This page is Point of Interest page 11 of the Alternative Rock, Grunge and Seattle Tour,

click here to access the main tour page and introduction.

The Seattle Centre

This is the Seattle Centre, also home of Seattle's iconic Space Needle. Perhaps symbolically, this well-known commercial centre and popular mainstream tourist destination marks the end of our tour.

By the mid 1990s, the Seattle music community had undergone a massive shift. Commercialization had brought alternative rock to the world, but it also put tremendous pressure on the music community. Author Catherine Strong wrote that by the end of 1993, grunge had become unstable and in a state of decline. Author Justin Henderson wrote that "grunge had become a startling collision of geographical artistic movement—in the form of rock-and-roll—and commercialism—in the form of record companies, fashion designers, department stores, and every manner of money-hungry corporate leech".

The grunge phenomenon had demonstrated the cultural and commercial viability of alternative rock, but alternative rock had become absorbed into the mainstream adult world. The music lost what Sara Thornton calls the "subcultural capital", which had once belonged to youth.

This put the credibility of alternative rock as being oppositional to mainstream commercial music into question. In response, Musicians and members of the Seattle music community started to backlash against the commercial excesses that had become of grunge and alternative rock. Indie rock had also formulated as a rejection against alternative rock's absorption into the mainstream. Not all artists wanted to cross over to commercially viable alternative rock, while others could not cross over by virtue of their less commercially viable music.

The bands and musicians of Seattle had become widely imitated, and many popular bands started to retreat from the spotlight. The documentary Hype! shows how the pressures of commercialization put a lot of pressure on musicians. Jack Endino stated that "suddenly every publication, and all the media in the world wants to get at you. Suddenly people everywhere you go recognize you. They want your autograph. Suddenly your life as a private individual was now over with. And that's probably a pretty heavy thing to deal with". Many of the stories that were circulating in the media about musicians were untrue, and celebrity culture took its toll on many.

On April 5^th, 1994. Kurt Cobain had died, and many consider this to be the symbolic end to the grunge era. On April 10^th, 1994, thousands gathered here around the fountain at the Flag Pavilion in the heart of the Seattle Centre, to mourn, and pay their respects to Kurt Cobain. After Kurt's death, grunge, as a form of alternative rock had remained commercially viable into the new millennium, and evolving into post-grunge, but grunge as an alternative musical movement would fade.

There were several significant releases by commercially successful alternative rock bands in subsequent years, such as Mellon Collie and The Infinite Sadness in October of 1995 by the Smashing Pumpkins, the self-titled Alice in Chains album in November of 1995, and Soundgardens' Down on the Upside in 1996, which followed their massively successful Superunknown album from March of 1994. But eventually, the original big four grunge bands became one – Soundgarden disbanded in 1997, and Alice in Chains remained relatively un-active from 1996 to 2002, due to the deteriorating condition of frontman Layne Staley. Layne had been reclusive and struggling with drug addiction until his body was found in his apartment in 2002. Pearl Jam was the only band from the original big four bands that stayed strong into the new millennium.

Apart from these bands though, many other bands that came into prominence in the 1990s would gradually fade from the spotlight in the new millennium. But the music has made a lasting impact on Seattle, and the music will always be woven into the city's cultural history.

After all, Mudhoney did play on top of the Space Needle in 2013, and Sub Pop, still going strong, established a Kiosk at the Seattle Airport. The music that came from Seattle continues to influence musicians to this day, and it continues to be deeply meaningful in the lives of people from all over the world. This period in music, regardless of the genre labels, was a period of a lot of honest rock n' roll.

The end of the documentary Hype!, provides a fitting end for our tour as well. Susie Tennant discussed how the music community had grown from out of the region. She said: "Everybody was doing what they loved because they loved it, people were in bands because they wanted to be in bands. People started record labels because they liked their friend's bands and they wanted to put out a record. Fanzines started because no one was covering the music that they heard and loved, and all this was able to grow without any other force coming in and disturbing that".

You have now reached the end of the tour. I hope you've enjoyed visiting some of the places that played an important part in the story of alternative rock, and grunge in Seattle, because the places you have visited are among the many places where it all actually happened. Thank you for taking the tour! I hope you have appreciated some of the stories I have shared, and have gained new insights into this influential chapter in the story of rock n' roll.

Indie Rock. (n.d). All Music. Retrieved from http://www.allmusic.com/style/indie-rock-ma0000004453

Grunge. (2017). Retrieved (May 6, 2017) from the Grunge Wiki: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grunge

Helvey, S. (Producer). & Pray, D. (Director). (November 8, 1996). Hype! [Motion Picture]. USA: Lions Gate Entertainment

Henderson, J. (2010). Grunge Seattle. California, United States of America: Roaring Forties Press

Thornton, S. (1996). Exploring the Meaning of the Mainstream (or why Sharon and Tracy Dance around their Handbags). In Club Cultures: Music, Media and Subcultural Capital (Chpt. 3 pg. 87-115)

This work was created by Kyle Huisman

Contact: seattlerock@outlook.com