Kurt Cobain's death 17 years later: Words and sculpture remember Nirvana's frontman

View full sizeMacLeod Pappidas/The Associated PressA sculpture of a large concrete guitar honoring the memory of Kurt Cobain is unveiled at a ceremony observing the 17th anniversary of the musician's death in Aberdeen, Wash., on Tuesday.
"I can't remember if I cried
When I read about his widowed bride..."

Don McLean's words, written decades before in remembrance of his idol Buddy Holly, seem fitting enough this week, 17 years after one of America's musical icons took his own life. On Tuesday, the 17th anniversary of the day the music died, a sculpted guitar memorial to Kurt Cobain was unveiled in a park in Aberdeen, the Nirvana frontman's Washington state hometown.

A diverse group of fans and Aberdeen residents, many born after Cobain's 1994 death, attended the ceremony, the Associated Press reported.

The sculpture was placed in a park near the Young Street bridge where Cobain spent time while growing up. The bridge attracts Cobain fans because it's mentioned in his song "Something in the Way."

Besides the concrete guitar, there's a steel ribbon dangling in the air with lyrics from the Nirvana song "On a Plain" that say: "One more special message to go and then I'm done and I can go home."

The Los Angeles Times music blog featured snippets of tributes that ran in the newspaper after his death, including this from then-Times pop music critic Robert Hilburn:

"To many who weren't touched by his music, he will be dismissed as another rock 'n' roll stereotype ... a guy who was more lucky than talented, more indulgent than tormented. But he was so much more. In a pop world filled with pretenders and opportunists, Cobain was the real thing -- a unique and invaluable voice."View full sizeKurt Cobain of Nirvana.