The album, re-released last year on Fire Records, featured collaborations with Colvin and Elliott Smith - another celebrated singer-songwriter of whom Lord was an early champion. She made her major label debut on Sony with her album "Got No Shadow" in 1998. Lord later began writing songs, moved to Olympia, Washington and recorded for the Kill Rock Stars label. Lord was playing Colvin's songs in Boston's T well before Colvin signed a record deal and was catapulted to international fame with her 1997 hit, "Sunny Came Home." The two became close friends. "Mary Lou can sniff out soon-to-be superstars better than anyone I know," said singer-songwriter Shawn Colvin, a three-time Grammy winner. For those who know Lord, including Collins, it comes as no surprise that she recognized a uniqueness to Nirvana before anyone knew just how popular they would become. All of a sudden, the anti-rock star steps up and steals the mic - it was just this feeling that the underdog was finally getting his day."īut even in Seattle, where Nirvana was so popular by 1991 Collins would often play "Smells Like Teen Spirit" on his radio station twice in a row, Nirvana's crossover success came as a huge shock. ".The whole mainstream schlock had gotten so boring, and MTV was inundated with this s***. It just felt revolutionary," Collins said. It was the system being flipped on its head. As hair bands dominated the radio waves, Nirvana was a "f*** you" to the mainstream, said Marco Collins, a Seattle radio DJ who championed the "Seattle sound" in the early 90s - later known as grunge, or to many in Seattle, "The G-word." In this 1993 file photo, lead singer of Nirvana Kurt Cobain is photographed. Nirvana appealed to a generation that was rejecting the formulaic commercial rock and longing for music that was not only powerful, but accessible, said former Nirvana manager Danny Goldberg, who recently released a book about his friendship with Cobain. and most of the world within months of its release, and by the beginning of January 1992 it had reached #1 on the Billboard 200 chart, replacing Michael Jackson's "Dangerous." "Nevermind" exploded in popularity in the U.S., the U.K. The less than two months the two dated marked the time period that Nirvana was rocketing from relative anonymity to international stardom. Lord spoke to CBS News last month from her childhood home in Salem, Massachusetts, detailing a relationship with Cobain she called short, but intense - in many ways like the band's rise to fame. Cobain would be at the center, and Lord would have a front row seat. The next day, the release of "Nevermind" would mark the beginning of a rock revolution. They stayed up all night talking, Lord said, watching the sun come up. "I said, you get on the back," Lord said.Ĭobain rode on the back of her bike to the hotel. He was confused when she started unlocking her bike. She found she shared Cobain's taste for music, which she describes on a podcast she recently produced with fellow musician Maryanne Window as "melodic, different, daring."Īt the end of the night, Lord offered Cobain a ride back to the Howard Johnson where the band was staying.Ĭobain accepted gratefully, Lord said. Lord said she soon discovered Cobain, like her, had an affinity for bands that were underappreciated. Lord didn't believe him, at least not at first.Ĭobain invited Lord upstairs to talk. "Those are my favorite bands, in order," Cobain said, according to Lord. When Cobain said he liked a lot of music, Lord told him about bands like Daniel Johnston, Teenage Fanclub and the Vaselines. She replied he probably wouldn't know it. "Kurt was like, 'You play in the subway?"Ĭobain, then 24, asked her what kind of music she played. "The guy said, 'Hey Mary Lou, heard you playing in the subway, you sounded really good!'" Lord said. Legendary Boston music club The Rathskeller, known a "The Rat," closed in 1997 When some acquaintances came over to say hi, she suspected it was because of who she was talking to. Nirvana was part of the new guard of rock, and Lord wasn't the only one at the Rat that night that knew it.