Musician Calvin Johnston once said “Rock and roll is a teenage sport, meant to be played by teenagers of all ages – they could be 15, 25 or 35. It all boils down to whether they’ve got the love in their hearts, that beautiful teenage spirit.” Bootsy Holler’s new book MakIng iT- An Intimate Documentary Of Seattle’s Indie, Punk, and Post-Grunge Music Scene (published by Damiani Books) may be introduced on It’s Nice That, but she needs no introduction to the riotous world of 90s and noughties American indie rock. A place where the beautiful simplicity of guitar-based music, with its oddball characters and dedicated radio play, created a cultural, metaphorical state of the eternal teenager.
Bootsy Holler landed in Seattle just as grunge music took off, but she was intrigued by “more interesting music”, for example, Pavement, PJ Harvey, Dinosaur Jr. and the local band Sunny Day Real State, who quickly became emo legends. It was here where Bootsy began shooting photos of everyone around her – musical artists and fans alike – to capture the palpable cultural wave, a feeling in the air that made rock fans feel close and similar. A community was growing. “We were in it, and you could feel the energy in the people I was hanging with. Seattle had a vibrant and deep music scene,” says Bootsy. “I was living with a drummer and all my housemates were in his band. I would walk into small clubs and see obscure music every Tuesday and Thursday night, with them often playing.”
Seattle was most certainly the place for Booty’s photography, the largest city in Washington, which produced countless (if not the most) indie rock bands. Bootsy immediately became part of the fabric of the scene there, a place where “it was easy to become a big fish in a small pond” – in a good way. Bootsy wasn’t just a fan with a camera, she took it seriously, taking profile shots of Moby, Beck, Pearl Jam, The Posies, R.E.M and Reggie Watts alongside stunning gig photography of unchained acts like The Yeh Yeh Yehs and Blonde Redhead. The book is a goldmine of new cultures blooming, such as the ‘tweemo’ wave of Death Cab For Cutie or the moment where garage rock went mainstream.