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Frances Bean Cobain

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Frances Bean Cobain
BornAugust 18, 1992 (age 32)
Los Angeles, California, U.S.
Parent(s)Kurt Cobain
Courtney Love

Frances Bean Cobain (born August 18, 1992) is an American singer and the daughter of the late Nirvana frontman Kurt Cobain and Hole singer Courtney Love.

Early life

She was born at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, California at 7:48 a.m., weighing 7 lb 1 oz (3.2 kg).[1] Her father named her after Frances McKee, the guitarist for the indie pop duo The Vaselines, not Frances Farmer as often thought.[2][3][4] The middle name Bean was chosen because Kurt thought she looked like a kidney bean on the ultrasound.[5] Her godfather is R.E.M. frontman Michael Stipe, and Drew Barrymore is her godmother.[6] She is an only child, raised solely by her mother after her father's death when she was two years old.[7]

Birth and infancy

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.

Childhood and father's death

Main article: Death of Kurt Cobain

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.[8] The two of them played, and Kurt sang to her. A week later, on the morning of April 8, 1994, Cobain was found dead at his home in Seattle.[9] A final ceremony was arranged for Cobain by his mother on May 31, 1999, that was attended by both Courtney Love and Tracey Marander. As a Buddhist monk chanted, Frances scattered his ashes into McLane Creek in Olympia, the city where he "had found his true artistic muse." The following autumn, 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.

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.

In late 2005, Hank Harrison, Frances' maternal biological grandfather, prepared a brief petitioning the Los Angeles court for visitation rights to the minor child, but the petition was denied. A similar petition was prepared in late 2009 and will be filed pending the final outcome of a 2010 custodial hearing.

The custody battle that began in early 2010, resulted in a victory for Kurt's mother Wendy and his only biological sister Kimberly. They were finally able to prove, after several attempts, that Courtney Love was incompetent to handle Frances' financial affairs, and custody was restored to the Cobain family. Upon her eighteenth birthday in August 2010, Frances will inherit a sizable portion of the Cobain Estate.

Teen years

To date, Frances has given four official interviews. In September 2005, at age 13, Cobain gave her first interview to Teen Vogue where she discussed her personal style and mentions her parents.[10] 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."[11] 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, she appeared in a photo spread for Harper's Bazaar.[12]

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. Love intends to hold an auction of many other possessions, with a portion of the proceeds going to charity.[13] According to Rolling Stone magazine, the title and cover photograph for Sliver: The Best of the Box, were chosen by Frances.[14] The cover photograph shows a pile of Nirvana and Cobain tapes strewn about, including a copy of the "Fecal Matter" demo.

Frances worked as an intern for Rolling Stone in the summer of 2008.[15]

Frances' 16th birthday party was held in the House of Blues restaurant on the Sunset Strip in West Hollywood, Los Angeles, on September 2, 2008. The band Mindless Self Indulgence played a private show for the event, which was controversially themed "suicide", representing her movement from childhood to adulthood. A competition was held for the party goer that looked "the most dead", with prizes including an iPod Touch and a $200 gift certificate for Amoeba Music stores. Her daughter's party allegedly cost Courtney Love over $326,000.[16]

On December 11, 2009, a California Superior Court in Los Angeles appointed Wendy O'Connor, Kurt Cobain's mother, and Kimberly Dawn Cobain, Kurt's sister, as temporary co-guardians of Frances Bean.[17] On December 16, 2009, TMZ reported that a judge had issued a related temporary restraining order, prohibiting Love from having any direct or indirect contact with her daughter.[18]

Musical career

Frances Bean Cobain will appear as a guest vocalist on the song "My Space" from the album Evelyn Evelyn by Evelyn Evelyn, set to be released March 30, 2010.[19]

Notes

  1. ^ Charles R. Cross, [[Heavier Than Heaven]]. Hyperion, 2001: ISBN 0-7868-6505-9 p. 246
  2. ^ Frances Bean Cobain
  3. ^ www.LiveNirvana.com
  4. ^ The Nirvana Faq
  5. ^ Michael Azerrad. 'Come as You Are: The Story of Nirvana. Doubleday, 1993. ISBN 0-385-47199-8, p. 270
  6. ^ i-d Magazine interview with Bean in January 2006
  7. ^ "Frances Bean Cobain Has Steered Clear Of Her Parents' Spotlight". MTV. December 18, 2009. Retrieved April 2, 2010.
  8. ^ Charles R. Cross, Heavier Than Heaven. Hyperion, 2001: p. 341
  9. ^ The Mourning After Apr 29, 1994
  10. ^ Don't expect any grunge from Frances Bean Vogue. 7 September 2005.
  11. ^ i-D Magazine, January 2006
  12. ^ Riedel, Jeff. "Frances Bean Cobain". Harpers Bazaar. Hearst Communications, Inc.
  13. ^ Courtney Love to Sell Kurt Cobain's Possessions - Courtney Love, Kurt Cobain : People.com
  14. ^ Unreleased Nirvana Due : Rolling Stone
  15. ^ Frances Bean Cobain is a summer intern at Rolling Stone
  16. ^ COURTNEY LOVE THROWS DAUGHTER FRANCES BEAN A SUICIDE-THEMED 'SWEET 16'.
  17. ^ Cobain's mother gets guardianship of granddaughter, Associated Press. Accessed December 14, 2009.
  18. ^ Court to Courtney: Stay Away From Frances
  19. ^ Kurt Cobain's Daughter, Frances Bean Cobain, makes singing debut
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