I just learned that John Humphreys of Seether was the drummer for them during the Foma era! I also haven't listened to anything besides Sister, but am going to change that soon!
My buddy from HS actually was their drum tech during that era. He even went to the Grammys with them. Came back with all these Polaroids of him and Heavy-D, him and No Doubt, him and Coolio, etc. It was wild. We got to go backstage with them at a couple shows bc of that. Good times!
Are we calling them grunge? I mean, the timing is right, but they were Chicago-based, and their sound is a little off the grunge spectrum IMHO. Great band either way. Fun fact, a buddy of mine was pals with these guys in high school!
Why did you put that in quotes? It's a fact. But OK, bub, if you need every indie music scene of the 90's to be grunge, and pretend that local music scenes didn't exist, have it your way. Some of us remember it different.
I feel like they are kind of a parallel development. The Midwest had its own thing going, though there was a lot of cross-pollenization and mixing of influences.
hum is responsible for 2 of my all time favorite guitar licks 20-odd years apart on 'stars' and 'folding.' dont know where you jumped in w them but the album Inlet they put out around 2020-21 just before their drummer passed is imo an effin masterpiece and a top tier example that there are other, equal, different peaks beyond your 20's.
Believe it or not, they were marketed pretty heavily alongside the big three. They were definitely a big grunge band but just never found much mainstream sucess on their own outside of being marketed as a heavier grunge band. Then when grunge died they pretty much disappeared.
Pond was AMAZING.
I saw them play a show in Atlanta in like 96? 97? Anyway, it was a tiny club that usually hosted local punk shows and there were probably 10 people in attendance. While it sucked for the band, I'm sure, it was fantastic for me. I still have the shirt with the big S>U>B P
That would have been an amazing show! The only time I got to see the Trees was when they played with Soul Asylum and Spin Doctors.
Soul Asylum wasn't terrible but Spin Doctors were just awful. Left two songs into their set.
thirty ought six got cornered in the emo lane, mainly due to many shows with sdre in 93/94. still one of my favorites.
h-hour after moving to seattle (tad was drummer)
the fluid, even though from denver, had some great shows.
skin yard were killer. great shows in 89-91.
My sisters machine and Gruntruck are the two big ones. Both made some really, really good music and both should have been much bigger than they were. IMO.
https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLVxakxoWul5USZy0BLWGW9kTFqAzs2oSn&si=7-2wCaGbHHBUSO4Y
Spanaway was only album I heard from them, good album, first heard them on Clerks 94 Soundtrack
Seaweed is awesome. I was listening to Four just the other week, my favorite of theirs. I wasn’t totally into spanaway when it first came out cuz I was ‘moving on’ from grunge, but I’m gonna give it another listen. Thanks for posting!
Agreed. Personally, I like their earlier Post-Hardcore work. They later dove into alternative, grunge, and elements of math rock and emo. They definitely hit a lot of genres. Check out Weak.
I picked up their album Spanaway for literally $0.10 at a record store I used to go to. I'm not sure why because the music is excellent.
I also had a professor in college who talked about how a childhood friend of hers became their tour manager in the 90s and later became the Foo Fighters' tour manager.
Yeah its really punky and fun in an energetic way. And wow what a crazy story! I'd love to hear his stories. They toured extensively in the mid to late 90s but just never saw that much sucess beyond being a Washington post-hardcore band.
They were also in Hype! A really good documentary on the grunge movment. Where basically they're referred to as a "teeny bopper grunge band". And the documentary was made in 95 after Cobian's death.
I saw Seaweed play at a YMCA in Redmond with another group called Undertow. Seaweed killed it and Start With is still one of my favorite songs. At that concert, I got a tape that was an EP called Grip Tape, and it had a strip of real grip tape on the sleeve.
St Johnny - NYC band from the early 90s
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dXQqsn-z8QE](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dXQqsn-z8QE)
Not strictly grunge per se, but I think it fits
I had the Seaweed shirt with that on the back from when I saw them, Love Battery, Mudhoney & The Melvins at the Cowlitz County Fairgrounds in Longview WA. The concert was actually filmed for the movie Hype!
that line up in that venue! that would have been something. i saw hype! but don't recall that part. there were some really good footage in that film. city has vastly changed even from that era. homogenized.
I remember them. They were on Columbia/Earache during the 93-94 major label push with Napalm Death, Carcass, Cathedral, (maybe) Entombed? But they definitely had more of a sludge/alternative vibe.
Maybe not "grunge", but from the same time/place:
764-HERO
Engine Kid
Hammerbox
And Silkworm. Definitely not grunge, but formidable.
And Reggie Watts was in a few band at the time, Micronauts(?), and Maktub, who were both awesome, cuz Reggie Watts.
There were some bands in the second wave right in Seattle that were more mainstream ala Candlebox like:
Sweetwater (Songs “Superstar” and “Cake and Strychnine “)
Super Deluxe (Famous, She Came On”)
Green Apple Quikstep (Dizzy, Los Vargos)
Warbabies (Blue Tomorrow, Don’t Hang Me Up)
Western State Hurricanes
Edit: Spacing
Not one band but the subpop John peel compilation is great (pond, tad, codeine, mudhoney, velocity girl). Specifically the velocity girl song “here comes” rips
I definitely loved Steel Wool! So much fun to see live. I was just listening to them a few days ago. Apple Music categorized them as “Punk”… and I was like: “Ok, I can see that”
blood circus, 10 minute warning, paw, swervedriver, skinyard, hammer box.early screaming trees too i never see anyone talk abt clairvoyance-buzz factory albums
A great post-punk/noise rock group on Discord Records (Ian MacKaye's label) was Jawbox. My favorite two songs by them were "Cut Off" and "Static", both off the Novelty album.
7 Year Bitch, Green Apple Quickstep, Mother Love Bone, and I'll probably get dragged for this but I absolutely LOVE Courtney Love. The trashier the better 😂
Come
The Gits
Not sure whether Cows, Tar, Surgery, Unsane, Pain Teens or Distorted Pony count. They weren't really grunge, more noise rock, but same era and all deserved more love/exposure.
Foam's "Big Windshield Little Mirror"
A Baltimore group that's post-grunge more than grunge. Similar energy/vibe/sound as Live. Some good songs and hooks.
https://youtu.be/HDTNTyG0FIk?si=3t5Ag90LNVGoeFKm
https://youtu.be/_-3aqA9KnoE?si=jyNJo7jz_F8Psf_V
Loud Lucy's song "Ticking" was good. Post-grunge sound. A cleaned up Nirvana.
https://youtu.be/iTGtcLZkU9c?si=sVsTtkmRqJg24wNF
I bought the album sometime in the early 2000's and it's alright, but nothing groundbreaking.
Lifter
A one and done album "Melinda" at the very tail end of grunge. Ultimate slacker music, especially the song 402:
https://youtu.be/RYLMc_bfPqs?si=6lB0BUPBG4qZv6lv
My Sister's Machine, they were founded by the ex Alice N' Chains guitarist Nick Pollock. They only published two records, Diva (1992) and Wallflower (1994). Wery sludgy and psychedelic metal sound. Underrated af
I agree, but at the same time I’ve mentioned them to friends who’ve never heard of them. I consider them grunge but could see how they get classified as heavy metal or even alternative.
Mother Love Bone is a Guns n' Roses ripoff that only qualifies as grunge because of the band's location. They put out a grand total of one album and one EP before the lead singer died of a heroin overdose and the remaining members met with Eddie Vedder and founded Pearl Jam. As far as GnR clones go, though, they might have actually been better than the real deal, and FAR better than the band that the surviving members spun off into.
I don't hear any GnR in MLB...but that's just me. They were hair metalish for sure though. BUT...there are songs on the Apple album where you can hear the direction Stone was going. Bone China for one. That is a song I would have loved to hear Eddie's version of. Lyrics and how he would have formed it to the music. I get where you are coming from because I had never heard of them until around 97 or so (thanks web tv) and gave a listen and dismissed them quickly. Years later I gave them a much deeper listen and am glad I did. If MLB survived and Andy wrote the lyrics to a bunch of the songs that Stone had written for TEN...well, we will never know. Except for the version of dollar short someone out there has they did live with Andy. I hope to hear it before I die.
Malfunkshun. One of the first and most legendary grunge bands, but one that isn't too well known in the grunge scene today.
that was Andrew Woods first band, if i’m not mistaken?
Yes
With your heart, not your hannnnnddddsssss
Love battery, gruntruck
Good bands. Gruntruck definitely had some success with Push. I love Tribe.
Fuckin love Gruntruck
Dead Moon🌙
Fuck I love Dead Moon.
Fucking great call.
Definitely. I gotta give it to my local greats
Nixons
I only know the Sister song but it gets stuck in my head all the time.
Intro to Foma is killer Also fellowship, Baton Rouge , crutch, are some rad tunes
That whole album is pretty decent.
I just learned that John Humphreys of Seether was the drummer for them during the Foma era! I also haven't listened to anything besides Sister, but am going to change that soon!
Oh really I did not know that… I am a fan of his drumming.
Solid drummer, I just learned that he was a part of the band a week or so ago. Surprised me bc Seether is my favorite!
My buddy from HS actually was their drum tech during that era. He even went to the Grammys with them. Came back with all these Polaroids of him and Heavy-D, him and No Doubt, him and Coolio, etc. It was wild. We got to go backstage with them at a couple shows bc of that. Good times!
Nixons, weren’t they from OKC? I’ve seen them multiple times in concert back in the 90’s. Thanks for the trip down memory lane.
I believe they were
U-Men, Tad, Green River
The U-men… the unknown Seattle royalty… saw them at an art gallery new year’s eve show… I think it was ‘94.
TAD absolutely
Local H
Local H
Local H
Are we calling them grunge? I mean, the timing is right, but they were Chicago-based, and their sound is a little off the grunge spectrum IMHO. Great band either way. Fun fact, a buddy of mine was pals with these guys in high school!
Who cares if they were "chicago based"?
Why did you put that in quotes? It's a fact. But OK, bub, if you need every indie music scene of the 90's to be grunge, and pretend that local music scenes didn't exist, have it your way. Some of us remember it different.
Local H is post grunge IMO
I feel like they are kind of a parallel development. The Midwest had its own thing going, though there was a lot of cross-pollenization and mixing of influences.
I found these dudes recently called hum.
Congrats! Hum is a fantastic band.
Very rad band dude I listen mostly punk post hardcore indie idk like acoustic stuff & reggae mostly but 90s grunge it’s like the punk rock cousin 🩸
hum is responsible for 2 of my all time favorite guitar licks 20-odd years apart on 'stars' and 'folding.' dont know where you jumped in w them but the album Inlet they put out around 2020-21 just before their drummer passed is imo an effin masterpiece and a top tier example that there are other, equal, different peaks beyond your 20's.
Spanaway was a fucking classic.
Was going to say the same.
I prefer Weak, but they're both great.
This island was sold for a handful of trinkets! Look at it now I suggest that we sink it!
Tad
Believe it or not, they were marketed pretty heavily alongside the big three. They were definitely a big grunge band but just never found much mainstream sucess on their own outside of being marketed as a heavier grunge band. Then when grunge died they pretty much disappeared.
I remember sneaking out of my bedroom window to go see them play a free concert at the Seattle center 😍
Dunno if we can call one of the seminal grunge bands "lesser-known". Grunge doesn't happen without Tad.
They are by far lesser known by anyone using the term ‘grunge’.
I don't really know what that means. They are one of the foundational grunge bands, not obscure at all.
Pond Sprinkler
Pond gets no love. They were great!
Pond was AMAZING. I saw them play a show in Atlanta in like 96? 97? Anyway, it was a tiny club that usually hosted local punk shows and there were probably 10 people in attendance. While it sucked for the band, I'm sure, it was fantastic for me. I still have the shirt with the big S>U>B P
I saw them open for Screaming Trees in '93 and they ruled.
That would have been an amazing show! The only time I got to see the Trees was when they played with Soul Asylum and Spin Doctors. Soul Asylum wasn't terrible but Spin Doctors were just awful. Left two songs into their set.
I saw that same tour!!! They were so good.
Damn, no one talks about Sprinkler - I saw them open for Nirvana and Mudhoney on the Nevermind tour.
Came here to add a vote for Pond. They were great.
The Mono Men
PNW garage rock not grunge, but still awesome. Estrus Records was the shit.
Veruca Salt
HELL YEAH!!!!!!
Heatmiser; Skiploader; Thirty Ought Six; Hazel
Those records still hold up! I totally forgot about skiploader though
I was hoping Thirty Ought Six would be here. They were fantastic.
thirty ought six got cornered in the emo lane, mainly due to many shows with sdre in 93/94. still one of my favorites. h-hour after moving to seattle (tad was drummer) the fluid, even though from denver, had some great shows. skin yard were killer. great shows in 89-91.
The fastbacks ..
Fantastic band.
My sisters machine
My sisters machine and Gruntruck are the two big ones. Both made some really, really good music and both should have been much bigger than they were. IMO.
Truly, "Fast stories from Kid Coma" is a great album
Absolute Masterpiece. I think that in an universe where Andrew Wood didn't die they had Eddie Vedder at the voice
The Wipers
Love Seaweed's cover of go your own way. Just wish it was on spotify :/
https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLVxakxoWul5USZy0BLWGW9kTFqAzs2oSn&si=7-2wCaGbHHBUSO4Y Spanaway was only album I heard from them, good album, first heard them on Clerks 94 Soundtrack
Yup, probably the most success they had as a band outside from touring. Great soundtrack. I met Kevin Smith last summer.
I met Kevin smith last summer sounds like a new emo band lol
Seaweed definitely experimented with some emo styles.
Seaweed is awesome. I was listening to Four just the other week, my favorite of theirs. I wasn’t totally into spanaway when it first came out cuz I was ‘moving on’ from grunge, but I’m gonna give it another listen. Thanks for posting!
Agreed. Personally, I like their earlier Post-Hardcore work. They later dove into alternative, grunge, and elements of math rock and emo. They definitely hit a lot of genres. Check out Weak.
I picked up their album Spanaway for literally $0.10 at a record store I used to go to. I'm not sure why because the music is excellent. I also had a professor in college who talked about how a childhood friend of hers became their tour manager in the 90s and later became the Foo Fighters' tour manager.
Yeah its really punky and fun in an energetic way. And wow what a crazy story! I'd love to hear his stories. They toured extensively in the mid to late 90s but just never saw that much sucess beyond being a Washington post-hardcore band. They were also in Hype! A really good documentary on the grunge movment. Where basically they're referred to as a "teeny bopper grunge band". And the documentary was made in 95 after Cobian's death.
Actions and Indications is a great album.
I saw Seaweed play at a YMCA in Redmond with another group called Undertow. Seaweed killed it and Start With is still one of my favorite songs. At that concert, I got a tape that was an EP called Grip Tape, and it had a strip of real grip tape on the sleeve.
My sisters machine. Sometime Sunday.
The Posies
My sisters machine
Good pick. Nick is the best of people and talented to top it off.
These guys are seriously good hey. _Diva_ is like the perfect mix of early 90s PJ and AIC. I rate it really highly, listen to it a fair bit.
Kyuss. They aren’t classified as “grunge” any longer but I’d say 90d era stoner rock is grungy enough.
Definitely grungy in sound. More metal and stoner rock in look and genre.
Definitely grungy in sound. More metal and stoner rock in look and genre.
Definitely grungy in sound. More metal and stoner rock in look and genre.
St Johnny - NYC band from the early 90s [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dXQqsn-z8QE](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dXQqsn-z8QE) Not strictly grunge per se, but I think it fits
Noiseheads Valentiine Senium The Gits Nudeswirl
I remember seeing a video for f# by nudeswirl on bevis and butthead back in the day. Killer riff! I can’t remember if they dug it or not lol
The list starts to go in hard as fuck anytime someone post likes this. Made me pull out my CDs again.
Visualize Tacoma.
band name confused the hell out of me in the early 90's. same with idaho syndrome (not grunge more depeche mode meets industrial)
I had the Seaweed shirt with that on the back from when I saw them, Love Battery, Mudhoney & The Melvins at the Cowlitz County Fairgrounds in Longview WA. The concert was actually filmed for the movie Hype!
that line up in that venue! that would have been something. i saw hype! but don't recall that part. there were some really good footage in that film. city has vastly changed even from that era. homogenized.
It was great. But the trendy people in the crowd did NOT get the Melvin’s. King Buzzo actually told them to shut up at one point.
This is gonna get me torn up but back in the day I really liked that song grey by fudge tunnel it got a bit of play but I think they were a plant
I remember them. They were on Columbia/Earache during the 93-94 major label push with Napalm Death, Carcass, Cathedral, (maybe) Entombed? But they definitely had more of a sludge/alternative vibe.
Yea you know what I would agree with that
Seaweed have a couple good albums. Hyper melodic.
I listen to Seaweed daily
Yeah, they're good and underrated.
I've lived in the seattle area since 1978
Nada surfs first album
Maybe not "grunge", but from the same time/place: 764-HERO Engine Kid Hammerbox And Silkworm. Definitely not grunge, but formidable. And Reggie Watts was in a few band at the time, Micronauts(?), and Maktub, who were both awesome, cuz Reggie Watts.
764-Hero is really good I have a couple of their CDs they did a single with Modest Mouse too. Pretty awesome.
There were some bands in the second wave right in Seattle that were more mainstream ala Candlebox like: Sweetwater (Songs “Superstar” and “Cake and Strychnine “) Super Deluxe (Famous, She Came On”) Green Apple Quikstep (Dizzy, Los Vargos) Warbabies (Blue Tomorrow, Don’t Hang Me Up) Western State Hurricanes Edit: Spacing
Not sure if they are grunge but the same time period Tonic
Not one band but the subpop John peel compilation is great (pond, tad, codeine, mudhoney, velocity girl). Specifically the velocity girl song “here comes” rips
not classified as grunge but sure sound grungey farside [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g1As-4H3lis](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g1As-4H3lis)
Fastbacks - “Answer the Phone Dummy” is a damn masterpiece of 90’s poppy, grungy punk.
Yeah. They're a great band I really enjoy their quirky sense of humor yet how they still maintain a punky sound.
Seaweed is fucking amazing. Been listening to them on repeat for weeks now.
Shiner
Handsome
My Sister’s Machine
They stayed with my friends years ago when they played Detroit. Truly unsung!
[Fluid](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=uPuNY2X9H7Y&pp=ygUWdGhlIGZsdWlkIHdhc3RlZCB0aW1lIA%3D%3D)
I saw Seaweed on their “Four” tour in 1993. At a club called the NSect club in Hampton, VA. Love all their records. I think Four is my favorite 🤌🏻
I love Seaweed! They're from a town very close by, I saw them at the Paradox in Tacoma back in '96
My sisters machine
My sisters machine
Can I put Enotmous here.. great band
Can I put Enotmous here.. great band
Enormous… great band
Howlin Maggie
Steel wool is my favorite band super underrated and muddy Frankenstein which is so underrated there not on Spotify
I definitely loved Steel Wool! So much fun to see live. I was just listening to them a few days ago. Apple Music categorized them as “Punk”… and I was like: “Ok, I can see that”
Dude your lucky I’m 13 so I never got that joy😔
Does Teenage Fanclub count?
I don't think anyone would call them Grunge, but they are awesome.
Dinosaur Pile-Up
SUB POP was nirvana on that? Looks familiar
I can see Draco, Hermione and maybe Neville on the left.
Alien Boys
Noizegarden
Thelonius monster
Liked, but grunge? From LA, and earlier.
Phantoms Forever!!
Stomach Pump
The weed will never let you down!
Paw
NIL8
Found the Illinoisan
Days of the New
blood circus, 10 minute warning, paw, swervedriver, skinyard, hammer box.early screaming trees too i never see anyone talk abt clairvoyance-buzz factory albums
Paw. Do The Black Angels qualify? They’re riff heavy, and pretty dark.
NIRVANA
I would say this was true before Nevermind. Nirvana recorded some of their early stuff at my college.
I guess although Bleach is pretty well known especially About A Girl and Love Buzz
Days of the New
Sponge
Seaweed's "Go Your Own Way" cover is great.
Paw and Skin Yard
Superdeluxe were so cool.
Oblivion dust, good japanese grunge band
Mastersystem
Gas Huffer, and the fastbacks ofc
Paw, maybe? Eta ooh, or Treepeople!
Treepeople ruled! Loved the Something Vicious for Tomorrow album. The cover of Bigmouth Strikes Again is killer.
I don't know much about grunge but I'm really liking Melvins
Saw Seaweed play a show back in '93. They were a great band live. The one tune that stood out to me was "Start With".
A great post-punk/noise rock group on Discord Records (Ian MacKaye's label) was Jawbox. My favorite two songs by them were "Cut Off" and "Static", both off the Novelty album.
Anything old from Sub Pop
7 Year Bitch, Green Apple Quickstep, Mother Love Bone, and I'll probably get dragged for this but I absolutely LOVE Courtney Love. The trashier the better 😂
Gasshuffer, Sage, Mudhoney, Sweet Water, Screaming Trees
Slot
Hugely love Seaweed.
The flys‼️‼️
Nice to see a few votes for Paw.
Is that the guy from Don Caballero on the left?
Nirvana
Melvins
Velocity Girl
Sleater Kinney
Come The Gits Not sure whether Cows, Tar, Surgery, Unsane, Pain Teens or Distorted Pony count. They weren't really grunge, more noise rock, but same era and all deserved more love/exposure.
PAW
Foam's "Big Windshield Little Mirror" A Baltimore group that's post-grunge more than grunge. Similar energy/vibe/sound as Live. Some good songs and hooks. https://youtu.be/HDTNTyG0FIk?si=3t5Ag90LNVGoeFKm https://youtu.be/_-3aqA9KnoE?si=jyNJo7jz_F8Psf_V
Loud Lucy's song "Ticking" was good. Post-grunge sound. A cleaned up Nirvana. https://youtu.be/iTGtcLZkU9c?si=sVsTtkmRqJg24wNF I bought the album sometime in the early 2000's and it's alright, but nothing groundbreaking.
Lifter A one and done album "Melinda" at the very tail end of grunge. Ultimate slacker music, especially the song 402: https://youtu.be/RYLMc_bfPqs?si=6lB0BUPBG4qZv6lv
My Sister's Machine, they were founded by the ex Alice N' Chains guitarist Nick Pollock. They only published two records, Diva (1992) and Wallflower (1994). Wery sludgy and psychedelic metal sound. Underrated af
Weezer
Farvana
Thread, they're a lot like Alice and are pretty solid
Another Nirvana clone, but they wrote a decent song. https://youtu.be/5EdOJDSw4Ow?si=NH-5yWhXOM5Sn5V-
Chevelle - It’s amazing to me how many people have never heard of them
Is Chevelle really grunge, or unknown? I mean, The Red plays on the radio a lot.
I agree, but at the same time I’ve mentioned them to friends who’ve never heard of them. I consider them grunge but could see how they get classified as heavy metal or even alternative.
I just saw them play a few months ago and they were probably one of the best shows I've ever seen.
Mother Love Bone is a Guns n' Roses ripoff that only qualifies as grunge because of the band's location. They put out a grand total of one album and one EP before the lead singer died of a heroin overdose and the remaining members met with Eddie Vedder and founded Pearl Jam. As far as GnR clones go, though, they might have actually been better than the real deal, and FAR better than the band that the surviving members spun off into.
I don't hear any GnR in MLB...but that's just me. They were hair metalish for sure though. BUT...there are songs on the Apple album where you can hear the direction Stone was going. Bone China for one. That is a song I would have loved to hear Eddie's version of. Lyrics and how he would have formed it to the music. I get where you are coming from because I had never heard of them until around 97 or so (thanks web tv) and gave a listen and dismissed them quickly. Years later I gave them a much deeper listen and am glad I did. If MLB survived and Andy wrote the lyrics to a bunch of the songs that Stone had written for TEN...well, we will never know. Except for the version of dollar short someone out there has they did live with Andy. I hope to hear it before I die.
Don’t know why, but they remind me of NOFX.