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DOUG PRAY (Hype! documentary director) When I started the movie Hype!, it seemed like the worst idea in the world because I was just late. I had just come out of UCLA film school, and I had done music videos for the Young Fresh Fellows and Flop, who had nothing to do with grunge but were pretty respected Seattle bands. A producer from the UCLA Producers Program, Steve Helvey, came to me in 1992 and was like, “Look, we have to do a documentary film about the Seattle music scene.” And I was like, “It’s just too late.”

It was just embarrassing starting out. You could not have possibly put together a more cynical and media-wary—not just wary, but willing to fuck with the media—group of people than that group of bands and musicians and publicists. For example, Steve called Charles Peterson, and Charles was so incensed that a movie was gonna be made about the Seattle music scene at this point, when there had been so many journalists overrunning the town, that Steve’s response was, “These people are so fucking pissed off, we have to do this movie.”

MEGAN JASPER Shortly after I got laid off from Sub Pop, there was a U.K. magazine called Sky that called up saying, “Maybe you can give us some words people in Seattle use?” So I threw out some lies to them, and they published this lexicon that they thought was real. The Mudhoney guys got their hands on that publication while they were over there touring and started using those words as jokes in interviews.

Somehow someone at The New York Times heard there was a lexicon that existed. So they called Sub Pop. Jonathan knew I’d have fun with it, so he redirected them to me, and the reporter called. At that point, I was working out of my apartment for Caroline Records. I’d had three pots of coffee and I was flying out of my fucking skin. I was thrilled I had a distraction I could have fun with. I said, “Why don’t you give me words, and I’ll just give you the grunge translation?”

The reporter, Rick Marin, was super-sweet on the phone. I kept escalating the craziness of the translations because anyone in their right mind would go, “Oh, come on, this is bullshit.” I thought we would have a hearty laugh, and he would have to write it off as 15 minutes wasted, but it never happened, because he was concentrating so hard on getting the information right. My favorite was “swingin’ on the flippity-flop,” which meant “hanging out.” That came from a crazy guy from Northampton, Massachusetts, who used to work at the Red Lion Diner and wore a T-shirt that said CATCH YOU ON THE FLIPPY-FLOP or something.

When I hung up, I was like, Oh, it will be edited out in the end. And a few days later, it was a huge thing on the front page of the Style section.

THE NEW YORK TIMES (“Lexicon of Grunge: Breaking the Code,” by Rick Marin, November 15, 1992) All subcultures speak in code; grunge is no exception. Megan Jasper, a 25-year-old sales representative at Caroline Records in Seattle, provided this lexicon of grunge speak, coming soon to a high school or mall near you:

WACK SLACKS: Old ripped jeans

FUZZ: Heavy wool sweaters

PLATS: Platform shoes

KICKERS: Heavy boots

SWINGIN’ ON THE FLIPPITY-FLOP: Hanging out

BOUND-AND-HAGGED: Staying home on Friday or Saturday night

SCORE: Great

HARSH REALM: Bummer

COB NOBBLER: Loser

DISH: Desirable guy

BLOATED, BIG BAG OF BLOATATION: Drunk

LAMESTAIN: Uncool person

TOM-TOM CLUB: Uncool outsiders

ROCK ON: A happy goodbye

DANIEL HOUSE Oh, people were in hysterics. It just showed how desperate everybody had gotten to do a piece on Seattle, that they’d print anything and wouldn’t even bother to see if it was true. So C/Z printed up two different T-shirts with the “Lexicon of Grunge” on the back, both with a different word on the front, one being HARSH REALM, the other being LAMESTAIN.

The shirts sold pretty well. Not as good as BRUCE PAVITT GAVE ME HEAD, though. That was the single most popular C/Z shirt. It came out while I was still working at Sub Pop. What did