After digging up an old ticket stub for a 1991 Nirvana concert, skateboarding legend Tony Hawk shared a short message about the gig and said he wished Kurt Cobain was still alive to meet their shared grandchild.
The show Hawk attended took place Oct. 20, 1991 at the now-defunct Houston venue, the Vatican (and the ticket, if you can believe it, cost $10). As Hawk noted on Instagram Stories (the post is now gone, but has been screenshotted for posterity), he was in town for a skateboarding competition and went straight from the skatepark to the concert.
“It was as transformative as live music can possibly be,” Hawk recalled. “We all experienced something rare and powerful that night. The world would never be the same.” (Indeed, Nirvana had released Nevermind just one month prior, and the set list that night primarily comprised songs from the new album. By January of 1992, Nevermind would be the Number One album in the country after bumping off Michael Jackson’s Dangerous.)
While Hawk’s long been an avowed Nirvana fan — he famously bought Cobain’s old skateboard, which the musician had decorated with Iron Maiden art, at auction a few years ago — his love for the band has added emotional significance these days. In October 2022, Hawk’s son Riley and Cobain and Courtney Love’s daughter, Frances Bean, were married (at a ceremony officiated by R.E.M.’s Michael Stipe, no less). And last September, the couple announced the birth of their baby boy, Ronin Walker Cobain Hawk.
Hawk ended his recent post by saying, “I wish Kurt were here so he could see the incredible woman [Bean] has become, meet her devoted, caring husband, and hold our wondrous grandchild.”
From Rolling Stone US
