Courtney Love, watch out: A Cobain-era beef comes roaring back — Mary Lou Lord "will not go down without a f**king fight"

The '90s are back with an ugly vengeance — Lord stirs up old hate for Love on Facebook, then dirty-deletes her rant

By Mary Elizabeth Williams

Senior Writer

Published February 5, 2016 4:20PM (EST)

Courtney Love    (AP/Stephen Trupp)
Courtney Love (AP/Stephen Trupp)

It's like the nineties never left us. The OJ Simspon trial is playing out yet again on television — and this time with the stars of "Pulp Fiction," "Jerry Maguire," and "Friends." Weezer has announced a summer tour. "The X-Files" are back, and "Fuller House" is coming. New theories about who killed Tupac have reawakened memories of the old east coast-west coast rivalries. And even old "Courtney Love is a MONSTER" trope has been trotted out again.

In a pair of seemingly unprovoked and — of course, now deleted — Facebook posts, singer-songwriter Mary Lou Lord recently went medieval on the Hole front woman and widow of Kurt Cobain. "To Courtney and her sycophants and lemmings," she began in a January 31 post, before launching into her tirade, saying, "I will not go down without a f__king fight to set the record straight with that c__t. I honestly mean that. I HATE her, and didn't I say anything back then? I was too scared. And also, out of respect for Kurt's daughter who was a child." But now, she wrote, "It appears that time did what it was meant to do, and Courtney love does not have the respect, trust, or power she once had And therefore, I am no longer fearful… NEVER ever F__K with me again you c__t, cause I will crush you. I have waited 26 years for this. And it's time. I will crush you. You are a self serving sociopath. Congrats on all the money that you got, that was never YOURS to begin with. You are scum. And I am about to CRUSH YOU." She added, "Let the Tom games begin. I am behind him," seemingly a reference to Tom Grant, a retired investigator and the leading proponent of the "Kurt Cobain was murdered" theory.

On Wednesday, Lord continued, in a somewhat calmer vein, "I just wanted to thank you guys for being cool and tolerating my ranting about CL over the last few days. Something did indeed spark it...but I'm trying to let it all go now…. She had a field day back when the internet was new and all the lies she would spread about me. She told people I killed her cat. She told stories upon stories on the internet (that old AOL Hole folder).... (DOCUMENTED and downloaded to prove she did), countless grotesque lies that I could NOT stop her from spreading. I was not only was in fear of her, I was in fear of her fans. Countless times I would come out from a club, or the subway, and my car windshield would have been written on with lipstick 'you suck', or 'f__k you' signed 'Courtney.' ... Then, the obvious forged fax, and the s__t she said about me in Rolling Stone-The one where she was on the cover!"

Both posts have since been deleted, but Lord has now stated on Facebook, "My post was about ME not him. it was about the Hell Courtney Love put ME through and how it's taken a long time to get over it. But I never said I thought she was the mastermind behind his death, or, had anything to do with it." Love, meanwhile -- no stranger to getting into it -- has remained remarkably quiet about the whole thing.

For more than two decades, there have been rumors about the nature of Lord and Cobain's relationship after they met in a Boston club in the 1991. Six years ago, Lord reminisced about it on Facebook, disputing "fictional" accusations "that Courtney MADE UP!!" and remembering "my friend Deb (who God bless her saved every piece of shit rant that Courtney was to spew YEARS later.)" Yet back in 1993, a fax allegedly from Cobain was sent to the Boston Phoenix disputing rumors of a romance, saying, "One night in Boston, a creepy girl came on to me. I don’t even remember what happened but It WASN’T MUCH. All of a sudden my life is plagued by this insane girl. I NEVER had a relationship with her. Please Mary whoever you are, leave me alone and see a therapist."

But in Everett True's 2007 book "Nirvana: The Biography," the author claims, "I have a strong memory from around this time of meeting a besotted Kurt going on and on about this girl called Mary Lou Lord, how in love with her he was, and how he was going to move to Boston to be with her. Fantasy perhaps, but he believed it at the time." Whatever he really believed, it certainly seems he had fondness for blondes with a NSFW vocabulary. And he'd probably have amused to see that 25 year later, their strong feelings around him haven't waned.


By Mary Elizabeth Williams

Mary Elizabeth Williams is a senior writer for Salon and author of "A Series of Catastrophes & Miracles."

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Related Topics ------------------------------------------

Courtney Love Grunge Kurt Cobain Mary Lou Lord Nirvana