posted on Friday, July 11, 2008 3:37 PM

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Walking across the street to grab a sandwich this afternoon, I saw something pretty cool. Flying proudly atop the iconic Seattle Spaceneedle is a huge flag sporting the Sub Pop Records logo. Why the big deal? Well, not many people know about Sub Pop outside of Seattle. However, it launched this little band called Nirvana. It also broke Soundgarden, Mudhoney and so many others that it become THE label most closely associated with the "grunge" scene. And - it's celebrating it's 20th birthday this weekend.

As I was pleasantly reminded by this article, they sold some pretty funny t-shirts back in the day including one featuring "Loser" on the front and back as well as another boldly stating, "Going Out of Business Since 1988". Priceless.

Back to my first point - why I thought this was cool. Something I've always found fascinating about Seattle culture is that it is this blend of driven yet casual people focused on substance (over style, in many cases. See: plaid flannel shirts) and an understated sense of self. Musically, the grunge era was very contrarian, all about the music, not at all about glam, and produced some remarkable work that will withstand the test of time (IMO).  This small label that took a chance turned the music business on it's ear and it actually has a flag flying on the Spaceneedle!

Interestingly, this can-do, contrarian attitude permeates other business and industry here. Starbucks upended the coffee biz. No matter what you think about Microsoft, there's no disputing their role in our world today. Expedia broke new ground in travel. A new round of companies are serving the disintermediation papers to their respective markets - particularly folks like Zillow and Redfin. Waiting in the wings are some compelling startups like Blist and Wetpaint.

(Obviously, I like to include F5 in this mix but I'm pretty biased. We DID, however, pioneer things like load-balancing, Application Delivery Networking, and other patented technologies like cookie persistence. And, there's this thing called DevCentral that was a "first" in our market as well.)

Huh. Nirvana. Starbucks. Microsoft. DevCentral. All in the same blog post... wow. And I didn't even mean to do that.

At any rate, I'll try to get back to my original sentiment. Congrats Sub Pop. Thanks for blowing apart the industry and saving us from further nausea driven by big hair and glam-rock (sorry Don). Your contributions - including your continued inspiration - create the fabric that makes your community unique and impact global.

OK - here's the fun part: who was your favorite "grunge band" of all time? (share your comments below)