The irony of playing vinyl albums through digital online radio is not lost on us. Nor are the crackles and scratches of the genuine vinyl records we will be playing for you every Wednesday from 9am to 10am. And this week it’s..

Nirvana, Unplugged in New York.

How old were you when you first listened to this album? Maybe it was on vinyl? Maybe a tape?

Accoridng to NME magazine:

There now follows an easy prediction. Kurt Cobain will become one of those revered figures (see also Lennon, Hendrix) around whom there is only the faintest murmur of debate; someone who’ll only have the word “over-rated” sprayed on to their headstone by deluded heretics; who has already risen way above cultish small-fry to stand as the fantastic exemplar of a whole era.

For sure, what tends to befall the spectres of such people is not always pleasant. He’ll probably be talked about by tweed-suited pundits with only the faintest clue about what made him great, end up on Athena posters tacked on to suburban walls and have every last bit of tragedy and gravitas that surrounded him ground into trite soundbites.

Thankfully, we have the records: the artefacts that can speak in a language uncluttered by sentimentality and already fill the listener with a strange-tasting mixture of exhilaration and sadness. It should come as no surprise that listening to large parts of ‘Unplugged’ is like hearing ‘A Day In The Life’ or ‘The Burning Of The Midnight Lamp’ – you are silenced, suddenly made to ransack your thoughts. That’s how good he was.

There may be imperfections here: the way that Kurt’s fingers can’t quite cope with an acoustic guitar, occasionally making the foundations of the tracks sound frail and fractured; the fact that his voice can sometimes get a little too nasal, his teeth a little too clenched. In all, they matter little, either because they lend themselves to the idea that we’re party to something unfettered by circuitry and production gloss, or because they’re swamped by an overwhelming charm.

The virtues of this record are almost endless. For a start, it’s candid enough to be sprinkled with laugh-strewn dialogue. “Am I going to do this by myself?” asks Kurt before ‘Penny Royal Tea’. “Do it by yourself,” replies Dave Grohl, like a schoolteacher. “Well,” says Kurt, “I think I’ll try it in a different key. I’ll try in a normal key, and if it sounds bad, these people are just going to have to wait.” There follows a welter of sitcom-esque laughter.

Read the rest here.

Relive this epic album from start to finish, on your computer of through our app – played from genuine original vinyl.

Tune in or get the app at www.2ov.fm.