"Having to resort to writing something like this is so embarrassing." The story behind the extremely controversial Nirvana song that almost got them banned and made a US President smash up his own daughter's CD

Nirvana outside their trailer gurning at the camera in 1992.

Nirvana may have a back catalogue filled with iconic anthems, but there is only one track that has the distinction of being both the final single released before Kurt Cobain’s death and the most controversial song the band ever recorded. Tied to both tragedy and outrage, equally haunting and misunderstood and capable of inspiring the future President of the United States of America to burst into a violent rage, perhaps nothing sums up Nirvana’s final act more than Rape Me.

The impact of Nirvana’s 1991 album Nevermind was so seismic that it had turned a small Seattle punk band into the biggest and most talked about musical artist on the planet. It was not a situation that the members of Nirvana themselves took well. Suddenly inhabiting the mainstream pop world, with all of the gossip and scrutiny that brought with it, Nirvana, and Kurt in particular, quickly started to unravel.