Lithium (Nirvana song)

"Lithium"
UK picture sleeve, with sonogram of Frances Bean Cobain
Single by Nirvana
from the album Nevermind
B-side
ReleasedJuly 13, 1992 (1992-07-13)
RecordedMay 1991
StudioSound City (Van Nuys, California)
Genre
alternative rock
Length4:16
LabelDGC
Songwriter(s)
Producer(s)
Nirvana singles chronology
"Come as You Are"
(1992) 		"Lithium"
(1992) 		"In Bloom"
(1992)
Nevermind track listing
13 tracks
  1. "Smells Like Teen Spirit"
  2. "In Bloom"
  3. "Come as You Are"
  4. "Breed"
  5. "Lithium"
  6. "Polly"
  7. "Territorial Pissings"
  8. "Drain You"
  9. "Lounge Act"
  10. "Stay Away"
  11. "On a Plain"
  12. "Something in the Way"
  13. "Endless, Nameless"
Music video
"Lithium" on YouTube

"Lithium" is a song by the American rock band Nirvana, written by vocalist and guitarist Kurt Cobain. It appears as the fifth track on the band's second album, Nevermind, released by DGC Records in September 1991.

In a 1992 interview with California fanzine Flipside, Cobain explained that the song was a fictionalized account of a man who "turned to religion as a last resort to keep himself alive" after the death of his girlfriend, "to keep him from suicide."[4] Nirvana biographer Michael Azerrad described its lyrics as "an update on Marx's description of religion as the 'opiate of the masses.'"[5]

"Lithium" was released as the third single from Nevermind in July 1992, peaking at number 64 on the US Billboard Hot 100 and number 11 on the UK Singles Chart. It also reached number one in Finland and the top five in Ireland and Portugal. The accompanying music video, directed by American filmmaker Kevin Kerslake, is a compilation of live footage from the band's October 31, 1991, concert at the Paramount Theatre in Seattle, Washington, and from the completed but then-unreleased film, 1991: The Year Punk Broke.

  1. ^ Danaher, Michael (August 4, 2014). "The 50 Best Grunge Songs". Paste. Archived from the original on March 20, 2016. Retrieved April 23, 2017.
  2. ^ Sacher, Andrew. "Every song on Nirvana's 'Nevermind,' ranked". Brooklyn Vegan. Retrieved December 29, 2022.
  3. ^ Nevermind (CD liner notes). Nirvana. DGC. 1991.{{cite AV media notes}}: CS1 maint: others in cite AV media (notes) (link)
  4. ^ Kowalewski; Nunez, Al; Cake (May 1992). "An Interview With...Kurt Cobain". Flipside. Retrieved February 12, 2023.{{cite news}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  5. ^ Azerrad (1994), p. 218.