American poet and critic Adam Fieled continues his occasional series of essays on key pop and rock moments for Eyewear with this reflection on Nirvana's second-best-known song...
Come as You Are: Ambivalent Invitations
It is a subject important enough to be the pivot point for thousands of movies, television shows, and pop songs: how do adolescents relate to each other, particularly American adolescents? The average pop song lyric tends to focus on romantic desires, often skewed towards directly sexualized elements. In the 1960s, many rock songwriters began to investigate other realities: John Lennon, Paul McCartney, Mick Jagger, Bob Dylan, Ray Davies, Lou Reed, and others wrote songs exploring memory, complex situations, aging processes, societal mores, and voyeuristic instincts. By the time Nirvana released Nevermind in 1991, a kind of reversion had taken place. Most pop music, specifically commercially successful rock music, was stuck, thematically, where it had been in the early 1960s. The first single from the album, “Smells Like Teen Spirit,” had given the world a fresh glimpse into the darker aspects of the American adolescent psyche; it functions, lyrically, as a dramatic monologue, not directed at any specific other. It is more like a snapshot of an adolescent mind, talking to itself, trying to balance different kinds of interactions and experiences. The second single taken from Nevermind, “Come as You Are,” is more directly a relationship narrative. The lyrics are directed entirely towards an unnamed, gender neutral other. The ambivalent invitation it sends is worth investigating, as a possible synecdoche of how adolescents in America comingle.
If there is an overwhelming message that the lyrics of this piece send, it is this: that American adolescents, despite their youth, often experience pangs for an innocence that has more or less been lost. The narrator wants the other that the song puts forth to come back “as a memory”: in other words, to come back the way he or she used to be, but can never be again. In the dichotomous word games that constitute the verses, we get the sense of an adolescent mind waffling, not quite knowing what it wants. One of the most fascinating bits presents the notion that the protagonist wants this other to arrive “doused in mud/ soaked in bleach/ as I want you to be.” Lyricist Kurt Cobain’s allusiveness makes definite meanings difficult to pinpoint, but this allusion could certainly have sexual connotations: it is the narrator’s way of saying that he/she is interested in having sexual relations (being in the mud), while also wanting to maintain cleanliness that augurs against the notion of sexual interaction (soaked in bleach, which equates flesh with clothing, in another juxtaposition between surfaces and depths which is one of Cobain’s lyrical signatures). This ambivalence, specifically as regards sexuality, is a key facet of this song’s conceit: the fact that sex is dirty, dirtiness implies a loss of innocence, innocence is what is desired, but that in the two time zones that constitute this song’s temporal landscape (how things are/ how things used to be), it may be the most efficacious way of achieving intimacy. The bridge features a lyric that heightens this impression, while adding darkling hints that give the song an edge that “Teen Spirit” doesn’t have: the narrator “swears” that he doesn’t “have a gun.” This language is (we hope) metaphoric; if the gun is a phallic image with destructive potential, the narrator must state with some vehemence (swear) that he not only will not bring but does not have a gun. Emasculation may be the only way to retain innocence; the narrator is so desperate to make a connection, and to preserve his memories in the context of new experiences, that he effaces his own ability to display sexuality, even if the “muddy” aspects of what could be male or female sexuality intrigue him, or taunt him with his own immaturity.
Musically, “Come as You Are” establishes a kind of impressionism, both more muted and murkier than “Teen Spirit,” but also with more depth. Unlike that song, this is based on a riff that repeats for the duration of the verses. It is the rock equivalent of a question mark, as it hinges on three chromatic notes that tumble forwards and backwards again, creating a see-saw effect. The guitars during the one-word chorus (“memory”) and the bridge that alternates between B and D are treated with echo boxes so that they shimmer more than they pound. What carries the song along, and gives it some of the punch that made “Teen Spirit” so effective, are Dave Grohl’s drums: the drum-rolls, cymbal smashes, and other punctuations sharpen the muted, watery quality of the guitars, which again give the pop elements some thrash to satisfy an audience that wavered between punk, heavy metal, and pop tastes. There is also a plaintive quality to Cobain’s voice in the context of this track that is not in “Teen Spirit”; the way the chorus hinges on one legato phrase, the way he strains to hit “want” and draws out “you to be” in the verses. The protagonist of “Teen Spirit” expresses things in a clipped manner; rage and violence have more to do with staccato “punches”; the fact that this particular protagonist is actively seeking an emotional connection makes it more imperative to convey emotion in the vocal performance. Hard/soft dynamics are still present, but stand out with less intensity than they do in “Teen Spirit”; “Come as You Are” is less shocking, more touching. The ambivalence seems to be less about a desire to reach out and connect than about the protagonist’s level of self-belief, his feeling that he may or may not be able to reach out and connect. All this ambivalence manifests itself in the video as many strains of phantasmagoric imagery: guns, sperm cells, molecules, waterfalls, Nirvana playing the song in near-darkness (again, highlighting qualities of self-effacement not particularly consonant with rock star poses), Cobain swinging on a chandelier. There are no raging moves and no crowds; this video is a self-contained world without the obvious social overtones that buoyed “Teen Spirit.”
Unlike “Teen Spirit,” which has R.E.M.’s “The One I Love” as an obvious predecessor, both in terms of its thematic elements and in terms of its “break out” quality as a massive hit single, “Come as You Are” is more sui generis. There are no other tracks on Nevermind that have a distinct similarity to it, and the only obvious antecedent in indie rock is The Replacements “I Will Dare,” from their 1984 album Let It Be, which was lauded by major critics but failed to do significant commercial damage. Like “Come as You Are,” “I Will Dare” riffs on the scenario behind adolescent relationships: that ambivalence is the name of the game, as a protagonist balances curiosity with moments of discouragement and cowardice. Paul Westerberg crafted this song in such a way that it sounds very much like a certain kind of classic pop-rock: sharp vocals, catchy hooks (in this case, they underpin and mirror vocal inflections), a slight punkish quality to the vocals, which have the hoarse quality that Cobain often employs. However, Cobain’s compositions from this period have a drastic, dramatic quality that Westerberg’s do not: besides having a surer dramatic sense, Cobain is able to craft songs that combine more elements, which stake out more ground. Westerberg and Cobain are both truthful, direct, and, in their ambivalences, quintessentially American: Cobain achieved greater commercial success, not only because Westerberg was ambivalent about putting his songs into a commercial context, but because Cobain was far better at conveying complex emotions. If “Come as You Are” is to take its place as another masterpiece, next to “Teen Spirit,” it is specifically because there are more emotions on display here. They make interesting companion pieces, specifically because what “Teen Spirit” lacks is, for want of a better word, heart. The adolescent presence in “Come as You Are” actively cares about others; thus, his world is not strictly nihilistic. As bleak as these musical textures are, and the images of the video right alongside them, this caring is something that millions responded to with as great fervor as they did to the malignant overtones in “Teen Spirit”; “Come as You Are” may not be another self-contained revolution, as “Teen Spirit” was; it is, however, just as rich as a work of art.
by Adam Fieled
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