I stumbled upon an old Bikini Kill video the other day. They were performing live outside some state
capitol building. If they weren’t
dressed in 1990’s clothing, I would have guessed by the musical style that it
was a recording from 1979. Was this a
band that had been playing these songs for a dozen years? No, they were too
young to have played back when so many other bands played this same style. So why did this band gain the attention that
they did? This version of stripped down,
repetitive, less musically inclined style of music has been done so many times
before.
So I took a look at the lyrics. Maybe that’s where I would find the lure of
this band. Yep, that’s where the band hits a nerve. They speak of being a
strong woman, being yourself, feminism, and so much more. They might have
sounded like old school punk rockers, but their lyrics were “new school.”
Bikini Kill’s second album contains the song Alien She. The words that ring out in that song speak of
someone who is two women. One is pulled
towards the stereotypical way “girls” are supposed to be. The other tries to
understand that other side. What I pull from that song is that it’s about someone
who struggles to be herself. Someone is
trying to understand why they think the way that they do.
The band wrote more focused lyrics as they gained a better knowledge of song writing. Take the song Double Dare
Ya. The song challenges women to speak
out, to fight for their rights, to stand up for themselves. The song Feels
Blind starts off slow, and almost melodic.
Is it an anthem? It could be. It has one great line, but the words
leading up to it are very important. “As a woman I was taught to always be
hungry. Women are well acquainted with thirst. Yeah, we could eat just about
anything. We'd even eat your hate up like love.”
Give Bikini Kill a try.
You might enjoy the mix of old school punk music set to lyrics that are
so important, even 23 years after they first came out. Keep in mind that the members of the band
went on to work on women’s rights. That’s
more punk rock than so many other musicians who talked the talk, but never
walked the walk.
My last band was led by one person.She named the band after herself. She did all the promotion, the booking, and
the hard work that it takes to get people in the bar. Sure, the other members
of the band had to play well enough to keep people from leaving, but she had no
problem with replacing you if you couldn’t make a show. As I recall, she went
through some 19 bass players over ten years. One of them was nick-named “T3”
because he was the third bass player that was named Tom.Not just the third guy in the band named Tom,
but the third bass player named Tom.
When you joined her band, you were welcome to play the hell
out of your instrument, but you weren’t allowed to bring your own songs into
the band.On more than one occasion, I
heard her say to other members “That’s a great song you just showed us.Now go and start your own band if you feel
like playing it.This is my band.” What’s
funny is that I heard her say that at least three times over the years.It was somewhat amusing; because she would let
the musician play the entire song first, then give her speech.She didn’t bother telling new members in
advance that they weren’t allowed to write their own material. If you didn’t
like what she had put together you were free to leave. On the other hand, we were free to add whatever
we liked to the songs that she wrote.In
fact, she felt that I never over played my drums on her songs. If she had it
her way, I would be going ape behind the kit on every number.
Hitting The Road As A Hired Hand
In 1998, a band that hired me for a tour gave me their
disks, told me to learn the music, and instructed me on just where I could add
my own creative ideas. (See photo above.) There weren’t
many spaces for me to break out on my own musically, but I knew what I was
getting into.When those moments in the
song came up, I took full advantage of the opportunity. No, it wasn’t very much
fun playing those somewhat rudimentary drum parts that someone else had
written, night after night, city after city. But I was the hired help.That was my job. What was my incentive? Getting paid a per diem, part of the net profits, and getting a cut of the merchandise. There had to be a guarantee for me. After all, I was the hired help. I wasn't going to see any profits from record sales. I would receive no income from royalties. The drummer who made the album, the guy sitting back at home was getting paid for my hard work. The more shows we played, the more disks we sold, the more money he made. At the very least, I knew what base rate I was guaranteed, before I got on the plane for Europe.
By the end of that tour, we were all pretty sick of each other. It was nothing personal, you just can't look at the same faces day after day without feeling like you need to get away from it all. The combination of being cooped up together
for weeks at a time, and playing the same songs every night made for a
long tour. It didn’t affect my performances, but it certainly kept me from
going “all in” with that group. Perhaps it was the sleep deprivation, but I lost my mind on that tour.I met up
with some friends in Amsterdam just after the tour ended. One of them told me
the only way I was truly going to be happy was when I started my own band. I knew that I wasn't "band leader" material, but it was a nice compliment.
What
I miss when I join groups like that is the feeling that I was part of something
creative.I came along after these bands
had already built up a following.It
didn’t matter if I received a compliment, or praise.Those bands would go on without me.I had to understand that.
I was called back for a second tour, and took the job. They
kept me on as a regular member, and that’s when things started to change,
albeit slowly. It took another year for the band to start listening to my
ideas, and allow me to be part of the creative process. By year number three,
we had written an entire album’s worth of material. The record label wasn’t
interested in keeping us on, so we had to decide whether to shop our sound
around, or go it alone, or break up. The band called it quits, or at least that’s
what I did. I quit, and the rest of the
band took a long break.Two years later
they resurfaced with their old drummer, but those songs that I helped to write
stayed with the band.In fact, they went
on to record those songs with their original drummer.It’s very hard for me to listen to that
recording.With all due respect, that
drummer was not interested in playing what I had written. I found out later
that he couldn’t replicate my style. It was too different. After being in a
band for three years, then leaving, it’s an odd experience to then go and watch
that band play live. I didn’t feel comfortable with going back stage to say
hello.
It’s so different when you aren’t behind the drums.As an audience member, I was more forgiving of
their mistakes.It made me wonder if I
was too uptight when I was in the group. Those little miscues were actually
enjoyable. They looked like tiny mistakes when I wasn’t playing, but huge
mistakes when I was part of the band. I learned that I should let those little
things go. As for now, I don’t know if I would ever go back to being a hired
hand in a band, unless the reward was significant.
