Buick Encore Presents, One Playlist for Driving Around Seattle

by Carl Camilla Lane

This One Playlist for Driving Around Seattle is brought to you by the all-new 2013 Buick Encore, the luxury crossover that’s always the perfect fit. Learn more.

It’s been 22 years since Nirvana’s Nevermind and Pearl Jam’s Ten first catapulted what critics were then calling “the Seattle Sound” into the mainstream. And while Seattle’s legacy will be forever linked to the image of the flannel-clad, generationally apathetic masses, the city’s music scene has long been a source of era-defining music.

In tribute, here is just one playlist for driving around Seattle, inspired by some of the music that helps makes it great.

Sir Mix-a-Lot — Posse on Broadway

The Broadway that Sir Mix-a-Lot refers to in the song is a street in Seattle’s Capitol Hill district. Mix-a-Lot is a fantastic storyteller, and I recommend memorizing the lyrics to this one before blasting it with the windows down. As you can tell from the lines below, “Posse on Broadway” makes for perfect Seattle driving music.

At 23rd and Union the driver broke left
Kevin shouted Broadway it’s time to get def
My girl blew me a kiss she said I was the best
She’s lookin mighty feaky in black silk dress
The closa that we get the crazier I feel
My posse’s on Broadway it’s time to get ill

Jimi Hendrix — Purple Haze

There is very little to say except that Jimi Hendrix is perhaps Sattle’s best-loved musician. Which means that, no matter how many times you’ve heard this tune, it’s still great.

Heart — Barracuda

“Barracuda” is allegedly a response to Heart’s record label, which attempted a publicity stunt involving a made-up lesbian affair between Heart vocalist Anne Wilson and her sister Nancy. It’s a tune born of anger. In consequence, everything front the galloping guitar rhythm to the Robert Plant-esque vocals just sounds so metal. A fitting precursor to the riot grrrl movement that would eventually take Seattle by storm 13 years later.

Bikini Kill — Rebel Girl

The story here is that Bikini Kill burst onto the male-dominated Seattle punk scene in the early ’90s and basically changed it forever. They played jagged, unforgiving punk rock, helped pioneer zine culture, and empowered countless women coming of age in an increasingly masculinist hard rock scene. “Rebel Girl” exemplifies everything that’s great about both Bikini Kill and Seattle in the early ‘90s.

The Entire Singles Soundtrack

Singles is a film written and directed by Cameron Crowe that centers on the lives of a group of young people, mostly in their 20s, living in an apartment block in Seattle. As the events of the film are set against the backdrop of the city’s early 1990s grunge movement, the soundtrack captures the Seattle zeitgeist just as grunge broke into the mainstream.

Pearl Jam — Even Flow

Pearl Jam remains one of the most iconic bands of the grunge era, and their debut album, Ten, is still — in my opinion — their best record. More important, Ten served as most of the world’s introduction to Eddie Vedder, who pioneered the famous vocal style that would eventually spawn hordes of cringe-inducing Vedder-wannabes. But “Even Flow” might be the purest example of the impossible distance between Vedder and his imitators.

Hole — Violet

Hole is probably most notable for being a Courtney Love vehicle. And Courtney Love — along with fellow Hole members Caroline Rue, Eric Erlandson, and Jill Emery — wrote some fantastic music during the band’s early years while traveling between LA, Portland, and Seattle.

Sleater Kinney — One Beat

Before Carrie Brownstein was doing the writer and producer thing with Portlandia, she was doing the Sleater Kinney thing along with principal bandmate Corin Tucker. A key band in the ’90s riot grrrl movement, Sleater Kinney helped to further popularize the Seattle punk sound with their melodic brand of punk-inspired, left-leaning music.

Beat Happening — Our Secret

Back in 1982, Beat Happening was pioneering the low-fi indie sound that we all know and love today. And they did it in and around Olympia, which would eventually be ground zero of the riot grrrl movement. In many ways, Beat Happening paved the way for the younger bands who emerged to change the face of music in the 1990s.

Modest Mouse — Convenient Parking

Modest Mouse creates truly beautiful driving music that basically begs to be sang/shouted along to. Though this song was selected specifically because it is called “Convenient Parking.”

The Microphones — I Want the Wind to Blow

Closing out our Seattle playlist is The Microphones’ (a.k.a. Phil Elvrum) “I Want the Wind to Blow” off the seminal The Glow Pt. II album. It’s a gorgeous, feel-good track that exemplifies the creativity that still emanates in and around the Seattle music scene. Elvrum’s brand of contemplative, low-fi music is the perfect distraction from a frustrating morning (or evening) commute.

Photo: Wikimedia Commons

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