EVERYBODY LOVES OUR TOWN

Before and after.

“On Honky, which we recorded for Amphetamine Reptile after Atlantic didn’t pick up our option, there is a tune called ‘Laughing With Lucifer at Satan’s Sideshow,’ which seemed to epitomize the major-label experience for us, and probably a few other bands, I would imagine. The voices on this are actually the band’s manager, David Lefkowitz, and a woman—I can’t remember who—quoting real statements made to us by individuals in some of the higher positions at Atlantic, after Danny Goldberg had left. Such chestnuts as ‘You should consider yourself lucky—any other major label would have dropped you by now’ and ‘The people here in Radio just don’t like your band.’

“I think ‘Laughing With Lucifer’ is truly the epitaph on the tombstone of grunge. Major labels brought it to the planet, exploited it, and then killed it when it was used up, like any self-respecting corporation would do.”

—from my interview with former Melvins bassist Mark Deutrom