Sub's prime market

REDMOND, WASH. — REGIONALISM IS dead: That's one of many extreme ideas floating around pop music circles during these tumultuous times. The theory goes that, as the Internet turns music thoroughly ethereal and links in people from Athens, Ga., to Australia, the need to form community with one's neighbors -- or to share an artistic vision with them -- will wither.

Yet this weekend at Marymoor Park, in the same Seattle suburb where Microsoft is headquartered, a new idea of cultural regionalism asserted itself. The 13 bands that played in honor of Sub Pop, the record label that defined the link between indie rock and regionalism in the late 1980s and 1990s, showed how a home base can support and unify artists across borders and expose commonalities among locally influenced styles.

The SP20 festival included Les Thugs, a cerebral punk band from France; potty-mouthed popsters the Vaselines, from Scotland; Oxford, England's jumpy dance rockers Foals; and two groups from New Zealand, tuneful comedians Flight of the Conchords and world music updaters the Ruby Suns (whose founder was raised in Ventura).

Other performers hailed from throughout the 50 states. Their musical approaches were as diverse as the psychedelic guitar tirades of Comets on Fire, the homespun country-rock of Beachwood Sparks and the singer-songwriter musings of Iron & Wine. Yet these artists share more than allegiance to the same record label: During 40-minute sets that flowed smoothly with no diva interruptions, Sub Pop's finest all showed that punk's quirkiness and resistance to mainstream norms can translate across the spectrum of rock-influenced music.

Those are also stereotypical qualities of Pacific Northwesterners. In cities like Seattle, the sons and daughters of pioneers evolved into hippies and then into dot-com "creatives," always clinging to the conviction that life's better lived through self-reliance and a healthy mistrust of mainstream opinion.

For two decades, Sub Pop has operated on that principle. Its bold black-and-white logo and branding based on the idea of "world domination" mimicked corporate cliches, but the label always signed bands whose primary selling points were integrity and a lack of fuss. Despite some serious financial ups and downs after Nirvana's stardom brought a fortune to squander, Sub Pop has survived by maintaining that homesteader attitude and looking for it in artists.