a Girl." Like "About a Girl," the song has been described as "Beatlesque." Nirvana bassist Krist Novoselic called it "a beautiful song. That's a really good one. I like the BBC version of the song. It's real raw, but still the beauty is strong. A sweet pop song." Describing the In Utero version, John Mulvey of the NME wrote that the song "broods and circles, with the aid of a cello, like a baroque parody of 'Lithium'. Again and again it builds up and up, primed to explode into a moshing sweatfest of a chorus, and again and again it ducks away from that commercially lucrative macho bonding rite." Likewise, Jim Bevigilia of American Songwriter wrote that "the recording of the song on In Utero is all coiled tension. Even though you expect Cobain’s guitar to come crashing through to break it, it never quite does. Instead, a cello runs counterpoint to the steady rhythm section of Krist Novoselic and Dave Grohl and to the protagonist’s insistence that maybe he’s happy after all." Lyrics In a 1993 interview with Melody Maker, Cobain explained that the song was "just about people who're easily amused, people who not only aren't capable of progressing their intelligence but are totally happy watching 10 hours of television and really enjoy it. I've met a lot of dumb people. They have a shitty job, they may be totally lonely, they don't have a girlfriend, they don't have much of a social life, and yet, for some reason, they're happy." Though written before Cobain's addiction to heroin, "Dumb" is also one of the few Nirvana songs to directly reference drug use, specifically inhalants. In Cobain's unused liner notes for the song, he blamed "all that supposedly unaddictive, harmless" marijuana for harming his nerves and damaging his memory, saying it "wasn't ever strong enough" which led him to "climb the ladder" to heroin. In 2015, Kurt's daughter, Frances Bean Cobain, offered her own interpretation of the song in an interview with Rolling Stone, saying, "I cry every time I hear that song. It's a stripped-down version of Kurt's perception of himself – of himself on drugs, off drugs, feeling inadequate to be titled the voice of a generation." Release and reception Though never released as a single, "Dumb" has become a popular song on American alternative rock radio, and was played on European radio. It was ranked at