Document & Eyewitness: We Go with the Kids, Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah

why this tape sounds the way it does.

although it could be argued that the tape sounds this way because I'm dumb,

I would prefer you think it's because rooms,

recording tape and tape machines are not invisible.

-- Al Larsen, From Playground Til Now - Some Velvet Sidewalk

Read my spiel on Bikini Kill Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah here

TIGER GRRL: A page from my diary, October 1990

October 21

I practiced with Cathy + Kathleen today and it was (should be thought of as) warranting AMAZEMENT.

A feminist to me means trying to confront sexism and be powerful.

I think I am changing. I am going to ask questions now instead of tell everybody everything.

Bikini Kill is a powerful name, the more people don't like it, the more I realize how great it is. Our band is really great. Nobody will like us though. I think we will be like thee most misunderstood band ever. It is really amazing to finally be playing with other girls again. I can already feel the power of it and the band is fast becoming the most important thing in my life. Kathleen is amazing. I am learning a lot.

Statement of Intent:

To provide support and guidance to the youth with modern punk rock sensibilities

To reclaim the domain of punk

anti-professionalism -- asking questions -- ideas -- anti-macho ritual -- anti-conformity -- form-as-key -- the cassette as access to means of production -- "don't follow rules" means not that everyone should or even could but that you don't have to be status quo -- NOT hardcore -- THIS generation

To set forth the legitimacy of GIRL ROCK. Sisters. Yeah.

incite discourse - - ask questions - - be dorky -- fight sophistication -- network

To work towards making a connection between political struggles against oppression and the new generation of punk

To entertain and alleviate despair

To fight sexism and homophobia

Fight song:

We're the girls with a bad reputation (Yeah you want to get to me) We're the girls with a bad reputation We're gonna make you pay (Hunger is power, desire a fool) Kill yr daddy, fuck yr boyfriend too We're the girls with a bad reputation (We're gonna show YOU what's TRUE) Kathy, Tobi, Kathleen (and Esther too.)

For Immediate Release: "Free Pussy Riot" MP3 by Tobi Vail

PRESS RELEASE:

Tobi Vail has released a song called Free Pussy Riot in solidarity with Nadezhda Tolokonnikova, Maria Alyokhina and Yekaterina Samutsevich, the three jailed members of Pussy Riot who are currently serving two years in prison for performing an anti-Putin song in a Moscow church. Pussy Riot is an anonymous feminist punk collective who play unsanctioned concerts as a means of political protest. Pussy Riot started in Moscow but chapters are forming internationally in solidarity with group members'unjust imprisonment and continued state harassment.

Inspired by Free John Sinclair by John and Yoko, Free Pussy Riot was written for Tobi's recent performance at Primera Persona at the Centre de Cultura Contemporània de Barcelona. Tobi continues to play Free Pussy Riot in her solo set, recently performing it live backed by The Pussy Riot Olympia Solidarity Band at Kitzel's Deli in Olympia, WA as part of an event held to rally international awareness and support for the Russian group. Pussy Riot Olympia videos can be viewed via Tobi's youtube channel

Upon the arrest of Nadezhda Tolokonnikova, Maria Alyokhina and Yekaterina Samutsevich, members of Bikini Kill made statements in solidarity with the group. Tobi's statement is an MP3 edited together with paintings of the group made by Billy Karren and posted on youtube. Tobi also wrote an article about Pussy Riot for eMusic and continues to speak out about their unjust imprisonment via social media. Kathleen Hanna video-taped a statement of support for her blog and has spoken to the music press about the group.

On October 10 Pussy Riot's appeal will be heard by a Russian court. To quote from Tobi's solidarity statement she reads at the end of her song:

Pussy Riot is organizing in Moscow but the struggle for self-determination of women, LGBTQ rights, gender justice and political transparency is an international one. 'Death to Prison, Freedom to Protest' Free Pussy Riot!

Lyrics available upon request. Please share the FREE MP3.

Photo by Sara Peté taken Live at Kitzel's Deli on Friday September 14, 2012

Free Pussy Riot was written by Tobi Vail in collaboration with Pussy Riot Olympia agitator Henri Riot & New York based artist Amy Yao. Tobi Vail plays lead guitar & sings, Henri Riot plays bass & sings, Wild Man James (Spider and the Webs) plays guitar, Kanako Pooknyw (Broken Water) plays drums & sings and Bongo Randy (Spider and the Webs, The Family Stoned) plays percussion. The song was recorded by Dave Harvey.

Man Thinks Woman When He Talks To Me

Be sure to check out today's Magnet piece by David Lester and Jean Smith from Mecca Normal. Jean wrote a cool short story about a struggling woman writer in a male dominated literary scene who finds herself doing traditional "women's work" at the book store readings. It's a thoughtful, well written piece. This is a part of a weekly series they've been doing, today's edition also comes with a free MP3 of Mecca Normal's classic feminist story-song Man Thinks Woman performed live in Toronto, 1987.

Before I had studied feminist theory or read much women's history, Jean Smith's song lyrics were one of the main sources for feminist analysis in my life. I first saw Mecca Normal when I was about 16 years old, it was 1986. They were in Olympia as a part of The Black Wedge tour, which was a group of anarchist writers and musicians traveling down the coast in DOA's old school bus. Jean's songs and voice spoke directly to my experience as a female. When you suddenly find yourself a teenage girl, the double standards imposed on you are unacknowledged yet psychologically devastating. Not only are you dealing with overt sexism, which is a little easier to understand and address, but also the insidious cattiness between girlfriends, the subtle monitoring of your body/sexuality by boys/men and then there's your own self-sabotage and competition towards other girls/women or what feminist theorists called "internalized oppression".

As I was slowly piecing together all of this, without a language to view it as systemic, in comes Mecca Normal, with their stories about women living under patriarchy. They provided a way for me to view my own personal experience of female adolescence as political. Even more amazing, 26 years later, they are still working artists and their work has consistently done this kind of thing--they use storytelling, sound, light, texture and image to examine the world politically. In doing so, they help us locate our own experience in terms of power. This kind of political art creates space for resistance.

For example, Bikini Kill was heavily influenced and inspired by Mecca Normal. We wanted to create a feminist youth culture so that girls could resist. But in order to even have the idea that maybe we could change things, we needed a political analysis of how capitalism and patriarchy impacted our lives as young women. Mecca Normal helped us see that and actively encouraged us to find our own voice and participate. Please check out their music and art if you aren't familiar with it.

Illustration by David Lester

From Magnet:

"Every Saturday, we’ll be posting a new illustration by David Lester. The Mecca Normal guitarist is visually documenting people, places and events from his band’s 26-year run, with text by vocalist Jean Smith."

A picture of me and my friend Heidi, 1985.

Huggy Bikini Blood Sausage Bear Kill

photo taken by jo johnson in london, 1993

Share Your Bikini Kill Story

Bikini Kill has set up an official archive online

We are collecting stories of how people got into the band/shows they saw/memories/testimonials etc.

It would be awesome if you wanted to contribute. It doesn’t have to be fancy or well-worded, we’d just like you to leave a record of your experience and get an idea of what Bikini Kill means to you. Maybe it’s your reaction to a song we wrote, something weird that happened at one of our shows, a personal anecdote or just WHATEVER. Send yr story to bkillarchive@gmail.com and we will post it or just leave a comment somewhere on the site. You can also send us images to post.

Please help us spread the word. To document the history (or herstory) of the band it is necessary to include an oral history from “the fans”. We say fans for lack of a better word—a more expansive term would be inclusive of friends, peers, comrades, co-conspirators and imply participation rather than an audience separate from the band—which is what we hope to achieve with this interactive approach.

Also, if you have video/film footage of the band, please contact us, Thanks!

Read this Bikini Kill story by M'Lady's own Brett Lyman:

I saw Bikini Kill on October 13, 1994, in Dayton, Ohio. I didn’t live there, and was in fact about six hours away in Detroit, but because of a fairly disastrous previous engagement in Detroit they seemed destined never to return, and Dayton was close as they were gonna get on that particular tour. I was 17 and constantly in trouble, teenage runaway style, no fixed address, and shame-facedly back at my parents’ house for that month, all strings attached. I was not allowed to go to punk shows when I was younger (nice reverse psychology, Mom and Dad) and had to run away every time I wanted to. This show was no exception. I hitched a ride with my friends Jef, Becky, and Carrie, in Jef’s incredibly fucked up 1980s Detroit behemoth car, and he insisted on listening to Shellac on repeat, and only dining at Denny’s.

The show was at this dump ironically called the “Palace Club”. It was in a strip mall, next to like a dry cleaners or something, I forget. There were four bands on the bill: BK, Team Dresch, and two incredibly shitty emo hardcore extremely damaged groups that I forget, though I vividly remember wanting to throw up while they were playing. Then Team Dresch came on, presented a “Free to Fight” self-defense course (most of which is a blur, though I do recall one of the scenarios featuring an assailant that was screaming “I’ll teach you to love Jesus!”), then threw down with a ferocity that I’d never seen before. BK then played, and I’ll spare you a bunch of florid nonsense and just say that they were and are the best group I’ve ever seen in concert, and it was worth every bit of hassle I had to go through when I got home and found out the cops were looking for me and I was no longer welcome in my parents’ home. I remember that they played a lotta songs from “Pussy Whipped” they were wearing these matching red jackets before the show, ‘cept for Bill who was wearing like a trench coat maybe? I always wondered what it was like to see the Misfits or Minor Threat or the Pretty Things in 1964 but I think that actually it was probably that good, you know? I went back to Michigan, stayed in trouble, and never ever forgot what that feeling was like. The end.

Girl Power: The Nineties Revolution in Music by Marisa Meltzer

Girl Power traces the influence of OG "riot grrl" groups (Bikini Kill, Bratmobile, Heavens To Betsy) to the Spice Girls, covering "foxcore", Sleater-Kinney, Le Tigre and Ladyfest as well as several other pop stars and other all-female alternative/indie rock groups along the way.

The book is written for a mainstream audience and suffers from some of the awkwardness that comes along with trying to explain this stuff to the general public. Marisa comes across as a former indie-rocker who felt she didn't really fit into the punk scene, yet was invigorated by the feminism (and celebration of girlhood) that happened during riot grrl. This makes sense, as she admits she found out about the movement through Sassy (her previous book is a love letter to the pro-girl teen magazine) She argues that riot grrl's "media blackout" led to its demise and wishes that the original groups would have stuck around and tried to find a larger audience. Describing an experience of seeing Sleater-Kinney play to 13,000 people, she recalls wishing that riot grrl had been able to sustain itself. Paradoxically, she acknowledges that, while the Spice Girls were cool in some ways, their "girl power" was limited to marketing and questions what that means in terms of empowerment. Quoting Kathleen Hanna, she points out that buying a Spice Girls notebook is not going to change the world. This makes me wonder what would be different if it had been Bikini Kill notebooks the girls were buying.

I knew Marisa around 96/7 when she lived in Olympia and had a cute all-girl accapella group called The Skirts. In the interest of "full disclosure"--I was a big Skirts fan and she was my favorite member! It was a weird time period. It was interesting to read her take on things as someone who admits (somewhat reluctantly) that she moved here to go to Evergreen after getting into riot grrl and even "semi-stalking" Kathleen. I wish she would have told more of her own story here. Her voice comes through loud and clear when she is critiquing what she calls the elitism of independent culture. She belongs to the camp that believes that it's exclusive to play basement shows, failing to see how this can be a more inclusive model. By booking our own tours and creating a DIY feminist network through the mail, Bikini Kill encouraged girls to meet each other and start their own scene. Sure a "scene" can be clique-ish and Olympia was/is no exception, but the idea we were were working with is that if we can do it here, certainly you can do it where you live. Only a few bands can get on MTV or sign to a major label. It's far more populist to encourage kids to put on shows where they live and take their own work and friends seriously. To her credit she does acknowledge that Ladyfest was a successful attempt to take this idea to another level.

I was interviewed (via email) for the book and am quoted a lot, which is kind of embarrassing, as I don't think what I'm trying to say really comes through, which is partially my fault, not thinking about who the audience for the book would be and just neurotically rambling on to her about how strange it is to have been a part of something that had such a big cultural impact. I remember telling her how weird and hard to talk about a lot of this is for me without going into a lot of detail. I tried to explain my perspective. On the one hand you want to take credit for your work, especially because women are encouraged NOT to take credit for anything. On the other hand, it's embarrassing. Sometimes I feel like I'm lying when I talk about this stuff because what actually happened is so surreal and bizarre that I often have a hard time believing it myself.

Personal weirdness aside, I think it's cool that someone wrote this book for a mainstream audience. My hope is that teenage girls and young women who don't know this history will get inspired to find out about riot grrl. It would be really cool if it inspired girls to create a new young feminist movement rooted in their generation.

The book made me think a lot about documenting history from a strategic perspective. How could this story be told to incite participation in girls? A big part of the original "girl power" idea, was to get girls to stop being consumers of male-dominated culture and start producing our own. I guess my fear is that this kind of pop-culture history could encourage girls to simply consume "girl-culture", thereby claiming the identity of "riot grrl" or "feminism" through the act of buying a record, as opposed to starting their own band or fanzine or putting on a show. To me the point is to encourage girls to start their own young feminist movement, not just to copy what we did. That is the danger of nostalgia I think...

So I'd be interested to hear what people think about this. How can we tell our story without feeding into this consumer-oriented nostalgic trap? Or is that inevitable?

Single Bullets