Jacobs lawyers argue that case against him has numerous deficiencies, in dispute over smiley face logo that appears in his designs
Fashion designer Marc Jacobs has filed a lawsuit against Nirvana, after he was sued by them for breaching copyright of their smiley face logo and signature font in a T-shirt design.
The original lawsuit was filed against Jacobs in January, accusing him of being oppressive, fraudulent and malicious in creating the designs, which, it was argued, threaten to dilute the value of Nirvanas licenses with its licensees for clothing products.
Jacobs attempted to dismiss the suit in March. His lawyers argued that the smiley face was a commonplace image and that while the designs were inspired by Nirvanas 1990s concert T-shirts, his designs did not infringe copyright as they sufficiently deviated from Nirvanas.
Earlier this month, a California judge allowed the case to move forward. Jacobs has now responded with a countersuit, arguing that there are numerous deficiencies with the case.
Chief among these alleged deficiencies is that it is not clear who designed the bands logo. The original Nirvana lawsuit claimed it was designed by late frontman Kurt Cobain in about 1991 it first appeared on a flyer for a release party celebrating the album Nevermind, and would later adorn the bands T-shirts. But in depositions during the lawsuit, surviving bandmembers Dave Grohl and Krist Novoselic admitted they didnt know who created it.
Jacobs suit demands that Nirvanas copyright claim to the logo be removed, and his companys legal costs be recovered. Nirvanas legal team will continue to contest the case they have complained that individuals who were more familiar with the copyright registration have not yet been questioned by Jacobs lawyers.
As the Prince of Pops skin got lighter his music became more politicised, and 1991s overlooked album encapsulated this radical moment in music
For a figure as enigmatic as Michael Jackson, one of the more fascinating paradoxes about his career is this: as he became whiter, he became blacker. Or to put it another way: as his skin became whiter, his work became blacker.
To elaborate, we must rewind to a crucial turning point: the early 1990s. In hindsight, it represents the best of times and the worst of times for the artist. In November 1991, Jackson released the first single from his Dangerous album: Black or White, a bright, catchy pop-rock-rap fusion that soared to No 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 and remained at the top of the charts for six weeks. It was his most successful solo single since Beat It.
The conversation surrounding Jackson at this point, however, was not about his music. It was about his race. Sure, critics said, he might sing that it dont matter if youre black or white, but then why had he turned himself white? Was he bleaching his skin? Was he ashamed of his blackness? Was he trying to appeal to every demographic, transcend every identity category in a vainglorious effort to reach greater commercial heights than Thriller?
To this day, many assume Jackson bleached his skin to become white that it was a wilful cosmetic decision because he was ashamed of his race. Yet in the mid-1980s Jackson was diagnosed with vitiligo, a skin disorder that causes loss of pigmentation in patches on the body. According to those close to him, it was an excruciatingly humiliating personal challenge, one in which he went to great lengths to hide through long-sleeve shirts, hats, gloves, sunglasses and masks. When Jackson died in 2009, his autopsy definitively confirmed he had vitiligo, as did his medical history.
However, in the early 1990s, the public were sceptical to say the least. Jackson first publicly revealed he had vitiligo in a widely watched 1993 interview with Oprah Winfrey. This is the situation, he explained. I have a skin disorder that destroys the pigmentation of the skin. It is something I cannot help, OK? But when people make up stories that I dont want to be what I am it hurts me Its a problem for me that I cant control. Jackson did acknowledge having plastic surgery but said he was horrified that people concluded that he didnt want to be black. I am a black American, he declared. I am proud of my race. I am proud of who I am.
For Jackson, then, there was no ambivalence about his racial identity and heritage. His skin had changed but his race had not. In fact, if anything his identification as a black artist had grown stronger. The first indication of this came in the video for Black or White. Watched by an unprecedented global audience of 500 million viewers, it was Jacksons biggest platform ever; a platform, it should be noted, that he earned by breaking down racial barriers at MTV with his groundbreaking short films from Thriller.
The first few minutes of the Black or White video seemed relatively benign and consistent with the utopian calls of previous songs (Can You Feel It, We Are the World, Man in the Mirror). Jackson, adorned in contrasting black-and-white apparel, travels across the globe, fluidly adapting his dance moves to whatever culture or country he finds himself in. He acts as a kind of cosmopolitan shaman, performing alongside Africans, Native Americans, Thais, Indians and Russians, attempting, it seems, to instruct the recliner-bound White American Father (played by George Wendt) about the beauties of difference and diversity. The main portion of the video culminates with the groundbreaking morphing sequence, in which ebullient faces of various races seamlessly blend from one to another. The message seemed to be that we are all part of the human family distinct but connected regardless of cosmetic variations.
In the age of Trump and the resurgence of white nationalism, even that multicultural message remains vital. But thats not all Jackson had to say. Just when the director (John Landis) yells Cut! we see a black panther lurking off the soundstage to a back alley. The coda that follows became Jacksons riskiest artistic move to this point in his career particularly given the expectations of his family-friendly audience. In contrast to the upbeat, mostly optimistic tone of the main portion of the video, Jackson unleashes a flurry of unbridled rage, pain and aggression. He bashes a car in with a crowbar; he grabs and rubs himself; he grunts and screams; he throws a trash can into a storefront (echoing the controversial climax of Spike Lees 1989 film, Do the Right Thing), before falling to his knees and tearing off his shirt. The video ends with Homer Simpson, another White American Father, taking the remote from his son, Bart, and turning off the TV. That censorious move proved prescient.
The so-called panther dance caused an uproar; more so, ironically, than anything put out that year by Nirvana or Guns N Roses. Fox, the US station that originally aired the video, was bombarded with complaints. In a front page story, Entertainment Weekly described it as Michael Jacksons Video Nightmare. Eventually, relenting to pressure, Fox and MTV excised the final four minutes of the video.
The Black or White short film was no anomaly in its racial messaging. The Dangerous album, from its songs to its short films, not only highlights black talent, styles and sounds, but also acts as a kind of tribute to black culture. Perhaps the most obvious example of this is the video for Remember the Time. Featuring some of the eras most prominent black luminaries Magic Johnson, Eddie Murphy and Iman the video is set in ancient Egypt. In contrast to Hollywoods stereotypical representations of African Americans as servants, Jackson presents them here as royalty.
Promised a sizable production budget, Jackson enlisted John Singleton, a young, rising black director coming off the success of Boyz N the Hood, for which he received an Oscar nomination. Jackson and Singletons collaboration resulted in one of the most lavish and memorable music videos of his career, highlighted by the intricate, hieroglyphic hip-hop dance sequence (choreographed by Fatima Robinson). Again, in this video, Jackson appeared whiter than ever, but the video directed, choreographed by and featuring black talent was a celebration of black history, art, and beauty.
The song, in fact, was produced and co-written by another young black rising star, Teddy Riley, the architect of new jack swing. Prior to Riley, Jackson had reached out to a range of other black artists and producers, including LA Reid, Babyface, Bryan Loren and LL Cool J, searching for someone with whom he could develop a new, post-Quincy Jones sound. He found what he was looking for in Riley, whose grooves contained the punch of hip-hop, the swing of jazz and the chords of the black church. Remember the Time is perhaps their best-known collaboration, with its warm organ bedrock and tight drum machine beat. It became a huge hit on black radio, and reached No 1 on Billboards R&B/hip-hop chart.
Only recently, however, have critics begun to reassess the significance of Dangerous. In a 2009 Guardian article, it is referred to as Jacksons true career high. In her book on the album for Bloomsburys 33 series, Susan Fast describes Dangerous as the artists coming of age album. The record, she writes, offers Jackson on a threshold, finally inhabiting adulthood isnt this what so many said was missing? and doing so through an immersion in black music that would only continue to deepen in his later work.
That immersion continued as well in his visual work, which, in addition to Black or White and Remember the Time, showcased the elegant athleticism of basketball superstar Michael Jordan in the music video for Jam and the palpable sensuality of Naomi Campbell in the sepia-coloured short film for In the Closet. A few years later, he worked with Spike Lee on the most pointed racial salvo of his career, They Dont Care About Us, which has been resurrected as an anthem for the Black Lives Matter movement. Still, critics, comedians and the public alike continued to suggest Jackson was ashamed of his race. Only in America, went a common joke, can a poor black boy grow up to be a rich white woman.
Yet Jackson demonstrated that race is about more than mere pigmentation or physical features. While his skin became whiter, his work in the 1990s was never more infused with black pride, talent, inspiration and culture.
Another epic cover by the project Rockin’ 1000, where 1000 musicians altogether perform “Smells Like Teen Spirit” by Nirvana in Cesena, Italy. The video already got around 1.7 million views on YouTube.
You get none of the credit and do a lot of the work: whod be a drummer? Deirdre OCallaghan asks some of the best in the world. Introduction by Stella Mozgawa of Warpaint
Im not sure what kind of person makes a drummer, because they are so wildly different. The star of Whiplash and a 14-year-old kid in a punk band have a different set of goals, even though they are expressing themselves through the same instrument. You have to be a certain kind of person to want to play music seriously. There is a type that sees the value in sticking to it.
When I was at primary school, boys never let me near a drum kit, because girls cant play drums. But while other kids learned instruments and became disillusioned, I always had this little fire in my belly. Even now, when I play drums, I still feel like an excited teen.
A lot of drummers are studious and read percussion notation, but I started off hitting pillows to video clips of Hanson songs in the living room. The bands drummer, Zac, was 11, tiny and on TV. Everyone needs that moment of realisation I can do that! and seeing a kid my age and stature in a successful band was mine.
My mum was a singer and my dad played bass; he bought me my first drum kit for my 12th birthday. I took lessons with a local jazz teacher, but after a couple of months he told my dad he wanted to let me follow my own path. I thought it was really cool of him to say, let her teach herself all these songs, she has a good ear. I found the best learning process was sitting at my drum kit, headphones on, listening to songs by Tool and Led Zeppelin, music that had intense drumming.
Performing well has a lot to do with feeling relaxed and confident, as opposed to warm-ups before a show. Its important to do the best work you can, to honour the composition and nail the parts youre playing, but its difficult to have an achievement that is separate from everyone else. As a band, you are a package: its a very emotional experience, with the same three people every night over an extended period of time.
Outside Warpaint, Ive played with Flea from the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Kurt Vile and Regina Spektor. When I play more aggressive stuff, I can snap two pairs of sticks a gig. Its a different game now: Warpaint dont go that hard.
I dont get nervous before shows, but sometimes, on TV, I get a cramp in my hand muscles. Something just hits me and I grip the sticks differently like a monkey, rather than a human who has practised this for a decade.
Drumming suits my personality more than being a singer in the spotlight. I dont want to be famous. As a child playing Steely Dan in my bedroom, I would close my eyes and fantasise about playing a massive festival; I never wondered what it would be like to hook up with Leo DiCaprio.
(Top picture: Deap Vallys Julie Edwards, photographed by Deirdre OCallaghan at the bands rehearsal space, Los Angeles)
It was really difficult getting a gig because there werent that many venues. Nobody liked punk bands. It was us versus the establishment; we quite liked being on the outside of it all. There was the bloody Manchester mafia, where the Drones would get gigs, and the Buzzcocks, and everybody else but we couldnt get a gig. So when you did, youd really go for it.
We knew Tony Wilson, who became our manager; he saw us, and everyone thought we were fantastic, even though it was probably more anger that set us apart. And then people started getting interested.
Working with our producer Martin Hannett on the album Unknown Pleasures was interesting and infuriating. Youd listen to it and wonder how it had got from what you imagined, which was very raw and live and raucous, to the way it sounded. It was like, whats he done? I had to record all the drums separately. Martin wanted the bass drum in the ballroom, and the snare drum in a tin can, and the hi-hat in a little cardboard box which is dead easy to do now, but not then.
The worst was Love Will Tear Us Apart. We had recorded it, and I had done the drums over and over again. We were staying in a flat in Baker Street in London, and I had just got my head down when the phone went. Its bloody Martin: he wants us to come back and do the snare drum. Every time I hear Love Will Tear Us Apart, all I can hear is the anger of being dragged out of bed.
The drumsticks I played with in Rockers [the 1978 reggae film] werent real. I couldnt find mine, so I took two posts out of some old chairs in the back of a hotel. Its not about the drumsticks, its you. A lot of drummers dont master the beat; you can see it in their faces, theyre dying for the song to be done.
You make your own space. Reggae represents a lot of things. Its several beats in one. Its hip-hop, Tchaikovsky in everything you play, there is a reggae beat.
I was a huge glam rock fan. In 1973, Cozy Powell released Dance With The Devil, which reached No 3 in the UK charts. Its a rare and beautiful thing for a drummer to have a chart hit. But if glam, pop and rock, along with Dance With The Devil, were my wake-up call, then Hunky Dory, Ziggy Stardust and Aladdin Sane would become my most important benchmarks, with one of the all-time great rock drummers, Woody Woodmansey, playing on all three. I had no clue what Bowie was singing about.
In Nirvana, I never got recognised. I lived this perfect existence: I was in one of the biggest bands ever, but I could walk in the front door of a gig and no one would know. I could get up and play those great songs with my friends and watch people go bananas.
Some of my favourite drummers would be considered some of the worst of all time because their tempo fluctuates so much, or there is inconsistency but its the passion that interests me. I cant do a solo. I never practise by myself. Its like, Id never really dance alone.
As a drummer, its your responsibility to make sure this thing gets off the ground, but you dont expect any thanks. Youre there to serve the song; youre there to get people to move. They might not really know why theyre dancing, but its you.
Ive always been fascinated by the Ringo Starr debate. Was he a great drummer? Of course he was a great drummer: you hear three and a half seconds of his playing and you immediately know its him.
I think rhythm comes with the body, and my timing comes with my heartbeat. I try to teach this to kids; some get the idea, some dont. But you cant hurt the kids feelings, so I say: Maybe you should play piano or guitar. You can put a lot of time in and play good piano, but I dont think that happens with drums.
On Sgt Peppers, I had this new kit, the maple kit. It had actual skin heads, calf heads, which I had never had before: from the 60s onwards, it was all plastic. Theyre so deep, and I was always looking for depth. You see pictures of me where I have towels over the drums and cigarette packs anything to give it more body.
Watching Nirvanas Unplugged was a Proustian moment but the rest of the channel, which repeats shows from the 90s and 00s, seems superfluous
Lets get one thing straight: MTV Classic does not play music videos.
The criticism that MTV, the cable channel formerly known as Music Television, doesnt even play any music has lasted more than half of the 35 years it has been on air, an anniversary it celebrated on Monday by turning the former VH1 Classic, which focused on classic rock and hits of the 70s and 80s, into MTV Classic.
The new channel, like a good BuzzFeed list, is preoccupied with preserving everything Gen Xers and millennials loved about the 90s and 00s. Yes, that era is well after the channel eschewed the visual oeuvre of Duran Duran for reality shows like The Real World, Pimp My Ride, Cribs and other non-music-related programming.
The first day of programming on MTV Classic started off with MTV Hour One, a special that replayed the first hour of the channel complete with commercials for Chewels (a gum with a liquid center), Mountain Dew and other confections. The music videos included hits by Rod Stewart, the Pretenders and the Who, but also tracks from acts never to be heard from again, such as PhD, Robin Lane and the Chartbusters and Split Enz (to be fair, the latter band did morph into Crowded House). The whole thing was terribly quaint, from the way the VJs were obsessed with the fact that it was being broadcast in stereo, to its telling viewers who wanted an MTV dial sticker that they could get one by sending a self-addressed stamped envelope to an actual physical PO Box.
The next hour was given over to The TRL Decade, a documentary about Total Request Live, the staple that ran from 1998 to 2008 and was dominated by Britney Spears, NSync, hip-hop and a future reality show host by the name of Carson Daly. While it was nice to chart the rise, fall and influence of this undeniable pop behemoth, it would have been even better just to watch an episode of TRL from the late 90s and laugh at the music, hair and whatever dumb turtleneck Daly was sure to have on.
The rest of the day was dominated by replays of Unplugged, MTVs groundbreaking show that got bands to play their hits on acoustic instruments. The channel is resurrecting the series later this year with modern acts. I rewatched the most famous episode of all, Nirvana Unplugged, which was filmed about six months before Kurt Cobains suicide and went into heavy rotation on the channel after his death.
Ive watched this special countless times, flipping around the dial aimlessly after high school looking for something to watch and landing on this so often. It was just as remarkable as I remembered it, each song howling like a dirge, sublime not only because it was so close to the end, but because Cobain and company were creating such raw, emotional magic.
But it was also different. Cobain was so much more handsome than I remembered; he looks so young in his fuzzy green sweater cradling his guitar so delicately. When it aired in 1994, I was 10 years younger than Cobain and he seemed like such a grown-up. Now Im 10 years older; he seems like such a baby, and his death so much more tragic. Nirvana Unplugged was always imbued with a sense of loss, but now it wasnt just the loss of genius wasted, but the loss of my own youth, driving around my hometown wearing out the cassette of the broadcast in the car stereo. I was transported back immediately not just to the music, but to the memory and the emotions, like Prousts madeleines dunked in Pennyroyal Tea.
The funny thing about MTV Classic, though, is that most of it doesnt really hold up, and Im not just talking about the Backstreet Boys ridiculous outfits on TRL. MTVs groundbreaking 90s animation, such as Daria, Beavis and Butt-head and Aeon Flux all of which aired later in the evening inevitably dont seem remotely revolutionary now. In between two programming blocks, there was just enough time to air a Limp Bizkit video, which reminded me that, contrary to what the internet will lead you to believe, not everything from the 90s needs to be brought back and re-experienced.
The strangest thing about MTV Classic is that its not only celebrating a bygone era, but seems linked to a bygone way of consuming television. Back in the day, if I was sitting and aimlessly looking for a way to pass 30 minutes and came across an episode of The Real World, Jon Stewarts old talk show or the game show Remote Control (oh please, MTV Classic, Im dying to see Remote Control!) I would stop and watch it. But I never do that anymore, and I have a feeling that most people in the on-demand age dont either. We now watch the shows clogging our DVRs or find something to stream on Netflix, Hulu or any of the other services, all of which have vast libraries of content. There is so much out that that instead of trying to stumble upon things by happenstance, we search them out with surgical precision.
For those that really want to scratch an itch, MTV has tons of its archive online already (including all the episodes of Daria). What do we need MTV Classic for? So that we can teach the next generation what Jenny McCarthy looked like on Singled Out before she went crazy and decided that vaccines are killing our children? Im not saying I will never be tempted to relive my teen years with some well-curated nostalgia bait just that I dont know if Ill come across it like I used to, hoping for some music videos but being sucked in by a Real World: Boston marathon instead.
