It’s surprising how often a piece of gear pops up for sale with the seller claiming it once belonged to a rock star from the past century. And, naturally, the bigger the star, the bigger the potential payout.
One of the hottest names in this category is the late Kurt Cobain. As the frontman of Nirvana and widely regarded as the voice of Generation X, Kurt is often considered the last great icon of rock and roll. His influence on the 90s music scene and beyond has made anything tied to his name extremely valuable.
We recently covered a story about a Teisco Audition guitar—well, actually just the body of one—that appeared on the Discovery Channel’s show Final Offer. While the owner was convinced of its connection to Kurt, there wasn’t any solid photographic proof to back up the claim. It lived in a kind of gray area, leaving us unsure of its true history.
In a similar story, a video posted on History’s YouTube channel in December 2015 featured a pawn shop owner presented with a guitar pedal, which the seller claimed Kurt Cobain had used in 1993. The seller even produced a letter from Kurt’s guitar tech, Earnie Bailey, to back up the claim. Although Earnie himself was understandably reluctant to fully verify its authenticity, the whole thing seemed pretty convincing.
The pedal had a white sticker on the side, marked “12.29 – 9.44.” According to the letter from Earnie, the first number is a date, while the second refers to the voltage. This got our attention because, according to LiveNirvana—a site we’ve referenced before in our write-ups about Kurt’s gear—on December 29th, 1993, Nirvana played a show at the San Diego Sports Arena.
Thankfully, there’s video footage of that concert available on YouTube. At around the 29-minute mark, you can hear Kurt mention the pedal by name, and based on the audience’s reaction (even though the camera wasn’t on him), it seems like he threw it off the stage.
To sum it up, the seller asked for $5,000 for the pedal. After consulting with Jesse (yes, the tattoo guy), the pawn shop owner thought it was only worth about $500. To everyone’s surprise, the seller turned down the offer and walked out of the shop with the pedal still in his pocket. Good move, seller!
TV show drama aside, it’s always fascinating to see how old pieces of gear, especially those tied to legends like Kurt Cobain, continue to be cherished decades later. If you come across any similar stories or, better yet, own something like this yourself, let us know. We’d love to hear about it and take a closer look!
You can see the grayish pedal on the left and the sans amp pedal next to it
Watching the rehearsals he mainly uses his sans amp classic pedal
Kurt used a grunge pedal during the live and loud concert well it was in his effects chain if he actually used it in any songs is another question, you can see in the DVD extras of the concert rehearsals
“Generation Y?” You mean Gen X. Gen Y are called Millennials now. Gen X were 20 somethings and teens at the time. Kurt was speaking to us. He was a Gen X “hero.” And $500 is more than reasonable. This is not some Martin prototype rarity that once toured with Elvis Presley. It’s a throw away pedal that might or might not have been one of a hundred thrown to audiences on the tour as part of a show routine.
I mean, I guess that’s also correct. If you wanna go and look at the statistics, Gen Y an Gen X are within 3% – https://www.statista.com/statistics/992200/enjoyability-of-nirvana-by-generation-us/ . I think I should’ve just left it at “voice of a generation”.
I wouldn’t agree about $500. The buyer is obviously expecting to sell it for a lot more, and he’s ripping the guy off. Find a NIrvana fan with cash, and he’ll probably throw thousands at you for it. However insignificant to Kurt, it’s still an important piece of memorabilia to many.
1981 is almost universally considered the first birth year of the Millennials. That puts the oldest of them at 10-years-old when Smells Like Teen Spirit hit. On the other hand, Gen-Xers (Kurt was one of us), ranged in age from 11 to about 27. Kurt sang about all the same shit the “Latch-Key Generation” (Gen-Xers) were going through, and/or had encountered. Gen-X was the disaffected generation those songs described. Drugs, sex, depression, boredom, even pregnancy. I sincerely do not believe that Kurt Cobain was aiming songs about Courtney Love’s uterus at ten-year-olds. And they were not the ones buying CDs and concert tickets. We were.
I stand by the $500. You can’t go into a pawn shop expecting a good deal in the first place. You go in knowing they are going to try to turn it around at a significant markup. But that means, in this case, about $900 – $1000. By asking for $500, the guy is basically admitting he will try to get a grand for it. $5000 is insane. If you can find me a Nirvana fan that will hand out that kind of cash for that pedal, I will eat this computer. The market simply would not sustain that, with the one possible exception of a Christies Auction on a crazy day where two random guys with a crap ton of cash had a few too many martinis.
I actually went onto their store site to see how much they were selling it for but then I watched the entire clip and saw they didn’t buy it off the guy.
Jesse is knowledgable but he obviously knows nothing about the Grunge stuff and its a good thing the guy didn’t sell since we all know, he could have gotten way more for it if indeed it was Kurt’s old DOD pedal.
So where’s the pedal today? I’m pretty sure he sold it eventually?
Yeah, if legit, $500 is a ridiculously small number to offer for it. No idea if he eventually sold it, I was kind of hoping he would somehow end up reading this article through Google and we’ll find out from the man himself, but no luck so far. Cheers.
Actually my brother now owns it. He bought it from the guy for a little less than he was asking. Hoping to auction it off in the next few years.
And for everyone on this thread saying it’s only worth $500, a broken pedal used by Kurt recently sold for $9,000.
Kurt Cobain’s DOD FX69 Grunge pedal has sold at auction for $16,000, as part of Julien’s Auctions Music Icons 2021 event.
What was the name of the show? Or the youtube name
Pawn stars, series 15 episode 1. Its on history channel right now.
The nirvana show is https://youtu.be/udisQiJ2UxU