The Spokesman-Review from Spokane, Washington • 65

Two bands who made a mark on the Seattle sound Veteran rock bands the Screaming Trees and the Melvins have had a profound impact on modern rock music, helping define the Seattle sound. Yet, neither band has been credited by the mainstream media for the influence. The Melvins are considered by many as the Northwests original grunge band, packing angst-ridden vocals and mammoth power chords into sluggish songs. The Screaming Trees were grunge-by-association, but really, the band brought a psychedelic edge to Seattle. Although both bands have outgrown their early sounds, the Screaming Trees and the Melvins remain two of rocks most under-appreciated bands.

Perhaps With their new albums Dust by the Screaming Trees and Stag by the Melvins as well as prominent slots on the Lollapalooza tour, which stops at The Gorge July 30, theyll gain the respect and recognition they sorely deserve. Screaming Trees blow closer to the spotlight with new album Dust By Joe Ehrbar Staff writer fm i I Spotlight Sweetness is in demand By Jim Kershner 1 Staff writer Are you ready for dueling Love Notes? Terry Holiday, who has been doing this show for 6'2 years on KISC-FM (98 KISS FM), has been lured to KXLY-FM (Classy 99.9) beginning Monday evening, i This show combines requests, dedications, and sympathetic advice. As syrupy as it may sound to the unromantic among us, it has i been tremendously popular. But Holiday said he didnt feel he was getting the support he wanted from KISC-' FM, so he was willing to be wooed by KXLY-FM. His show will now run on I KXLY-FM from 7 p.m.

to midnight every weeknight, and it will be called Classy Love i Notes. Or will it? KISC-FM recently fired off a broadside saying that Love Notes is a trademarked I name, and only KISC-FM can use it. KISC-FM plans to continue their own Love Notes every weeknight beginning Monday with new host Ian Richards. Richards, from Blackpool, England, has spent many years with the British Broadcasting Company, and is now a full-time employee of KISC-FM. His British accent will be a very unique i addition to nighttime radio in Spokane, said KISC-FM operations manager Rob Harder.

1 Holiday and the people at KXLY say that I they will use the title Classy Love Notes unless ordered to stop. Holiday pointed out, I with some incredulity, that he was even warned that he could not use the name i Terry Holiday. i Its not his real name its his on-air name but Holiday said he was using it for years before he went to KISC-FM. This may all have to be settled by the i lawyers. Call it Law Notes.

i Tims still on-air Tim Adams is still handling the main i weather anchoring duties at KHQ-6, even though the station has not renewed his contract, which expired at the end of June. 1 Adams said he will continue to do the main weather anchoring "TFN till Continued: SpotllghtE8 Settle photo the ntil June, the Screaming Trees hadnt howled in more than two years. They hadnt even rustled. It appeared the Seattle-via-Ellensburg rock combo had vanished after finally producing their commercial breakthrough, a spectacular album called Sweet Oblivion. Four years passed between the release of their sixth album Sweet Oblivion and the release of Dust, the bands exceptional new album.

The recording gap started after the bands arrival home in 1993 from two grueling years of touring in support of Sweet Oblivion. Instead of doing the sensible thing and taking a much-needed break from both music and each other, the Screaming Trees, eager to capitalize on their newfound success, re-entered the studio to record a follow-up. It was at that point that tensions within the band vocalist Mark Lanegan, brothers Van Conner (bass) and Gary Lee Conner (guitar) and drummer Barrett Martin reached a boiling Eoint. Not only had the four been crammed in a us for far too long, but their ideas had temporarily dried up. Undaunted, the Screaming Trees recorded an album anyway.

After its completion, they spiked it. Why? Because it sucked, says Van Conner, during a recent phone interview from Cleveland, where the Trees were on the two-week headline tour preparing for Lollapalooza. We werent getting along very well, he recalls. It wasnt like we were having big brawls. We didnt want to see each other because we hung out for three years.

We didnt really find that spark that we had on Sweet Oblivion. It was really empty and Ken Gary Lee Conner of Screaming Trees. Danny Clinch photo The Screaming Trees are back on the scene with their latest album Dust. Continued: Screaming TreesE6 Melvins: Were not mainstream rock5 By Joe Ehrbar Staff writer- i I Partnership I could be sign of the future i By Tom Sowa Staff writer The two partners dont seem like a natural fit. NBC has been in the news business for 40-some years.

Microsoft Corporation has been running an on-line computer news bureau for about a year. One is a TV network with celebrity reporters and editors; the other is primarily a West Coast software firm where employees work in T-shirts and use buzzwords like content and apps. On Monday, the two companies unveil MSNBC, a cable-internet partnership that could be the sign of things to come. Or yet another media-frenzy fizzle-and-bum. Why would the TV empire join forces with the Redmond-based software giant? The answer, said Peter Neupert, Microsofts vice-president in charge of the MSNBC project, is a vision for the future, not profits.

He said the goal is to start delivering 1 interactive technology that gives users active control over the news and information i they're using. I Microsoft realized two years ago that it needed to find a presence on the Internet. 1 More than just a vehicle for exchanging e- mail, it wanted an operation that gave the PC crowd much greater freedom in selecting what they wanted from the 1 Internet, when they wanted it. i That led to forming MSN last summer, Bill Gates challenger to America Online i and other on-line computer services. But Gates, Neupert and others realized i that MSN by itself didnt have the clout or i wide appeal to seriously compete in the i news and information segment of that Continued: MSNBCE8 For example, the bands most pop-oriented album (which isnt saying much), 1993s Houdini, was followed by 1994s Prick, an album of noise textures, song snippets and soundbites.

And when Nirvana released the radioready, MTV-friendly Nevermind, the Melvins strayed from pop-grunge and dove deep into sludgy ambience with their three-song LP called Lysol. The Melvins pioneered grunge music, but they never generated the kind of mainstream hoopla their contemporaries did, which was partly by design. The Melvins sustained their appetite for dissonance, and they left Seattle for San Francisco before the scene exploded. Says bandmate Crover: People always ask us, Arent you guys bitter that Soundgarden and Nirvana have become really big but you guys havent? No, those bands are almost pop bands and not. band members, who live in San LA.

and London, wish the band was more warmly by mainstream rock? really, says Crover. We just know that really different than mainstream not mainstream rock, explains same time, the Melvins hope their 10th Stag, which arrives in stores Tuesday, some commercial success. Continued. MolvinsES hen the Melvins last played Spokane opening for White Zombie at the Convention Center a year ago the band greeted the audience with a sludgy instrumental. The slow, noisy number failed to kick-start the mosh pit, where fans impatiently awaited the arrival of White Zombie.

Just as the song picked up steam, so did the moshers. But then, suddenly, the Melvins would kill the momentum. They did this for 10 minutes. It was as if the crowd was a pack of dogs and the Melvins were teasing owners by dangling mouthwatering treats in front of the pit. As soon as the treat was within the crowds grasp, the Melvins would swipe it away.

By the time the song ended, the trio guitarist-vocalist King Buzzo Osborne, drummer Dale Crover and bassist Mark Dcutrom had angered the crowd. When asked about this incident during a recent phone interview from Atlantic Records Beverly Hills office, Deutrom said in a sarcastic tone: No. People got angry at a Melvins gig? It was the song Goggles and its on our brand new CD (Stag), he says. That was a case of actually working out a song on stage before we recorded it. The Melvins guitarist-vocalist (from left) drummer Dale Crover, bassist Mark Deutrom and King Buzzo Osborno are said to have pioneered grunge music.

It was obvious the 5,000 guinea pigs didnt cling to the song. Not everybody is as open-minded as perhaps they should be about music, Deutrom says, vinegar thick in his voice. (Appropriately, Atlantic Records employees have dubbed Deutrom the Grumpy Cowboy.) Hes right. If they were more tolerant, perhaps the Melvins would be the biggest band in the world. But at the moment theyre not.

Since they cranked up the distortion more than a decade ago in Aberdeen, the Melvins have built a sturdy reputation as being a rock roll nuisance, confusing fans and critics ever since. because were' really So do Francisco, embraced Not our stuff is rock. Were Deutrom. At the album garners (I, 4t97 4.