Frances Bean Cobain

Infobox Person
subject_name = Frances Bean Cobain


birth_date = August 18, 1992 (age age|1992|8|18)
birth_place = Los Angeles, California

Frances Bean Cobain (born August 18, 1992) is the only child of Nirvana frontman, Kurt Cobain and wife Courtney Love. She was born at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, California at 7:48 AM, weighing 6 lb 1 oz . [ Charles R. Cross, "Heavier Than Heaven". Hyperion, 2001: ISBN 0-7868-6505-9 p. 246]

Name

Frances is named after Frances McKee from Scottish band The Vaselines but is often said to be named after Frances Farmer, a troubled and suicidal actress from the 1930s. [ [http://www.nndb.com/people/063/000044928/ Frances Bean Cobain ] ] [ [http://www.livenirvana.com/history/92.php www.LiveNirvana.com ] ] [ [http://home.thezone.net/~sreid/nirvana/faq.htm The Nirvana Faq ] ] . The middle name Bean was chosen because Kurt thought she looked like a kidney bean on the ultrasound. [Michael Azerrad. 'Come as You Are: The Story of Nirvana". Doubleday, 1993. ISBN 0-385-47199-8, p. 270] Her godfather is R.E.M. frontman Michael Stipe, and Drew Barrymore is her godmother. [ [http://www.moonwashedrose.com/media/francesid.html i-d Magazine interview with Bean in January 2006] ]

Early life

Frances Bean Cobain was born to musicians Kurt Cobain and Courtney Love on August 18, 1992 in Los Angeles, California. During Courtney Love's pregnancy with Frances, there were rumors suggesting that Courtney used heroin. This scandal intensified when "Vanity Fair" published Lynn Hirschberg's article "Strange Love" that alleged Love admitted to taking heroin even after learning of her pregnancy. The response to this article caused serious damage to Love's public standing, and many parenting groups called for Frances to be removed from her parents' custody immediately after birth. Along with Cobain, Love maintained that "Vanity Fair" took her words out of context. This continued after her birth, with tabloid reporters wanting to know if Frances was born addicted to drugs. The notoriety of the article resulted in child welfare services launching an investigation into the couple's ability to parent. The investigation was eventually dismissed, but not without a significant amount of legal wrangling and two-week-old Frances being removed from her parents' custody for a short time. During Courtney Love's hospital stint in 2003, Frances was put into the care of Kurt Cobain's mother. Frances was returned to the custody of Courtney Love several months later.

Father's death

April 1, 1994 was the last time Frances saw her father alive while she was visiting him at Exodus Recovery Center, the L.A. rehab clinic he had entered the previous day. [Charles R. Cross, "Heavier Than Heaven". Hyperion, 2001: p. 341] The two of them played, and Kurt sang to her. A week later, on the morning of April 8, 1994, Cobain was found dead in his home from an apparent suicide.

The following fall, Love enrolled Frances at Happy Medium School in Seattle, now called Giddens School. During her kindergarten year, Frances attended Highland Hall (a Waldorf school) in Northridge, California.

Currently

To date, Frances has given four official interviews. In September 2005, at age 13, Cobain gave her first ever interview to "Teen Vogue" where she discussed her personal style and mentions her parents. [ [http://vogue.co.uk/vogue_daily/story/story.asp?stid=28754&date=&sid= Don't expect any grunge from Frances Bean | Vogue.com ] ] The second interview appeared in i-D magazine in January 2006, where she expressed negativity over tabloid portrayals of her mother, saying, "when you see a lot of lies about her in the tabloids...it can be hurtful." [ [http://www.moonwashedrose.com/media/francesid.html i-D Magazine, January 2006] ] In August 2006, she was photographed for "ELLE" in her father's famous brown cardigan and his pajama pants that he got married in. "I wore his pajamas because he got married in them to my mom in 1992 in Hawaii so I thought they would be cute if I wore them today ... he was too lazy to put on a tux so he got married in pajamas!" she said. She also said that she wears his clothes now and then, and owns more than 137 pairs of shoes, 200 pairs of jeans, and many designer bags. In February 2008, Frances appeared in a photo spread for Harper's Bazaar [http://www.harpersbazaar.com/fashion/fashion-articles/frances-bean-cobain-0308] .

According to her mother, Frances is set to inherit "a sweater, a guitar, and the lyrics to 'Smells Like Teen Spirit'" from her father's possessions. [ [http://www.people.com/people/article/0,,20037283,00.html Courtney Love to Sell Kurt Cobain's Possessions - Courtney Love, Kurt Cobain : People.com ] ] Many other possessions will be sold in an upcoming auction held by Courtney Love, with the majority of the proceeds going to charity. According to "Rolling Stone" magazine, the title and cover photograph for "", the latest posthumous Nirvana release, were chosen by Frances [ [http://www.rollingstone.com/news/story/_/id/7661197/nirvana?pageid=rs.Home&pageregion=single1&rnd=1127255233359&has-player=true&version=6.0.12.1059 Unreleased Nirvana Due : Rolling Stone ] ] . The cover photograph shows a pile of Nirvana and Cobain tapes strewn about, including a copy of the "Fecal Matter" demo.The band "Mindless Self Indulgence" played a private show for her 16th birthday.

Notes