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© St. Petersburg Times, published February 27, 2002
TAMPA -- Just because the headliners canceled doesn't mean there can't still be a party.
That seemed to be the sentiment Monday of 125 alt-rockers at the Orpheum in Ybor City. Le Tigre, the night's main act, canceled earlier that day, crushing local music lovers' dreams of experiencing one of today's most important political and artistic acts.
Le Tigre's lead singer, Kathleen Hanna, is a legend in modern punk. She fronted for eight years the incendiary, feminist Bikini Kill and kick started from tiny Olympia, Wash., the Riot Grrrl movement, a worldwide -- yes, in fact, it was -- grass roots feminist collective that included all-girl bands, 'zines and community activist groups.
Hanna's shoes are tough to fill.
When the Butchies, the second-tier act on the bill, became the first, members of the North Carolina trio acknowledged their fright.
"Are we enough tonight?" asked drummer Melissa York. "I was afraid there was going to be a riot, like the Who wasn't playing or something."
York needn't have worried. Though the Butchies, a self-described "lesbo-core" punk act specializing in love songs to ladies powered by big guitar crunch, may not be everyone's cup of tea, they quickly wooed the mostly female crowd, some of whom brought along boyfriends.
The Butchies' live show is as striking as the band's appearance. All three ladies wore their hair short; African-American bassist Alison Martlew has just stubble on her skull. York wears black Clark Kent frames. Singer-guitarist Kaia Wilson has grown out her blue hair and now sports bleached-blond locks with long dark roots.
Their songs are filled with merriment, celebrating their love of Gertrude Stein, Ellen DeGeneres and all of what they call "queer" culture. Yes, the Butchies live stridently outside of any closet. They are part of a nationwide "queercore" punk movement that also includes San Francisco's Tribe 8 and Pansy Division. The trio doesn't just joke around; it's adamant about causes, demanding communities create safe spaces for "queer youth."
The Butchies' pride and power charmed the audience, whose members bounced along to songs many hadn't heard before. The act won converts with its cheeky nods to the bad boys of hard rock: Wilson and Martlew posed with guitar necks touching, Wilson dished an occasional Pete Townshend windmill, York stood crisscrossing her drumsticks above her head like Peter Criss of Kiss. They even slipped into a spontaneous, sloppy cover of Yes' Owner of a Lonely Heart.
Wilson, formerly of Team Dresch, another popular all-lesbian punk band of the early 1990s, sings like an angel, all the while her hands furiously running over the neck of her Gibson. She and Martlew brightly harmonized on several songs. "If you want it, you've got it" Wilson purred on Forget Your Calculus.
The crowd, so hyped up on passionate rock, feminist ideals and a girl power unlike that offered by the Spice Girls, did want it. Fans missed seeing Hanna, their punk rock patron saint, but the Butchies were here, are queer, and that was fine with them.
-- To contact Gina Vivinetto, e-mail gina@sptimes.com