The Corner Girls

It’s just before midnight on a Sunday, and I’m lying on the kitchen floor at the Corner Girls’ house.

One room over, people are gathered in front of the TV to un-ironically watch Avril Lavigne music videos. Below me, Bourgeois Girl is finishing up recording for its upcoming EP in the creepy back room in the basement. The beer count is running dangerously low, but both the bottle of Seagram’s and the bag of Ruffles are still well over half full. Someone pours shots and toasts in Hebrew. I find the strength to stand up and re-establish my mostly amicable relationship with gravity and make the right decision when offered more alcohol. At the moment, the house seems like a veritable who’s-who of Denver DIY, brimming with members of Space Suits for Indians, Total Goth, Ancient Elk and Galleries. To use the contemporary term, Pet Shop — that’s the name of the Baker punk house the Corner Girls moved into last month — is lit.

Two days later, I’m back in their kitchen, sober and fully upright. The band, which comprises frontwoman and guitarist Breanna Ahlgren, bassist Jessica Pulido and drummer Madi Pietruszka, is gathered around a blender, making margaritas while Death Proof plays on the TV in the living room. There are a few open cans of LaCroix water around, but evidence of the recent party is largely gone. The four of us sit down in the living room to chat as Ahlgren passes out the margaritas. Pietruszka starts talking about their self-described “pastel punk.”

“It’s like punk rock, but flirty,” she says. “And with glitter.”

It’s an accurate assessment. Glitter is a staple of Pietruszka’s makeup bag, and all three members project a punk image loaded with feminine power. Pietruszka’s drum set is bright pink, and she plays in high heels — something the male members of the audience find baffling. “I always get, ‘I can’t believe you play in high heels,’” she says. “And I’m like, ‘I don’t get why you can’t believe that.’”

Her bandmates are similarly out of fucks to give about the punk-rock patriarchy. Pulido’s dark-blue bass is decorated with sparkly stickers and the band’s name. Ahlgren plays a baby-pink guitar and sports velour knee-high boots on stage, projecting an overtly feminine image while banging out overtly feminist kiss-offs like “Baby Honey,” a sharp punk number in which she shrieks, “Call me baby again and I’ll kick your face in.”

It’s a refreshing sound and sight within the male-dominated Denver scene, but it has yet to deter all the creeps. Ahlgren notes that there’s always a question as to whether men are being genuine. “Someone came up to me after a show and was like, ‘The way you scream is so sexy,’” she says. Pietruszka adds, “But he started out that conversation like, ‘You guys are really great; you have great musical chemistry.’ And then he says that! ‘But what I’m actually meaning to say is I like it when you squeal.’”

“We’re not asking for a handout,” Pietruszka continues. But she also knows just how real the Denver DIY glass ceiling is. “The men in the music scene in Denver are so unified, and they always give each other opportunities and help each other out,” she says, noting that her band is rarely extended the same courtesy or opportunities.

All three women are fully aware of the fact that their gender is a constant factor in the way they’re approached and perceived as musicians, as well as how it’s used to boost other people’s images. “If we get put on a bill, is it because they want to be like, ‘We’re feminists because we have a girl band on the bill’?” Ahlgren asks.

Though the musicians are not keen on being evidence of someone else’s pseudo-progressivism, feminism and post-riot-grrrl punk have always been integral to their identities, even before they became the Corner Girls. Hinds, Chastity Belt, Tacocat and Peach Kelli Pop (who they opened for in May at the hi-dive) are all vital inspirations in both sound and message, and the Girls have been making some version of their pastel punk since Ahlgren and Pietruszka met as freshmen at Metropolitan State University of Denver. The pair started the short-lived punk band Poison Ass, which quickly fizzled following the loss of a practice space.

Ahlgren introduced Pulido to Pietruszka shortly after they dissolved Poison Ass, and the trio started attending shows around the city together. Pietruszka decided to start a new band with Ahlgren, and the pair enlisted Pulido to play bass. “I was like, ‘Jessica, be in our band,’” laughs Pietruszka. “‘You’re going to play bass, because you look like a bassist.’”

Pulido had never picked up the instrument before. “I just went to a pawn shop and bought a bass,” she says. “I was like, ‘Okay, I’m going to do this.’”

Pulido came up with the Corner Girls name while waiting for a bus, and the trio set to work writing songs and performing in DIY spaces. The musical chemistry was instantaneous, and the three present a united front held together by a friendship that extends well beyond a typical bandmate relationship. Living together has proven the ideal situation for practice, writing songs and hanging out together after work.
“We always talked about living together anyway, so we were like, ‘We should just fucking do that.’ We’ve never had any arguments,” Pietruszka says.

“Knock on wood,” Ahlgren jokes in response, and Pietruszka quickly taps her knuckles on the coffee table, which is decorated with the signs of the zodiac.

Superstition aside, it’s not difficult to believe Pietruszka. Songwriting is a vehemently collaborative effort, and their songs typically begin as a single lyric drawn from the good, bad and ugly of their real lives. “We talk about the things we go through,” says Pulido. “And we try to call people out on how shitty they treat girls.”

“I think we talk about shit that girls want to talk about but are afraid to,” adds Pietruszka.

It makes them an anomaly — and a desperately needed one, at that — in the male-dominated scene. For all the creeps, they’ve found some serious male supporters, most notably the members of Bourgeois Girl.
“Being in this community makes me fucking stoked to be making music,” Pietruszka says. “I personally don’t want to do anything else.”

The Corner Girls
Underground Music Showcase, 7 p.m. Friday, July 29, hi-dive, 7 South Broadway, 303-733-0230. - Westword

Though South Broadway was teeming with hundreds of fest-goers last Friday evening — it was day two of the sweet-sixteen edition of the Underground Music Showcase — it was still easy to spot my friends in Tacocat. Like shiny pastel buoys bobbing among a sea of beards and black clothes, the three women (three-fourths of the band; guitarist Eric Randall was probably hiding from the masses somewhere) skipped across Ellsworth Street in matching purple dresses and sporting various shades of Care Bear hair. Straggling behind them were three more women, following the Seattle band in its pursuit of a quiet place to drink before the commencement of its midnight set at the hi-dive.

As I caught up with the crew, I learned that the three women hanging with Tacocat were also a band — Denver's own Corner Girls (check out last week's feature on the Denver punk-ish trio.) We found refuge at the Compound, scattering ourselves in little groups across bar stools and tall tables. I struck up a conversation with Corner Girl Jessica Pulido; we talked about being bass players and our mutual admiration for our "Nth Wave" feminist pals Tacocat.

No more than five minutes into our chat, the conversation turned to the dark side of being a woman who plays music. Pulido began telling me about how earlier in the night, she'd been hassled by a door guy when trying to enter her own show (the Corner Girls had played a 7 p.m. slot at UMS). She also told me about a previous show, after which, in a written review, a music critic had dismissed the Corner Girls as a reincarnation of Girls Gone Wild, insinuating that the band's perceived intoxication was somehow inappropriate. We laughed together for a moment, reveling in the notion that many of modern rock's most adored acts have been dudes famous for being wasted in public — but somehow, when women exercise their right to present an outrageous stage persona, they get shamed.

Tacocat on Broad City, Rookie and Using Humor To Make a Point
Hearing all of this made me furious. I get that the more things change, the more they stay the same, but really? Hadn't Denver come to a place where women could play music without being relegated to the "less serious" category of music or be treated like they were a fucking novelty?

When I started playing music in public more than a decade ago, I quickly learned how much more you have to do in order to be "legitimized" as a woman who plays music. Whether we want to be or not, when we decide to play music, on a stage, in front of people, we are spokespeople for our own credibility. You have to be an expert player, but not too good; you're supposed to present a "sexy but not too sexy" vibe, always risking being labeled icy or, alternately, "too much" on stage. You're supposed to be a master at hovering just outside the boys' club, making sure not to get too close while retaining your femininity behind an instrument. It's a very complicated and exhausting regimen of completely made-up rules that many of us have been ignoring for decades but still seem to be punished by.

After the work I had done with my own bands in the past and as the co-creator of Titwrench, a music festival started in 2009 to deal with the very issues Pulido was facing as a woman making art, I thought that we as a community had possibly moved past some of the same old sexist bullshit that has permeated art and life for centuries. But in those few moments I spent getting to know this musician, the more I saw how little had really changed. At 21, she was experiencing the exact same bullshit I went through at 17. And 21. And 31. It reminded me of time I overheard a guy trying to convince his friend to stick around for my band's set because "they're chicks, but they're chicks who rock the fuck out." Or the time a group of men at a bar decided to line the stage my band was about to play on, turning their backs to us to create a barrier and ensuring that the audience couldn't watch us perform even if they wanted to.

As I looked around the Compound at the incredible group of musicians taking time to commiserate and share triumphs and challenges with each other, I was reminded that for me, rock and roll really will always be a girls' club. Sometimes, we really are the "girl band" label ascribed to us. But when I say "girl band," I mean it in the way that women in bands tend to take care of each other and look out for other women in bands (at least in my experience). On top of making incredible music and art, Tacocat excels at what is so often tossed aside as "feminist punk" with "girl power," but their power as girls is to be inclusive and accessible to other women. They are seasoned musicians who have always put forth the intention of sharing the stage with new and less-established acts that include women. The members of Tacocat aren't required to do it; they just do it.

Tacocat is also a great example of how the "girl band" moniker is so often a misnomer; after all, they do have a dude in the band. But if I've learned anything as a musician who is a girl, any band that isn't made up of strictly cis-het males is considered a "girl" band. I would know— I spent five years in a band that was one-third dude for most of that time, and yet we were still forever known as a "girl band."

So I'd like to flip the script. If you wanna call bands "girl bands," fine. Just know that "girl band" means the inclusion of women, the inclusion of folx who don't subscribe to an arbitrary gender binary, and the inclusion of queer folx. The "girl band," like rock and roll, is a club. Anyone who wants to be a part of something bigger than the archaic pantheon of misogynist rhetoric that modern rock and roll was built on is welcome. Just beware: You might find yourself in a "girl band" one day. If you're lucky.

Be my voyeur (or better yet, let me stalk you) on Twitter: @cocodavies - Westword

UMS is a 4 day festival that brings local, regional & national bands together in small and large venues in downtown Denver. The showcase features over 300 acts including Polica, So Pitted, South of France, Thee Oh Sees and more. This year’s festival has, as of the writing, 50 acts with women. Profiled below are 10.

Aida Victoria – Victoria released her full length album Beyond the Bloodhounds this year. She has a blood dripping vocal style that brings in her blues influenced rock.http://adiavictoria.com/

Eros and the Eschaton – Weight of Matter will be released by Bar/None Records in August, but you can hear songs from it during their set. E/E is a rock alternative band led by Kate Perdoni. https://www.facebook.com/erosandtheeschaton

La Fin Absolute du Monde – Jason Myles & Cyndy Melanio make up the core of the ambient fringe folk group. They have toured internationally. Their latest release isBlack Sheep: Remixed. http://lafinabsolutedumonde.com/

Megafauna – Dani Neff was the recipient of our “Best Guitars” in December. This Texas 3 piece released Welcome Home this year. They are wild beyond belief in person. http://www.megafaunamusic.com/

San Fermin – We first heard about the 8 piece band San Fermin a couple of years ago. They have both male and female vocals and a rock heart mixed with imagination. They released Jackrabbit last year. http://www.sanferminband.com/

SIR – Sarah and the Meanies became SIR this year. We caught them after they returned from recording in California and leading a showcase at SXSW. They released the single “Go” in July and we are waiting for word of the album release. SIR may be the one secret everyone should know. http://www.sirband.com/

Sunflower Bean – If you’ve heard of SB it is because they are everywhere. This young NYC band released their full length album Human Ceremony this year on Fat Possum. They have been generating waves since SXW. https://www.facebook.com/SunflowerBean/

Tacocat – We’ve been taken by the feminist punk scene in Seattle before we’d even heard of it. Tacocat is in the center of it. This 4 piece band is led Lelah Maupin. They released Lost Time on Hardly Art Records this year. http://tacocatdotcom.com/

The Corner Girls – This Denver 3 piece opened for Kelli Peach Pop recently and we think their styles are complimentary. They are sugar pop with imaginative lyrics. Much like The Milk Blossoms last year; this is one band we are interested in seeing develop. https://www.facebook.com/thecornergirls/

YaSi – YaSi is a new hip hop artist. We have yet to see her live but the tracks we’ve heard have impressed us. She comes from the Denver hip hop wave that includes such artists as Povi and Jilly.fm. https://www.facebook.com/YaSimuse/ - FEMMUSIC