Release and Reception
"Lithium" was released as a single in July 1992. The packaging included full lyrics for all the songs on Nevermind. In the United States, the single charted at number 64 on the Billboard Hot 100 single chart. "Lithium" peaked at number 16 and 25 on the Billboard Mainstream Rock and Modern Rock Tracks airplay charts, respectively. The song was tied at number 20 with singles by Ministry, Lisa Stansfield, and Utah Saints in the 1992 Village Voice Pazz & Jop critics' poll.
Numerous acts have covered the song, including in psychedelic arrangements by The Polyphonic Spree and the original Nirvana. The latter was intended as a track for a tongue-in-cheek cover album titled Nirvana Sings Nirvana that the British Nirvana abandoned after Cobain's death.
In September 2011, to celebrate 20 years of Nevermind, Kerrang! released a version of the album with all songs (including "Endless, Nameless" and "Sliver") covered by different modern artists. "Lithium" was covered by the British rock band Francesqa.
Read more about this topic: Lithium (Nirvana Song)
Famous quotes containing the words release and, release and/or reception:
“We read poetry because the poets, like ourselves, have been haunted by the inescapable tyranny of time and death; have suffered the pain of loss, and the more wearing, continuous pain of frustration and failure; and have had moods of unlooked-for release and peace. They have known and watched in themselves and others.”
—Elizabeth Drew (1887–1965)
“An inquiry about the attitude towards the release of so-called political prisoners. I should be very sorry to see the United States holding anyone in confinement on account of any opinion that that person might hold. It is a fundamental tenet of our institutions that people have a right to believe what they want to believe and hold such opinions as they want to hold without having to answer to anyone for their private opinion.”
—Calvin Coolidge (1872–1933)
“Satire is a sort of glass, wherein beholders do generally discover everybody’s face but their own; which is the chief reason for that kind of reception it meets in the world, and that so very few are offended with it.”
—Jonathan Swift (1667–1745)