What's Your Hometown's ContributionTo Music?

Ummm... Silverchair.

We've had our share of acclaimed outsider acts like Pel Mel (70s-80s postpunk) and the noise scene at the turn of the millennium was ace. But you'd have to be an avid Wire reader or something to remember bands like Castings (awesome).

Newcastle, Australia BTW.

Angela Hewitt is the most famous to whom I also listen regularly.

I guess I also have a couple of Arcade Fire albums and we could claim a couple of their members.

Some of Mastodon went to my high school

Heh. I'm (mostly) from West Chester, PA, which has brought the world composer Samuel Barber and, um, Matisyahu. And apparently the first public performance of Bruce Springsteen & the E Street Band as we know it (opening for Cheech & Chong). Half the Jackass guys were at high school with me, too, fwiw.

Feel like the OP should be informed about Foul Play.

There are many more significant reasons to hate the guy, but I can't wait to have a president again that doesn't do 90% of his communications with the public while he's sitting on the shitter every morning.

I have no idea why this showed up in this thread. I swear I put that in the US politics thread. Jesus. Sorry.

US politics gets everywhere >:(

LOL @ me failing to mention Momus and mentioning Kenneth McKellar instead - twice!

Crazy House, Subhumans (anarcho band), members of The Bolshoi, Jeff Keen (hey he made sound art).

Or alternatively, my birthplace (and where most my family are from): Tears for Fears, Propellerheads, DNA of Tom's Diner fame

(For bonus, the town between them: Jesus Jones)

Oh and Dave Dee went to school here too.

From my neighbourhood of Toronto, Drake. Supposedly also Rik Emmett, the guitarist for Triumph, though I can't confirm this.

Depends on what you mean by "hometown." I was born in Detroit, which has contributed as much to popular music as any other American city, probably more than most.

I grew up in Denver, whose greatest contribution may be . . . Judy Collins? Nathaniel Rateliff and the Night Sweats? The Fray? The fucking Lumineers? I did finish high school in Pueblo, Colorado, which if I remember correctly had some connection to Tommy Bolin.

my hometown sent ambassadors to the american south in the 1890s to teach them slide guitar

Dave Matthews Band
Pavement, pretty much
Bella Morte
Happy Flowers

(Charlottesville VA)

I mentioned Gerry Rafferty upthread but forgot to mention his sparring partner, Joe Egan. My hometown seems to have produced more actors than musicians though.

I spent mny first 6 months in Ladbroke Grove which had initially an undergrounnd scene followed by a pub rock scene after I left and eventually punk.
Moved to Richmond, couldn't forment revolution as a babe in arms
Moved to Kenya where Benga and a few other sounds appeared.
Moved to Woodford Green where Gnidrolog came from
Then Walthamstow which gave you the Vibrators and a bunch of other bands over the years I was there and was about the last cheapish place in London so had various bands move there and i think On U Sound.
Moved to Dublin which had a good underground scene
Then Galway which is where Sweeney's men formed years earlier.

two jons. jon small, drummer of the hassles, lived two doors down from me. some other neighborhood kids and i used to watch them rehearse in the garage.

jon carin, six years my junior (his sister was in my grade), has played keyboards for pink floyd, roger waters, the who, bryan ferry, kate bush, etc.

carin was also in a new wave band called industry. jon small was also in atilla, and was married to / divorced from elizabeth webber before billy joel was.

Lisa Germano. I wish I'd known as a teenager there in the late 90s.

My school gave the world Leyton Buzzards/Modern Romance and 2 members of Bark Psychosis but they lived in another local area.

oh, and evan shore from muck & the mires! and mercury caronia, drummer for jon carin's industry, was in a prog band called cathedral whose self-produced lp goes for big bucks.
https://www.discogs.com/release/2901414-Cathedral-Stained-Glass-Stories

the boys from Brave Little Abacus (New Hampshire "midwest" emo band beloved by internet nerds) were a grade or two behind me at my regional high school. band/theater geeks iirc. I didn't really know them, but the lead singer's sister was valedictorian of my class, and the keyboardist and I were members of a myspace group called "The Boys Who Like Jokes" along with like five other members. their legendary live album was recorded at the senior center next to my high school. I wasn't aware of the band at the time so don't have any stories to tell

The Shaggs are probably the most famous band to come out of my home county. I have no idea what to do with this information.

― i ain't marchant anymore (unregistered), Thursday, February 12, 2015 11:17 PM (eight years ago)

I once dreamed of making a pilgrimage to The Shaggs' former home, but sadly

The Shaggs disbanded and sold most of their equipment. A few years later, Betty and Dot married and moved out, and their mother sold the family house. The new owner became convinced that the house was haunted by Austin's ghost and donated it to the Fremont fire department, who burnt it down in a firefighting exercise.

oops, clipped off a relevant part of that quote: "Shortly after the recording session, Austin died of a heart attack at the age of 47."

Not sure I wish to claim DC proper (Duke Ellington, Marvin Gaye).

But I do live a few blocks from Dischord, and recorded at Inner Ear, so I think I can claim about one degree of separation from the Teen Idles/Minor Threat/Fugazi axis, plus the Scream/Grohl/Foo agglomeration. I have played with Skeeter from Scream and with Don Zientara. So.

Will always rep for our DIY scene but nobody ever makes it big here. The only 'famous' acts I can think of are: Tindersticks, Jake Bugg, Ronika, Paper Lace, Sleaford Mods.

Also home to Earache Records, for you metalheads.

Earache My Eye

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c32JxwQeyJs

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Qpv-lGNXAQ

I'm from a small village in the hills, outside Edinburgh, which gave the world

Boards Of Canada
The Scars (well, 50% of them)
Christ.
Nina Nesbitt

Real hometown (Toronto), many. Current hometown (St. Marys), Emm Gryner, sort of.

depending on which london suburb counts as my actual hometown it's either iron maiden, stormzy, or a certain fascist "bluesman"

They call Alabama the Crimson Tode. Call me fascist blues.

*Tide, gah.

I don't know of any notable musicians from Silver Spring MD, though Stevie Nicks immortalized the town/city in song in Fleetwood Mac's "Silver Springs", which of course has nothing to do with Silver Spring but was named for it. My current address about a 10 minute drive from Silver Spring is a block away from where John Fahey attended high school (and also Jim Henson and Len Bias).

didn't Half Japanese have some connection to Silver Spring (I knew the Fair brothers grew up in Union Bridge, MD). The town I lived in until last year gave the world Lester Bowie.

David Byrne grew up in Arbutus, Md., which is sorta between Columbia and Baltimore. The Fairs lived in Carroll County, near Frederick. My wife is from Mount Airy. South Carroll.

Not helpful for Silver Spring, but in the ballpark.

This reminds me that I was in a grade-school class with Rebecca Gibb, later drummer for Harlow, and Pat Smear's wife.

i'd tell y'all but then you'd be able to figure out my hometown, which isn't big, and i'm clinically paranoid. i just find it endlessly amusing that my hometown has actually contributed to music and not just to pablo escobar's retirement account

Same. There’s a major pop star from my hometown but I don’t wanna talk about it

XP to Tom D - this is very obscure but Paisley was home to this guy also -

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lOniGvP4eCE

Specific neighbourhoods are typically hard to pin down within this sprawl but the interweb tells me that Percy Grainger, Daevid Allen, Kylie Minogue, J G Thirlwell, Dame Nellie Melba, Helen Reddy, Flea and various members of Air Supply and the Birthday Party were born somewhere around here, for starters. (This game is less interesting if thinking in terms of largish conurbations, admittedly, but there's also little risk to anonymity lol.)

Mine's where Colin Meloy grew up and got his first Replacements album, and where Charley Pride played baseball and first started performing. A truly formative town.

Both Taylor Hawkins and Jon Davison of Yes would have been surfer kids around Laguna Beach when I was in high school. Ty Segall also comes from Laguna but a generation later.

i'm from east dulwich in london. nitin sawhney and glenn tillbrook are both from here, and king krule spent a lot of time in east dulwich growing up

a good friend i went to primary school with is in a band called curser who seem to be doing well :)

i think another friend played (plays?) bass for Lynks Afrikka