Smells Like... Bullshit?
The canon surrounding the origins of one of the 90's most important cultural keystones might just be a myth: A Teen Spirit timeline
Note: this article has been updated, click here for part 2 (or scroll to the bottom)
Last week I was reading some random Substack article that, to be honest, I wasn’t that interested in — until I got to a line saying, "I do not believe that teen spirit deodorant was successful until Kurt Cobain wrote a song called 'Smells Like Teen Spirit' and made it cool." Something about that just made me have to skip to the comment section.
My initial thought was: the very fact that it was known enough to even be a joke before the song was written kinda makes it seem like it was successful before the song came out. Right? That makes sense. Its success is what led to it being used as a joke, which led to being used for the title of a song... and then even more success.
That should have been the end of it, but before I could reply, I ran into the dreaded "Only paid subscribers can comment on this post". After a few moments of muttering to myself, my energy was refocused on… deep diving deodorant, as one does — and that’s where it got weird, but for reasons I wasn't expecting.
Teen Spirit Introduced?
I assumed Teen Spirit came out in the 80s, and I found an article that not only seemed to confirm it, but also debunk the "not successful until Nirvana made it cool" narrative: "Teen Spirit officially hit drugstore shelves in the late '80s .... at the time of the acquisition, Teen Spirit was by far the company's most popular product."
Only problem: InStyle didn't provide any sources other than the same YouTube video mentioned in the original article. So, I checked Wikipedia… and, according to Wikipedia, Teen Spirit was released in "early 1991"... and that acquisition the article mentioned was in February of 1992 (5 months after SLTS's release).
The only corroboration of this I could find was an archived press release/product review in the June 17, 1991 edition of Chain Drug Review, and a print ad copyrighted 1991. If Teen Spirit was released in the late 80s, why would it be still be called a "new product" halfway through 1991? Also: what does "early 1991" mean, if it's being reviewed as a "new product" in June?
Maybe the article that started this all had a point with the "Nirvana made the deodorant popular" (vs "more popular") thing, but what about the claims of seeing a commercial specifically in 1988? What evidence is there for it? I looked, but all I could find was a YouTube video that just happened to be titled, "Teen Spirit Deodorant 1988" (but the date doesn’t appear in the video itself), uploaded by some random person who provided no sources. That's it. Not to mention, the lyrics to the commercial’s rap — which was still the go-to thing for youth marketing in 1991 — include that it’s “made for your generation”... which is very 90s marketing. That was everywhere. It’s the 90s!
If it's true that Teen Spirit was introduced to the market in early 1991, that kinda puts a wrinkle in the canon surrounding the origin story of the most important — or, depending on how jaded you are, the second most important — cultural keystone of the 90s.
So, multiple sources of official documentation that all point to 1991, versus... a single 15-second YouTube video posted by some random user. I honestly tried finding some kind of documentation, beyond this YouTube video, of Teen Spirit existing before 1991 and I just couldn't. One might even say, it's hard to find... oh, well — whatever…
Buuuut... if it's true that Teen Spirit was introduced to the market in early 1991, that kinda puts a wrinkle in the canon surrounding the origin story of the most important — or, depending on how jaded you are, the second most important — cultural keystone of the 90s.
Questioning Authority
For those not in the know, the short version goes like this: Kathleen Hanna (lead singer for the band Bikini Kill and a close friend of Cobain) and Kurt got drunk one night and she wrote "Kurt smells like Teen Spirit" on his wall in marker. For as long as I can remember that has been the story, and I never really thought twice about it… until now.
Over the years, through various documented versions of the story, Kathleen has peppered her narrative with details that don't seem to follow the actual timeline of events.
In a video from "Our Hit Parade" filmed at Joe's Pub in NYC on December 15, 2010, she said that the infamous night that birthed the legendary title happened in August of 1990 — at least 4+ months before Teen Spirit, the deodorant, was apparently released in "early 1991". And in a 2016 interview on Double J radio, she mentioned that Dave Grohl was there that night.
She's also mentioned that Kurt called “6 months later” to ask her permission to use what she wrote as "lyrics"... though, she never mentions that — even in the earliest recorded demo — it was never used as lyrics. That itself is pretty inconsequential, I just thought it was interesting.
Boy Meets Nirvana
According to multiple sources, the event that led to Dave Grohl joining the band was Kurt and Krist — then without a drummer — seeing Scream in San Francisco at the I-Beam [Aug 13, 1990], after Buzz Osbourne (of The Melvins) suggested they go see them play. Though, there are conflicting accounts of the events leading up to it. One claims they drove down from Seattle. The other involves them driving up from Los Angeles after Soundgarden's manager suggested driving down there to look for major label deals.
Early August 1990 saw Kurt potentially in LA, then on the 13th in SF, then on the 16th he started a set of one-off shows near LA leading up to the 5-day West Coast tour with Sonic Youth that ended on the 25th of August. Seems like a pretty busy month.
Then there's the issue of Dave Grohl being there on this August night. I couldn't find a specific date for Scream's break up, but the last gig poster I could find was September 6th. Dave, like Kurt, was busy with shows all through August.
It wasn't until the 21st of September of 1990 that Dave flew up to Seattle from LA — where he was staying post-Scream break-up — despite having not even met the band he was joining. On the 25th, Grohl auditioned for Nirvana at their rehearsal space. Needless to say, things went well and a few weeks later, on October 11th, he had his first gig with the band, and then on the 17th he went with them on a short tour of England with L7 that ended on the 29th. It wasn't until after the tour that Grohl moved into Cobain's apartment in Olympia — where they spent the winter recording demos, some of which appeared on 1993’s In Utero.
Conclusion
So, if Kathleen just misremembered by a few months and the night in question happened in November or later, that puts the repeated claim of Kurt's call “6 months later” to ask her permission after “Smells Like Teen Spirit” had been written and potentially performed... at a show her band opened. So... that obviously doesn’t make sense.
But... that still puts the legendary night months before there’s any official documentation of Teen Spirit being on the market. In fact, it appears that the demo for SLTS was recorded and named shortly after (or before, depending on what "early 1991" actually means) the deodorant Teen Spirit was first released.
I'm not sure what this means for the legacy of “Smells Like Teen Spirit”, but the story surrounding its naming seems to have some plot holes.
Teen Spirit Timeline
Additional Sources/Misc
Krist Novoselic, Kim Thayil and Jack Endino 2022 interview with Rick Beato
Dave Grohl with Howard Stern on leaving Scream
Update
Smells like... an update
Back in October I posted my findings after falling into an unexpected rabbit hole of teenage deodorant & pop culture history. The entire process left me with more questions than when I started, and while I didn’t really get much feedback on Substack itself, the article made its way to reddit. If you know
I always thought the line was just something funny and cynical but the company didn’t get the joke and named their product based on the popularity of the top song of the day... very interesting rabbit hole. Think I’ll throw on some Nirvana today
What strikes me reading your rabbit hole story is this: memories are notoriously unreliable, and p.r writers and musicians (and journalists) are prone towards hyperbole.
“People say believe half of what you see son, and none of what you hear. But I can't help being confused, if it's true please tell me...”