9 Greatest Hoaxes In Music

2. Grunge Fans Speak In Their Own Language

In 1992, the New York Times printed a mini-dictionary detailing the "Lexicon of Grunge".

This included words like "wackslacks" (old ripped jeans), "swingin' on the flippity-flop" (hanging out), "bound-and-hagged" (staying home on Friday or Saturday night) and the brilliant "bloated, big bag of bloatation" (drunk). This they detailed was the language of grunge, the genre championed by Seattle rockers Nirvana. The article was read by millions and millions of Americans (many of whom were already wary of the band's heavy, often indecipherable sound). So how did this ridiculousness come to be? A journalist phoned Sub Pop Records wanting to do a piece on the grunge scene's slang. Apparently amused by this notion, the receptionist Megan Jasper made the whole thing up.