Bikini Kill - C or D?

come to think of it, BK's singles compilation is probably my favorite punk rock of the '90s. I'd certainly rather listen to it now than Nevermind.

however, i'm pretty sure the singer from the gossip lives in my apartment complex, so that's good enough for me.

(i stand by that.)

crikey! what's the matter with you, I would've made my move earlier...as far as the q is concerned I haven't heard them.

regarding Thurston Hearts The Who - I love that thing, actually. the built up noise/rant, breaks down completely with kathleen hanna moaning the lyrics in the background while tobi finishes... whatever the fuck she's reciting, everyone starts screaming, the instruments all jump and the percussion starts to fold in on itself...

it's an absolutely beautiful and meaningless moment.

Besides, Huggy Bear were WAAAAAYYYYYYYY better.

You're not alone -- I'm in total agreeement there.

You've obviously never been to the west coast u.s., then...

I take it you've never been to a Ladyfest. Any of the 40,000 of them.

I find Riot Grrl - philosophically - far too simplistic for the issues that they claim to address. And my whiny freshly lesbian 20 year old tolerance is pretty low. Musically - it just does not do it for me.

I think that the movement STARTED with some pretty interesting ideas and concepts (Suzy has a collection of inspiring zines and things from a decade ago) but got completely derailed.

Anyway, we've had the Riot Grrl: Classic Or Dud discussion before, I seem to remember.

The Gossip should change their name to The Thieves. Jess keep a real good eye on your stuff. Don't ever invite them over to listen to records.

"Feels Blind" from the "Revolution Girl Style Now" debut cassette is one of those few songs that truly "changed my life," and seeing them live was one of the few concerts that did the same. I liked Huggy Bear's "Her Jazz" and a few other tunes, but there's just no comparison. BK's music was unique (girl-group meets Iggy surf meets soul), their politics were new, their confrontational stance was classic.

They has sex, controversy, cred, a real "movement," good records/CDs/tapes. I think there's one absolutely classic compilation to be made of all their stuff but riot grrrls apparently don't believe in box sets.

this is probably a matter for another thread, though.

I like Bikini Kill, although I like Le Tigre more; I think 'Hot Topic' might not do much to develop the argument that we need to re-evaluate our cultural output from an outlook with less of a masculine bias, but that doesn't make it any less catchy.

YES. IT. FUCKING. IS.

For exactly the reasons that that Thom described in his posts above and more.

(overgeneralisation alert!) 90% of the "riot grrls" that I have met have been 20 year old girls freshly politicised by college with little to no experience of real life sexism and real life dilemmas. Their philosophies are as simplistic as their experiences, black and white, clear cut and as dogmatic and inflexible as this post is probably sounding.

Yes, I've met exceptions to this rule. But...

the movement is as varied as the women/men who participate.

Yup. That says it right there. College age, white, suburban, middle-class and freshly politicised. REALLY varied movement, Riot Grrl is.

I can discuss the music of AC/DC without discussing their overwhelming sexism. I can't discuss BK without discussing their feminism. Why?

I don't have anything AGAINST political bands, I mean, more power to them for addressing something non-ephemeral. But when the politics overpowers and becomes more important than the CHOONS, then I think that there's something wrong there.

Riot grrl as a MUSICAL movement is as outdated as Grunge or Crusty or anything else that was floating around concurrently.

*YOUR* answer is so typical of every riot grrl I've ever met. As soon as I make valid critcisms, riot grrls shrug and refuse to discuss the issue rationally, as dogmatic as all born agains.

That is one of the fundamental problems that I have with riot grrl, is their and/or the press's wish to dismiss ALL female rockers as being part of a tiny subculture. That is marginalisation, and that is wrong.

That's as insulting and dismissing as say all black musicians = rap. It's just not true.

Do you consider yourself a Riot Grrl, Di? That's a serious question.

To clarify matters, I am NOT one, yet the moment I start shooting my mouth off about feminism, I get dismissed as one by the mainstream. Yet to "real" Riot Grrls, I bear about as much relation to one as a liberal does to a Marxist. (Maybe that is part of why I dislike the movement... nah. It's just insult to injury.)

do you think all punk music is outdated, kate?

Yes. I think most punk music IS outdated. (Most ROCK in general is outdated, but that doesn't stop me from playing it.) Punk was a reaction to certain socio-economic constraints and cultural mores. To play punk in 1970s UK or late 80s/early 90s US was a revolutionary political and musical statement.

Now it stinks of retrofetishism. Don't play your grandparent's music as a form of rebellion against your parents.

yes i do consider myself a riot grrrl, although i often make music that doesn't fit into the olympia-style format. and i also believe punk is important too, though obviously not in its neo fake blink 182 form. if it weren't for punk and riot grrrl i would never have picked up a guitar. everyone has to start somewhere, right? i don't subscribe to the idea that everyone has to be a master at their instrument before they can make interesting original music. but i also don't believe that people should stick to formulas either.

and i believe thats one of the reasons why the riot grrrls did the whole press blackout thing

If they'd stuck to the original press blackout thing, fair enough. But these days... having been part of a rugby style pile-on of neo-riot grrls stabbing each other in the back to get access to The Mainstream Press, well, it makes one a bit cynical.

Maybe my problem was that I was too OLD for riot grrl. My first exposure to women in music was NOT riot grrl, I had already been in a band for a couple of years when it exploded. So it seemed simplistic and overstating the obvious, to me.

I think that the original Riot Grrls knew that from its inception, the movement was going to be misunderstood and misinterpreted, but my understanding was that, the British version at least, (which I have slightly more respect for than their American cousins) was BUILT with an expectation that it would explode and end, like situationism, like dada. Hence why I get so irritated when people are still at it 10 years later, like don't you UNDERSTAND the point? The Riot Grrls I have the most respect for are the ones who grew up and took their political and feminist ideals out into the world, instead of just staying in this treehouse club.

if it weren't for punk and riot grrrl i would never have picked up a guitar. everyone has to start somewhere, right?

Fair enough. If it wasn't for the Shop Assistants and Sonic Youth, I'd probably have never picked up a guitar. I don't believe everyone has to be a prodigy to start a band, but I do believe that you should aspire to aquire some technical skills as you go on. (Kathleen Hannah still has to have Amy Ray change her guitar strings for her onstage! sheesh!)

All musical movements stultify and stagnate as they mature, and become reduced to formulae. It's happened to punk, too.

When music as an artform becomes secondary to philosophy or politics, that's where I get off. I dislike that in all artforms, be it punk rock or conceptual art.

One of the many reasons I love the woman.

(Why is it every time I type CL, I want to type CTCL, much like I can't type Blue without automatically typing Blur?)

My god, three posts in a row, I'm turning into Doomie! Help!

but I do believe that you should aspire to aquire some technical skills as you go on
i wholeheartedly agree with this. thats what i meant regarding people not sticking to formulas.

https://news.avclub.com/bikini-kill-reunites-for-shows-in-los-angeles-brooklyn-1831778445

Could they have, I dunno, waited a year or done some sort of benefit show before advancing directly to "American Express Presale"

Waited a year for what?

been a band again for a year before selling out so grossly, I assume

playing three shows = selling out? what am I missing

the last three words in ET’s post?

Amex presale? Ok...

FWIW, Hanna played “some kind of benefit show” just last week:

So thrilled to be playing a few songs at this Planned Parenthood Benefit! pic.twitter.com/ycPHrqUvn3

— Kathleen Hanna (@kathleenhanna) January 8, 2019

I got a ticket. I am beside myself. I saw LT twice but never got to see BK. This is huge for me and apparently the NY shows sold out in 2 mins. I am so fucking excited.

I don’t give a shit if this is considered selling out or whatever you’re all implying above. This has been a dream of mine for 25 years. Ahhhh.

👍👍 (the L.A. show apparently sold out instantly, too)

I saw! That has to be boys buying loads of tickets for scalpers right? It’s crazy and I almost feel bad that I got one when so many ppl didn’t but also I can’t fucking wait. People are asking KH to add more shows or identify the bots and release those tickets so maybe that will happen.

i managed to get tickets for the first LA show, but it felt like a miracle. there has to be a better way to do this.

from former ilxor Nate C via FB:

"Didn't get a Bikini Kill ticket? Let me tell you something:

Booking psychology 101:

1) Announce major reunion at a single festival, or a "tour" comprised of only NYC and LA.

2) Sell it out in seconds. Create market place panic.

3) Once the first show(s) are completed, announce full US tour the very next morning, also in venues slightly too small for the act."

I would expect it to be more like Jawbreaker, not a regular tour run but flying in to big shows around the country. I think the Austin crowd where I saw them was like 7k people outdoors and it wasn't a sellout.

Could they have, I dunno, waited a year or done some sort of benefit show before advancing directly to "American Express Presale"

half of me wants to grouse about how the death of physical media, as advertised, has meant that almost nobody can afford to be pure about this kind of thing any more. the other half is the half that will never ever have any "American Express presale." that is unless it turns out Amex actually pays cash money for the privilege because these medical bills etc do not pay themselves

I just realized a typo in my last post - meant bots not boys obv. I’m sad about this whole thing because I keep seeing people post about being sad they weren’t able to get tickets. I do hope they add shows or fix it some other way.

It does feel very against the whole spirit of the band etc.

But i still can’t believe I’m actually going to get to experience them. Gah.

i have no personal stake in this but i will note that the situation has caused my brother to lose the last shreds of his faith in humanity

I tell every woman that is waffling about asking for the most money possible in any situation. GET YOUR MONEY. GET YOUR MONEY. GET YOUR MONEY.

I don't care if people think we are spending all our money on purses. No one else is going to watch out for us besides ourselves.

I am hoping they add more shows in NYC.

Not in Terminal 5. That place sucks.

It was the only one I could get a ticket for. They could play in a dumpster though and I’d still go. Is it really that bad?

I still don’t get the issue with an American Express presale. Do true punks only carry the Discover card or something?

Oh it's fine. It's just really out of the way and the staff seems disorganized. It gets suuuuuper crowded in there. The last show I saw there was PJ Harvey and everyone was on top of each other.

It's a weird venue. I don't know what it is about it. I went with ian once to a show there and we timed it poorly and missed Dinosaur Jr and totally left before sonic youth because the place was sucking so bad.

I think Bowery Presents has a partnership with amex.

That’s the other thing — I assume these venues are partnered with agencies who do that, the band probably has no say? (tho I’m not in the biz.) Isn’t that just modern life for most venues larger than small clubs?

I still don’t get the issue with an American Express presale. Do true punks only carry the Discover card or something?

you honestly don't get a disconnect with an ideological punk band deliberately taking steps to make their tickets hard for punters to buy while facilitating both exploitative financial institutions and scalpers?

I don’t know a ton about the band, but I thought they were known for feminism, not being anti–credit card.

I also don’t see how a presale enables “scalpers”; if anything, it probably prevents scalping, no(?) But as I pointed out above, I they also probably don’t have control over whether these venues offer presales for their show. Maybe I’m wrong there.

Finally, I assume many of their fans are, like the band, people in their 40s rather than “punters.” Even if you see credit cards as somehow fundamentally “exploitative,” do you really think most ppl buying tickets online don’t already have one (even if not Amex)? Is your take that this particular band is “selling out” if they’re not playing small venues that sell tickets for ca$h only?

BK were vocally anti-capitalist

"I'm not / your bulletproof vest or your VI SA CA HAARD"

Ok, then I guess it’s NOMB if fans who are big on that ideological aspect want to consider them sellouts.

Finally, I assume many of their fans are, like the band, people in their 40s rather than “punters.”

If your argument is that actual fans of the band would not go to see them live because they are in their 40s, and therefore scalpers and youthful randos may as well have all the tickets, I can see why you're nonplussed!

do you really think most ppl buying tickets online don’t already have one (even if not Amex)?

hmmm

Is your take that this particular band is “selling out” if they’re not playing small venues that sell tickets for ca$h only?

I don't have a hardline take on that, I was volunteering to take a stab at interpreting ET's take

i think the part that's annoying most of my friends is they all sold out in some kind of mysterious amex-exclusive "presale" before the 12 noon on friday that i was waiting for

Well not all of them - I do not have an Amex and did not get it in the pre-sale. I was on at 12 and after two tries had a ticket by 12:02. I do understand from what I’ve read online that I got very very lucky and that most ppl were unable to get any.

If your argument is that actual fans of the band would not go to see them live because they are in their 40s,

xp My argument (or just assumption) was actually that most core fans of this band are at an age where they are as likely to have/use credit cards as fans of any other band from the ‘90s (even if they’re aging punks). It’s not like this is a young band that was playing all-ages house parties last week, and suddenly jumped to the big leagues. But if BK fans are more likely to be anticapitalist, than I am wrong there.

Obviously it suxx to be left out of an Amex presale if you don’t have a Amex card; that’s true for any band/show. My guess is that real ppl are buying that particular tranche of tix rather than scalpers, but that’s just a guess. I don’t know how to solve the bot/scalper problem, obviously limiting tix to ppl with particular cards isn’t a good way.

My guess is that real ppl are buying that particular tranche of tix rather than scalpers,

$900 on StubHub

Are those definitely the presale tix tho?

(What I strictly meant was that I assume at least scalper bots can’t do the presale thing — maybe I’m even wrong about that — but it does stink if regular ppl are buying and flipping them.)

not for nothin but while tix to that show are definitely, most obviously being scalped, most of them are in the under $200 range. any in the $700 - $900 are probably the same types of people who put tickets up for sale to non-sold out shows for ridiculous amounts, either as a placeholder, or some other weird reason. they never sell.

still tho...Terminal 5 show going for like $189 at the cheapest for a GA show.

Update from https://bikinikill.com

Hi everyone, we wanted to apologize to anyone who had a bad experience trying to get tickets to our upcoming shows. We weren’t aware of the pre-sale for people with a certain credit card in NY until it was too late and that will not happen in the future. Also as soon as we realized there were problems we tried to put as many obstacles in front of scalpers as we could and are trying to figure out a better solution going forward. Thanks for all the interest and support of these shows - it is beyond anything we expected and we are excited to play for you!

Bikini Kill has added 2 shows!
Thurs May 2, 2019
LA, CA @ Palladium All Ages.
7pm doors $39.50 https://t.co/DvXxvYrAps
LA on sale: Friday 1/25 Noon PT

Wed June 5, 2019
Brooklyn NY @ Kings Theatre
All Ages 7pmhttps://t.co/YZqVwHJBc8
NY tix on sale: Friday 1/25 Noon ET

— Kathleen Hanna (@kathleenhanna) January 23, 2019

Riot Grrrl pioneers Bikini Kill (Bikini Kill Records) will play a European exclusive show at O2 Academy Brixton on 10th June 2019! This will be the band’s first time in London in 23 years.

Tickets on sale Friday at 10am.

We went tonight - killer show. Erica Dawn Lyle slams as hard as Brian James or the Young brothers and uncovers a hidden glam rock/pop sensibility that was obviously there all along. The entire Palladium singing along to "Rebel Girl" was an earworm the scale of the Sweet. In the merch line after the show we got talking to two women who drove 1200mi from Monterrey, Mexico to LA for the show. They said that 17 years ago they taught themselves how to play music by singing along to BK songs.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6DXAIEEYZm0

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sMUQel9928M

Awesome. I am so so so excited to see them soon.

Okay, so if I only ever get one trip in a time machine, I will use it to travel to the early '90s so I can inform Kathleen Hanna that Billy Ray Cyrus's daughter is going to perform 'Rebel Girl' at the Super Bowl in thirty years.

FWIW, if you're in NYC and would like to go to tonight's show at Irving Plaza, there's a TON of ridiculously cheap tickets on Stubhub.

https://www.stubhub.com/bikini-kill-new-york-tickets-7-9-2022/event/105268869/

I grabbed one for "$11" an hour ago (wound up being $19 after fees) but asking prices have dropped further.

IIRC, StubHub stops selling concert tickets four hours before showtime, so you only have 20 minutes as of this posting.