Officially, grunge music started in the mid-to-late ’80s and continued on through the mid-to-late ’90s. The decade-long period produced heavy songs, depressive lyrics, and big-name bands, most of which originated from the Pacific Northwest’s city of Seattle, Washington.
But if you look a little deeper, the seeds for the genre were sewn far earlier. You can travel all the way back to the ’60s and hear the beginnings of the hefty sound. If you listen close enough, bands were playing the sludgy, muddy stuff earlier than the ’80s. And those tunes seeped into the garages, basements, and recording studios in Seattle later on.
We wanted to explore three songs from the ’60s that music fans could consider grunge. While they aren’t officially grunge songs, they could be.
“Purple Haze” – Jimi Hendrix (Single, 1967)
Some people, including native Seattle guitar player Jimmy James, believe that Jimi Hendrix was the original grunge musician. His low, fuzzy, electric-guitar-driven songs punch you in the gut just like the tracks of Soundgarden and Alice in Chains.
Of course, Hendrix came around some 20-30 years before any of those bands. Yet, the Seattle-born guitar virtuoso’s presence is felt in the city far and wide. Could some of his hefty songs have seeped into the ether and laid the foundation for grunge? Easily.
“The End” – The Doors from The Doors (1967)
It’s easy to imagine Chris Cornell singing this song, backed by his Soundgarden cohorts. As guitarist Kim Thayil played in the background, Cornell would step on stage and sing about the end of the world and insanity. He would start low and build to a giant screech, the glass on the nearby windows rattling as he raised his voice. While Thayil might have brought some heavier riffs to his music, this song from Jim Morrison and the Los Angeles-born band the Doors could easily be a grunge demo.
“In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida” – Iron Butterfly from In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida (1968)
A bass line that travels from the fillings in your teeth to your too-long toenails, this song is heavy and thick. It probably found its way onto a lot of early morning playlists for grunge bands trying to wake up for tour. When you can’t afford coffee, there’s always Iron Butterfly. If the song came out in the ’90s and you were told Jerry Cantrell and Layne Staley wrote this one, would you be surprised? Of course not.
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