In 1991, the rock band Nirvana released an album called Nevermind with a naked baby on the cover. It was the most influential album of that decade. Thirty years later, the naked baby is suing everyone involved. Spencer Elden filed a lawsuit claiming "former members of the grunge-rock trio, various record companies, art directors and others violated federal criminal child pornography laws and caused him lifelong suffering by 'trafficking' his image worldwide."

According to the suit, Spencer's parents never signed a release for use of the photo. If true, even though I'm not a lawyer, that seems open and shut without getting into the tawdry stuff. Also if true, that means Spencer's parents never remembered that they didn't sign a release at any point over the past thirty years of the album selling hundreds of millions of copies.

Cobain is also said to have agreed to partially cover up the nudity on the photograph with intentions to place a sticker over the genitals that read, "If you're offended by this, you must be a closet pedophile," but the sticker was never applied to the cover.

My girlfriend at the time got me the CD for Christmas and put a poinsettia sticker over the little wee-wee. Whether or not Cobain agreed to that is for the courts to decide.

Spencer's attorneys, according to the lawsuit, are claiming permanent harm not limited to "extreme and permanent emotional distress with physical manifestations, interference with his normal development and educational progress, lifelong loss of income earning capacity, loss of past and future wages, past and future expenses for medical and psychological treatment, loss of enjoyment of life, and other losses to be described and proven at trial of this matter."

Spencer's lawyers want $150,000 apiece from everyone involved, including Dave Grohl (who is still a rock god) and Courtney Love (who may or may not have killed her husband).

Side note: This is Spencer:

From here it's for the lawyers to decide. I am not one, nor do I play one on Twitter. But let me say this. Child sex trafficking is a serious issue that needs to be taken more seriously than it is. Child pornographers and pedophiles -- and really, anyone who preys on children -- need to be put UNDER jail if they aren't left in the general population with a sign that says "I am a pedophile, who wants to touch me?" I'm willing to make a controversial stance and proclaim we all agree about that.

But you'll have to forgive me for thinking this reeks of a frivolous lawsuit from someone whose life isn't working out for him. Cheapening the severity of ACTUAL trafficking and ACTUAL exploitation of children to make a buck does not make you the sympathetic figure here.

Smells Like Two-Spirit (Nirvana Parody) | Louder With Crowderyoutu.be