Melissa Auf der Maur Breaks Silence on Father's Death and 90s Rock Chaos
Melissa Auf der Maur has waited twenty-five years to reveal the heartbreaking circumstances surrounding her father's death, a secret she kept even from her husband until now. The former bassist for Hole and Smashing Pumpkins details this pivotal moment in her new memoir, Even the Good Girls Will Cry, which chronicles her turbulent journey through the 1990s rock scene.
A Father's Final Moments
In April 1998, while on break from recording Hole's final album Celebrity Skin, Auf der Maur returned home to Montreal to visit her ailing father. Nick Auf der Maur, a prominent politician and columnist, was battling advanced throat cancer that had spread to his brain. After experimental treatments left him unable to eat, drink, or speak properly, Auf der Maur overheard a phone conversation where her father expressed his desire to end his life.
"I wanted to be there if he was going to do it," Auf der Maur explains in her memoir. Two friends administered morphine through a kiwi smoothie, one of the few things he could consume. Auf der Maur arrived afterward and stayed with him until the end, telling him, "You can let go now. Let go."
The decision to share this story now comes as her daughter River turns fourteen. "I would never want my daughter to grow into a woman with her own mother still hiding from the defining moment that made me an adult woman," Auf der Maur states. "I felt this urgency like a fire. I must face this to heal it, purge it, to let go."
Entering Courtney Love's World
Auf der Maur's entry into Hole came at one of the band's most chaotic periods. She joined just weeks after bassist Kristen Pfaff's heroin overdose death in 1994, and mere months after Courtney Love became a widow following Kurt Cobain's suicide. The band's album Live Through This was released just one week after Cobain's death, with Love navigating grief, single motherhood, and drug addiction while under intense public scrutiny.
"Courtney was not OK," Auf der Maur writes. "She was grieving, she had a young daughter to raise alone, and she was on drugs. On top of that, she was the most famous widow of the most famous dead rock star in the world. She was a raging, rolling tornado."
Initially resistant to joining what she viewed as a major-label sellout, Auf der Maur was persuaded by Love's persistence and a chance meeting at the Seattle airport. "All of a sudden, my preconceived notions landed differently," she recalls. "I saw the flesh-and-blood women, with a small child. And it felt like destiny."
The Reality of 90s Rock Excess
Life in Hole proved even more tumultuous than Auf der Maur anticipated. She describes Love's near-death experiences from abscesses caused by dirty needles, a house fire that nearly killed the entire band in New Orleans, and constant drug use. Throughout it all, Love's daughter Frances Bean was often present—crying in smoky clubs or sitting on her mother's lap during recording sessions.
Auf der Maur expresses palpable anger toward record labels that profited from grunge bands while offering little support for artists struggling with trauma and addiction. "No one was taking care of these people who were in major trauma," she asserts. "They were just pushing Courtney and her daughter on tour, which was insane."
As the only non-addict in the group, Auf der Maur carried constant concern for her bandmates. "Was Courtney impossible, difficult, a drug addict, terrifying, and even mean sometimes? Yes, she was," she acknowledges. "But it took me one second to understand that she was also a survivor."
Society's Crucible
The public scrutiny reached its peak in 1998 when Love faced accusations of using drugs while pregnant and was implicated in conspiracy theories about Cobain's death. Auf der Maur's father famously disrupted a Montreal event promoting these theories, earning roses and gratitude from Love who called him "the father I never had."
Auf der Maur, who grew up watching her mother's "fearless independence and absolute refusal to have society dictate how she was going to live," saw a disturbing contradiction in 90s culture. "It was supposed to be 'women power' time," she observes. "But with Courtney, I watched society burn a woman at the stake."
Moving Beyond the Chaos
After leaving Hole at their commercial peak, Auf der Maur joined Smashing Pumpkins' world tour before departing to "find myself again." She also began a relationship with Foo Fighters frontman Dave Grohl, which she describes as a deeply late-90s romance conducted through faxes and phone calls between tours.
When both came off tour in 2001, their paths diverged fundamentally. "I had assumed we'd share in a 'let's get out of here' way of living," Auf der Maur explains. "But he had unfinished business in show business." Grohl wanted a traditional home life alongside superstardom, while Auf der Maur sought a simpler creative existence.
Her journey led to solo albums, marriage to filmmaker Tony Stone, the birth of their daughter, and establishing the arts space Basilica Hudson. Alongside her memoir, she's releasing a photography book and exhibition from her 90s archive, and collaborating on Love's upcoming album.
Reflection and Reconciliation
Today, Auf der Maur's relationship with Love is "the best it's ever been." She expresses pride in "a woman who should be dead, who instead is evolving," and believes Love's new music will help people understand complex women better.
"A lot of what's in this book, I did not think about for 20 years," Auf der Maur admits. "I was running from the 90s, running from my father's death. I was trying to define the next chapter while not letting time do its work."
Though her memoir is dedicated to her daughter and all girls, Auf der Maur hopes anyone reading will "find what makes you tick, what moves you and rings true to you, and simply follow that"—advice forged through decades of navigating rock's most turbulent waters.
