Frontwoman of early 90s Grunge band Hole, widow of Kurt Cobain, currently a few notches short of Ax Crazy. Here's a reasonably quick rundown of her career:
Moved around a lot in The Eighties and was in various bands. At one point she joined Faith No More as a temporary vocalist, but was kicked out for clashing too much with the others.
Pretty on the Inside (1991), a harsh Noise Rock album produced by Kim Gordon and Don Fleming. The lineup was Love, Erlandson, Jill Emery on bass and Caroline Rue on drums.
Live Through This (1994), a more obviously Grunge album produced by Sean Slade and Paul Kolderie (previously producers for Radiohead's Pablo Honey). This became their most successful album, and brought about rumors that it was ghostwritten by Kurt Cobain.*
Cobain's contributions to the album were uncredited, nearly inaudible backing vocals to "Asking for It" and "Softer, Softest".
For this album, Emery and Rue were replaced by Kristen Pfaff (who died of an accidental overdose two months after the album's release) and Patty Schemel.
My Body, the Hand Grenade (1997), a compilation of early (and recent) material released while the band's attempt to record a third album collapsed. Included a Nirvana song called "Old Age" which was rewritten and credited entirely to Love, fueling the Fan Dumb and Hate Dumb.
Celebrity Skin (1998), a much more accessible Power Pop-influenced album produced by Michael Beinhorn and with some contributions by Billy Corgan. To prevent a repeat of Live Through This, the album contained extensive liner notes and writer's credits just so people would know exactly who did what. Melissa Auf Der Maur played bass on the album (and quit in 1999 to join the Smashing Pumpkins), while Schemel controversially left during the sessions for unclear reasons and was replaced by a session drummer in the studio and Samantha Maloney for the tour.
Married Kurt Cobain. You know the rest.
Disbanded Hole circa 2002 after a period of inactivity, became slightly more known for drug addiction, erratic behaviour and a talent for annoying/insulting various other Alternative Rock figures than her music.
Did not endear herself to Nirvana fans by starting a long legal pissing match with Dave Grohl and Krist Novoselic, delaying the release of the With the Lights Out box set for three years.
Recorded a solo album, America's Sweetheart (2004). This was not as well received as her Hole material due to the weaker songwriting and overly commercial production, and even she admitted she was mostly out of it during recording. This album featured Emilie Autumn, and launched her non-classical career.
Resurrected the Hole name with an entirely new lineup (and annoying Erlandson in the process). This lineup (Love, Micko Larkin, Shawn Dailey and Stu Fisher) put out a new album, Nobody's Daughter (2010). People are still mostly on the fence about it. Fisher left a year after the release, being replaced with Scott Lipps.
All things considered equal, as a female singer she is still able to perform a rare feat: conveying anger and rage without sounding or acting like a man and being perfectly credible in her anger.She also has a Self InsertManga called Princess Ai.
Discography:
With Hole:
Pretty On The Inside (1991)
Live through This (1994)
Celebrity Skin (1998)
Nobody's Daughter (2010)
Compilations With Hole:
My Body The Hand Grenade (1997)
Icon (2011)
As A Solo Artist:
America's Sweetheart (2004)
Courtney Love provides examples of the following tropes:
Arch-Nemesis: Dave Grohl, although their "rivalry" is entirely one-sided; Grohl has never instigated any of their conflicts and whenever she picks a fight with him, his response is always just something along the lines of, "Oh, it looks like Courtney has gone off on another tangent again."
Hate Dumb: Go onto any video or internet thread about her and you will be bombarded by messages to the effect of "Bitch killed Kurt Cobain!" and/or links to websites run by attention-seeking conspiracy theorists showing "evidence" that links her to Cobain's death.
Despite the fact that most, if not all, evidence that links her to Cobain's death is circumstantial and probably wouldn't hold up in court, many strongly cling to the belief that she was directly involved in his suicide (With some believing that she murdered him herself) enough to make her role in it a very YMMV issue.
Harsh Vocals: Apparently Courtney was gargling whiskey while recording "Pretty on the Inside" for this effect.
Hidden Depths: Her speech about how artists are unfairly treated by the record industry is surprisingly insightful, informative and well-written. Also, let's face it, her talent as a musician and a frontwoman is greatly underrated.
I Am the Band: Former guitarist and only other constant member Eric Erlandson criticised the resurrection of the "Hole" name and alluded to a "contract" which specified that Hole couldn't legally reform without him. Love responded by declaring that Hole is "MY band".
Indecipherable Lyrics: When Courtney isn't screaming or genuinely singing, she gets to this. Though on Pretty on the Inside, it's mostly the fault of the production.
Jerkass: Early in The Eighties she was the lead singer in Faith No More for a short amount of time, being sacked due to her domineering behaviour (her replacement turned out to be so bad a magazine commented on the band's "internal warfare").
Jerkass Woobie: Between being abandoned by her mother at a young age, growing up practically unwanted by any of her family, spending her adolescence in Juvie, having to work as a stripper to make ends meet, narrowly escaping being raped during said job and the police not believing her story, the love of her life killing himself right when her life seemed to be getting on track, and her then developing one of the biggest hatedoms in history because of it, it is inarguable that Love has lived an extraordinarily hard life. However, her generally abrasive and wreckless behavior makes it difficult, if not impossible, for anyone to feel sorry for her.
Misogyny Song: Things like "Baby Doll" and "Samantha" feel like this.
New Sound Album: Celebrity Skin is much more pop than the last three Hole albums.
Precision F-Strike: "I Think That I Would Die" is a a pretty slow and melancholy song, however it just makes the vitriol when she screams all the more powerful.
Record Producer: Rather influential for the album's overall sounds - Kim Gordon and Don Fleming's work on Pretty on the Inside is more Noise Rock-oriented and harsh, Sean Slade and Paul Kolderie gave Live Through This a more straightforward Grunge sound, and Michael Beinhorn contributed to Celebrity Skin's more pop leanings.
Beinhorn also counts as an Acrimony Producer: in a retrospective documentary on Celebrity Skin, Love called Beinhorn a "Nazi" and Schemel accused him of forcing her out of the band in favour of working with a session drummer.
Revolving Door Band: The only constant members of Hole were Love and guitarist Eric Erlandson - they cycled through drummers and bassists at a pretty fast rate (with the odd Author Existence Failure, such as Kirsten Pfaff's heroin overdose). The recent reformation with an entirely-new lineup hasn't helped.
Rock Star Song: The original version of "Awful," which was several pages long, included things like this.
In her solo album America's Sweetheart, "Mono" feels like this.
Split Personality: Love has had a mixture of "good" and "bad" public appearances. In her "good" public appearances she comes off as a kind, approachable, intelligent, well-meaning Cloudcuckoolander. In her "bad" public appearances she comes off as an insane, abrasive, destructive, drug-addled nutcase who is two steps away from being Ax Crazy. This had lead many to believe that she has bipolar disorder, a condition that Kurt Cobain also had.
Unkempt Beauty: reinvented this for the early 90s, with tattered little dresses, smeared makeup and unbrushed hair. Still considered highly attractive anyway.
The look in question, Kinderwhore, was the attempt to look like a prostitute crossed with a child playing dress-up. She was accused of stealing it from Kat Bjelland of Babes in Toyland.
Yoko Oh No: Much of the Nirvana fandom hates her, with a vocal group of conspiracy theorists even insisting that she was responsible for his death.
A frequent source of controversy was the allegation that Cobain either entirely wrote or heavily contributed to Live Through This (he only added backing vocals and guitar to two songs) — Love did not help her case by rewriting the lyrics of the Nirvana outtake "Old Age" for My Body the Hand Grenade and not bothering to explain that it was originally a Nirvana song.
That she almost seems to go out of her way to antagonize Nirvana fans and seemingly has little respect for her husband's legacy has only made things worse. She published his personal journals (Cobain was pretty anti-fame, and notoriously private), and then licensed his image to Guitar Hero, so fans can force him to sing whatever they want. Admittedly, it IS funny to make him sing GNR songs, but Nirvana fans (and former band members) were not pleased. Her habit of holding up the release of pretty much any unreleased Nirvana stuff seemingly (to her Hatedom anyways) just For the Evulz threw even more fuel on the fire.
At one point, she had a relationship with Trent Reznor, which didn't end well. Trent blames her for ruining his friendship with Tori Amos, and both of them made songs seemingly attacking Love (NIN's "Starfuckers, Inc.", accompanied by a video which involved a lookalike being dunked in a tub of water, and Tori's "Professional Widow")
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