Nevermind nevermind. Grab these instead, and for free.

With the anniversary of what some are calling the last real punk album upon us there's some interesting alternatives to picking up the reissued edition of the seminal release from Nirvana that acted as a catalyst for the wave of grunge that swept the globe.
A few magazines have went down the obvious hit and miss route of collecting a pot pourri of bands to do covers with the most laudable being from Spin who have made theirs available as a free download, but then there's the bargain bin offering from the other end of the scale that is the meagre effort from Kerrang. In all honesty there should be some crime scene tape around each of their issues as they're undoubtedly guilty of a plethora of crimes against music.
Like I said, hit and miss. So watch your step.
Anyway as mentioned the Spin one is free, and with acts like Amanda Palmer, The Vaselines, Titus Adronicus, The Meat Puppets, Foxy Shazam and more giving their interpretation of songs from Nevermind it's as eclectic as you could imagine.
Very few of the bands and artists seem willing to do straight covers, and for this I will be eternally grateful.
It's a refreshing change from a bunch of rock acts turning their amps up to eleven and thinking that works as a different take on the original material.
I would highly recommend grabbing yourself a copy while it is still available.
However the strangest homage to Nevermind that I've stumbled across is the very straight cover of the whole album by Kevin Devine.
Everything about it screams pointless to me, but for some reason I don't feel disinclined to listen to it.
While I would much rather hear Nevermind de-constructed and then built back up so that it would sound like something new and fresh I seem hooked on listening to one guys virtually verbatim run through of it.
Maybe my lack of loathing is down to it just being a fan release.
It has no airs and graces and it certainly doesn't pretend to be anything else other than a tribute to an album that must have moved him on its release.
I would maybe have had a few issues with it if it was available in stores as I would be focussed on the lack of anything new being brought to the table for profit aspect of it, but as it's another free download that you can grab from his website it would be churlish, and more pointless than covering the album in this manner, to have a dig.
So there you have it. A couple of nudges in a different direction.
Save your pennies and give the anniversary edition a miss, walk on by the Kerrap cover mounted CD and grab yourself something a bit different.
In doing so you would probably be honouring the intent of Nevermind in shaking things up a bit, rather than just regurgitating the past for profit.
Something I don't think Mr Cobain would have been comfortable with.

Free Downloads :
http://www.spin.com/node/90310
http://www.kevindevine.net/