So they did it on April 1st so it could be called a joke if they failed, but really they were serious. Today is the anniversary of the day Sub Pop Records officially opened its office doors, way back in 1988. With a knack for self-deprecation, the independent label also had a talent for combining innovation, timing, and marketability – not only for its bands, but for the label itself.
Sub Pop developed a unique image based around hype that became the straw that broke the camel’s back – that is, if you can call the wall that was blocking underground musicians from having mainstream success in the United States a camel – and thereby caused a major shift in American glamour. Nevermind the make-up and leather outfits, here’s the flannel.
When the music scene in Seattle exploded in late 1991, bands from everywhichwhereplace rushed to the Pacific Northwest to try and get in on the buzz. This wasn’t how things usually went. Normally, a musician had to leave the Emerald City in order to make it big. Heck, even Jimi Hendrix had to do a reversal of “follow the yellow brick road.”
Example of a brilliant scientist
Here’s some other examples of people that had to ditch Seattle to order to find “success.” I put success in quotations because it can be a pretty subjective term, and the following musicians certainly achieved different levels of it. Of course, the examples given will then be combined into a trifector (trifecta?), because science has proven that’s the best way to make an overall argument. Thanks in advance, science.
19 years ago today, a little album called Nevermind was released in the United States by a band called Nirvana. Very very VERY quickly, the album soared up the Billboard record charts and knocked Michael Jackson’s Thriller out of #1 position.
It was the watershed moment where punk hit the mainstream. The products of an underground network of musicians, venues, record labels and fans that had been building throughout the 1980s was suddenly moved from the periphery to the forefront of American culture. And the rest, as they say, is history (and an important part of my MA thesis, which I’ll get around to writing one of these days).
Most people know what Dave Grohl has been up to since his days in Nirvana.
Kirst Novoselic, on the other hand, has stayed out of the public limelight (at least compared to Grohl) – BUT he’s still been a very busy bass player. He’s played in bands like Sweet 75, Eyes Adrift and Flipper. And he’s also been very active in political…activism.
The early Seattle music scene was driven by the jazz community. It would help launch the career of Ray Charles, give Quincy Jones his start and influence a young Jimi Hendrix. Now the New York Times sheds some light on the contemporary jazz milieu in the city:
“Seattle, a city synonymous with alternative rock, has also been known as an incubator for talented young jazz players who leave town to develop and thrive elsewhere.
‘But the landscape has been shifting because of recent events at the university level and at joints like Cafe Racer,’ Nate Chinen writes. ‘A growing number of young musicians have been focused on building an autonomous scene, something distinctive and homegrown.'”
The Black and Tan Club on 12 Ave and Jackson Street. First called the Alhambra, the jazz club was opened in 1922 and closed in 1966. The name Black and Tan referred to the Asian, Black, and White patrons who all happily mingled together, effectively creating a tolerant space in a racially charged era.
A lot of American musical heroes have died at the age of 27. Janis Joplin. Jimi Hendrix. Jim Morrison. Kurt Cobain. Heck, Brian Jones was from England but you can count him too. Superstars dying while still in their prime has become the climatic symbol of rock-star excess and glamor – the ultimate and almost necessary outcome for those who believe it’s better to burn out then to rust.
But there have been other American musicians that have died at age 27. While their deaths have still been incredibly tragic and often taken place under mysterious circumstances, their stories have lacked the excess and glamor of “the Big-Five.”
.jpg "Novoselic")
Rylan Kafara
The Past is Unwritten 
