In Here We Are Now: The Lasting Impact of Kurt Cobain, Charles R. Cross, author of the New York Times bestselling Cobain biography Heavier Than Heaven, examines the legacy of the Nirvana front man and takes on the question: why does Kurt Cobain still matter so much, 20 years after his death?

Kurt Cobain is the icon born of the 90s, a man whose legacy continues to influence pop culture and music. Cross explores the impact Cobain has had on music, fashion, film, and culture, and attempts to explain his lasting and looming legacy.

This essential piece of rock and roll history goes beyond the myths to answer that question:

• The Seattle Music Scene: A first-person look inside the explosion of Grunge, from the journalist who covered Nirvana’s first cover story and saw the city transformed.
• Lasting Musical Influence: An analysis of how Nirvana’s sound changed rock radio forever, and why artists from Jay-Z to today’s biggest stars still reference Cobain’s work.
• A Fashion Icon by Accident: The surprising story of how Kurt’s thrift-store flannels and ripped jeans—a style born from necessity—ended up on high-fashion runways around the world.
• Addiction and Suicide: A clear-eyed examination of Cobain’s personal demons and how his public struggles and tragic death changed the cultural conversation around mental health.

Kurt Cobain was the voice of a generation. Twenty years after his death, why does he still matter?

On April 5, 1994, twenty-seven-year-old Kurt Cobain took his own life. His desperation to kick drugs, his complicated relationship with fame, his tortured soul—all these elements came together in one terrible moment in Seattle, and the landscapes of music and pop culture were forever changed. Two decades have passed since Cross, a Seattle-based editor and writer and early supporter of Nirvana, lived the horror of that day on the front lines, fielding the phone calls as the media descended upon his city, desperately searching for an exclusive on the death of yet another young rock icon.

While the impact of a person's life is difficult to see fully on the day he dies, the long view provides a wider, and usually more accurate, vista. For the first time ever, Cross, author of the definitive Cobain biography, Heavier Than Heaven, explores how the haunting memory of Cobain—the life he led, the music he played, and the people he touched—lives on in innumerable, and sometimes surprising, ways. Here We Are Now attempts to answer where we—the fans, the music business and fashion industry, the addiction and recovery communities, Kurt's family—are, two decades later.

Cobain's life and work can be seen everywhere, from his indelible marks on music to his more subtle influence on gender and gay rights, the way we view suicide and drug addiction, and the very idea of Seattle as a cultural hub. Nirvana's music has touched multiple generations, and while the world has changed considerably since Nevermind was first released in 1991, the status of that album only grows as years pass. Cobain and Nirvana are now part of a rite of passage through adolescence, and while "teen spirit" may have changed and evolved since the early nineties, the music remains authentic all the same. Simply stated, Kurt Cobain changed the cultural conversation, in his all too brief life, and even after his shattering death. With interviews and commentary from all corners of the pop culture universe, from the people who knew Cobain to those who continue to help his legend grow, Here We Are Now explores what a singular life meant, and how that meaning can be measured, when and if it can be.