Dołączył: 20 Wrz 2007
Posty: 3885
Przeczytał: 0 tematów
Skąd: Bloomsbury
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She reminds me of Janis, Jimi, or Jim because she shouts her mind, doesn't hold back, holds her own reins, and makes sure everybody knows about it-Iggy Pop in a shredded antique wedding dress, a female Lou Reed who screams like Exene. I can't think of a woman in music who has ever been as candid or spontaneous, as unshakable or brazen, as this founding member of the band Hole and former member of Faith No More and Sugar Babydoll. Live Through This, to be released by DGC Records next month, marks Hole's and Love's ascension from uncontrollable Indie underdogs to major-league players in alternative rock. If there's anything that her records, performances, and outspoken opinions have shown, it's that this Love never has to say she's sorry.
I spoke to her and the members of Hole in Seattle, where Love lives with her husband, Nirvana's Kurt Cobain, and their exquisite baby daughter, Frances. While the two new members of her band-bassist Kristen Pfaff and drummer Patty Schemel-and I waited for Love to finish her nap and join us for the interview, Eric Erlandson, the guitarist who has been with Hole since the beginning but who rarely speaks during interviews, and said only a few words during this one, went out to get us all some wine; a new kitty sat purring on the table; Frances toddled around grinning; and Kurt called the pizza man.
PAMELA DES BARRES: You are still sort of pioneers in the hard rock world. I know you were both in a number of bands before joining Hole, but what was it like for you to get started as female musicians?
KRISTEN PFAFF: It wasn't very much like sex and drugs and rock 'n' roll at all for me in the beginning. It was really intense work, just so that people would eventually accept me as a serious bass player, Because I realized right away that since I was a woman, I'd have to be better at what I did to be treated as an equal. Like I'd have to take the music further. So I've worked my ass off.
PDB: I just interviewed Joan Jett, and she told me that her parents taught her that she could do anything a man could do.
PATTY SCHEMEL: Yeah, I kind of had that support from my parents, too.
KP: Me, too. And I think it was the same for Courtney. We didn't grow up learning to be limited.
PS: I never felt like I had anything to prove. It was the general impulse to make music that drove me. I started playing drums when I was eleven and started playing in punk rock bands when I was like fifteen.
PDB: Your record [Live Through This] Is about to come out. Everyone is expecting it to be really big.
PS: I'm afraid to think like that.
KP: Courtney's kind of like that, too. We don't want to-
PS: Jinx it. [laughs]
PDB: To whoever is reading this, I'm talking to the girls while Courtney is taking a nap. We're expecting her down anytime soon.
KP: Oh, here she comes.
COURTNEY LOVE: Kurt! Kurt!
KURT COBAIN: [from the other room] What?
CL: Give me some of that pizza!
PDB: Hi, Courtney.
CL: Hi, Pamela. You want a piece?
PDB: No thanks. [Pizza is handed out] So you've decided to settle down in Seattle. Do you like it here?
CL: It's probably my favorite place that I've ever lived. It's been really nice to me.
PDB: Have you lived in a lot of different places?
CL: Yeah, I've lived all over the world. To me, towns are like boyfriends. I have sick relationships with some of them. Like New York is sort of your junkie Eurotrash guy that you know is not very good for you but you keep going back. San Francisco is kind of like the wanna-be junkie Eurotrash guy-a skater with dreadlocks, sort of scummy, that totally lives off you. Minneapolis is like Dave Pirner [of Soul Asylum], basically. A cute guy who would dump his girlfriend of thirteen years for Winona Ryder the minute he gets famous.
PDB: [laughs]
CL: It's not fair to rag on Dave, though. When me and Kat [Bjelland of Babes In Toyland] moved to Minneapolis, we were like, "All right, we're going to a different town, starting a new band, and one of us is going to land Dave Pirner."
PDB: I used to talk like that.
CL: I know.
PDB: I actually had a list.
CL: [laughs] Yeah, me, too. Mark Arm, the guy in Mudhoney, said I should write a book called I'm in the Band.
PDB: You should.
CL: [laughs] Well, in your time things were probably a lot different than they are now. Which is why, in some ways, I'm really excited to do this interview with you. In other ways, I don't want to identify myself with you, even though I totally do identify with so much of your life. But you know, it's that word-
PDB: The G word? [groupie]
CL: Yeah. That's why I wanted to talk to you, about your experiences and how artists today, particularly women artists, relate to them. How the energy that you had in the '60s is so similar to ours. Because to me rock 'n' roll is about being sexy, and watching guys that make you want to fuck them.
PDB: Absolutely. I mean lots of guys, or even girls, start bands to get laid. Gene Simmons told me that was the reason he started Kiss.
CL: I don't think most girls really do that. Although an old friend of mine in another band went through a phase where her whole thing was like, I'm going to fuck sixteen-year-old cute guys all over the land. But that's fairly unusual. I mean, on a physical and mental level, sex is not the same for women as it is for men. And sexuality is also different. Or should be different. But I've noticed that a lot of girls in bands will do this whole androgynous thing, and even though sometimes I think it's natural, other times I think it's a way of them saying: "Look, there's something wrong. There is a weakness in the female character, so I'm going to cover it up and I'm going to create this masculine persona." That's sort of what PJ Harvey does. I mean I love PJ Harvey, but fuck that, I am not just like a guy. None of us in this band are. [to Eric Erlandson] Well, Eric is. [to PDB] It's so sad when Eric gets left out of these interviews.
ERIC ERLANDSON: Yeah. [laughs]
CL: But, like, Kristen did feminist studies and women's studies for years in school. Kristen also comes from a band that was on a label that was notoriously sexist. It's very guy-band oriented.
KP: When I was with that band, it was like we were speaking a different language. I couldn't really explain myself in a way that would be understood at all. I couldn't say anything about wanting to play with other women.
CL: But she was the attraction in her band, because she was such a great player and her stage presence was so excellent. [to Kristen] Did you tell Pamela about ... ?
KP: What about him?
CL: Oh, this is such a sad story. When I left Minneapolis and moved to L.A. I took this guy's drummer with me and basically broke up his band. Me and the drummer lived together for a little while-until I drove him crazy. You know, I did this Yoko Ono job on him. He was so beautiful, and then . . . he was broke. I was broke. I was like, "I'm going to go work in an escort service if you don't sell your stereo." It was pretty pathetic. But that's when I decided to go to Alaska, because I needed to get my shit together and learn how to work. So I went on this sort of vision quest. I went to Alaska to dance. Actually, to strip.
PDB: Why did you do that?
CL: My little trust-fund ran out. It was a tiny trust-fund, but suddenly I had no money at all. So I got rid of all my earthly possessions. I had my bad little strip clothes and some big sweaters, and I moved into a trailer with two crack chicks who turned tricks on the side at the club where we danced.
PDB: That was really ballsy of you. But why did you go to Alaska?
CL: Alaska just seemed like the farthest place that I could go to get away. And it was dark all the time while I was there, so I kind of figured that no one could see me. [laughs] But before I left L.A. I looked up strip clubs in the yellow pages. I realized I couldn't work at The Seventh Veil or Star Strip at that time because I was fat. Later, when I lost weight, I did work in those clubs. But then I had to quit because they kept playing songs from Faith No More. There's nothing worse than having to dance topless to your old band.
PDB: [laughs]
CL: But you know, on my way back from Alaska I stopped in Seattle on the Greyhound, and when I got off I had little visions of Kurt [Cobain] and Mark [Arm] in my head-not in a sexual way, but in that way that . . . Because every town has its sort of rock star icon guy, the king of the town. And in my head I was like, Yeah, when I get my band together, you're going to open for me. Which is a great way of taking that energy, that sexual energy that comes from rock, and changing it. And that's part of the reason why I have such a problem with the whole groupie thing. You know, the whole we're-backstage-and- we're-going-to-blow-a-roadie thing. I just think that's such a waste of female energy and I hate it. Like I remember one night Roddy [Bottum of Faith No More] was opening for Billy Idol at the Forum, and I went backstage for the show. Whenever I had to go to these horrifying events, like VIP parties, I made sure I wore no makeup and a big Vietnam jacket and put grease in my hair so that I could separate myself from the other women there. When I went into the bathroom that night and saw some of these girls standing in front of the mirror, I thought: If I gave each one of you a guitar and showed you how to play, you'd be repulsed. You wouldn't even want the power.
PDB: Do you feel like you have power by being a rock star?
CL: Fuck, yeah, man! I'm a rock star girl!
PDB: Have you always wanted that power?
CL: Always! Since I was a kid, you show me any kind of male-oriented thing that can have a female protagonist and I'm there.
PDB: Did you ever think of yourself as a groupie? Or did you always just want to play?
CL: I wanted to be a groupie, but I wasn't really pretty enough. There is one heavy metal rock star I slept with. It's a fairly well-known fact, but I can't tell you who it was. It's so goddamn embarrassing. So yeah, I did score once in my yellow tube top and my red painter pants. [laughs] Back then there was this girl that I would hang out with who was pretty bottom of the barrel. She could never really get past the road manager. And when she did she would get to, like, drummers. To me the whole thing was, Is this your dream? That this guy is going to fall in love with you and take you away and marry you?
PDB: That was my dream.
CL: But my dream was, when I saw those lighters go up at the end of the Van Halen show at the Portland [Memorial] Coliseum, Why do guys get to do this? I'm making no judgment on your dream, but...
PDB: In my time there weren't too many other options.
CL: Yeah, but this is now, and it's a complicated issue for me because so many people have called me a groupie since I married a rock star. I just wish that his band was smaller. You know, when we started dating, our bands were about the same. Actually, Hole's first record [Pretty on the Inside] sold more than Nirvana's first record [Bleach]. Of course, that was before they got huge.
PDB: Do you feel competitive with him?
CL: Yeah. I mean, I married one of the best songwriters of my generation. If my goals were minor the professional side of my relationship with Kurt wouldn't bother me that much. But I'm not like some Olympian riot grrrl. In fact, that's my problem with the whole riot grrrl thing. As supportive as I am of them, there's a faction that says, "We don't know how to play, but we're not going to follow your male-measured idea of what good is." Look, good is Led Zeppelin II. That's fucking good. And I'm not going to sit here and say you're a good band when you suck. They're like, "But we're entitled to suck." Really? We work so hard to get good at what we do without covering up who we are as women. So when I hear people saying things like "Oh, Courtney got that gig because of who she's married to," it really pisses me off. Of course it's not like I don't feel lucky to have this great guy. I mean, on a personal level, just in terms of his fidelity and that kind of stuff, he's amazing. Like the other night we went out with Mark Lanegan [lead singer for the Screaming Trees]. Mark is the sexiest guy in the Northwest. When I see him I'm just like, Uhhhhh!
PDB: So you still feel that sort of sexual thing for other guys?
CL: Oh, yeah. You know sweet Evan [Dando]? We just toured with him, and one night he passed out in Patty's bed. He was asleep and I woke up to go to the bathroom-we were sharing a room and I was in the other bed. I looked at him and I was just kind of checking him out. Not bad. Then I thought: Ahh, fuck it. I got steak at home. I mean, you can look, right?
PDB: [laughs]
CL: Anyway, I'm about three times out of his age range. Frances is more in his age range! You know, Evan's on the cover of Spin this month [February], and Frances walked over and picked up the magazine and said, "Daddy.' This just happened today. I was like, "Frances, no. You'd have a huge jaw."
PDB: There are very few sexy guys In rock anymore. I think Evan is one of them.
CL: Well, the whole idea of what's sexy has changed a lot. When I was growing up, my best friends and I were into guys like David Bowie, Leonard Cohen, Keith Richards, Bob Dylan.
PDB: I loved Bob Dylan. Have you seen Don't Look Back?
CL: Who do you think I live with? I have to watch it every day.
PDB: Is Kurt a Bob freak?
CL: No, it's just that when he's in a bad mood, he is Don't Look Back.
[more guy talk until...]
PS [to PDB]: Have you read Peggy Caserta's book on Janis Joplin?
CL: First sentence: "I was stark naked, stoned out of my mind on heroin, and the girl lying between my legs giving me head was Janis Joplin." It was just so fucking sick. But there's a martyr for you-Janis. First of all, she was nominated for Ugliest Man on Campus at the University of Texas. She came to San Francisco once, got too strung out, started hanging out up on Columbus and Broadway, back when Columbus and Broadway was sleazy. I loved it when it was sleazy-the way it was when I was in Faith No More and living in the Europa Hotel and my window was the corner window with pictures of Carol Doda's tits all over it. That was also during my Iggy Pop phase, when I used to cut myself onstage.
PDB: You used to cut yourself onstage?
CL: Yeah. See? [shows PDB her scars] I really lived it back then. I just thought I was rock or something. Now I realize that there's a certain detachment one must have from all of that. Being a female performer, the whole dynamic of an audience is different. Like we toured once with Mudhoney, and Mark [Arm] would stage-dive every night. [lowers voice] I was so in love with that guy. [laughs] In fact, it was sort of a contest there for a while between Kurt and Mark over who was going to end up being the love of my life. Anyway, one night Hole was in London performing. We had just gotten off tour with Mudhoney, and I decided to stage-dive. I was wearing a dress and I didn't realize what I was engendering in the audience. It was a huge audience and they were kind of going ape-shit. So I just dove off the stage, and suddenly, it was like my dress was being torn off of me, my underwear was being torn off of me, people were putting their fingers inside of me and grabbing my breasts really hard, screaming things in my ears like "pussy-whore-cunt." When I got back onstage I was naked. I felt like Karen Finley. [laughs] But the worst thing of all was that I saw a photograph of it later-someone took a picture of me right when this was happening, and I had this big smile on my face like I was pretending it wasn't happening. So later I wrote a song called "Asking for It" based on the whole experience. I can't compare it to rape because it's not the same. But in a way it was. I was raped by an audience-figuratively, literally, and yet, was I asking for it? That's when I started trashing stuff, because I was like, Why can't I have the same contact with the audience that all these guys do? I think I did about $5,000 worth of damage that night. I broke my favorite Rickenbacker [guitar]. And we were a poor band. I mean, I was so broke. [laughs] But later I read in some rock 'n' roll book that I was the first person...the first girl to smash my guitar onstage. I guess they weren't counting Wendy O. Williams.
PDB: Do you see yourself as someone who likes to provoke people?
CL: No. Not at all.
PDB: [incredulous] So you're really not doing any of this stuff on purpose.
CL: Honestly, I just want to play.
***
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