Riot Grrrl 1

Trawling the depths of my computer, I found another couple of documents of interest.

This time, they relate to a series of interviews I did with Julia Downes for her PhD thesis on DIY Queer Feminist (Sub)cultural Resistance in the UK (University of Leeds, September 2009). I've never really gone on record about any of this stuff before - but I trusted Julia, because I liked her contribution to the Riot Grrrl: Revolution Girl Style Now! book, published by Black Dog. So I answered at far greater length than I'm sure she required. Anyhow, Julia has kindly given me permission to reprint my answers - the first part of which is below...

(P.S. The hand lettering on the MM cover reprinted above was actually done by me - meant to indicate a 'fanzine' style of design. The effect is somewhat lessened by the addition of Ned's Atomic Dustbin and Right Said Fred as drop-ins. Perhaps my pal from Archived Music Press could add this issue to my increasingly lengthy list of reprint requests for his site?)

1.  How did you hear about riot grrrl?
"Oh jeez. So long ago. I used to travel to Olympia whenever Sub Pop flew me out to Seattle – it was one of my great, secret pleasures: turn up there, sleep on Calvin Johnson’s floor at The Martin (first time I visited there, I even recorded a single with Calvin and Tobi Vail in the garage at Tobi’s parents’ house), berate him for the Screwdriver poster on his wall, drink hot chocolate and go to all-night dance parties, and delight in the fact alcohol didn’t seem to exist in Olympia. How little I knew! My early friends there were Nikki McLure, Calvin, Lois Maffeo and Tae from Kicking Giant. I delighted in visiting the K warehouse – which was in a tiny apartment above a garage shop or something right near the Capitol Theatre – and avariciously buying up every last cassette and fanzine and seven-inch single Calvin was distributing, on Melody Maker expenses.
I can’t actually recall buying the Bikini Kill cassette and fanzine on one of those visits, but I certainly did. I think it was actually before I moved in with Jon and Jo (became their landlord) in Brighton, start of ’92. My timing is all weird over these years, so who knows? Tobi has a better memory of these times, I think: I’m fairly sure I didn’t buy two copies, but I may have done – cos Jon and Jo were kinda my long-standing best friends (I’d known them since they were 15/16) and I knew they’d like it. I certainly would have played it to them. I knew I liked it – and it certainly fitted in with my whole Pacific Northwest focus I was going through at the time.
Riot Grrrl would’ve been used as a phrase in the fanzine I picked up... but wait, earlier than that, I was corresponding with Donna Dresch about her using an article I was writing about alcoholism for her queercore fanzine Chainsaw (it never got used, much to my chagrin – I always suspected it was because I was by then part of the ‘mainstream’ media). And that was one of the early inspirations behind the early Riot Grrrls.
When did that Bikini Kill tape come out? Was it before or after the IPU?
I’ve read that Courtney Love passed it along to me and to Huggy Bear, and that’s not true. She was an initial enthusiastic and loud champion (also a primary influence for Kathy from Bikini Kill) while she still thought there might be something in it for her (it was also a way of gaining Kurt’s approval) but she dropped it pretty fast... and I can’t help feeling she gained almost all her information about Riot Grrrl early on via me (certainly not vice versa). It was via Calvin I discovered Bikini Kill (for many, Beat Happening were absolutely one of my favourite bands ever at the time), but I already had encountered many of the initial prime movers.
Unlike grunge – which was a term I unwittingly popularised via my writing in Melody Maker – Riot Grrrl came fully-formed (so it seemed to me) and thought out. By the time Jon and Jo had moved in with me in Brighton - start of ’92 – me and Jo were having all-night conversations about feminist language and doctrine and behavior. Before Huggy Bear discovered Bikini Kill I think they were out-and-out cutie. It would have made sense they were, knowing my friends’ musical preferences. Encountering Tobi, Kathy and Kathleen’s writing and songs politicised them.
And let’s not forget the influence of Sonic Youth...

You can find Part 2 of this series here.
You can find Part 3 of this series here.
You can find Part 4 of this series here.
You can find Part 5 of this series here.
You can find Part 6 of this series here.
You can find Part 7 of this series here.
You can find the follow-up interview in this series here.
You can find the entire series collected together here.