A recent visit to SeaTac International Airport brought two musical discoveries, different but equally welcome. The airport now has a store stocked to the rafters with new LPs and CDs, dedicated to Sub Pop Records, the record company that brought us Nirvana. More than any other label, Sub Pop symbolizes Seattle’s enduring commitment to independent popular music, making it a fitting, however astonishing, addition to the airport.
The city’s commitment to indie music came through still more tangibly in the airport’s bright south atrium where I stumbled onto a live performance by the singer and guitarist Jessica Lynne. No doubt about it, Seattle is a magnet for talent. Lynne, who won last year’s Texaco Country Showdown for Washington State, writes her own material and sings with an endearing southern twang—an adopted one, as it happens: she’s from Denmark. Seattle’s pull is strong indeed. When I greeted her between sets, here’s what she had to say.
“I grew up out in the country, in a different country. I grew up in Demark. That’s where I lived all my life until I moved to Seattle four years ago. My dad lives here, so that made it an easy choice, to have some family and some support. I happen to love it here, and I even wrote a song about it, ‘Calling Me Home.’ Before country, my inspiration was the Beach Boys. (My dad and I can agree on Kingston Trio and the Beach Boys. And John Denver, of course.)
“I think I was six years old when I wrote my first song. The first songs I ever played, on both my instruments, piano and guitar, were things that I wrote. I didn’t ever sit down and learn a song that someone else wrote. I just started writing. I was probably 10 when I performed my first finished song, which was a hit at my school. You could not get me off the stage! Then once when I was 12 and home with the flu, the TV was stuck by chance on this channel called CMT, Country Music Television. I’d listened to the classics—Jim Reeves, Patsy Cline—but this was fresh and new. They called it ‘new country’ in the ’90s, right? And Faith Hill’s ‘Wild One’ was number one, and I just loved that song, and I fell completely in love with that genre. And I have been ever since.
“But I did stop playing for 10 years, from age 18 to 28. I just stopped doing music. I got discouraged, like a lot of people do. Finally I just had to admit that I am not happy unless I do music. I also had to admit that country music was what I want to do, and there’s not a lot of country going on in Demark!
“City of Music started at SeaTac airport about a year and a half ago, funded by the Port of Seattle, and they’ve recently doubled the number of musicians. I’m here about 4 times a month. The best thing about playing at the airport is the exposure—you never know who’s gonna be here. I do love to sing in front of this many people. I like the challenge. I really like having to overstep boundaries to get people’s eye contact. Plus, the kids. The kids come out and they dance, and they don’t have all those inhibitions that we do. So they’ll just sit there, clapping. There was a little boy over here a minute ago, and every time I stopped he was like, ‘Yay!’—the first one—and then everyone else was like, ‘We better clap.'”
Mississippi In July – Jessica Lynne Live at the Columbia City Theater from Jessica Lynne on Vimeo.
30 August 2014