Monday, November 28, 2011

Ironically, the exhortation 'riot, girls!' is one of the challenges Iggy threw at a crazed audience during the gig documented on the Stooges' live album Metallic K.O. A comparison between Bikini Kill and the Stooges reveals some of the differences between male and female rebellion. Iggy turned self-mutilation and reciprocal abuse between audience and singer into grisly theatre; Bikini Kill sing about unsolicited, real-life abuse over which they have no control. Iggy, following Jim Morrison, envisioned incest as the ultimate symbol of transgression/transcendence in his Oedipal fantasy 'Sister Midnight'; for the Riot Grrrls, incest isn't a metaphor but an omnipresent threat. It haunts their imagination as a symbol of patriarchal domination.

Simon Reynolds + Joy Press: The Sex Revolts. Gender, Rebellion and Rock 'n' Roll (1995)