from "Constructing Communities and Identities: Riot Grrrl New York City." by Theo Cateforis and Elena Humphreys, pg. 395-418
In The Music of Multicultural America

Edited by Kip Lornell and Anne K. Rasmussen

 

c. 1993, New York City. Double Zero. Emma Johnson, Jill Reiter, Halle Winkler, and Debbie Wolfensohn.

On the surface, this recording sounds similar to countless other punk rock songs, characterized by its distorted guitars, raspy, shouted vocals, and streamlined punk production values. Listen to the singer's adoption of caricatured macho hard rock lyrics - e.g. "out here it's all about dope and drugs, and four wheel drive, and meat" - however, and you can hear how the band exposes and satirizes the gendered language and posturing endemic to the traditional male rock idiom. Such gender masquerading resonates especially with the sizable queer audience following that Riot Grrrl attracted.

A hand drawn poster for the band Riot Grrrl showing three women writing a wall on a wall at night.
Playing with gendered imagery: a Riot Grrrl NYC poster for a Double Zero performance at the New York City club Brownies. Photo by Elena Humphreys.