The baby reaching for the dangling buck on the iconic album cover “Nevermind: from Nirvana will turn 16 on July 9th. Little Spencer Elden was photographed swimming in a pool and the dollar on the fishing line was added later. Elden’s family were friends of the photographer hired by Nirvana to shoot the cover, and were paid about $200 for their son’s photograph.

In a September 2006 interview in NME, Elden said that he was proud to be a part of such a great album, and that the band’s songs don’t get old:

“Nevermind is fifteen years old now, but you still hear the singles being played on the radio and it just doesn’t sound dated. Most bands around today can’t even get near to what Nirvana did on that album, and I’ll always be happy to be a part of it.”

[From Wikipedia]

Elden recreated the album cover in 2002 for an article in Rolling Stone that discusses how influential Nirvana was in changing the scope of popular music and how timeless all of the tracks are.

When “Nevermind” came out I was in college, and I remember my friends singing “Smells Like Teen Spirit” as that was a hit single at the time. I missed an opportunity to see Nirvana play at my school around that time and will probably always regret it. It’s nice to see that they’re still remembered and that Nirvana influenced more than just my generation.

Header photo from Paxtonland via Digg. Thanks to Digg commentors for pointing out the Wikipedia story.