Let's see if I can get through this one. Sleater-Kinney (named after a road in Washington) is about more than their songs. It's about their sound, style, and significance. As the 90's progressed and grunge fizzled out, it was replaced with early indie rock, which is much more like background dance music. It was the antonym to grunge. And of course, this new indie music was waiting for something to shake it up.
One of the shakers was the riot grrrl movement, and from that, Corin Tucker and Carrie Brownstein together formed Sleater-Kinney, adding drummer Janet Weiss. It's kind of an all girl neo punk movement. Sleater-Kinney put out a couple of albums to positive critical reviews, but didn't get widespread airplay until 1997's Dig Me Out. Some of the more well-known songs from the album are Words and Guitar, plus the title track
I don't usually like to post retro concert videos, but this is a good performance, and all the videos from '97 have bad sound
Sleater-Kinney – Dig Me Out (live)
Next up was 1999's The Hot Rock, and 2000 brought us All Hands on the Bad One, containing the song You're No Rock n' Roll Fun. But the next album I got interested in was 2002's One Beat, which has this fun song on it
Sleater-Kinney – Oh! (live)
They finished their initial run of albums with 2005's The Woods, with songs like Jumpers and Entertain. Then they went their separate ways, much to the displeasure of many, who made weekly calls for their reformation. They got their wish ten years later, when they released the brilliant No Cities to Love in 2015. But that's for another post.
During their hiatus, all three of the main members were up to something. Corin Tucker could be heard in the chorus of this song in 2007
Eddie Vedder with Corin Tucker - Hard Sun (from the Into the Wild soundtrack)
Carrie Brownstein became one half of this nutty show
And Janet Weiss became the drummer for another band I have coming up, from the former Pavement frontman.
Before Sleater-Kinney reformed in 2015, Corin Tucker released this excellent album in 2010 under the name The Corin Tucker Band, which got mainstream radio airplay. Here's the title track
Corin Tucker – 1,000 Years
and here's the lead single
Corin Tucker - Doubt
Like I said, I'll feature their reunion album as we get into the 2010's.