Hole, Miranda Sex Garden - April 10th, 1995
Milan, City Square

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Courtney, Kurt Cobain's widow, is a personality with her own rules.  We didn't need the concert of this night in Milan to have one more proof of it. Come to Italy right on the sad anniversary of the husband's death, Miss Love, together with her band Hole, gave to Milan the concert we were expecting.

In the environment of the City Square,after an evanescent exhibition of the youngest band Miranda Sex Garden,before a variegated crowd made up mainly by a bunch of young girls adoring and imiting her, Courtney displayed her repertoire not just of songs. Winkings with the public,little,spontaneous performances typical of her own personality and lots of rock,of good rock.

It starts off with a powerful instrumental part that gives evidence of her wildness,then Courtney shows her entire complexity. She's clearly under sedatives and not only sedatives,an apatethic smile on her lips,the will to communicate,the inner fire that never leaves her. Like when she gives up to the temptation to let her fall in the hands of the unrestrained public of the first rows (the same thing was the cause of the cancellation of the concert in Paris,she hit the ground and had a bad fall) but she was immediately grabbed by the security crew,or like when she gets pissed off for the objects hitting her thin body bandaged by the little highschool girl dress,objects thrown by the same public who received lots of water from her to calm the heat of the air. And it's in that exact moment that Courtney decides to quit,but she'll come back onstage after 10 minutes to play another 30 minutes of "noise" (her words).

Holding onto her beautiful guitars,looking melancholy for her intoxicated glance, Courtney is an excellent musician who hits hard the instrument's strings,well supported by the new bass player Melissa,by the other guitarist Eric and by her drummer Patti (the only one coming from Seattle). A very hard band,used to the intemperances of their leader. Courtney doesn't want to hear a word about grunge anymore: "grunge is dead" she says. The words for the old friends aren't exactly gentle: "fuck Nirvana, fuck Pearl Jam, fuck Mudhoney and fuck you with the grunge shirt" she screams angrily at the crowd. Bye bye sweet Miss Love, au revoir.

Massimo Scabbia.
Pop Magazine