everybody loves our town a history of grunge

Everybody Loves Our Towncaptures the grunge era in the words of the musicians, producers, managers, record executives, video directors, photographers, journalists, publicists, club owners, roadies, scenesters and hangers-on who lived through it. But it wasn’t until five years later, with the seemingly overnight success of Nirvana’s “Smells Like Teen Spirit,” thatgrungebecame a household word and Seattle ground zero for the nineties alternative-rock explosion. Though it sold miserably, the record made music history by documenting a burgeoning regional sound, the raw fusion of heavy metal and punk rock that we now know as grunge. In 1986, fledgling Seattle label C/Z Records releasedDeep Six, a compilation featuring a half-dozen local bands: Soundgarden, Green River, Melvins, Malfunkshun, the U-Men and Skin Yard. (Sept.Twenty years after the release of Nirvana’s landmark albumNevermindcomesEverybody Loves Our Town: An Oral History of Grunge, the definitive word on the grunge era, straight from the mouths of those at the center of it all. While the enormous cast of characters can be hard to follow and after a few hundred pages the stories of jealousy, drunken brawls, and overdoses start to blur together, hardcore fans of grunge will treasure this. Yarm has cleverly edited the interviews so that at times it feels like we're listening to a conversation or an argument. The stories of small clubs, teenage desperation, and bad behavior will resonate with anyone who came of age in a rock and roll milieu. Yarm is careful not to focus only on the bands that came to define grunge in the mainstream world. He chronicles the way in which the 1970s punk sensibility filtered through the gloom of the Pacific Northwest to create a unique sound%E2%80%94and put flannel shirts in the closets of millions of teenagers.

Yarm conducted over 250 interviews with celebrities from Courtney Love to Eddie Vedder, as well as with the lesser-known musicians, producers, roadies, photographers, and fans who took part in the rise of Pearl Jam, Nirvana, Mudhoney, Soundgarden, Melvins, and many, many others. Music writer and former Blender editor Yarm has compiled a sprawling oral history of the Seattle music scene and the grunge phenomenon of the early 1990s.

Everybody loves our town a history of grunge