Ongoing History Daily: The roots of the word “grunge”
There’s still plenty of debate and study about the origins of the word “grunge.” It’s likely it descended from British slang, which created the word out of older words like “dingy, goo, and gunge,” which is an unknown sticky substance. But the original word was “grungey,” an adjective that was applied to something dirty and grubby.
The first time it appeared in print was in the New York Times in 1965 when it was used to describe a dull date. When it comes to music, grunge was used in New Yorker magazine as part of a review of the New York Dolls.
It was applied to the rock music of Seattle in 1987 when Bruce Pavitt, the co-founder of Sub Pop Records, described the sound of a Green River EP, which was recorded cheapy, loosely, and with a dirty guitar sound. From there, “grunge” just kinda stuck.
