An ebow is just what it sounds like, an electronic bow used by a guitarist to simulate their strings and give themselves a legato sound.

It's appeared on countless hit records and is definitely one of those things that once you start

noticing it you can't really stop.

Welcome to Strong Songs, a Podcast About Music. I'm your host, Kirk Hamilton, and I'm so glad

you've joined me to talk about music played by e-bows, music played by regular bows, music played by fingers, plectrums, mallets, and more.

Strong songs is entirely independent, made entirely without compromise thanks to the fact that it is

entirely funded by

donations from listeners like you. That is such a cool thing and I really appreciate

everyone out there who's chipped in on Patreon to keep this thing going.

On this episode we're going back to an earlier era of American music

when a handful of bands from the Pacific Northwest reimagined

what a rock band could sound like and what they could sing about.

It's a band that I'm very excited to talk about so let's drop the sixth string, power

up the amps and hit this thing. Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, When I was a kid in the early 90s, Grunge wasn't really my thing. I was 11 years old when never mind came

out I wasn't old enough to understand the late Reagan era alienation that drove

so many young adults to feel so frustrated and alone. I was shifting from action figures to the

saxophone at the time. I thought it was pretty cool when Bill Clinton went and played

tenor on Arsenio. The dark hard-hitting sounds emanating from the Pacific Northwest just

didn't really resonate with me. Later, of course, I would come to appreciate, admire, and

even love a lot of the rock bands that define the post-Hare metal sound of the early 90s,

nirvana, Allison Chain's, Stone Temple Pilots, and above all, Sound Garden.

But at the time, it just wasn't my thing. I was into They Might Be Giants and Charlie Parker.

...