100 Bands in 100 Days Presented by Verity Credit Union — Day 8: Great Grandpa
Music fans of the Pacific Northwest, hello and welcome back to our third annual year-end daily countdown, 100 Bands in 100 Days, where every day until December 31st, we’re showcasing a new band or artist you have to know about, presented by Verity Credit Union. Follow the #100Bands100Days hashtag on Twitter to stay on top of all the bands featured and make sure to follow Verity on Twitter as well. Some days the featured act could be an established and locally-adored northwest-based musician that perhaps you haven’t been turned onto yet, and other times they could be a band with a small following that just hasn’t had their deserved time in the sun yet. Either way, we’re fairly confident you can come away from this daily segment with plenty of new favorites. Today we’re bringing our journey to Seattle’s prolific underground rock scene, with one of our local scene’s quickest-rising and most notable names as of late, Great Grandpa.
If you aren’t familiar with the delectable sounds made by the somewhat nostalgic alt-rockers that are Great Grandpa, here’s a brief rundown. Close your eyes, and think of a current rock band that takes influence from 1990s distortion-pedal rock (think Garbage, Nirvana, The Smashing Pumpkins) and vows to bring that sound back in 2016 with all of the energy and drive of that era of rock music. Did you think of a band? Good, now forget that they ever existed, because chances are Great Grandpa is way better than they are. On their debut EP, Can Opener (released through Broken World Media in 2015), Great Grandpa proved to an overly saturated and largely uninteresting market that alt-rock revivalism could be more than just a one-dimensional facsimile, doling out one catchy, sound-rich, charming noise pop exercise after another.
There are two main elements to the band’s style that make them a hit. For starters, the band’s array of influences that they subtly cull from help give the band a wide instrumental palette. While they don’t expressly state shoegaze or dream pop as one of their genres, you can hear clear Loveless influences shine through on the Wall of Sound guitars that rear their head every so often and up the volume considerably. The guitars on this album are just the right amount of noisy to keep these songs feeling sweet and decidedly poppy. The other side of the coin that gives this band their musical stride are the vocals from lead vocalist Alex Menne. On top of her vocals being stunning and somewhat coy, Menne’s cadence perfectly captures the essence of alternative vocalists from back in the day, occasionally sounding reminiscent of everyone from Kim Deal to Liz Fraser. Nothing about the quintet’s music feels overly polished or like it’s trying to modernize the sounds of their favorite ’90s rock bands. The way the band recorded Can Opener, as well as presents it in its finished form, the release authentically feels like music that could have been released between 1990 and 1995.
If you’re in the market for some excellent alternative rock revivalist music, and especially if you’ve felt burned by mediocre modern rock bands who only wallow in their influences and forget to include memorable songwriting and defining qualities, Great Grandpa is the remedy you need.
You can follow Great Grandpa on Facebook and check out their music at greatgrandpa.bandcamp.com. Can Opener can be purchased digitally via their Bandcamp, or physically on black vinyl at brokenworldmedia.limitedrun.com.
Submissions for 100 Bands in 100 Days are still open to any Pacific Northwest band interested in submission. If you would like to have your band submitted for a chance to be featured in this segment, consult this link for more information on how you can do so.
