The Strangest Tribe: How a Group of Seattle Rock Bands Invented Grunge

Grunge isn’t dead – but was it every truly alive? Twenty years after the height of the movement, The Strangest Tribe redefines grunge as we know it. Stephen Tow takes a second look at the music and community that vaulted the likes of Nirvana, Pearl Jam, Mudhoney, and Soundgarden to international fame. Chock-full of interviews with the starring characters, Tow extensively chronicles the rise of rock 'n' roll’s last great statement and contextualizes what the music really meant to the key players. 

Delving deep into the archives, Tow paints a vivid picture of the underground rock circuit of tattered warehouses and community centers. Seattle’s heady punk scene of the late '80s gave birth to a rowdy and raucous movement, influenced by metal, but wholly its own. Seattle made its own sound, a sound that came to be known internationally as grunge. Tow walks the reader through this sonic evolution, interviewing members of every band along the way. 

In 1991, Seattle’s sound took the world by storm--but this same storm had been brewing in the Pacific Northwest for a decade before it hit MTV. The Strangest Tribe is a reframing of this last transformative era in music. Not just plaid shirts, bleached hair, and angst, “grunge” is a word used to describe a rich community of artists and jokers.