River Cuomo loves Nirvana but he doesn’t think the late band frontman Kurt Cobain would have “approved of” Weezer.

In the late ‘90s, Weezer did a couple of shows under the pseudonym Goat Punishment: one where the band played a set of Oasis covers and another where they solely covered songs of Nirvana, who rejected Eddie Van Halen for performing.

River Cuomo feels Kurt Cobain wouldn’t approve Weezer’s covers

Recently, in speaking with NME, Cuomo was asked if, as a Nirvana-obsessed teenager, he takes pride in the fact that Courtney Love has previously approved of Weezer’s Nirvana covers. Cuomo, while ecstatic about Love’s approval, doesn’t think Cobain would feel the same way.

“Yeah. Courtney is a real icon to our generation, and feels like our big sister,” he said. “You really want somebody like that to approve of what you’re doing and Kurt didn’t live long enough to hear us – he died a month before [in April 1994] our ‘Blue’ album came out, but I’m assuming he would not have approved of us. But that Courtney does is pretty great.”

When asked why he thinks Cobain wouldn’t have been a Weezer fan, Cuomo explained: “It seemed like the music he looked up to was rougher around the edges, more punk, and less commercial.”

Speaking about cover songs, Krist Novoselic has revived a Nirvana favorite with his new band. On Friday (June 21), the former Nirvana bassist made an appearance alongside his latest group The Bona Fide Band at Make Music Day in Aberdeen, Wash., the town where he and Kurt Cobain grew up and formed the iconic grunge band.

During Friday’s free performance, The Bona Fide Band — comprising Novoselic (bass), Screaming Trees’ Mark Pickerel (drums), Jillian Raye (vocals), Jennifer Johnson (vocals) and Kathy Moore (guitar) — performed a cover of Nirvana’s “Love Buzz,” which appears on the group’s 1989 debut album, Bleach.

“Love Buzz,” with its catchy opening bass line, was released by Sub Pop in 1988 as the first single from Bleach. The track was originally recorded by Dutch rock band Shocking Blue in 1969.

The Bona Fide Band, which is “playing mostly Giants in the Trees and 3rd Secret songs,” as per to a website link shared through Nirvana’s official X (formerly Twitter) account, has a handful of live appearances lined up in Washington through late July, including stops in Seattle and Tacoma. The five-piece made its live debut at Easy Street Records in Seattle on Thursday (June 20).