Woman Who Helped Break Nirvana Dead at 61

Woman Who Helped Break Nirvana Dead at 61

‘We loved Susie a great deal, and she will be missed,’ Nirvana’s Dave Grohl and Krist Novoselic said of former publicist Susie Tennant

Published |Updated

Peter Helman

Susie Tennant Susie Tennant/Facebook

Susie Tennant, a Seattle music industry veteran who helped break bands like Nirvana and became an integral part of the city’s burgeoning grunge scene in the late ’80s and early ’90s, died on Thursday of frontotemporal degeneration, a form of early onset dementia, The Seattle Times reports. She was 61.

“There was no one in Seattle music that was as well-loved, or as respected as Susie,” said Kim Warnick of Seattle punk rock band the Fastbacks, who lived as Tennant’s roommate in the 1990s. “She was the bond that connected so many, and there wasn’t a person in Seattle music that didn’t love her.”

“Every person Susie worked with, or even met, became a friend,” Warnick continued. “She was the unsung hero of Seattle music, and she brought that same love to everything and everyone. She was the glue that stuck Seattle together.”

Over her lengthy career, Tennant worked in promotions and marketing at companies including Geffen Records’ DGC Records division, Sub Pop, Experience Music Project (later MoPOP), Tower Records, BMG, University Book Store, M3 Marketing and Town Hall.

Jim McKeon of M3 said that the secret to Tennant’s success as a publicist was that she “was able to get even the most cynical radio program directors to play her bands simply because she truly believed in everyone she promoted.”

Tennant was an early champion of Nirvana, working as their publicist and organizing the record release party for Nevermind in 1991. After the band members were kicked out of their own party for starting a food fight, she took the party back to her house, where Kurt Cobain put on one of her dresses.

“We loved Susie a great deal, and she will be missed,” Nirvana’s surviving members Dave Grohl and Krist Novoselic said this week.

Tennant also worked with artists including Sonic Youth, Beck, Hole and Weezer, and members of Nirvana and Pearl Jam contributed to a benefit concert to help pay for her medical expenses when she was diagnosed with ovarian cancer in 2011.

Susan Silver, manager of Soundgarden and Alice in Chains, added that “Susie had such a big impact on me, personally and professionally, from raising our kids in the same neighborhood, to both working with history-making Seattle rock bands. She set the tone, always leading with positivity, enthusiasm and perseverance.”

Tennant is survived by her husband, Christopher Swenson, and children Ella and Eli. The family asks that any donations in Tennant’s name be sent to Seattle Musicians Access to Sustainable Healthcare, Seattle Musicians for Children’s Hospital, MusiCares or The Association for Frontotemporal Degeneration.