Considered among the godfathers of grunge, Seattle’s Mudhoney isn’t running from that now-overused term. But lead singer Mark Arm admits the band does keep running into it.
“In Holland, we were getting a lot of questions like `Well, now that grunge is dead, what do people in Seattle do?’ ” says Arm, calling from Paris in the midst of the band’s European tour.
“I don’t know–eat and drink and sleep, same things they always did before grunge was around. If they think grunge is dead, fine, whatever. It’s like the old argument, `Punk’s not dead’ or `Punk is dead.’ Who cares?”
Without the stratospheric commercial success of Pacific Northwest peers Nirvana and Pearl Jam, Mudhoney has nonetheless shifted into a brighter spotlight.
After some late-’80s releases on the indie label Sub Pop, Mudhoney signed with Reprise and released “Piece of Cake” in 1992. The band’s current release, “My Brother the Cow,” keeps the proceedings firmly in garage-punk territory with raw, chunky guitar and Arm’s rough delivery.
Besides vocalist Arm, Mudhoney includes guitarist Steve Turner, bassist Matt Lukin and drummer Dan Peters.
Arm, 33, grew up in a Seattle suburb and was inspired by punk to start playing music at age 18. The early rumblings of grunge were in the air.
Before Mudhoney, Arm and Turner were members of the seminal grunge outfit Green River. The band also included Stone Gossard and Jeff Ament, who would go on to slightly greater fame as members of Pearl Jam.
As for the “grunge” label that would eventually envelop Seattle and become synonymous with all things flannel, Arm remembers the first time the term surfaced.
“At first, it was just being used to describe guitar sounds and a recording style that kind of fit in with the early Sub Pop recordings,” he recalls. “The way the word was originally used was to describe live, raw-sounding guitar.”
Although Mudhoney eventually made the leap from the indie ranks into the major label universe, Arm doesn’t see that move as having any significant effect on the music his band makes.
“I think history has kind of proven that we didn’t really change our sound that much in terms of recording techniques,” he says. “We didn’t all of a sudden make really slick records.”
Arm says he doesn’t mind the grunge label, but he views Mudhoney as essentially being from a school rooted in the good old-fashioned values of punk.
“We just thought of ourselves as being a punk rock band, but hopefully not doing the same exact thing,” he says.
“Just punk in this overall tradition that goes back to ’60s garage punk. Just little weasels that are playing rock ‘n’ roll that aren’t trying to make some big statement about the importance of music.”
Mudhoney appears with Claw Hammer Friday at Metro.
Richard Buckner, Michael Fracasso, Friday at Schubas: San Francisco singer-songwriter Richard Buckner plays acoustic folk with some country tinge, and vocally he’s somewhat reminiscent of Dwight Yoakam. His current Dejadisc release “Bloomed” starts off strong with several melodically driving tunes and cutting lyrical introspection, but after that engaging intro the proceedings start to drag.
Buckner has a strong voice and plenty of words, but he tends to run out of steam when it comes to musical ideas. Austin singer-songwriter Michael Fracasso also is on the bill.
Iguanas, Friday at FitzGerald’s, Saturday at the Cubby Bear: New Orleans quintet the Iguanas mixes a heavy Latin flavor with a steamy, Crescent City rock vibe. The band’s second album, 1994’s “Nuevo Boogaloo,” was released on Jimmy Buffett’s Margaritaville Records.
Kansas, Saturday at the Skyline Stage: This prog-rock dinosaur has roamed the earth for more than 20 years, and left its largest footprints in the ’70s with such melodramatic epics as “Carry on Wayward Son” and “Dust in the Wind.” The current line-up includes original members vocalist Steve Walsh, drummer Phil Ehart and guitarist Richard Williams.
Moondogs, Go Getters, Saturday at the Elbo Room: Chicago’s much-loved and long-running rockabilly outfit the Moondogs calls it quits with this farewell show. (Moondog bassist Jimmy Sutton is currently making waves with the Mighty Blue Kings.) Opening the show is Swedish rockabilly trio the Go Getters.
Orb, Friday at the Riviera: London’s Orb (headed by ambient trance-out mastermind Alex Paterson) carries on its explorations of the time-space continuum on the current release “Orbus Terrarum.” The Orb combines spacey electronics and various beats and sound effects into atmospheric techno landscapes for the after-rave crash pad.
Tom Ovans, Wednesday at Schubas: On his current NSR release “tales from the underground,” Nashville-based folk-rocker Tom Ovans displays the sort of gritty, nasal vocals that inevitably recall Bob Dylan. He sounds sincere enough, but after a while it’s like watching Icarus fly too close to the sun.
In “The Real Bono,” Ovans offers up a laundry list of modern social ills and angst-causing agents and sums it all up by invoking Bono–no, not the U2 frontman, but current congressman and former Cher partner Sonny. But Ovans is so earnest you’re not supposed to laugh.
