You know the old saying: "If you remember the 60s, you weren't there." For me this cliché also applies to most of the 80 and 90s. Rampant grunge nostalgia has given rise to no fewer than a half-dozen recent or soon-to-be-published books on the subject. As a peripheral player in Seattle's proto-grunge punk scene, I've been asked repeatedly to recount the specifics of my misspent youth to a cadre of eager young "rock historians." Hell, I'm lucky if I remember what happened last week, much less 25 years ago.
Thankfully we had Peter Bagge to chronicle the entire era. His comic book series HATE went far beyond simple satire. Buddy Bradley and his gang of hapless losers helped fashion the attitudes and aesthetics of the movement. It's a sure bet that BUDDY DOES SEATTLE, collecting the first 15 issues of HATE, more accurately reflects the grunge milieu than an entire library of murky oral histories. In a prescient 1992 review, Bruce Barcott of the Seattle Weekly observed, "Twenty years from now, when people want to know what it was like to be young in 1990s Seattle, the only record we'll have is Peter Bagge's HATE." If you too are gripped by grunge nostalgia, or just curious about the period, skip the revisionist histories and pick up a copy of the real deal.
While you're at it…the most splendid comic book of the summer is Peter Bagge's HATE ANNUAL #8. From the first page you'll be reminded why you so closely identified with the series in the first place: Sexy and silly, but with an unmistakable air of familiarity. This book gives you an uneasy feeling like, "Hey, I think I know these people. Omigawd! That's me!" An imperative addition to your summer reading list.
