Anti-Climacus

The difference between Nevermind and In Utero is attributable to two things. The first is the difference in production styles between Butch Vig and Steve Albini--Vig liked things to sound polished, which is why "Breed" sounds too much like "Drain You," and the second half of the album gets a little indistinguishable. Albini, by contrast, appears to have gotten out of the way of the band. In Utero, at least to these ears, does not have the usual Albini production touches.

The second is that Kurt Cobain became a better songwriter, and was finally able to do things other than write loud and fast pop-hard rock songs. On "Serve the Servants," the tempo is slower and the composition less dependent on a wall of guitars to keep the song moving forward; the individual parts are more complex and the lyrics come closer to narrative coherence (they are, at the very least, no longer a succession of nonsense words). "Dumb" is close to acoustic; "Pennyroyal Tea" and "All Apologies" will fare better that way. In general, the better a song plays on acoustic, the better the song itself is.