Sub Pop

Sub Pop helped carry Seattle’s grunge explosion into the early 1990s, releasing music by Nirvana, Soundgarden and Mudhoney, three of the movement’s central bands. Founded in Seattle in 1986 by Bruce Pavitt and Jonathan Poneman, the independent label grew from Pavitt’s earlier Sub Pop fanzine and cassettezine, first produced in Olympia, Washington, and from the Sub Pop music column he later wrote for Seattle Rocket.

The label’s early releases included the Sub Pop 100 compilation and a run of 7-inch singles that brought Mudhoney’s “Touch Me I’m Sick” to wider attention. English music press coverage helped turn Sub Pop into a widely recognised name as grunge broke beyond the Pacific Northwest. The label is often credited with helping popularize the genre, though its catalogue has never been limited to the heavy, distorted sound associated with that era.

Sub Pop’s roster has encompassed indie rock, folk, electronic music, hip-hop, noise rock, metal and comedy. Fleet Foxes and The Shins represent its work with melodic, song-focused indie music, while Beach House, The Postal Service, Sleater-Kinney, Built to Spill and Blitzen Trapper each reflect different strands of American independent rock. Father John Misty, Weyes Blood and Low have also released music through the label.

Elsewhere, Sub Pop has worked with artists whose music sits further from its grunge-era reputation: experimental hip-hop from clipping. and Shabazz Palaces; the extreme volume and drone of Sunn O))); and the abrasive, kinetic rock of METZ, Bully and Guerilla Toss. Its more recent and continuing roster includes Nation of Language, The Bug Club, Alan Sparhawk and Frankie Cosmos, alongside artists such as La Luz, Rolling Blackouts Coastal Fever, Kiwi Jr. and TV Priest.

In 1995, Pavitt and Poneman sold a 49 percent stake in Sub Pop to Warner Music Group. The label remains closely identified with Seattle and with the independent culture that produced its earliest records, while maintaining a catalogue that reaches well beyond the sound that first made its name.