Courtney Love Courtney Love was originally known as the wife of Nirvana frontman Kurt Cobain. During the time of his death they were actually in the process of divorcing. Since his death she‘s gone on to be more well-known for every bit of trouble that she can find. Courtney Love was born Courtney Michelle Harrison on July 9, 1964 to author Hank Harrison (a follower of The Grateful Dead) and psychologist Linda Carroll. After her parents’ divorce, Linda was awarded custody of her daughter when one of her friends provided a court with letters saying they had witnessed Hank giving his daugher LSD when she was only four. He denied this, but Linda was granted custody nonetheless. Courtney has said her stage name comes from her mother, often referring to her as “Courtney, Love.” Even as a young child, Love was getting in trouble. She was caught reading pornography at the age of nine and was already being kicked out of schools. At the age of 12, Love drank too much wine and ran out into a field and began cutting herself. Love became emancipated at 16 and traveled the world on a trust fund started by her grandparents. Rozz Rezabek became her first boyfriend that was involved in the rock music scene, and she followed this with a fling with the frontman of The Teardrop Explodes, Julian Cope. To support herself in her travels, Love occasionally worked as a stripper, with her first acting role being in the movie Sid and Nancy about punk rocker Sid Vicious. She tried out for the role of Nancy, but was given the smaller role of Nancy’s best friend.
Love was once the lead singer of Faith No More, but was booted from the band for being too controlling. Next she and Kat Bjelland formed their own band, Sugar Baby Doll which only lasted for a couple of quick gigs and a demo tape. She tried it again with Kat Bjelland in a band called Babes in Toyland, but Love left that band as well, and it’s rumored that she was dismissed for stealing band receipts to attend a Butthole Surfers concert. Love finally found a band to call her own, Hole. Their first album was Pretty on the Inside which received good reviews on the British music scene, garnering Hole a record contract from Geffen Records. The first marriage for Love was actually to Leading Trains frontman, Falling James Moreland, but it ended after just a few months. She also had relationships with Michael Stipe of R.E.M. and Billy Corgan of The Smashing Pumpkins. When Love married Nirvana lead singer, Kurt Cobain, he became very jealous of any time she spent with Corgan, despite the fact that he and Love were just friends. Love and Cobain had a daughter Frances Bean, and Vanity Fair published an article stating that Love had continued to use heroin throughout her pregnancy. Four days before Hole’s second album was released, Live Through This, Cobain committed suicide with a shotgun blast to the head. Love read his suicide note to his fans at a memorial service and encouraged the fans to call him a vulgar name for leaving everyone behind. She also said that the worst crime of all would be for him to continue to be a rock star since she knew he hated it. Two months later, the bassist for Hole was found dead of an assumed drug overdose. Love moved on with her life, and starred in the biopic The People vs. Larry Flynt along with Woody Harrelson and Edward Norton. She received good reviews for her role, and even received a nomination nod from the Golden Globes for best supporting actress. In yet another biopic, Man on the Moon about comedian Andy Kaufman, she again received positive reviews as she starred alongside Jim Carrey.
Hole finally released its next album, Celebrity Skin to rave reviews. The album ended up going multi-platinum. Love’s old friend Billy Corgan helped with some of the songwriting and recording. Sadly, it would be Hole’s last album together, as they would break up a few years later amidst many, many problems. Trouble continues to follow Love around, just as it seems to have, all her life. She was arrested n 2003 on felony drug charges within days of her first solo album, America’s Sweetheart, being released, and lost custody of Frances Bean to Cobain’s mother. A year later she was arrested in New York City for throwing a microphone stand and hitting a man in the head. Earlier that night, she’d appeared on The Late Show with David Letterman, and flashed her breasts to Letterman. On her fortieth birthday, Love missed a court appearance over a break-in attempt at her boyfriend’s house, and she was sentenced to treatment in a drug rehabilitation program. The following year Love regained custody of Frances Bean, only to admit to using drugs once again. She was sent to yet another drug treatment program, this time with six months lockdown. |
