Northwest Passage: Andy Kotowicz

On November 1, Town Hall was filled with a palpable sadness and beautiful music, a fitting tribute to Andy Kotowicz, the thirty-seven-year-old Sub Pop executive who had died in a traffic accident a week before. Led by stoic Sub Pop vice president Megan Jasper, the memorial was anchored by performances by several artists from the Seattle record label, including Damon and Naomi, as well as the Fruit Bats’ Eric Johnson, who offered up a moving cover of Bobby Charles’ “I Must Be in a Good Place Now.” The room was infused with a warm and occasionally ribald sense humor, with Kotowicz’s friends and loved ones reflecting on his dry wit almost as much as on his undying love of independent-minded art. 

Photograph courtesy of Sub Pop Records

Kotowicz found the passion that determined the trajectory of his career in the music of the Stooges and R.E.M., two seemingly disparate bands that were popular during his childhood years in Ann Arbor, Michigan. Working in the dual capacities of marketing and A&R at Sub Pop was a dream job that he tackled with boundless enthusiasm, helping sign acts like Comets on Fire and Pissed Jeans and championing the reissue of the popular Radio Birdman collection. 

Understandably, the loss of their colleague and friend hit the folks at the influential label particularly hard. “It’s too, too much,” wrote Sub Pop president Chris Jacobs in a post on Sub Pop’s blog the day after Kotowicz’s death. “He was smart and funny and enthused; passionate in his love of music and his family; a patient and steadfast friend.”

He was also an indisputable asset to the label. “He had an innate sense of how to market and sell records,” asserts Jasper. “It was so much fun to chat with him about our records because the conversation would go from the art and why it was so meaningful to the nuts and bolts of how we would tackle marketing and sales. He was one of those rare people who could lose themselves in all aspects of the music.”

The outpouring of grief and support from the community was immediate and immense. Pearl Jam offered up a guitar for auction, and benefits to raise money for Kotowicz’s family are popping up all around the country. 

“The thing I repeatedly hear people saying is that they want to use this as a reminder to spend more time with the people they love and make sure they know they are loved, and also to live each moment to the fullest as you never know when it will be the last moment,” says No Depression founder Kyla Fairchild. “I realize that's a common theme when people die, but in this case the energy behind that sentiment seems even more pervasive and inspired.”

Sub Pop will host a benefit for the Kotowicz family featuring AFCGT, Fruit Bats, Mudhoney, Michael Yonkers, Pissed Jeans, Shabazz Palaces, Vetiver and Wolf Eyes at Showbox at the Market on December 4.