Lamestains

Nicholas Attfield is an Associate Professor of Music at the University of Birmingham. His books include an account of Dinosaur Jr’s 1987 album You’re Living All Over Me in the 33 1/3 series (2011).

"Attfield analyzes the indie Sub Pop record label, which helped launch Northwest grunge music. He begins with Bruce Pavitt’s 1980 Subterranean Pop fanzine and moves to the origins of the label with the compilations of the 1986 Sub Pop 100 and the 1988 Sub Pop 200. Viewing the label as both a brilliant marketing tool and a crass, misogynistic, and unabashedly commercial venture, the author chronicles the selling of Sub Pop’s regional punk/metal by using the antihero, anti-corporate, tongue-in-cheek caricature of the bands as primitive losers. The label reinforced this with album inserts, Charles Peterson’s blurry photos, Lame Fest concerts, the limited-edition, colored-vinyl Singles Club, and even "secret" messages hand-etched in records. He critically discusses songs by the fuzzy Mudhoney, the sludgy, pile-driven Tad, and the punk/pop sound of early Nirvana. The book ends with Sub Pop’s 25th-anniversary celebrations. . . . A solid analysis." - Library Journal"The impact of Sub Pop Records on the music industry isn’t in doubt. What Nicholas Attfield does in this brilliant, impeccably researched and beautifully written book is to illuminate the label’s cultural identity and aesthetic, through a deep dive into its origins, politics and relationship with the mainstream. The result is one of the best and most thought-provoking books I’ve ever read about a record label." - David Barker, University of Derby"At the heart of Lamestains – Nicholas Attfield's overview of grunge and the contradictions surrounding its formation and popularity – lies a core truth: rock sells individuality and exclusivity to anyone and everyone. To the author's credit, he never shies away from this paradox, instead using it as the jumping off point for a deep dive into a world of distortion, divergence and musical deconstruction. A thoroughly engaging read that is at once heady, harrowing and way insightful. Yes, I recommend it." - Everett True, author of Nirvana: The True Story and Live Through This: American Rock Music in the Nineties