Girls to the Front: The True Story of the Riot Grrrl Revolution

admin — Tue, 28 Sep 2010 02:00:00 +0000

First, an admission: like several feminist friends in my age group, riot grrrl didn’t make a profound impact of me until college. I was ten in 1993, the year Sara Marcus claims as pivotal for the movement in her book Girls to the Front. I was moving away from Mariah Carey and getting into the Pet Shop Boys. Riot grrrl was first on my radar through mainstream distortion in the pages of Spin and in the Spice Girls’ defanged “girl power” message. Marcus’s book is a great reintroduction and a valuable entry point for folks who have only a cursory knowledge of riot grrrl.

I especially appreciate that, despite the book’s monolithic title, Marcus incorporates the shared experiences of many girl participants. Riot grrrl tends to be defined by its adult-aged bands, with Bikini Kill and Bratmobile representing the movement. But many teenage girls were inspired by these bands. Some formed ‘zines and bands of their own, like Girl Friend founder Christina Woolner and Heavens to Betsy’s Tracy Sawyer and Corin Tucker. Not all of their contributions were preserved or recorded, so the book’s intervention is all the more important.

Some of these girls also came from working class or single-parent households or did not attend college. Furthermore, while much is made of the movement’s Pacific Northwest origins and identification with liberal arts colleges like Evergreen, Marcus is quick to refute essentializing class assumptions. Riot grrrl’s class heterogeneity becomes more pronounced when Bikini Kill and Bratmobile relocate in Washington D.C. and contend with the hardcore scene, which was primarily peopled by diplomats’ children.

Marcus challenges the notion that riot grrrl was sustained exclusively by white, middle-class, college-educated women. She also points out the movement’s aspirations toward queer inclusiveness were complicated by the efforts of predominantly straight or bi-curious cisgender females. Previous interpretations of riot grrrl represent it as a celebration of white girls challenging gender politics in a vacuum. Marcus points out how some girls created ‘zines, formed organizations, chaired panels, and created conferences challenging feminism’s inherent white privilege, racism, heteronormativity, and class politics, often causing contention and defensiveness from within.

Thus, I also liked reading that riot grrrl was an imperfect, discursive movement comprised of many conflicting opinions, belief systems, and identities. Despite third wave feminism’s investment in the fragmented female self, so often riot grrrl is depicted as a halcyon period for a then-nascent third wave. While it’s sad to read about in-fighting and rivalries, it’s refreshing to read differing opinions on philosophies and movement imperatives. As someone who’s participated in collective and politically-minded non-profit organizations, it seems a more honest representation.

Furthermore, the presence of male oppression from within informs riot grrrl in interesting ways. Riot grrrl formed in response to the right wing’s attack on feminism’s political gains as well as the cultural silencing of incest, sexual abuse, intimate partner violence, poor body image, and low self-esteem. It also opposed punk and hardcore’s exclusionary, homophobic, and misogynistic tendencies, best symbolized by the mosh pit, and implemented “girls in front” or “girls only” policies at shows. So it was really interesting to read about how bands like Fugazi aligned with riot grrrl, but were less willing to cede control over their audience.

In 1992, Fugazi and Bikini Kill played a Supreme Court protest. Frontman Ian MacKaye bristled at the idea of sharing the bill out of concern that the event would be misunderstood as a concert. He was also unable to reign in the aggressive inclinations of his predominantly white male fan base, and blamed the women in the audience who defended their space in the pit.

Marcus does something valuable with Girls to the Front. In representing riot grrrl’s imperfections and contradictions, as well as its relevance, she argues at once for its historical significance while challenging how we understand it. Make sure to check it out. Maybe it’ll convince you form a band with your best girlfriend and kick off a new revolution.

Cross posted from Feminist Music Geek

Written by: Alyx Vesey, September 27th 2010

The Truth About Delilah Blue

admin — Sun, 16 May 2010 08:00:00 +0000

By Tish Cohen

Harper Perennial

After first reading The Truth About Delilah Blue's jacket blurb, it struck me as a beach book. It turned out I was only slightly incorrect; it's an airplane book, most satisfying when you really have nothing else to do and nowhere else to go.

Delilah, also known as Lila, is working as a nude model in an attempt to absorb the art education she cannot afford. Her father, a successful salesman who has long been the center of her world, now seems to be having trouble navigating the world on his own. It is at this point that Lila's long-lost mother reenters the scene, bringing a little sister and a family secret, both of which cause Lila to reexamine her viewpoint and direction in life.

The story’s center is a question: how do you solve a mystery that explains your entire life when one parent is too self-absorbed to recognize her part in the story, and the other parent is losing the part of his mind that remembers? Is it more important to go back or to go forward?

The Truth About Delilah Blue is well written, with an almost soothing narrative voice and descriptive prose that allows one to forgive the formulaic plot. Recipe for a summer’s read: Mix one plucky heroine with a family crisis, add a plot twist that no one will expect, sprinkle in a few quirky extras, and let combine for a hundred pages or so, more or less according to taste. Our heroine conquers her issues, shows them all, and lands the hot boyfriend just as she should, and voila, everybody’s fine. The story would have been sufficiently likable if it hadn’t tried to be more than it is, but unfortunately that’s not the case here. This book appears to be convinced it is a novel, not just a shortcut to a screenplay, but we have too many loose story threads, too many characters that enter with detail but drift off without explanation. Many concepts are touched on but none are done justice, from the pain of abandoned children to the sadness of a parent with Alzheimer’s and the anger at a parent that just won’t grow up. Any of these could have made for a successful story, several or all of them together if handled correctly and with enough detail. Unfortunately, Cohen sprinkles in only a little of each, and just ends up with soup.

The book is slow to start, and is most interesting in the middle third. The ending really isn’t one; only the father’s character sees resolution, while the others are left adrift in a sea of what ifs. Lila makes plans to be the one to gather up and hold together the loose ends of her family, and you expect to see how she manages the feat. Instead, the story just stops.

The Truth About Delilah Blue is enjoyable if you enter with little in the way of expectation. It’s just the thing to pick up before your next flight.

Written by: Melissa Ruiz, May 16th 2010