The late Juice WRLD is being compared to late Nirvana frontman Kurt Cobain in a new documentary.
The HBO documentary Juice WRLD: Into The Abyss, which premiered on Thursday (December 16), explores the monumental impact Juice and his legacy left on music. The film is directed by Tommy Oliver, who compiled hundreds of hours of unseen footage shot during the “Lucid Dreams” rapper last two years before his death on December 8, 2019.
In an interview with Yahoo!, Oliver spoke on how Juice’s one-of-a-kind talent became visceral as he watched the clips compiled for the film.
“The truth is, I didn’t know the insane level of artistry of Juice WRLD prior to really digging in,” Oliver told the outlet. “I knew he was talented. I knew he played different instruments. But I didn’t know how unbelievable he was. I just didn’t.
AD LOADING...
And Bill Simmons, who’s an [Associate Producer] on the project and was a fantastic partner throughout this, he asked me, “How come nobody thinks about Juice WRLD like Kurt Cobain?” And I said, “Because they haven’t seen the film yet.”
Oliver hopes this film breathes life into that comparison and proves that Juice was just as impactful to music as the Nirvana rocker was. For those unfamiliar, Kurt Cobain was so influential a musician that he was considered to be the spokesman for Generation X, and is regarded to be one of the most influential musicians in history.
“People didn’t really have insight into his process or insight into how he did 10 songs in a night, nor enough context to understand how atypical that is,” Oliver said. “He was something special.”
AD LOADING...
Oliver also added that Juice WRLD’s musical power came from his authenticity on the mic.
“I think that’s one of the reasons why he popped as much as he did,” the filmmaker said. “He didn’t hedge. He didn’t give people just a bit of him, or a bit of who they thought, or who he thought they wanted. He gave them who he was, and he was embraced because of it.”
Check out the trailer for Juice WRLD: Into the Abyss below.
