kane

Sub Pop played a huge roll in it all. They had Nirvana signed and released their first record called Bleach. They put out these now legendary compilation CDs that had bands like Nirvana, Mother Love Bone, Soundgarden, Alice In Chains, Mudhoney and others on them and those albums got them some real attention. The thing they did best was that they marketed themselves as a whole unit and a way of life. Instead of just marketing a bad the label marketed itself as the Sub Pop brand and with that they promoted the "Seattle" sound. When the scene exploded Sub Pop cashed in big time. They got a little bit of the money from Nirvana's Nevermind, but they re-released Bleach and it sold like mad because the fans were clamoring for anything Nirvana they could get their hands on. They were selling the compilation CDs as fast as they could print them.

As the scene got bigger they marketed themselves as kind of the godfathers of the Seattle music scene. And really they were just that. They were signing and recording and releasing these bands long before anyone had ever really heard of them. Suddenly anything Seattle was huge and they were selling records like crazy. They sold as many T-shirts that just said "Sub Pop" on them as they did band t-shirts. They made a ton of money just selling contracts of their bands to major labels. There was a band called Pond that was on Sub Pop and Elektra wanted them. The band wanted to go to Elektra so Sub Pop sold the contract to Elektra for about 2 million dollars. Pond recorded a record for Elektra, the label hated it and dumped them. They had spent 2 million just to get the right to sign them then spent around 800K signing them only to dump them. Pond then went back to Sub Pop, made another record and released it through them.

So they cashed in big having all these recordings from many of the big Seattle bands before they were big. As the scene faded they still sold fairly well and they went back to being what they were before which is a label the focuses on the local Northwest bands. The thing that changed was that the now had a worldwide name so they were able to better promote them and get more airplay and exposure for the bands that want it. They actually nearly went bankrupt in the late 90's because they thought they could do it again and signed a bunch of acts, dumped a ton of money into them and pushed them hard only to have them not be successful. That is the way the music business is. Sometimes the times are just right and the right band comes along at the right time. If the public isn't ready for it no amount of of money can convince them otherwise.

They eventually signed a band called The Shins and Jack White's pre White Stripes band called The Go and the band Hot Hot Hot among othera and redirected themselves back to what made them good before which was supporting bands as they developed themselves, went on the road and created a fan base. So it looks like they are back on the track of doing things well and are back to being an indie label that has developing good artists as its primary goal.