FamousCobain ChordSmells Like Teen Spirit and other songs, Nirvana (Nevermind and later), 1991 · Kurt Cobain (Nirvana)
The first chord of the Smells Like Teen Spirit riff (F) and throughout Nirvana songs such as Come As You Are; heard whenever Cobain played his four-string power-chord grip
Kurt Cobain played power chords with a lazy-looking but clever grip: one finger on the low string and his ring finger flattened across the next three strings. With the root on the low E string, that top note lands on the fourth instead of the root, so the chord becomes a 'sus4', neither major nor minor. You can hear it flicker on the very first chord of Smells Like Teen Spirit, and Nirvana fans now call it the Cobain chord. On F it is frets 1, 3, 3, 3 on the four lowest strings.
Also called Kurt Cobain chord, Nirvana sus4 power chord
Sources: The chord that Kurt Cobain trademarked for himself (Far Out) · Smells Like Teen Spirit (Wikipedia) · Video guitar lesson: Play riffs like Nirvana (Gibson Gazette)