Big Cheese

This song is about the pressures that bands are put under to please their manager, or in this case, the "big cheese." Many speculate that Kurt Cobain may have written this specifically about SubPop producer Jonathan Poneman, but others think it's more of a generalization. Cobain did, however, tell biographer Michael Azerrad (Come As You Are: The Story of Nirvana) that Poneman influenced the tune. "I was expressing all the pressures that I felt from him at the time because he was being so judgmental about what we were recording," he explained.

This was the B-side to Nirvana's first single, "Love Buzz."

In 2009, Nirvana bassist Krist Novoselic interviewed Chad Channing, who was the band's drummer from 1988 to 1990, for Seattle Weekly. The former bandmates reminisced over the Bleach track, with Novoselic saying, "I think one of the best songs you and I worked together on was 'Big Cheese.' Kurt came up with that two-note riff for the verses. You and I took off for that instrumental bridge. I went up high on the neck of the bass, and you did that great double kick!" Channing added: "That's one of my favorite songs. You know why it really worked for me? My friends and I would play our 45s on 33 rpm. It would sound deeper and heavier at that speed."