Jack Endino

Jack Endino is a well-known and highly influential record producer and lesser-known musician for many bands, chiefly associated with the grunge scene of Seattle, Washington. He is largely credited with the development of the grunge sound and has become one of the most famous behind-the-scenes personalities of the grunge movement.

Contents

1 Early career 2 Later career 3 Partial list of bands recorded by Jack Endino 4 External links

Early career

Endino's early music life was no different than that of your typical music lover. Growing up in Seattle, he played in several amateur bands throughout college, including drums for The Ones and guitar for Skin Yard. Some of his bands were minorly successful, particularly Skin Yard - who he went on to record an album with in 1986. Jack produced the album himself in a 5-dollar-an-hour recording studio, where he first noticed his talent for production.

Later that year, he founded his own production company, Reciprocal Recording, with his friend/partner, Chris Hanzsek. At the time in Seattle, there was a flourishing underground rock scene (which would become known as 'grunge') led by the likes of The Melvins and Soundgarden, so there were no shortage of bands eager for the opportunity to record their own tracks. Endino almost immediately got to work on recording 2 CDs, Soundgarden's Screaming Life EP, and Green River's Dry as a Bone EP. These 2 EPs were put out as some of the first releases on the influential Sub Pop label, and marked the beginning of a lasting Endino/Sub Pop relationship.

Later career

In the years to follow (and largely as a result of the Endino/Sub Pop partnership), grunge began to reach its creative peak. During this time, Endino recorded music by almost all of the most seminal grunge albums, including Screaming Trees' Buzz Factory, Tad's God's Balls, Mudhoney's Superfuzz Bigmuff and Nirvana's debut album, Bleach. At the time, his budget for recording was still very small, but Endino showed his knack for capturing the rawness of the genre despite his financial situation. After recording several more albums, he left Reciprocal Recording in 1991 to pursue a career as a freelance recording producer and engineer.

He continued to record albums in Seattle while increasingly travelling further to work - at times as far away as Brazil or Australia. He became very well known and in demand during the '90s, recording albums for the likes of Hot Hot Heat, Therapy? and Bruce Dickinson. He appeared in the 1996 movie Hype! concerning the Seattle scene, in which he was humorously labelled, 'the Godfather of Grunge'. He continues to work in production to this day and remains as in-demand as ever.

Partial list of bands recorded by Jack Endino

• Bruce Dickinson
• Fitz of Depression
• The Gits
• Green River
• Hog Molly
• Hot Hot Heat
• L7
• Mark Lanegan
• Mudhoney
• Murdock
• Nebula
• Nirvana
• RC5
• Screaming Trees
• Skin Yard
• Soundgarden
• Tad
• Therapy?
• Titãs
• Upwell
• Willard
• Zeke

External links

• Full List of Endino Production
• Jack Endino's Homepage