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Kurt Cobain Guitars & Gear: The Complete Guide to Nirvana’s Pawn Shop Guitar God

9 June 2026

He said he didn’t care about gear. He was lying.

Or rather — he cared deeply about gear, in a specific way that was entirely consistent with his public image. Guitar World’s definitive 1997 guide put it precisely: “although Cobain often said he didn’t care very much about equipment, he certainly possessed more than a passing interest in the tools of his trade. Cobain may not have collected vintage Gibsons, Martins, D’Angelicos and what-not, but he owned an eccentric cache of budget models, low-end imports and pawn shop prizes — most pursued with the same passion as a Gibson collector seeking a mint ’59 Les Paul.”

He pursued cheap guitars with collector’s passion. The difference was the target: not vintage Les Pauls but student-grade Mustangs, discontinued Jaguars that nobody wanted, Japanese Stratocaster imports used as disposable instruments for smashing at the end of shows. His entire guitar philosophy was the inversion of the vintage guitar fetishism that had always dominated rock culture. He bought the guitars everyone else ignored and made sounds that the expensive guitars couldn’t.

His favourite guitar was the Fender Mustang: “I’m left-handed, and it’s not very easy to find reasonably priced, high-quality left-handed guitars. But out of all the guitars in the whole world, the Fender Mustang is my favourite. I’ve only owned two of them. They’re cheap and totally inefficient, and they sound like crap and are very small. They also don’t stay in tune.”

Cheap. Totally inefficient. Sound like crap. Very small. Don’t stay in tune. This is his description of his favourite guitar.

The 1969 Competition Mustang — Lake Placid Blue with racing stripes, filmed in the “Smells Like Teen Spirit” video — sold at auction in 2023 for $4.45 million. The most expensive guitar ever sold at public auction. A guitar he described as cheap, inefficient, and sounding like crap.

He designed the Jag-Stang by taking Polaroid photos of a Mustang and a Jaguar, cutting them in half, and gluing the two halves together. “That’s what it is,” he said.

Background: Aberdeen, Olympia, Seattle, and the Sound That Changed Everything

Kurt Donald Cobain was born February 20, 1967, in Aberdeen, Washington — a small logging and fishing town on the Washington coast. His parents divorced when he was nine; he described this as a deeply formative disruption. He was creative and musical from childhood, receiving his first guitar at fourteen as a birthday gift from an uncle.

He moved to Olympia, Washington in the mid-1980s and embedded himself in the independent music scene centered on K Records — the DIY label whose aesthetic of homemade, anti-corporate music deeply influenced him. He moved to Olympia specifically to be closer to this scene and to Bikini Kill’s Kathleen Hanna and Krist Novoselic.

Nirvana formed in Aberdeen in 1987 with Cobain and Krist Novoselic. After various drummers, Dave Grohl joined in 1990. Bleach (1989) was recorded for $606 on Sub Pop Records. Nevermind (1991) changed everything: the album that brought grunge to mainstream commercial radio, sold 30 million copies, and is credited with ending the dominance of hair metal on American rock radio.

Nevermind made them famous in a way none of them had anticipated or prepared for. Cobain found the fame deeply uncomfortable. In Utero (1993) was a deliberate attempt to create music that was less commercially approachable — Steve Albini was hired as producer specifically because his aesthetic was the opposite of Butch Vig’s Nevermind polish.

The MTV Unplugged performance (November 18, 1993) is one of the most celebrated and discussed acoustic performances in rock history. He used Martin D-18E and Epiphone Texan guitars. He wore a green cardigan. He sang “Where Did You Sleep Last Night” and the performance became an elegy in retrospect.

He died April 5, 1994, at his home in Seattle, of a self-inflicted gunshot wound. He was twenty-seven. The posthumous album, MTV Unplugged in New York (1994), has sold over ten million copies.

Tone note: He said his favorite guitar was cheap, inefficient, and sounded like crap. He bought it used because he was left-handed and couldn’t afford better. It sold at auction for $4.45 million — the most expensive guitar ever sold publicly. The relationship between the value of an instrument and the value of the music made on it is not a relationship of proportionality. The $20 Stella acoustic on “Polly” and “Something in the Way” contains more musical truth than most guitars that cost a thousand times as much.

The Rig: Kurt Cobain’s Guitars, Amps & Gear

Guitars: Budget Models, Pawn Shop Prizes, and Disposables

1969 Fender Competition Mustang (Lake Placid Blue) — The “Smells Like Teen Spirit” Guitar

The guitar filmed in the “Smells Like Teen Spirit” music video — the one that made the Fender Mustang famous for a generation who hadn’t known what it was — is a 1969 Fender Competition Mustang in Lake Placid Blue with red racing stripes. It was completely stock during the Nevermind recording sessions, though it was later modified with a Seymour Duncan Hot Rails pickup and a Tune-o-Matic bridge.

His own description of the Fender Mustang: “I’m left-handed, and it’s not very easy to find reasonably priced, high-quality left-handed guitars. But out of all the guitars in the whole world, the Fender Mustang is my favourite. I’ve only owned two of them. They’re cheap and totally inefficient, and they sound like crap and are very small. They also don’t stay in tune, and when you want to raise the string action on the fretboard, you have to loosen all the strings and completely remove the bridge.”

The Mustang was a student-grade guitar when it was new in 1964. By 1969, it was still considered a second-tier instrument — smaller, cheaper, and less prestigious than a Stratocaster or Telecaster. Cobain chose it because it was affordable and available in left-handed configuration, not because it was fashionable.

The 1969 Competition Mustang sold at auction in June 2023 for $4,455,000 — making it the most expensive guitar ever sold publicly at auction, surpassing a 1959 Gibson Les Paul and Jerry Garcia’s “Wolf” guitar. For a guitar its owner called cheap and inefficient, this is a remarkable posthumous achievement.

Tone note: “They’re cheap and totally inefficient, and they sound like crap and are very small.” This is his description of his favourite guitar. The guitar that sold for $4.45 million is the guitar he said sounds like crap. Both things are simultaneously true. The music made on it is some of the most consequential of the decade. The specific crap sound is part of it.

1965 Fender Jaguar — “The Guitar I Polish and Baby”

The guitar Cobain most carefully maintained — in direct contrast to the disposable Stratocasters he smashed nightly — was a 1965 Fender Jaguar he acquired in the second half of 1991, after the recording of Nevermind.

His statement about it: “I own a ’66 [apparently actually ’65] Jaguar. That’s the guitar I polish and baby — I refuse to let anyone touch it when I jump into the crowd.”

The 1965 Jaguar came pre-modified from its original owner — the Guitar World article noted it was most likely modified by Martin Jenner, session guitarist for Cliff Richard and The Everly Brothers. The modifications: DiMarzio Super Distortion in the bridge position (replacing the stock single coil) and DiMarzio PAF in the neck. The DiMarzio Super Distortion’s high output drove Cobain’s Marshall and Mesa/Boogie rigs into aggressive saturation; the PAF provided warmer, cleaner neck tones.

He subsequently replaced the bridge DiMarzio with a Seymour Duncan JB and added a Schaller bridge to improve the Jaguar’s notorious intonation issues. He also added a Tune-o-Matic bridge for better intonation stability — the Jaguar’s floating bridge was another famous problem that Cobain addressed with the Gibson-style Tune-o-Matic alternative.

The 1965 Jaguar was his primary live guitar from late 1991 through the In Utero period. Fender released a Kurt Cobain Jaguar signature model based on this guitar in 2011.

Univox Hi-Flier — The Pre-Nevermind Workhorse

Before the Mustangs and Jaguars dominated Cobain’s collection, his primary guitar in the early Nirvana period was a Univox Hi-Flier — a Japanese-made Mosrite-style guitar produced in the early 1970s. The Univox Hi-Flier has become one of the most discussed pre-Nevermind Cobain instruments because of its role in the Bleach-era recordings and early tours.

The Hi-Flier’s specific attraction: it was cheap, it was available, and it had a specific abrasive character suited to the early Nirvana sound. The Hi-Flier uses single-coil pickups with a specific Japanese mid-range character different from either Fender’s American designs or Gibson’s humbucker approach.

Harmony/Stella Acoustic (12-String, Used as 6-String) — “Polly” and “Something in the Way”

One of the most important guitars in Nirvana’s catalog is one of the cheapest: a Harmony Stella H912 12-string acoustic that Cobain bought for $20 (some sources say $30) from a junk shop in Denver.

The context: “That’s a 20-dollar junk shop Stella — I didn’t bother changing the strings. It barely stays in tune. In fact I have to use duct tape to hold the tuning keys in place.” He played it as a six-string, having removed the extra strings from the 12-string configuration. It was used on “Polly” and “Something in the Way” from Nevermind.

“Something in the Way” — one of the most hauntingly beautiful songs in the Nirvana catalog, recorded almost alone in the recording studio while Cobain lay on the floor — was made on a $20 junk shop acoustic with duct tape on the tuning keys. This is the complete inversion of vintage-guitar fetishism: the guitar that required duct tape to stay in tune produced a song that has moved millions of people. The monetary value and the musical value are inversely related.

He made up the story about living under a bridge for the song, but the guitar was real. Twenty dollars. Duct tape. One of the most affecting acoustic recordings of the decade.

The Jag-Stang — The Guitar He Designed With Polaroids

In 1993, Cobain designed a custom guitar for Fender by taking Polaroid photographs of a Mustang and a Jaguar, cutting them in half, and gluing the halves together: “What I did is I took a picture of a Mustang, a Polaroid picture of a Mustang and a picture of a Jaguar and then cut them in half and glued them together and told them to build that. So that’s what it is. It’s the Jag-Stang.”

The resulting instrument — lower body from the Jaguar, upper horns and neck from the Mustang — went through prototyping with Fender, with Cobain playing the prototype and providing feedback until it felt right. He used it briefly before his death. Fender released the Jag-Stang as a production model after his death; it has been periodically reissued.

The design process — Polaroid photos, scissors, glue — is the most characteristically Cobain approach to any technical challenge in this series.

Other Key Guitars

Various left-handed Japanese Fender Stratocasters — Cobain’s reasoning: “I’ve resorted to Japanese-made Fender Stratocasters because they’re the most available left-handed guitars.” Japanese Fenders were higher quality than Mexican-made models and more affordable than American; they suited his preference for “guitars in the Fender style because they have skinny necks.” Most were used as disposable instruments for smashing
Epiphone ET-270 — Early collection; used in pre-Nevermind period
Mark IV-style Mosrite Gospel guitar — Bought by Cobain in 1990; the Mosrite Gospel is a student/entry-level version of the Mosrite Ventures model; its specific character influenced the In Utero recordings
Martin D-18E — Electric/acoustic version of the Martin D-18; used in recordings
Epiphone Texan FT-79 — Primary acoustic for MTV Unplugged; a 1959 model known for its warm, direct sound. The Texan was used for the iconic performance including “Where Did You Sleep Last Night”
1993 Fender Telecaster (sunburst, Gibson neck pickup) — Later period; an unusual Telecaster configuration with a Gibson humbucker in the neck position
Hagstrom — Very early collection; used before the Hi-Flier period
Washburn HM series — Used briefly in late 1989, five gigs total before being destroyed on December 3rd at Astoria Theatre London
Various MIM Fender Stratocasters — In Utero touring period; affordably disposable for smashing

Complete Guitar List (Key Instruments)

1969 Fender Competition Mustang (Lake Placid Blue) — “Smells Like Teen Spirit” video; primary Nevermind era; later modified with Seymour Duncan Hot Rails + Tune-o-Matic; sold 2023 for $4.45 million
1965 Fender Jaguar (DiMarzio Super Distortion bridge → Seymour Duncan JB; DiMarzio PAF neck; Schaller bridge) — Primary from late 1991 onward; “the guitar I polish and baby”; Nevermind and In Utero tours; Fender signature model 2011
Univox Hi-Flier — Pre-Nevermind primary; Bleach era; early tours
Harmony/Stella H912 12-string (used as 6-string, $20) — “Polly” and “Something in the Way”; duct tape on tuning keys
Jag-Stang (custom Fender, 1993) — Designed with Polaroid photos; brief use before death; Fender reissued
Epiphone Texan FT-79 (1959) — MTV Unplugged primary acoustic; “Where Did You Sleep Last Night”
Martin D-18E — Recordings and acoustic performances
Mosrite Gospel Mark IV — In Utero era
Various Japanese left-handed Fender Stratocasters — Disposable smashing instruments

Amps: Laziness as Philosophy

Mesa/Boogie Studio .22 + Crown Power Base 2 — The Primary Rig

Cobain’s primary amplification for the Nevermind and subsequent periods was a Mesa/Boogie Studio .22 Preamp paired with a Crown Power Base 2 800-watt power amplifier. His description of the setup philosophy: “I can never find an amp that’s powerful enough, and I don’t want to deal with hauling 10 Marshall heads. I’m lazy — I like to have it all in one package. For a preamp I have a Mesa/Boogie, and I turn all the midrange up.”

Lazy. Turn all the midrange up. This is his complete amp setting philosophy. All the midrange up. The Mesa/Boogie’s five-band graphic equalizer with all the mid frequencies pushed produces a specific scooped-then-boosted character — the tight low end combined with aggressive midrange presence that characterizes the Nevermind guitar tone.

Butch Vig confirmed the Nevermind amp situation: “Kurt had a Mesa/Boogie, but we also used a Fender Bassman a lot and a Vox AC30 on Nevermind.” The three-amp approach — Mesa/Boogie for distorted verse tones, Fender Bassman for the bigger chorus saturation, Vox AC30 for clean overdubs — provided the specific tonal variety of the album.

Fender Twin Reverb — The In Utero Amp

For In Utero, Cobain’s preferred amp shifted: “Apparently Cobain’s preferred amp was a 1960s Fender Twin Reverb, which he used to record In Utero, as well as MTV Unplugged.” The Twin Reverb’s crystalline clean tone, enormous headroom, and spring reverb suited both the more stripped-back aesthetic of In Utero (recorded with Steve Albini’s preference for acoustic transparency) and the intimate acoustic character of the Unplugged session.

Marshall Cabinets

For live shows, the Mesa/Boogie and later Fender Twin ran into Marshall 4×12 cabinets — between two and eight depending on venue size. The cabinets were loaded with Celestion 12″ G12M Greenback speakers. The contrast between the amp head (Mesa preamp, relatively modest wattage) and the cabinet count (up to eight 4×12s) reflects the scale difference between his recording preference (small, immediate) and his live requirement (stadium volume).

Sansamp GT2 — The In Utero Recording Preamp

For the recording of In Utero, Cobain used a Tech 21 Sansamp GT2 pedal as his primary recording tool. The specific settings documented: “3 up, 3 down, 2 up” on the switches, both drive knobs fully open, high frequency between 11 and 2 o’clock, in normal mode. The Sansamp GT2 is a preamp/distortion pedal that emulates different amp characters — in its specific In Utero configuration, it produced the raw, unpolished character that Steve Albini’s recording philosophy required.

Pedals: The Essential Three

Boss DS-1 Distortion — The Core Tone

The Boss DS-1 was Cobain’s primary distortion pedal — “the main factor in his tone” per Guitar World. Butch Vig confirmed its centrality to Nevermind: “Kurt felt that the DS-1 was the main factor in his tone.”

The DS-1 is one of the most common, affordable, and widely available distortion pedals in existence. Its circuit is simple; its character is aggressive; its tone control provides limited but effective frequency shaping. That this pedal — available at any guitar shop for $50 new — is the “main factor” in one of the most discussed guitar tones in grunge history is entirely consistent with Cobain’s philosophy.

Electro-Harmonix Small Clone — The Chorus Effect

The second essential Cobain pedal: the Electro-Harmonix Small Clone chorus. Vig confirmed: “That’s making the watery guitar sound you hear on the pre-chorus build-up of ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit’ and also ‘Come as You Are.'” The Small Clone is a simple analog chorus with just two controls (rate and depth/on switch) that produces a specific liquid, watery modulation different from more complex chorus units.

The “Come as You Are” opening guitar sound — the iconic unison-bend arpeggiated riff with the chorus shimmer — is the DS-1 and Small Clone working together through the Nevermind recording chain. Two pedals. Both affordable. The most recognized guitar tone in grunge.

ProCo RAT — Secondary Distortion

Cobain also used a ProCo RAT distortion on Nevermind sessions — confirmed in Equipboard’s documentation of a photo showing the specific model (first version RAT, identifiable by thick white line knobs). “A ProCo Rat distortion pedal was also used on some songs on the album.” The RAT’s more compressed, midrange-forward character provided a different distortion option from the DS-1’s brighter, more open response.

Electro-Harmonix Big Muff Pi

The Big Muff was used on “Lithium”: “We used an Electro-Harmonix Big Muff fuzz box through a Fender Bassman on ‘Lithium’ to get that thumpier, darker sound,” Vig confirmed. The Big Muff’s specific sustain and lower-midrange emphasis, through the Bassman’s warm low-end response, produced the specific heavy quality of “Lithium” compared to the DS-1’s more aggressive character elsewhere on the album.

Strings, Picks & Setup

Strings: Dean Markley strings, gauge .010-.052 — confirmed in multiple sources. He used heavier gauges than standard light (.009-.042) specifically to compensate for the Mustang’s short scale: the shorter scale length reduces string tension, and heavier strings restore it to a more playable level.

Picks: Dunlop Tortex Standard .60mm in orange — confirmed by photos showing orange picks on his microphone stand and a period concert video. The .60mm Tortex is a relatively thin, flexible pick that provides a bright, snappy attack appropriate for rhythm strumming without being so heavy that individual note articulation becomes difficult.

Left-handed: All of Cobain’s guitars were left-handed models or standard models strung for left-handed playing. His preference for Japanese Fenders was partly driven by availability: “I’ve resorted to Japanese-made Fender Stratocasters because they’re the most available left-handed guitars.”

Smashing protocol: Cobain maintained a specific guitar selection protocol for live shows: a primary “good” guitar (Jaguar or Mustang) used for most of the set; a cheaper “disposable” guitar (Japanese Stratocaster or MIM Fender) reserved for the final songs, in case the band felt like destroying equipment. “The band did not plan ahead of time to smash their instruments, sometimes they didn’t feel like doing it at all. But more often than not they did, so it was a good idea to swap to a cheaper instrument just in case.”

Playing Style & Tone Philosophy: The Anti-Guitar Hero

Kurt Cobain’s guitar playing philosophy is the most explicitly anti-virtuoso in rock history. He was not a technically sophisticated guitarist by the standards of the players who preceded him — he couldn’t shred in the 1980s manner, didn’t play jazz-influenced solos like Richard Thompson, didn’t fingerpick like Bert Jansch. What he had was different and more specific: a devastating sense of song structure, the ability to write riffs that communicated enormous emotional weight with minimal notes, and a performance energy that made technical limitations irrelevant.

The Power Chord Foundation

Cobain’s rhythm work is built on power chords — two-note fifth intervals that provide harmonic ambiguity (neither clearly major nor minor) and raw sonic power. The power chord approach is theoretically simple but rhythmically demanding: the specific placement of power chord hits, the muting between them, and the dynamic contrast between quiet verse and explosive chorus are the techniques that make songs like “Smells Like Teen Spirit” feel simultaneously inevitable and electric.

The quiet-loud dynamic — verse at low volume (clean or lightly driven), chorus at full attack (DS-1 full on) — was the specific compositional tool that “Smells Like Teen Spirit” popularized and that a decade of rock bands subsequently adopted.

The Riffs as Hooks

In the traditional rock structure, the guitar riff is the verse; the guitar solo is the chorus. Cobain inverted this: the riff IS the hook. “Smells Like Teen Spirit,” “Come as You Are,” “Heart-Shaped Box,” “All Apologies” — each of these songs is defined by a specific guitar riff that is as memorable as any vocal melody. The guitar writing came from someone thinking melodically first and technically second.

The Anti-Solo

Cobain’s guitar solos — when they appear — are deliberately unimpressive by conventional metrics. The “Smells Like Teen Spirit” solo is the verse melody played louder with distortion. The approach is punk-derived: the song doesn’t need a showpiece solo, and putting one in would be dishonest to the music’s emotional content. The restraint is not limitation; it is choice.

The Specific DIY Aesthetic

His entire guitar collection reflects the DIY punk aesthetic of the Olympia, Washington scene he came from: use what’s available, prefer the cheap over the expensive, treat the instrument as a tool rather than an object of reverence, destroy it at the end of the show if the music requires it. This aesthetic produced the most commercially successful album of the grunge era, made on instruments that cost a fraction of what his contemporaries were using.

How to Sound Like Kurt Cobain: The Nirvana Guitar Tone

The Guitar

Fender Mustang (short-scale, student-grade) for the Nevermind era; Fender Jaguar (with humbucking pickups) for the later period. Both available in current production in left- and right-handed versions.

Fender Kurt Cobain Signature Mustang — Competition Blue with racing stripes; close to the original
Fender Kurt Cobain Signature Jaguar — DiMarzio humbuckers; modified three-control layout
Any affordable Fender Mustang or Jaguar — The guitar’s character matters more than the specific year

The Amp

Mesa/Boogie preamp into power amp for the Nevermind character; Fender Twin Reverb for In Utero and Unplugged.

Control	Setting	Notes
Midrange	All the way up	“I turn all the midrange up” — the complete Cobain amp philosophy
Bass	5–6	Present but controlled; let the power chord’s lower string provide bass
Treble	5–6	The DS-1 adds treble presence; moderate amp treble
Volume	As loud as possible	“I can never find an amp that’s powerful enough”
Gain	High for chorus, lower for verse	The dynamic contrast between verse and chorus is the technique

The Essential Pedals

Boss DS-1 Distortion — The core tone; affordable and widely available; “the main factor in his tone”
Electro-Harmonix Small Clone Chorus — “Come as You Are” and “Smells Like Teen Spirit” watery pre-chorus; set to moderate rate
Electro-Harmonix Big Muff Pi — For the darker, heavier tones; “Lithium” character

Budget vs Authentic

Budget:

Guitar: Fender Mustang (current production) or Squier Mustang
Strings: Dean Markley .010-.052 or equivalent medium gauge
Pick: Dunlop Tortex .60mm orange
Pedals: Boss DS-1 + Electro-Harmonix Small Clone + optional Big Muff
Amp: Any clean-to-crunch amp; all midrange up

Authentic:

Guitar: Fender Kurt Cobain Competition Mustang (signature) or vintage 1969 equivalent
Guitar 2: Fender Kurt Cobain Jaguar (signature, DiMarzio humbuckers)
Amp: Mesa/Boogie Studio .22 preamp into Crown Power Base 2 power amp, into Marshall 4×12 with Celestion Greenbacks
Pedals: Boss DS-1 + EHX Small Clone + ProCo RAT + EHX Big Muff
Acoustic: Epiphone Texan FT-79 for Unplugged material

The Dynamic Technique

The verse-to-chorus dynamic is the fundamental Cobain compositional tool. In the verse: moderate volume, DS-1 on but guitar volume rolled back or picking lightly, creating the quiet, slightly tense character. Into the chorus: full guitar volume, full DS-1 output, full arm strumming — the release of all the tension built in the verse. This isn’t about changing any settings; it’s about the picking dynamics and guitar volume knob creating the contrast.

Influence & Legacy: The Anti-Hero Who Changed Everything

Kurt Cobain’s influence on guitar playing is the influence of someone who redefined what guitar playing means in a rock context. Before Nevermind, the dominant guitar aesthetic in mainstream rock was technical proficiency and elaborate production — hair metal’s shredding tradition or the growing complexity of alternative rock’s genre experimentation. After Nevermind, a generation of guitarists internalized the principle that emotional directness and song quality mattered more than technical facility.

His specific contributions:

The Boss DS-1’s cultural elevation — By making the DS-1 the “main factor in his tone,” Cobain made the cheapest, most widely available distortion pedal aspirational for a generation of young guitarists who couldn’t afford boutique pedals
The quiet-loud dynamic — The verse-quiet/chorus-loud compositional structure that “Smells Like Teen Spirit” popularized became a default template for alternative rock for a decade
The anti-guitar-hero stance — His explicit rejection of guitar virtuosity as a value gave permission to generations of musicians to write good songs rather than practice scales
The Fender Mustang’s rehabilitation — The student-grade guitar that Cobain described as cheap and inefficient became, after Nevermind, one of the most sought-after Fender models; the prices of vintage Mustangs reflect his influence
The $20 acoustic — The Stella/Harmony that required duct tape on the tuning keys produced “Something in the Way.” The lesson that the cheapest available instrument is sufficient for great music is one of the most important in the history of popular music

He said he didn’t care about gear. He pursued cheap guitars with collector’s passion. His favourite guitar sold for $4.45 million. He described it as sounding like crap.

Both things are true. All of it is the same thing.

Tone note: He took a Polaroid of a Mustang and a Polaroid of a Jaguar and cut them in half and glued the halves together and handed them to Fender and said build that. The Jag-Stang is a guitar designed by cutting photographs. It is the most characteristically Cobain approach to any technical challenge: don’t make it complicated, use what’s available, be direct. The guitar he designed by cutting Polaroids is the perfect metaphor for a musician whose most consequential compositions were made with a $20 junk-shop acoustic that needed duct tape to stay in tune.

He described his favourite guitar as cheap, totally inefficient, sounding like crap, and very small. It sold at auction for $4.45 million — the most expensive guitar ever sold publicly.

He used a $20 junk shop 12-string with duct tape on the tuning keys for “Polly” and “Something in the Way.” He designed a signature guitar by cutting two Polaroid photographs in half and gluing them together. He used a Boss DS-1 — the most common distortion pedal in existence — as “the main factor in his tone.”

He bought the cheapest available left-handed guitars with collector’s passion. He used Japanese Stratocasters as disposable instruments. He smashed the cheap ones. He polished and babied the 1965 Jaguar.

The DS-1. The Small Clone. The Mesa/Boogie with all the midrange up. The Mustang he called cheap and inefficient. The Unplugged in a green cardigan with an Epiphone Texan and a song about a bridge he never actually lived under.

He changed everything. He used the cheapest gear available. Both things are true.

If Kurt Cobain’s pawn-shop-prizes approach — the Competition Mustang, the DS-1, the Small Clone, the $20 Stella, the Jag-Stang designed with Polaroid scissors — has you exploring the grunge guitar tradition, check our complete guide to Elliott Smith’s guitars and gear — whose equally intimate, equally low-budget acoustic approach ran parallel to Cobain’s electric work in the same Pacific Northwest scene during the same years.

And for a guitarist whose anti-virtuoso philosophy shares Cobain’s commitment to song over technique — but expressed through the Funkadelic-and-soul tradition rather than punk rock — don’t miss our breakdown of Eddie Hazel’s complete gear guide, the next in the series.

FAQ: Kurt Cobain Guitars & Gear

What was Kurt Cobain’s favourite guitar?: The Fender Mustang — specifically a 1969 Competition Mustang in Lake Placid Blue with red racing stripes, used in the “Smells Like Teen Spirit” music video. His description: “I’m left-handed, and it’s not very easy to find reasonably priced, high-quality left-handed guitars. But out of all the guitars in the whole world, the Fender Mustang is my favourite. I’ve only owned two of them. They’re cheap and totally inefficient, and they sound like crap and are very small. They also don’t stay in tune.” That specific Competition Mustang sold at auction in June 2023 for $4,455,000 — the most expensive guitar ever sold publicly at auction.
What is the guitar used on “Polly” and “Something in the Way”?: A Harmony Stella H912 12-string acoustic that Cobain bought for $20 (some sources say $30) from a junk shop. He used it as a six-string, having removed the extra strings. His description: “That’s a 20-dollar junk shop Stella — I didn’t bother changing the strings. It barely stays in tune. In fact I have to use duct tape to hold the tuning keys in place.” The $20 guitar with duct tape on the tuning keys produced two of the most affecting acoustic recordings on Nevermind. The specific musical quality of the recording has nothing to do with the instrument’s monetary value.
What were the main pedals used on Nevermind?: Boss DS-1 Distortion — Butch Vig confirmed it was “the main factor in his tone.” Electro-Harmonix Small Clone Chorus — Vig confirmed: “That’s making the watery guitar sound you hear on the pre-chorus build-up of ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit’ and also ‘Come as You Are.'” ProCo RAT — also used on several songs on the album. Electro-Harmonix Big Muff Pi — used on “Lithium” through a Fender Bassman for “that thumpier, darker sound.” The DS-1 and Small Clone are the two essential and consistent elements; the RAT and Big Muff appear on specific songs.
What is the Jag-Stang?: A custom guitar that Cobain designed in 1993 by taking Polaroid photographs of a Fender Mustang and a Fender Jaguar, cutting them each in half, and gluing the halves together to produce a hybrid body shape. He described the process: “What I did is I took a picture of a Mustang, a Polaroid picture of a Mustang and a picture of a Jaguar and then cut them in half and glued them together and told them to build that. So that’s what it is. It’s the Jag-Stang.” Fender prototyped the guitar with Cobain’s feedback until it felt right; he used it briefly before his death in 1994. Fender released it as a production model posthumously and has periodically reissued it.
What amps did Kurt Cobain use on Nevermind?: Three amps were used across the Nevermind sessions: Mesa/Boogie Studio .22 Preamp paired with a Crown Power Base 2 800W power amp (primarily for distorted verse tones — “I turn all the midrange up”), Fender Bassman (primarily for the heavier, more saturated chorus sections), and Vox AC30 (clean overdubs and strummed sections). Butch Vig confirmed: “Kurt had a Mesa/Boogie, but we also used a Fender Bassman a lot and a Vox AC30 on Nevermind.” Four microphones were used on Kurt’s speaker cabinet for each song: Shure SM57, AKG 414, Neumann U87, and occasionally Sennheiser 421.
What was Kurt Cobain’s guitar for Nirvana’s MTV Unplugged?: His primary acoustic guitar for the November 1993 MTV Unplugged performance was a 1959 Epiphone Texan FT-79 — a flat-top acoustic with a warm, direct character. He also used a Martin D-18E (an electric/acoustic version of the D-18) for some songs. The iconic finale — his performance of “Where Did You Sleep Last Night” — was on the Epiphone Texan. He wore a green mohair cardigan that subsequently became one of the most recognisable pieces of rock clothing, selling at auction for $334,000 in 2023.
How do I get Kurt Cobain’s Nevermind guitar tone?: Fender Mustang or Jaguar (left-handed or right-handed depending on your orientation). Dean Markley strings .010-.052. Dunlop Tortex .60mm orange picks. Signal chain: Boss DS-1 Distortion + Electro-Harmonix Small Clone Chorus, into a Mesa/Boogie-style amp or any medium-gain amp. Amp settings: all midrange up (“I turn all the midrange up”), moderate bass and treble. The essential technique: the quiet-loud dynamic contrast between verse and chorus — in the verse, pick lightly and keep guitar volume moderate; in the chorus, strum hard with full guitar volume and DS-1 fully engaged. This dynamic contrast (not a settings change) creates the “Smells Like Teen Spirit” effect. Don’t practice solos. Write a better chorus.