Last week (December 3), Miley Cyrus once again proved herself to be the queen of cover songs, this time trying her hand at Hole’s 1994 classic “Doll Parts” live on the Howard Stern Show. Now, the cover has got the approval of Courtney Love herself.
On Instagram, the band’s frontwoman shared a video of Cyrus’ “sweet version” of the track, saying she was “touched” by the performance.
Love shared another post, which saw Kurt Cobain on stage at a Nirvana gig, describing Hole as a “sensational pop group” and Love as “the best fuck in the world”. In the caption, the singer detailed the story behind how “Doll Parts” was written.
“The song ‘Doll Hearts’ is an homage I wrote in 20 minutes in a girl named Joyce’s bathroom in Cambridge, Massachusetts,” Love said. “I had to write most of the lyrics on my arm in sharpie as I ran out of paper. People were pounding on the door as I wrote it. It was played for the first time an hour later, at the Virgin megastore in Boston.”
“It was about a boy, whose band had just left town, who I’d been sleeping with, who I heard was sleeping with two other girls. It was my way of saying, ‘You’re a fucking idiot if you don’t choose ME, and here is all the desire and fury and love that I feel for you’.”
She concluded: “Good songs don’t always come in 20 minutes, but the force was strong and that one did. Anyway, I married that guy.”
Love also said of Cobain’s on-stage comments: “Despite it seeming possibly vulgar to some, it isn’t, it was really sweet and made me chuckle. Sort of embarrassed and sort of not.”
Last month, Love hinted that a Hole reunion could be on the way, as well as announcing that she’s been working on a new solo album. “It’s something I’d love to do,” she told NME, “and (have) been taking guitar lessons over Zoom during lockdown, and I’m writing again, so we’ll see.”
Watch Cyrus’ cover of “Doll Hearts” below, and see Love’s Instagram post above.