Hole (band)

Hole
Hole performing live in 2010.
Background information
Origin	Los Angeles, California, United States
Genres	Alternative rock, punk rock, grunge, noise rock, hard rock, power pop
Years active	1989 (1989)–2002, 2009–2012
Labels	Sympathy for the Record Industry, Caroline, City Slang, DGC, Mercury
Associated acts	Sugar Babydoll, Pagan Babies, Doll Squad, Babes In Toyland, Janitor Joe, Tinker, Rodney & the Tube Tops, The Smashing Pumpkins, RRIICCEE, Bastard, Larrikin Love, Ozric Tentacles, Rock Kills Kid
Website	www.holerock.net
Past members	Courtney Love Eric Erlandson Lisa Roberts Caroline Rue Mike Geisbrecht Errol Stewart Jill Emery Patty Schemel Leslie Hardy Kristen Pfaff Melissa Auf der Maur Samantha Maloney Micko Larkin Shawn Dailey Stu Fisher Scott Lipps

Hole was an American alternative rock band that formed in Los Angeles, California in 1989. The band was fronted by vocalist, lyricist, and rhythm guitarist Courtney Love, who formed Hole with lead guitarist Eric Erlandson. Hole had a revolving line-up of bassists and drummers, their most prolific being drummer Patty Schemel, and bassists Kristen Pfaff and Melissa Auf der Maur.

Hole achieved considerable commercial and critical success throughout the 1990s, initially releasing singles through independent labels and debuting with their caustic noise rock-influenced Pretty on the Inside (1991), and later gaining critical acclaim for their 1994 album Live Through This. The band began to incorporate elements of power pop into their sound in the late 1990s, specifically on their third album, Celebrity Skin (1998), which went on to be their most commercially successful release, garnering them widespread critical attention and several Grammy nominations.

The group officially disbanded in 2002 and its members began solo careers and other projects. In 2009, Love announced she was reforming Hole as the sole returning member. Erlandson, however, stated that no reunion could take place contractually without mutual involvement. On January 1, 2010, a website promoting Hole's latest release, Nobody's Daughter, was launched, with links to various social media pages. Despite the dispute between Erlandson and Love, Nobody's Daughter was released in April 2010, and the reformed band toured extensively in Europe and North America. In November 2012, however, Love stated on her Twitter account that she was working now under her own name as a solo artist, and that "Hole is dead".

History

Background and formation

Hole formed after Eric Erlandson replied to an advertisement placed by Courtney Love in Recycler in the summer of 1989. The advertisement simply read: "I want to start a band. My influences are Big Black, Sonic Youth, and Fleetwood Mac."

"She called me up and talked my ear off," said Erlandson. "We met at this coffee shop, and I saw her and I thought "Oh, God. Oh, no, What am I getting myself into?" She grabbed me and started talking, and she's like "I know you're the right one", and I hadn't even opened my mouth yet." In retrospect, Love said that Erlandson "had a Thurston [Moore] quality about him" and was an "intensely weird, good guitarist." In his 2012 book, Letters to Kurt, Erlandson revealed that he and Love had a sexual relationship during their first year together in the band, which Love also confirmed.

Love had lived a nomadic life prior, immersing herself in numerous music scenes and traveling between Oregon and California; she had also spent time in the United Kingdom as a teenager, and had supported herself by working as a stripper. After having short stints attending Portland State University and San Francisco State University, Love moved to Los Angeles and obtained roles in two Alex Cox films (Sid and Nancy and Straight to Hell), but was ultimately displeased with acting, and quit. She had been in several bands with Kat Bjelland and briefly sang in Faith No More in the early 1980s, but had yet to find any success in music. Erlandson was a California native and a graduate of Loyola Marymount University, and was working as a royalties manager for Capitol Records at the time he met Love.

During an interview on Later... with Jools Holland, Love claimed the name for the band was inspired by a quote from Euripides' Medea which read "there's a hole that pierces my soul." Additionally, Love cited a conversation with her mother as being the primary inspiration for the band's name: "My mother is this new age psychologist and I said, "I had this terrible childhood", and she said, "You can't have a hole running through you all the time, Courtney.""

1989-1992: Early work and indie success

Flyer made by Courtney Love promoting a Hole show in Los Angeles, August 1991.

In the months preceding the band's full formation, Love used Michael "Flea" Balzary's rehearsal space in Los Angeles to begin writing. The band's first official rehearsal took place at Fortress Studios in Hollywood with Love, Erlandson and Lisa Roberts on bass. According to Erlandson, "these two girls show up dressed completely crazy, we set up and they said, "okay, just start playing something." I started playing and they started screaming at the top of their lungs for two or three hours. Crazy lyrics and screaming. I said to myself, "most people would just run away from this really fast." But I heard something in Courtney's voice and lyrics."

Initially, the band had no percussion until Love met drummer Caroline Rue. They also recruited a third guitarist, Mike Geisbrecht, and began to book club shows. Hole's first show took place at Raji's, a small club in Hollywood, in September 1989. Their early shows were notable for featuring lots of experimental playing, distortion, and guitar feedback—a style that would be heavily present in their eventual studio material. From the beginning, Hole was primarily influenced by punk, noise rock, and no wave music.

In 1990, Hole recruited bassist Jill Emery and began recording studio material. The band released their debut single "Retard Girl" in 1990, and followed it with "Dicknail" in 1991, released on Sympathy for the Record Industry and Sub Pop, respectively. According to KROQ-FM disc jockey Rodney Bingenheimer, Love would often "hang out" at a Denny's on Sunset Blvd. where he went for coffee in the mornings and try to convince him to play "Retard Girl" on his station. As the group began to generate income as an underground band, A&R representatives started to appear at their shows. When approached by a label representative who told Love the band needed a more "full sound", she simply replied "fuck off."

In 1991, the band signed onto Caroline Records to release their debut album, and Love sought Kim Gordon of Sonic Youth to produce the record. Sending a letter, a Hello Kitty barrette, and copies of the band's early singles to Gordon, Love mentioned that the band greatly admired Gordon's work and appreciated "... the production of the SST record" (either referring to Sonic Youth's album Sister or EVOL), also noting that they would "prefer to work with a woman". Gordon agreed, and Gumball's Don Fleming assisted in production. The album, titled Pretty on the Inside, was released in August 1991 to positive reception from underground critics, branded "loud, ugly and deliberately shocking", and earning a spot on Spin's "20 Best Albums of the Year" list. It was also voted album of the year by New York's Village Voice and peaked at number 59 on the UK albums chart. The album spawned one single, "Teenage Whore", which entered the UK Indie Chart at number one, as well as the band's debut music video for the song "Garbadge Man".

Musically and lyrically, the album was very abrasive, characterized by overt noise and feedback, chaotic guitar riffs, graphic lyrics, and a variation of Love's vocals ranging from whispers to guttural screaming. In later years, Love referred to the album as "unlistenable", despite its critical accolades and eventual cult following. The underlying pro-feminist slant prevalent in the lyrics led many to mistakenly tag the band as being part of the riot grrl movement at the time, a movement that Love was highly critical of.

The band embarked on a European tour in the fall of 1991 with Mudhoney and Daisy Chainsaw supporting. They also toured intermittently in the United States between July and December 1991, playing primarily at hard rock and punk clubs, including CBGB and the Whisky A Go Go, where they opened for The Smashing Pumpkins. The tour included a fair amount of chaos, and Love smashed her guitar onstage in a fit of anger at their last show of their US tour. It was during the tour that Love initially became romantically involved with Kurt Cobain of Nirvana (the two had initially crossed paths in 1989 in Portland), later becoming pregnant in December 1991.

1993-1995: Mainstream success and Pfaff's death

Hole began planning a second album in 1992, in the midst of Love's pregnancy. Love's desire to take the band in a more melodic and controlled rock format led bassist Emery to leave the band, and drummer Caroline Rue followed. In an advertisement to find a new bass player, Love wrote: "[I want] someone who can play ok, and stand in front of 30,000 people, take off her shirt and have 'fuck you' written on her tits. If you're not afraid of me and you're not afraid to fucking say it, send a letter. No more pussies, no more fake girls, I want a whore from hell." In April 1992, drummer Patty Schemel was recruited after an audition in Los Angeles and recommendation by Cobain, but the band spent the rest of the year without a consistent bassist.

Courtney Love performing with Hole at Molson Park in Barrie, Ontario; July 23, 1995

As a result of Pretty on the Inside's success and the furious press coverage surrounding Love, Hole signed to Geffen Records with an eight-album contract in late 1992 after many meetings with major labels during Love's pregnancy. In the spring of 1993, the band released their single "Beautiful Son", which was recorded in Seattle with producer Jack Endino as a fill-in bass player; Love also played bass on the single's b-side "20 Years In the Dakota". The band later traveled to Rio de Janeiro for studio work, where Love and Schemel, along with Cobain, recorded a four-track demo of "joke songs" under the group name Nighty Nite; the three pretended to be two teenage sisters from Marysville, Washington who were starting a riot grrrl band, and heightened the pitch on the vocal tracks. The demos were sent to various musicians as a joke, including members of Bikini Kill, Fugazi, and Beat Happening.

Love and Erlandson attended a Janitor Joe concert upon returning to the United States, and immediately offered the group's bassist Kristen Pfaff their open bass slot in Hole, to which she agreed. Now with a stable bassist, the band performed several concerts throughout 1993 (including the Phoenix Festival on July 16). The band's 1993 set-lists featured many songs from their upcoming major label debut, Live Through This, which was recorded at Triclops Studios in Marietta, Georgia in October 1993. The studio was recommended to Love by Billy Corgan, who had recorded The Smashing Pumpkins' album Siamese Dream there.

In March 1994, Love and husband Kurt Cobain individually checked themselves into rehab clinics in Los Angeles for heroin addictions. Cobain checked himself out of rehab shortly after arriving and returned to Seattle, just a week before the release of Hole's second album. The album, titled Live Through This, was released on April 12, 1994, and in tragic timing—-four days after finding that Love's husband, Cobain, committed suicide in their Seattle home. In the days following his death, Love mourned with fans outside their house, and a recording of her reading his suicide note was played at a memorial service in Seattle, where she arrived shortly after the ceremony to distribute some of his clothing to fans.

Live Through This was a critical success, and spawned several singles: "Doll Parts", "Violet", "Miss World" and "Softer, Softest". The album went multi-platinum and was hailed "Album of the Year" by Spin magazine and received unanimously rave reviews from major music periodicals. NME called the album "a personal but secretive thrash-pop opera of urban nihilism and passionate dumbthinks", and Rolling Stone said the album "may be the most potent blast of female insurgency ever committed to tape".

Despite the critical praise for Live Through This, furious rumors circulated insinuating that Cobain had actually written the majority of the album, though the band vehemently denies this. They did, however, state that Love convinced Cobain to provide backing vocals on "Asking for It" and "Softer, Softest" while visiting the studio, and music producers present during the recording sessions noted that Cobain seemed "completely unfamiliar" with the songs. According to Rolling Stone rock journalist Gavin Edwards, Love and Cobain had written songs together in the past, but opted to not release them because it was "a bit too redolent of John and Yoko". Incidentally, Love has revealed that the alternate mix of "Asking for It" featuring Cobain, was planned to be released as a single before his suicide occurred.

In the wake of Cobain's death, the band pushed forward to prepare for a tour to promote the album, but it came to a halt when bassist Kristen Pfaff died that June of a heroin overdose. Hole pulled out of the upcoming Lollapalooza festival, which was also going to include Cobain's band, Nirvana. The band disappeared from the media spotlight in the summer of 1994, and on September 1, played their first headlining show since the album's release at the Phoenix Theatre in Toronto, dedicating it to Kristen. The band, now with Melissa Auf der Maur on bass, embarked on a worldwide tour throughout late 1994 and 1995.

Appearances included the KROQ Almost Acoustic Christmas, Saturday Night Live, the Big Day Out festival, MTV Unplugged, the Reading Festival, and Lollapalooza 1995. Perhaps most infamously, the band was asked to play at MTV Video Music Awards, where they were nominated for the "Doll Parts" music video. They also performed "Violet" at the awards show. Before the song, a clearly distraught Love dedicated the performance to Cobain, Pfaff, Joe Cole, and River Phoenix, all of whom had recently died. Love ended the performance by chanting "God bless your soul", throwing her guitar into the air, pushing over a microphone stand into the audience, and knocking over stereo equipment before exiting the stage.

Back cover art of Live Through This, exhibiting the mislabeled closing track "Rock Star". The photo on the left is of Courtney Love during her childhood in Oregon.

Love's stage presence during the tour became something of a media spectacle, drawing press from MTV and other outlets due to her fraught emotional state and unpredictable performances. BBC presenter John Peel summarized the group's performance at the 1994 Reading Festival, writing:

Courtney's first appearance backstage certainly caught the attention. Swaying wildly and with lipstick smeared on her face, hands and, I think, her back, as well as on the collar of her dress, the singer would have drawn whistles of astonishment in Bedlam. After a brief word with supporters at the foot of the stage, she reeled away, knocking over a wastebin, and disappeared. Minutes later she was onstage giving a performance which verged on the heroic...Love steered her band through a set which dared you to pity either her recent history or that of the band...the band teetered on the edge of chaos, generating a tension which I cannot remember having felt before from any stage.

The volatile nature of the tour persisted when Love got into a physical fight with Kathleen Hanna backstage at a 1995 Lollapalooza festival and punched her in the face. More controversy was stirred at a Pittsburgh Lollapalooza concert in the fall of 1995, when Love stormed offstage with the band in tears after an audience member threw shotgun shells at her.

Toward the end of the tour, the band released their first EP, titled Ask for It, in September 1995; it featured 1991 Peel session recordings of "Doll Parts" and "Violet", as well as covers of The Wipers' "Over the Edge" and "Pale Blue Eyes" by The Velvet Underground. After the band's tour concluded, Hole entered the studio to begin work on a new album. There were multiple attempts to record Hole's third album, and one such attempt was in New Orleans in winter 1995. Interviews with Erlandson have confirmed the authenticity of this session, and the style is thought to have been a transition between the alternative style of Live Through This and the band's later pop-influenced sound, however no material from the sessions has surfaced.

1996-1998: Hiatus, and Celebrity Skin

Hole was thought to be on hiatus in 1996 due to Love's rising movie career which skyrocketed when she landed a lead role in The People vs. Larry Flynt (1996). Despite the reported hiatus, the band recorded and released a cover of Fleetwood Mac's "Gold Dust Woman" for The Crow: City of Angels (1996) soundtrack, the band's first studio song to feature Melissa Auf der Maur on bass. Hole released two retrospective albums during this time: firstly, their second EP, titled The First Session (1997), which was composed of a complete version of the band's first recording session at Rudy's Rising Star in Los Angeles in March 1990, some of which had been bootlegged widely years prior. It featured the group's first ever recorded track, "Turpentine", which had previously been unreleased to the public, as well as their first single, "Retard Girl", and its two b-sides.

The same year, the band released their first compilation album, My Body, The Hand Grenade (1997), which was produced chiefly by Erlandson; Love designed the packaging and artwork on the album. The album was composed as a retrospective on the band's career, featuring early singles, mid-period b-sides and recent live tracks, illustrating their path from a "tiny L.A. basement studio into alternative rock superstardom". One outtake from the Live Through This recording sessions which was included on this release was the controversial song, "Old Age". It was eventually learned "Old Age" had initially been written by Kurt Cobain for the Nevermind sessions in 1991, then aborted and given to Love, who rewrote the lyrics and tried to "make it goth".

Although Hole as a band did not perform during 1996 and 1997, members of Hole performed separately, including Love's guest appearance at a Smashing Pumpkins show in February 1996, at which she performed "Silverfuck" and "Farewell and Goodnight", with Smashing Pumpkins' frontman, and former boyfriend, Billy Corgan. Auf der Maur and Schemel also performed a show in Toronto in July 1996. Erlandson collaborated with Thurston Moore of Sonic Youth and director Dave Markey in the short-lived project, Rodney & the Tube Tops, with whom he released one single.

In 1997, the band entered Conway Recording Studios in Los Angeles after many "fruitless attempts" in Miami, London and New York to record a follow-up to Live Through This. Hole's third studio album, Celebrity Skin (1998) adopted a complete new sound for the band, incorporating elements of power pop, and Love drawing influence from Fleetwood Mac and My Bloody Valentine. The studio work on Celebrity Skin took almost a year and a half— according to Erlandson, Love was more focused on song-writing and singing than playing guitar. In addition to the band, Billy Corgan entered the studio and helped perfect the songs. Love, who felt she was in a creative slump, referred to Corgan's presence in the studio to "a math teacher who wouldn't give you the answers but was making you solve the problems yourself."

Although Patty Schemel is listed as drummer in the liner notes of the record, her drumming does not actually appear on the album, having been replaced by session drummer Deen Castronovo at the suggestion of producer Michael Beinhorn. The replacement left Schemel feeling "betrayed" by the rest of the band, who had ultimately agreed upon her replacement, and resulted in Schemel leaving the studio after two weeks of recording and breaking ties with the group. Though Love and Erlandson had authorized Schemel's replacement, Love stated in 2011 that Beinhorn was notorious for replacing drummers during recording, and referred to him as "a Nazi". After Schemel's departure, the band recruited drummer Samantha Maloney for their tours.

In reaction to public speculation that Kurt Cobain had written the band's second album, Celebrity Skin's liner notes listed explicitly every musician's contribution to the record, specifying authorship for every song. Love wrote all the lyrics, while Erlandson, assistant-producing alongside Michael Beinhorn, had a hand in every song. Co-songwriters on the album also included Melissa Auf der Maur, Patty Schemel, Jordon Zadorozny of Blinker the Star, and Charlotte Caffey of The Go-Go's, each contributing pieces to a number of songs, however the most notable contributor was Billy Corgan, who co-wrote five of the twelve songs on the album.

Nonetheless, as with the rumors surrounding the writing credits on Live Through This, unwarranted controversy stirred over the authorship of the songs. Upon its release, Corgan made references that he should have "been given credit" for writing the entire album. Erlandson responded to Corgan's statements in a Rolling Stone interview, commenting: "We were working on all the stuff that Courtney and I had already written. Billy really facilitated things, in a way... I would bring in the music, Courtney would start coming up with lyrics right away, and [Billy] would help map it all out." Erlandson also stated: "Courtney writes all her own lyrics. Nobody else is writing those lyrics and nobody ever has." One journalist took note of the controversy when reviewing the album, stating: "Back in 1994, the acclaim for Live Through This was undercut by whispers that Love's late husband wrote the album. Combine those conspiracy theories with the unfounded but persistent rumor that Cobain was actually murdered, and it is no surprise that, in the song "Celebrity Skin", Love calls herself a walking study in demonology."

Featuring a more pop-oriented sound, Celebrity Skin was a critical success with strong sales and successful singles, including the title track, "Celebrity Skin", "Malibu", and "Awful". Eric Erlandson told Rolling Stone, "I still think a lot of Celebrity Skin is my Johnny Thunders influence coming up – which Courtney just fucking hates." The album received unanimously positive reviews, with praise from music periodicals such as Rolling Stone, NME, and Blender, as well as a four-star review from the Los Angeles Times, calling it a "wild emotional ride" sure to be "one of the most dissected and debated collections of the year." The album charted incredibly well, peaking at number 9 on the Billboard 200, and garnering the band its first and only number 1 single, "Celebrity Skin", which topped the Modern Rock Tracks. "Malibu" was the album's second successful single, making it to number 3 on the Modern Rock Tracks. Commercially speaking, Celebrity Skin went on to be the band's greatest success.

In the winter of 1998–99, Hole went on tour to promote Celebrity Skin, and made further appearances at festivals throughout 1999 after an extensive American and European tour. Hole and Marilyn Manson toured together, with Manson promoting his then-recent album, Mechanical Animals (1998) on the "Beautiful Monsters Tour". The tour turned into a publicity magnet, and Hole dropped out of the tour nine dates in, due to both the majority of the fans being Manson's, who were not very interested in the Hole performances, and the financial arrangement for the bands (50/50 cost and revenue splitting) as a reason for discontinuing the tour (Hole had relatively little production costs and ending up paying a large amount for Manson's high cost production). Manson and Love often mocked one another onstage as well, and Love attacked Manson's stage antics, which included tearing up a Bible during performances: "You know, whenever somebody rips up the Bible in front of 40,000 people, I think it's a big deal," she said during a 1999 interview. The band played one last show on the tour after a poorly-received concert at Portland's Rose Garden Arena, which ended with Manson fans booing the band and Love dropping her guitar and walking offstage after a 45-minute set.

Nonetheless, Melissa Auf der Maur considered the tour "the best [we] ever were as a live band", and documented the Celebrity Skin concerts by taking photographs, several of which were featured in National Geographic music editorials. As noted by Auf der Maur, it was a "daily event" for Love to invite audience members onstage to sing with her for the last song at nearly every concert performed during the tour.

On June 18, 1999 during Hole's set at the Hultsfred Festival in Sweden, a 19-year old girl died after being crushed by the mosh pit behind the mixing board. The band did not comment on her death. Hole played its final show at Thunderbird Stadium in Vancouver on July 14, 1999.

1999-2002: Dissolution and disbandment

In October 1999, Auf der Maur quit Hole and went on to become a touring bassist for The Smashing Pumpkins. Samantha Maloney also quit a few months later. Despite being the only two remaining members of the group, Love and Erlandson still continued with Hole. The band's final release was a single for the movie Any Given Sunday (1999). "Be a Man", released in March 2000, was an outtake from the Celebrity Skin sessions, and was another song co-written by and including bass-work by Corgan.

Love and Erlandson officially disbanded Hole via a message posted on the band's website in 2002. After the split, the four musicians each took on projects of their own. Erlandson continued to work as a producer and session musician, eventually forming the experimental group RRIICCEE with controversial artist, Vincent Gallo and Love began a solo career, releasing her debut, America's Sweetheart in 2004. Melissa Auf der Maur also embarked on a solo career, and released her self-titled debut album in 2004, which also included Erlandson on lead guitar on the track, "Would If I Could." Her second album, Out of Our Minds, was released on March 30, 2010.

Hole's original body of work includes thirteen singles, six Grammy nominations, three LPs, three EPs, one compilation album and 10 music videos.

2010-2012: Reformation, and Nobody's Daughter

On June 17, 2009, NME posted two in-depth blogs, and links to two interviews, of Courtney Love announcing the reunion of Hole. The article was primarily focused on Love's upcoming solo release, Nobody's Daughter, yet it claimed with the "rock Courtney back in action, this music could only come out under one name, Hole". According to the blog post, Melissa Auf der Maur would once again be bassist, with Micko Larkin replacing Eric Erlandson, and a drummer was not mentioned. There was also mention of "tours next year". However, days later, Melissa Auf der Maur, interviewed in Toronto where she was appearing at the North by Northeast music festival, said she had "no clue" about the band's reported reunion and denied the NME claim she had, or was asked to, contribute vocals to the album or had been asked to tour with the purportedly reunited band saying, "I actually don't know [about the reunion]...I arrived at [the music festival in Toronto] and I heard that Hole were getting back together from people sending me links," she said. Auf der Maur did, however, state that she had been asked by Love to do harmonies on the album, but nothing else.

Erlandson stated in Spin magazine that contractually no reunion can take place without his involvement, therefore Nobody's Daughter would remain Love's solo record, as opposed to a "Hole" record. Erlandson stated that he and Love "have a contract", which was later revealed to be a contract preventing either from reforming Hole without mutual involvement. Love then responded to Erlandson's comments in a Twitter post, claiming that "he's out of his mind, Hole is my band, my name, and my Trademark". In a later interview, just days before the expected release of Hole's Nobody's Daughter, Erlandson explained how "[Courtney's] management convinced me that it was all hot air and that she would never be able to finish her album. Now I'm left in an uncomfortable position."

Hole launched a new website, and an official Facebook page on January 1, 2010. The band had its first performance on February 12, 2010 on Friday Night with Jonathan Ross. On February 17, 2010 they played a full set at the O2 Shepherds Bush Empire, with support from Little Fish. Further shows were performed at 02 Academy Brixton and SPIN's annual SXSW music festival, with further dates being added for the United States and United Kingdom. Television appearances included performances on Late Show with David Letterman, Jimmy Kimmel Live!, and Later with Jools Holland. On March 16, the first Hole single in ten years, was released, titled "Skinny Little Bitch". It was the most added song on alternative radio and the second most added song on active rock in early March in the United States, debuting at No. 32 on Billboard's Alternative Singles Chart.

Courtney Love and guitarist Micko Larkin performing at Bumbershoot in Seattle, Washington in September 2010.

Nobody's Daughter was released on April 26 and 27, 2010 worldwide through Mercury Records, and was received by music critics with moderately positive acclaim. Rolling Stone gave the album three out of five stars, but noted "[while Love] was an absolute monster vocalist in the nineties, the greatest era ever for rock singers... She doesn't have that power in her lungs anymore – barely a trace. But at least she remembers, and that means something in itself." The magazine also referred to the album as "not a true success", but a "noble effort". Love's voice, which had been noticeably raspier (likely due to years of scream-singing, drug abuse, and smoking) was compared to the likes of Bob Dylan. NME gave the album a 6/10 rating, and Robert Christgau rated it an "A-", saying, "Thing is, I can use some new punk rage in my life, and unless you're a fan of Goldman Sachs and BP Petroleum, so can you. What's more, better it come from a 45-year-old woman who knows how to throw her weight around than from the zitty newbies and tattooed road dogs who churn most of it out these days. I know—for her, BP Petroleum is just something else to pretend about. But the emotion fueling her pretense is cathartic nevertheless." In support of the release, Hole toured extensively between 2010 and 2012 throughout North America and Europe, as well as performing in Japan, Russia, and Brazil.

On March 28, 2011, Love, Erlandson, Patty Schemel and Auf der Maur appeared at the New York screening of Schemel's documentary Hit So Hard: The Life and Near-Death Story of Patty Schemel at the Museum of Modern Art. The appearance was first time in thirteen years that all four members appeared together in public. Schemel has expressed a desire to record with Love, Erlandson and Auf der Maur stating "nothing has been discussed, but I have a feeling." After the screening, the four took part in a Q&A session where Courtney Love stated: "For me, as much as I love playing with Patty – and I would play with her in five seconds again, and everyone onstage – if it's not moving forward, I don't wanna do it. That's just my thing. There's rumblings; there's always bloody rumblings. But if it's not miserable and it's going forward and I'm happy with it… that's all I have to say about that question."

In May 2011, a video for "Samantha" was shot, although it remained officially unreleased. In September 2011, Scott Lipps joined the band, replacing drummer Stu Fisher. In April 2012, Love, Erlandson, Auf der Maur and Schemel reunited at the Public Assembly in New York for a two-song set, including "Miss World" and the Wipers' "Over the Edge," at an after-party for the Hit So Hard documentary. The performance marked the first time the four members performed together live since 1995.

2013-present: Disbandment and further projects

On November 29, 2012, Love stated on her Twitter account for her upcoming clothing line: "From now on [the band is called Courtney], Hole is dead", implying that she was abandoning the Hole moniker and returning to performing as a solo artist. On December 29, 2012, Love performed a solo acoustic set in New York City, and in January 2013, performed at the Sundance Film Festival under her own name. She booked further performances across North America as a solo act, with Larkin, Dailey, and Lipps as her backing band.

In May, Love put an advert on craiglist stating she wanted to form a band and was looking for a bass player, although only got one response. She also said that she is working on a new album which she wants to be titled Died Blonde, She explained the reason behind this: "I'm thinking of maybe naming my fucking album 'Died Blonde', because I'm in such a morbid space… It's not that I'm unhappy. And it's certainly not that I'm crazy. It's just that I know all this shit and I don't know what to do with it." She so far has two songs thought to go on the album titled "Wedding Day" and "California", which she wishes to release as a single.

Musical style and influences

Initially, Hole drew inspiration from no wave and experimental bands, which is evident in their earliest recordings, specifically "Retard Girl", but frontwoman Love also drew from a variety of influences. Love, who had grown up in Portland, was influenced by local punk band Wipers, new wave groups such as Echo and the Bunnymen and Joy Division, and classic rock such Neil Young and Fleetwood Mac. The band's first album, Pretty on the Inside, was heavily influenced by noise and punk rock, using discordant melodies, distortion, and feedback, with Love's vocals ranging from whispers to guttural screams. Love described the band's earliest songwriting as being based on "really crazy Sonic Youth tunings." Nonetheless, Love claimed to have aimed for a pop sound early on: "There's a part of me that wants to have a grindcore band and another that wants to have a Raspberries-type pop band," she told Flipside magazine in 1991. Both Love and Erlandson were fans of the notorious LA punk band The Germs. In a 1996 interview for a Germs tribute documentary, Erlandson said: "I think every band is based on one song, and our band was based on "Forming"... Courtney brought it into rehearsal, and she knew, like, three chords and it was the only punk rock song we could play."

The band's second album Live Through This, captured a less abrasive sound, while maintaining the group's original punk roots. "I want this record to be shocking to the people who don't think we have a soft edge, and at the same time, [to know] that we haven't lost our very, very hard edge," Love told VH1 in 1994. The group's third album, Celebrity Skin, incorporated power pop into their hard rock sound, and was heavily inspired by California bands. The group's 2010 release, Nobody's Daughter, featured a more folk rock-oriented sound, utilizing acoustic guitar and softer melodies.

The majority of the band's musical structures were based on power chords, barre chords, open chords and occasional arpeggios and solos, with Love providing rhythm and Erlandson, lead guitar. Their chord progressions by and large drew on elements of punk music, which Love described as "grungey", although not necessarily grunge. Critics described their song style as "deceptively wispy and strummy," combined with "gunshot guitar choruses." Although the group's sound changed over the course of their career, the dynamic between beauty and ugliness has often been noted, particularly due to the layering of harsh and abrasive riffs which often bury more sophisticated arrangements.

Lyrics and songwriting

Love once said that lyrics were "the most important thing" to her when writing music. Her songwriting focused on a variety of themes throughout Hole's career, and mainly from a female, and often feminist standpoint. This underlying feminism in Love's lyrics often led the public and critics to mistakenly associate her with the riot grrrl movement, which she was notoriously critical of. She has described her lyrics as "wordy".

In a 1991 interview with Everett True, Love said: "I try to place [beautiful imagery] next to fucked up imagery, because that's how I view things... I sometimes feel that no one's taken the time to write about certain things in rock, that there's a certain female point of view that's never been given space." Charles Cross has referred to her lyrics on Live Through This as being "true extensions of her diary," and she has admitted that a great deal of the lyrics from Pretty on the Inside were excisions from her journals.

Throughout Hole's career, Love's lyrics often contained a great deal of intertextuality and references to other works of art and literature: Pretty on the Inside contains references to The Ballad of East and West by Rudyard Kipling; the title of the band's album Live Through This (as well as lyrics from the track "Asking for It") is directly drawn from Gone With the Wind; and the group's single "Celebrity Skin" (the title track to their 1998 album), contains quotes from Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice and Dante Rossetti's poem A Superscription. Love had had a minor background in literature, having briefly studied English literature in her early twenties at Portland State University.

Legacy

In spite of Love's often polarizing reputation in the media, Hole received consistent critical praise for their output, and was often noted for the predominant feminist commentary found in Love's lyrics, which scholars have credited as "articulating a third-wave feminist consciousness". Love's subversive onstage persona and public image coincided with the band's songs, which expressed "pain, sorrow, and anger, but [an] underlying message of survival, particularly survival in the face of overwhelming circumstances."

The band also became legendary for their unpredictable live shows and Love's volatile stage presence; concerts would often end with the band destroying instruments and trashing the stage, or with Love diving into the audience and having her clothes torn off of her. Love also became known for her onstage fashion, largely consisting of smeared makeup and babydoll dresses, later branded the title "kinderwhore". Rolling Stone referred to Love's style as "a slightly more politically charged version of grunge; apathy turned into ruinous angst, which soon became high fashion's favorite pose. It was a force of nature that sent shockwaves through mainstream Nineties style."

While Rolling Stone compared the effect of Love's marriage to Cobain on the band to that of John Lennon and Yoko Ono, they noted that "Love's confrontational stage presence, as well as her gut-wrenching vocals and powerful punk-pop songcraft, made her an alternative-rock star in her own right."

In addition to appealing to women and teenaged girls, the band also attracted a following among gays and lesbians, partially due to drummer Patty Schemel, who came out in a 1995 Rolling Stone interview with the band, and to Courtney Love's vocal support of gay rights. Regarding the band's fan base, Love said: "It's a lot of females, and a lot of gay guys, and a few advanced and evolved heterosexual men; not many. There's a few out there."

The band ranked at #77 of VH1's 100 Greatest Hard Rock Artists.

Members

• Courtney Love – lead vocals, rhythm guitar (1989–2002, 2009–2012)
• Eric Erlandson – lead guitar (1989–2002)
• Lisa Roberts – bass, backing vocals (1989–1990)
• Caroline Rue – drums, percussion (1989–1992)
• Mike Geisbrecht – guitar (1989)
• Errol Stewart – guitar (1989)
• Jill Emery – bass (1990–1992)
• Patty Schemel – drums, percussion (1992–1998)
• Leslie Hardy – bass, backing vocals (1992–1993)
• Kristen Pfaff – bass, backing vocals, keyboards (1993–1994; died 1994)
• Melissa Auf der Maur – bass, backing vocals (1994–1999)
• Samantha Maloney – drums, percussion (1998–2000)
• Micko Larkin – lead guitar (2009–2012)
• Shawn Dailey – bass (2009–2012)
• Stu Fisher - drums, percussion (2009–2011)
• Scott Lipps – drums, percussion (2011–2012)

Timeline

Discography

Main article: Hole discography

• Pretty on the Inside (1991)
• Live Through This (1994)
• Celebrity Skin (1998)
• Nobody's Daughter (2010)

Awards and nominations

Grammy Awards

Year	Recipient	Award	Result
1999	Celebrity Skin	Best Rock Album	Nominated
1999	"Celebrity Skin"	Best Rock Song	Nominated
1999	"Celebrity Skin"	Best Rock Vocal Performance by a Duo or Group	Nominated
2000	"Malibu"	Best Rock Vocal Performance by a Duo or Group	Nominated

MTV Video Music Awards

Year	Recipient	Award	Result
1995	"Doll Parts"	Best Alternative Video	Nominated
1999	"Malibu"	Best Cinematography in a Video	Nominated

External links

• Official website
• Hole on Myspace
• Hole's channel on YouTube