which led to him dislocating his arm.[59] The video was placed into heavy rotation onMTV in the US,[60] and into active rotation onMTV Europe.[61] It was also played onMTV Australia,Rage andVideo Smash Hits in Australia.[62]
According toMichael Azerrad inCome as You Are, Cobain's original idea for a "Lithium" video was an animated film about a girl who lived in a house in a forest. The story was to feature the girl, named Preggo, finding a pile of eggs in her closet and putting them in a train of three wagons that she would then wheel through the forest until arriving at a king's castle. By this time, all but one of the eggs have cracked, and she would place the remaining egg on a book on the lap of the king, asleep on his throne. The king would then awaken and open his legs, and the book would slide shut between them, crushing the egg. This concept was abandoned when Cobain and Kerslake learned that the animation would take four months to produce, and the live collage was made instead.[59] Azerrad wrote that while the final video was "enlivened by Kerslake's neat trick of using more violent footage during the quiet parts of the song and vice versa," it "was something of a disappointment from a band and a song that promised so much."[59]
| Year | Publication | Country | Accolade | Rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1999 | Kerrang! | United Kingdom | 100 Greatest Rock Tracks Ever![63] | 20 |
| 2013 | Rolling Stone | United States | Readers’ Poll: The 10 Best Nirvana Songs[64] | 1 |
| 2023 | The A.V. Club | Essential Nirvana: Their 30 greatest songs, ranked[65] | 5 |
All songs were written by Nirvana, except where noted.[1]
US 12-inch, cassette, CD, and UK 12-inch vinyl picture disc
UK 7-inch vinyl and cassette
UK CD
Personnel adapted fromNevermind liner notes[1]
Nirvana
Technical Personnel
Weekly charts[edit]
| Year-end charts[edit]
Decade-end charts[edit]
|
| Region | Certification | Certified units/sales |
|---|---|---|
| Australia (ARIA)[102] | 3× Platinum | 210,000‡ |
| Denmark (IFPI Danmark)[103] | Gold | 45,000‡ |
| Italy (FIMI)[104] Sales since 2009 | Gold | 35,000‡ |
| New Zealand (RMNZ)[105] | 2× Platinum | 60,000‡ |
| Spain (PROMUSICAE)[106] | Gold | 30,000‡ |
| United Kingdom (BPI)[107] Sales since 2004 | Platinum | 600,000‡ |
| United States (RIAA)[108] | 3× Platinum | 3,000,000‡ |
‡ Sales+streaming figures based on certification alone. | ||
Cover versions of the song have been performed by choral rock bandThe Polyphonic Spree (which appeared in the 2015 filmThe Big Short),The Vaselines,Rockabye Baby! (as a lullaby),a British band named Nirvana,Man with a Mission and jazz quartetThe Bad Plus.
A cover version by Bruce Lash appears in the 2008 comedy-drama filmMarley & Me, starringOwen Wilson andJennifer Aniston.[111][112][113][114]
{{cite AV media notes}}: CS1 maint: others in cite AV media (notes) (link){{cite AV media notes}}: CS1 maint: others in cite AV media (notes) (link){{cite news}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)The sellout crowd of 17,151 roared. The goal horn sounded from a decommissioned Washington State Ferry. And then came the goal song, "Lithium" from the Seattle band Nirvana, the late Kurt Cobain crooning, "Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeaaah!"
heavy
Active rotation
Active rotation
Active rotation
As voted for by readers
This is the 1993 re-entry peak as original 1992 Top 30 peak currently unsourcable
Key:DK = Denmark
France, Wallonia/Belgium, parts of Switzerland, Monaco
User must do a "singles" search for "Nirvana"
