Since I just reviewed the Lunachicks “Pretty Ugly” documentary, I decided I may as well get this interview up.
This was done sometime in 1999 while they were on tour for “Luxury Problem”. According to the internet, it was July 11th. I know for sure it was at the San Diego State Amphitheater. I want to say they were opening for the Go-Gos at this show. Either way, they gave me access to take photos of them during soundcheck and also a pass to take photos during their set. Which was a great thing, as I got my 2nd cover story ever for Flipside. I was so glad I could get it for the Lunachicks, because they are a great band. One of my favorites!
I remember seeing them on the Warped Tour later that year, after this interview came out. They had lots of copies of Flipside and were signing them at their table. I asked them what they thought of it and was a little disappointed when they said they didn’t like the pictures. I didn’t do the layout and this was back in the day when all you had were 2 rolls of film holding 24 pictures each, and you didn’t know what you were getting until 2 weeks later when you had the film developed. These days? I take hundreds of pictures and know that at least 3 of them have to come out great. lol. (That’s my secret). But I thought the interview and layout came out ok. I’ll post the soundcheck pictures and some pictures from the show in a future post.
This was my 2nd (or 3rd?) time interviewing them and I thought this one turned out pretty good, but knowing what I know now about interviewing people, I could’ve done a lot better these days.
Ted: How’s the tour been going?
Everyone: Great. Fun. Very cool. We love it. It’s really a blast.
Ted: What kind of people are showing up to the shows?
Gina: Weird middle aged people.
Theo: Overweight, not afraid to dance and wear socks and sandals.
Chip: A lot of walkers.
Squid: And also it’s like the people on the west coast, weird… you know? Like we’re not that used to… it’s still weird for us.
Ted: How do they respond to you?
Squid: They’ve been liking us.
Gina: They actually like us. I wasn’t expecting the response that we’ve been getting but we’ve been getting a really good response.
Chip: We probably win them over by the end.
Squid: Although they haven’t been spending enough money at the merch table, though.
Theo: How could you really go wrong? It’s like having a puppet show or a carnival side show. It’s daylight when we go on… [sings the trumpet part to “Jerk of All Trades”]
Squid: It’s so weird. It’s like an assault.
Theo: We make ’em laugh, we make ’em cry, we make ’em clap and ask for more.
Ted: So I take it you’re not getting a lot of guys on this tour yelling “Show us your tits!?
Theo: It hasn’t happened yet.
Gina: No we haven’t.
Squid: Theo got her ass grabbed, dude.
Theo: I went out in the crowd in LA and this guy grabbed my ass.
Ted: Did you hit him?
Theo: There were a couple of them [guys]. I didn’t see which one it was.
Squid: And you know, by the way, if you’re going to grab a girl’s ass, at least have the fuckin’ balls to take credit for it.
Theo: And it wasn’t a real grab either. It was a real weasely like soft like “ewwwww.”
Ted: I kind of like it when people yell out shit when you play because it’s really funny when you tear them a new asshole. I almost want to yell out something just to hear what you’re going to say.
Theo: Yell something tonight, Ted.
Ted: No fucking way. You guys are way too vicious.
Theo: Come on! We like that…
Chip: Then she’ll let you come over and say something into the microphone and then whack you in the head with it.
Theo: This has been very like.. I mean going from this tour to [we’re playing] the Warped Tour on the east coast, it’s going to be like we’re playing from parents to playing for the kids.
Gina: Yeah, and there’s multi women on this tour. And on that tour we’re going to be the ONLY women.
Squid: There’s going to be 500 men and us.
Theo: We’ll be dropping like an eyelash and they’ll all be “oh! here you go… let me get that..”
Ted: You can easily hold your own with any of those bands on the Warped Tour.
Everyone: Oh yeah. Are you kidding?
Ted: Do you think it’s better to tour with a band like Luscious Jackson or the Go-Gos rather than a band that’s more your style like the Warped Tour bands? [they all start talking at once…]
Theo: Nothing’s more our style though.
Squid: Yeah, we’re misfits.
Gina: In a way it’s easier… we have a hard time sometimes with a lot of the male macho crowds. They don’t like to admit that they like female bands. It kind of threatens their masculinity. So that’s like a hurdle we have to get over when we play with a lot of bands like that. But then we go on tour with other women in bands or bands like Marilyn Manson, No Doubt, that are less gender specific and it breaks that barrier and makes it a lot easier.
Squid: You get all the little chubby boys in dresses liking you and understanding you
Theo: It’s kind of sad in a lot of ways that punk rock is really… I think we had to do a whole lot of those tours to really find out how sexist it is. Because you don’t want to just jump on it and be like “Oh well we’re not doing well because it’s sexist.” You want to think of yourself as an equal and think that everyone has a fair shot, but it’s really a boy’s club and it’s really jockey…
Squid: very jockey.
Theo: … and you know, what Gina just said, it’s very, very true. We’ve done a lot better on a No Doubt or Manson tour that’s gender bending and you think that we’re mostly a punk rock band and we would do so good with those crowds, but it’s really just shitty that it comes down a lot to that “boy’s club” thing.
Ted: Yeah, I wouldn’t have agreed with that earlier, but after seeing you open up for Guttermouth at Soma down here where people were throwing bottles at you without even hearing one note of music. They didn’t even wait to hear what you sounded like!
Gina: That’s the mentality…
Theo: Then there was the time we were on tour with Rancid in D.C. There was this packed house and they were just totally fucking eyeballing us and throwing shit at us and being real fucking dicks to us and Lars comes onstage during our set and stage dives and then the whole room goes crazy and dances after that.
Chip: It’s like that’s all they needed was the approval.
Gina: It was like “Oh, if Lars says it’s OK, then we’re not fags because we like this band.” It’s too bad for us.
Theo: I think also being that we haven’t ever changed to be a certain thing and have kept our own thing and dressed up and all that stuff, that’s why the other crowds kind of [like it]. That’s why I think it’s harder for those “dudes”… you know I think that if we dressed up like this onstage [Gina’s wearing a way cool old AC/DC t-shirt] it might be a little easier for them to accept it rather than these crazy, larger-than-life, freaked out looking, really strong, tough chicks. I think that makes it harder for them too because they’re threatened double and they don’t understand. But then there are the people that DO get it and…
Squid: They’re mostly in the other bands… [laughter]
Theo: One time we were on tour with the Offspring, the whole entire crowd out in St. Paul MN, were shouting “Show us your tits” the ENTIRE crowd. So I had a bloody tampon I whipped out and threw it out into the audience. And also one time with Rancid in Cleveland, some quy from like the back of the room threw a whole can of beer that hit me in the head. So it was like the last song and I jumped out into the crowd and somebody else was in the front just giving me the finger so I just punched him in the face. I was wearing my tutu, stormed through the crowd, they opened for me…
Gina: So this crowd on this tour has been very well behaved. [laughter]
Theo: Yeah. The over 40 crowd doesn’t throw as many beers.
Chip: They can get their parents to throw bottles at us.
Gina: Throw their walkers.
Theo: The Offspring tour too, four years ago, I got hit in the head with a Birkenstock. The lowest! The lowest!
Chip: That’s even worse!
Theo: But it’s really awesome being on tour with all these women and people want so much to see you do good. It’s a really supportive environment.
Gina: [in high voice] It’s women embracing women! [laughter]
Theo: It is. I mean when we were thinking about the tour, people were like “Well do you mind being on tour with the Go Gos just because they’re women”? And it’s like if we’re going be booked with an all female band, it’s a real fucking honor to be on tour with the Go-Gos.
Squid: I’m a fan. So it was like I knew we were going and it didn’t really hit me until about a week before we left I was like “Oh my God! What are they going to be like? Are they going to be nice?” And they were so cool!
Gina: Yeah, they’re the nicest bunch of ladies.
Ted: Do you hang out and party with them all the time?
Chip: We keep trying to, but it’s hard getting our schedules all linked up. Either they’re getting in the bus and we’re staying, or… We have plans though.
Theo: Last night we were in Vegas together and that was pretty fun. They’re really, really fun.
Ted: So I was sitting at home geeking off on my computer and I had the TV on and I heard you guys on it and I went “Holy shit! What the fuck is this?” It was an E! show and it was a model thing. What was that and how did you guys get that gig?
Gina: It’s so funny that you saw that!
Ted: It was a miracle that I saw it.
Chip: When was that?
Ted: Probably like a week ago.
Chip: So they’ve been showing it some more. Good.
Theo: That was the American Fashion Awards. The first time that it was ever aired on TV. And Betsy Johnson (their previous drummer) called me up a couple weeks before. I have the message on my machine. It was like “Something’s brewing in the air! It’s exciting! Call me!” She had to really fight to get us on and basically we played one song while her models walked because she was getting a Timeless Talent Award which was like a special award. She’s not old enough for the Lifetime Achievement and so she had us do it and we were playing in front of every insane huge celebrity you couid think of.
Squid: It was like “Martha Stewart is over here. Bette Midler is over here” All the designers… [they start naming a ton of names: Calvin Klein, Donald Trump, Hilfiger, Versache…]
Squid: Everybody was there.
Ted: So did you make any new friends?
Squid: Tommy Hilfiger.
Theo: I’ve never met Calvin Klein even after modeling for him and I really wanted to meet him and go “You paid for my tattoos! Thank you!”
Squid: I wanted to talk to Anne Libowitz, but I couldn’t get to her.
Ted: So how was the reaction to you guys?
Squid: It was good.
Ted: You just played “Jerk of All Trades”, right?
Theo: Yeah.
Squid: Who was the drunken guy with the sneakers?
Theo: Mark Jacobs. The designer. He designs for Louis Baton now.
Squid: He won an award.
Theo: Yeah, he won some award. But he hangs out at Squeeze Box and stuff. He’s ripped off many of my looks actually from go-go dancing. [into the mike] Thank you! He was really bombed and they showed a close up of him going [gives a drunk look].
Squid: We walked out of the show and he was in his tux and Converse sneakers going “Yoush guysh sgreatesess. Boring sucks! Yous quysss are great!” and walks out. I was like “Look at that drunken guy! He’s a friend of somebody! Scott lan, how’d they let him in?” And then I watch the show and he’s getting a fucking award!
Ted [to Theo]: So you’ve modeled? For Calvin Klein? What was this for?
Theo: That was CKB… It was some years ago.
Ted: Before you had all the tattoos?
Theo: I had just my top [of her arms]
Ted: Now wouldn’t all those tattoos hinder you from getting a modeling job?
Theo: I’ve gotten whole a lot more work in the past couple years than I did before.
Ted: Really. For the same type of stuff?
Theo: All kinds of different things. Some where I’m covered up with a shirt and stuff where I’m not.
Ted: So are you in any magazines? Well, besides music magazines.
Theo: I did a bunch of Italian stuff this year and I’m going to be in the New York Times Magazine in August. A whole page.
Gina: I didn’t know that.
Theo: Yeah, It’s all like interesting New York people doing… I can’t remember what I was wearing, I was wearing Armoni or something. But it’s like a page where it’s me and then there’s some really rich aristocrat lady and then there’s all these other different people.
Gina: That’s excellent.
Theo: What else…. I had a thing in Paper [? this year, like a top 15 most beautiful people and all other kinds of things. And I’ve been doing commercials and some films.
Squid [in a funny voice]: Gina, what about your spread?
Theo [in a funny voice]: Yeah Gina, in Playboy?
Squid: The other one. [laughter]
Theo: I’m trying to get a Playboy spread, actually.
Ted: So if you get the spread in Playboy and people yell out “Show me your tits,” you can say “Buy the fucking magazine!”
Theo: Exactly.
Chip: There you go.
Theo: Make ’em pay for it.
Ted: So Gina, you have your art stuff on the side?
Gina: Yeah. I’m still doing art stuff.
Squid: Gina had a fashion… her own page. One of the best guitar players.
Gina: No… it was in Alternative Press, out this month. [funny voice] It was my moment of glory. I get my own page. It’s just me and my guitar. It’s very exciting.
Chip: Where do you get it? Is it out?
Gina: Yes, it’s out now.
Theo: It’s gorgeous:
Squid: Featured guitar player.
Ted: This isn’t the old guitar, the one that I like [had melted plastic all over it]. One of my favorite guitars of all time.
Gina: I haven’t played that guitar in years. No, it’s my Gold Top, actually.
Theo: The Gold Top? That other one is the Poop Charvel.
Gina: The Poop Charvel is now in the Rock ‘n Roll Hall Of Fame under my bed. Waiting to get famous so I can sell it for a bunch of money.
Ted [to Squid): So what do you have going on the side?
Squid: Squat. [laughter]
Squid: I was going to say “dick,” but I don’t have that going on either so I couldn’t say that.
Gina: She’s a tattoo artist.
Squid: That’s just my boring life.
Ted: Do you bring your tattoo needles tour with you?
Squid: No, I did it a couple of times, but it’s like for me that’s just work on vacation.
Theo: She brought it a two years ago and we almost got “OZZY” on our toes.
Squid: See, I’m afraid. I’m afraid of what will happen. There’s so many things that almost happened.
Theo: “If you only had your tattoo machine! I know I’d get..”
Ted: I wanted to get this: [pulls out a photocopy of something] The Stonecutter’s symbol (from the Simpsons)
Everyone: Oh yes!
Ted [to Chip]: So what else do you have going on?
Chip: Just carpentry. I’ve been working my ass off doing carpentry. Job after job. “Shelves, I need shelves!” That’s pretty much it.
Ted: Your new album is called “LuxuryProblem” and I heard you had a contest for who could come up with a title for the album?
Theo: We tried to get some stuff on the internet happening and all the kids came up with was like “Cunt Walkers.” Everything had to do with a pussy, a twat, or a cunt. [laughter]
Gina: Only vaginal references. So we had to come up with a name ourselves.
Ted: You got to love the anonymity of the internet!
Gina: One was called “The Twat Fairies”.
Squid [sarcastically]: Wow. That’s pretty good.
Ted: That would be a good name for a bootleg.
Theo: “Twat Fairies Wear Boots”
Everyone: Oh. Ooh!
Squid: Oh my God. That’s so retarded. I mean that was open to the world and all we got was that.
Theo: Oh, they’ll help us. They’re our fans!
Chip: Our intelligent fans.
Gina: Do you like the record?
Ted: Yeah, I think it’s great! I like it better than the last one. Not better than “Jerk Of All Trades” though. But I love… what’s that song that’s supposed to be in a new movie… I can’t think of it right now..
Theo: “Terror Firmer”?
Ted: Yeahl That’s my favorite. [actually looking back, I think “Down at the Pub” is my favorite. They’re all great. -Ted]
Theo: Cool.
Chip: Wow? Really?
Squid: See? Go figure.
Ted: Why “go figure”? You don’t like that?
Squid: No, no. It’s just so different. We’re not getting a lot of consistency on what are people’s favorite songs. I mean groups of people are like completely different. Like “I love this song, but I hate that one” and someone else will be like “I love THAT song but I HATE this one.”
Gina: Yeah, we can’t figure out what to do for a single. Everyone names different songs, so…
Squid: Even when we were arranging the record, it was like “OK, let’s put the strongest songs on the first half of the record.” It was really hard, you know?
Theo: Right before we left we made a video for “Say What You Mean” which was kind of suggested by some people. Lloyd Kaufman from Troma made the video for us. We haven’t seen it yet.
Ted: Are you guys going to be in the new Troma film?
Theo: We did it last year. I had a part in it and then we played in it. It’s coming out at the end of this summer.
Ted: Do you have a major part in it?
Theo: Yep.
Ted: What’s the name of the film?
Theo: “Terror Firmer”
Ted: Oh, doy. Speaking of videos, you have this “Naked” video coming out. What’s on it? When does it come out?
Squid: Oh my God. [lots of groaning and laughter] This is the bravest thing we have ever ever done. We’re holding back nothing. I’d rather have a picture of my twat in this fucking video that what is actually in there. It is so embarrassing. It’s our first ever ever live performance. Like a piece of that. And every embarrassing video of us when we were like 18 years old, being retarded.
Theo: We narrate you through it.
Gina: There’s bad acting all through it, and just us on tour footage…
Squid: It’s got all of our videos.
Ted: How many videos are on this and how long is the whole thing?
Squid: A little under an hour. It’s got a lot of stuff in it.
Theo: It’s got “Nowhere Fast” on it a home movie like our fake autobiography.
Ted: How many videos are on it?
Gina: I think there’s five.
Squid: All of our actual videos. Then there’s pieces of live stuff, pieces of different inter views over the years, tour footage… it’s got everything. It’s really fucking embarrassing.
Gina: It’s like lots of footage before I discovered tweezers.
Squid: Before any of us discovered tweezers and fucking razors and a whole lot of things.
Ted: There’s also this other video you had something on called “Not Bad for a Girl”?
Squid: Oh God.
Gina: That was a documentary that was made years ago by a woman out here and was all about female bands and she focused on four bands and we were one of the bands.
Ted: Is that available?
Squid: No.
Ted: I heard I’m in it. In the front row at Club Lingerie.
Gina: Oh yeah! That’s right! I’ve seen it. I’ve seen it for rent in underground video stores, but it’s really hard to find.
Theo: It’s really embarrassing.
Squid: So fucking embarrassing. I hate it.
Theo: It is kind of interesting though because there are similarities between the bands she focuses on, let alone like six different women all wearing overalls for the interview. Things like that. Really weird. Having pictures of Edith Massey on your wall. That kind of stuff.
Ted: You have been around long before the “riot girl” thing and you’re still around long afterwards…
Gina: You can’t get rid of us, can you?
Ted: Do you have anything to say about that?
Gina: That’s like so over. We haven’t had that question asked us in vears.
Theo: Yeah, it got irritating after awhile because people kept asking us about it and we had nothing to do with it.
Squid: We were lumped in about fifteen different categories.
Theo: Anything that comes around, it’s like “They’re that! They’re that! They’re that!”
Squid: Anything with a twat attached, we get lumped in with it.
Theo: Twat fairy rock.
Squid: I mean it was like… well, it was not like a New York thing.
Theo: This takes the cake because the other night this guy who has Down’s Syndrome came up to me after we played and he’s like… [some laughter] I’m a magnet for those types, which is fine, and he was like “So uh, what kind of music are you? Are you punk?” and I’m like “Well what do you think?” and he goes “Well, punk, but hard rock too.” And I was like “Yeah.” That’s the thing. People are dying to put us in a category but it’s not really that easy. So he knew.
Ted: That’s true.
Gina: The Downs know. They know. He was down with it.
Ted: For the record, what happened with Sindi and do you still keep in touch with her?
Theo: Well… She’s leading a path of destruction in New York right now.
Gina: No, we still see her. Me and Chip see her because we hang out in the same bars. She DJs at this bar called Motor City in New York. So I see her pretty much on a regular basis in New York. We’re still good friends. I love her. She’s great. She quit the band. She was just tired of doing it. She felt it was time to move on to the next chapter of her life.
Squid: Not like us losers.
Chip: We don’t know when to quit
Ted: I don’t know what I’d do if you guys weren’t here. You’ve played some of the best shows I’ve ever seen. So what is she doing now? DJing?
Gina: She’s DJing and…
Theo: She has another band.
Gina: Oh yeah, she does. She’s got another band called the Mobile Homos. And they’re fun.
Theo: You know the guy who is on the cover of a lot of Alice Donut records, Chet?
Gina: He was my body on the Flipside record. I mean the Sympathy record.
Theo: He basically looks like a real life troll. [some laughter] Well he does! And he sings for her band.
Squid: He’s hilarious.
Theo: He’s hilarious and terrible and wears lots of lingerie. It’s really good. Actually pretty brave. Pretty genius shit.
Ted: Have you ever thought of getting a second guitarist?
Theo: Gina’s holding her own.
Squid: It’s easier… it’s just… less people.
Gina: More room in the van.
Ted: More money for you guys.
Gina: Less equipment to carry. That’s another one.
Chip: More room. More money. Less equipment.
Gina: I mean it would be nice. Sometimes I worry about our sound not being full enough, but at the same time we also gain the clarity. I think that it’s a lot easier to hear what’s going on now.
Ted: So you guys met Gene Simmons once. [Everyone explodes]
Squid: Oh my God!
Gina: That was the last time we saw you, right? We played at Billboard Live.
Ted: Was his hair real?
Gina: No…
Squid: It was a weave or something.
Gina: Squid brought me over to introduce me and he was like “Hiii.” and he was like touching my hair and so I was like “Hiii” back and touched his hair and when I put my hand on his head, it went like this [makes movements with her hands suggesting it all moved). It was like a helmet of hair spray.
Squid: It was like a horror movie. It was so frightening. I’m standing next to Gene and everything went like in slow motion. You know when you get tunnel vision? And I see the hand reaching for Gene’s head and I’m going like “Noooooooo! Noooooo!” And she does it and the whole helmet like shifts.
Theo: Ted, it was intense. I met him before that and he what do you do? “Oh, punk rock? No, do something else. It doesn’t make money.” And then he’s like putting his arm around me going “Come on, sit with me. Make me look good.” I’m like. “Get away from me, and he pulled me back and put his arm around me. And he was totally sleazing on me. He was really friendly.
Ted: “Make me look good.
Squid: No, it was perfect. [he was like] “Well, are you Jewish? Are you from New York? What neighborhood are you from?” He was like “Oh, once you make your first million you’ll move out to LA, too” and we’re like “OK, yeah whatever.
Gina: Yeah, he was giving us all this dirt about money.
Theo: I regret not asking to see the tongue, but I was too afraid. I didn’t know if he was going to [stick it out and lunge].
Squid: He would have. He fucking would have.
Ted: I heard he was backstage at a Sonic Youth/Dinosaur Jr/Redd Kross show and Cake from Flipside was there and said that Gene walked in and said “What’s going on? I’ve been here 30 seconds and no one’s sucking my dick yet!” He was like “Girls these days….”
Chip: Whoa!
Squid: Yeah, but see, that’s all he knows. That’s been his life for so long. You feel it and… [?] It’s scary.
Theo: Wow. I’m going to try that one. “What’s the matter? No one’s suckin’ my dick yet?” [laughter]
Ted: Oh, was I right about the live record? Did you read my review on it? That you didn’t play any older songs on it probably due to licensing from the other record companies?
Everyone: No.
Chip: It’s not that calculated.
Ted: “Apathetic” wasn’t on there. “Jan Brady” wasn’t on there. Do you just not play those songs anymore?
Gina: No. It’s really because it’s more interesting for us to play new songs and it was just kind of like…
Squid: We recorded it at the last minute, of course.
Gina: We didn’t think “Oh, it’s for a live album, we should put old songs in the set.”
Leave a Reply