Mudhoney Articles
Student Life
19 November '02
Grunge Rock Survivors
Mudhoney is the biggest grunge band you've never heard of. Mudhoney and it's predecessor Green River (a band containing half of the future members of Mudhoney and half of the future members of Pearl Jam), kept seminal indie label Sub Pop afloat until Nirvana royalties permanently put the company in the black. Mudhoney also contributed, through no design of their own, to the perceived aesthetic of "grunge," with their ever-present attire of thrift store blue jeans, long-john undershirts and logger flannels. But Mudhoney has proved an exception to the grunge stereotype, being that they are alive and recording, and have been able to do so without stagnant re-hashing of old material. Mudhoney's new album Since We've Become Translucent is not a departure from form, but a continuation of Mudhoney's tradition of heavy-slow, heavy-distortion guitars, to which is added several horn parts and a more refined vocal and lyrical style. Mark Arm, Mudhoney's lead singer, will talk about the new album this Friday at noon on KWUR 90.3 FM, when the fifty-minute interview plays in its entirety. Here are some highlights from the interview: Mr. Arm on how indie rock suffered after 1991, and why he wants you to copy his records.
Cadenza: As a person who is known as an obsessive collector of obscure music, but also someone who also relies on music as part of your livelihood, I thought that you might have a unique perspective on the issue of file-sharing and copying.
Mark Arm: Well the way I look at it, for a band like us, whatever exposure we can get is a plus. You know, radio airplay, like college radio airplay, file-sharing... whatever, tape-trading, [laughs] if people still do that. 'Cause you know we're not going to be the kind of band that's shoved down people's throats through the mainstream, so however people come to us and hear of us is, I think, a bonus. In terms of making money, we make more money by playing live and going on tour than we do through record sales, which is kind of unfortunate since we're not going on tour [mild laugh].
Cadenza: You're not going to go on tour?
Mark Arm: Well we can't right now. Dan [Peters, Mudhoney's drummer] is a stay-at-home dad, you know, he's got a two-year-old daughter that he needs to take care of, and maybe we will [tour] when she's old enough to sell T-shirts on tour, like when she's four or something. Right now we can't just, you know, embark on a six-week tour or anything like that. And also Guy [Maddison], our new bass player, we asked him to join the band right as he was in the middle of nursing school, and right now he's in his final quarter and he's under a lot of pressure to do well. He's taking it pretty seriously, so we haven't even been playing in the last two months.
Cadenza: As someone who toured and created music both prior to 1991 and afterwards, would you say there was a big difference in the way the industry of indie rock was conducted? Was it just a complete 180?
Mark Arm: Oh yeah, indie rock became watered down crap. It went from like, the Butthole Surfers taking like, insane chances and doing the most fucked-up things to, I don't know, the Mises. [Laughs.] It just became all these bands trying to play it really straight, you know, and trying to be big. It went from Big Black to [Lemonhead's singer] Evan Dando.
Cadenza: You have a much wider perspective than I do, since you got to see punk break in 1978, and then you saw—
Mark Arm: I didn't really see that, I was alive for that [laughs] but I was looking the other way, and still living out in the suburbs. I kind of heard about punk rock... I remember seeing this show, it was like, I think, the Tom Snyder Tomorrow Show, and it was all about these punk rock people in London in '77. They weren't playing any music, but they were just showing people like Catwoman and [people] with safety pins in their cheeks, walking around, and I was just kind of watching TV going like "Wow, that's freaky, I hope that shit never comes over here." And then they played... I remember the band was the Damned, because I recognized them later, because of Dave Vanian's makeup, it was like "Hey, this sounds pretty good." [Laughs.] But there was this whole twenty-minute to half-hour buildup about how these kids are just going to hell kinda thing. Anyway, I think I got off the point... [Laughs.]
Cadenza: No, that was fine. Keep wandering, it's good. ... It just seems that when punk imploded, none of the record labels or even fans in the mainstream were looking for it to happen again, and then that undercurrent of music seemed to pop up again in 1990.
Mark Arm: I think the best thing was that all of the sudden [new] major labels... it was the best thing for the music that there was no longer this attention focused on the underground. They just let the freaks go wild and make stuff up on their own without any concerns about "Well, gee, are people going to like this? Is this sellable?" You know, once again I bring up The Butthole Surfers; case in point: this band named themselves The Butthole Surfers.
Cadenza: So in 1985 it was just a lot more genuine kind of deal?
Mark Arm: Right, you know, Black Flag knew there was no way in hell that any other label was going to be interested in them, but they didn't give a shit. They just went on and did what they felt they had to do. And that's where, I think, purity in rock and roll comes from. I mean, there's some prefabricated candy-type stuff that I like and enjoy listening to, but there's no there there. [Laughs.] The raw motion is going to come from somewhere else. You might get nice little hooks and harmonies and catchy tunes, but I expect more from music. I actually kind of expect less hooks and harmonies and catchy tunes. Sometimes that shit just irritates the hell out of me. [Laughs.]
