AFRAM Blog Post #3

During the emergence of punk rock, a movement was spurred that sought to push-against the mainstream music industry that had a long history of leaving women and underprivileged artists out of the spotlight. Yet, the movement was created in a complex scene that consisted of many misogynist and racialized subcultures. This notable punk crusade went by the name of the "Riot Grrrl" movement. Although this movement overcame many barriers for women in the punk scene, including providing a safe-space for women and pushing back against the male mosh-pit dominated concerts, the movement also created an exclusive environment for people who identified as more than a feminist in the punk scene. This movement, while attempting to create an alternative music industry where women were acknowledged for their work and not viewed as an object in a man’s song, also brought in "standards of the world they seemed to reject when they sneered at artists who signed with majors, calling them 'corporate rock whores'" (White 1997. 478). These very standards that used to define the riot grrrl movement resulted in an environment that championed femenist homogeneity, excluding the complex interactions of feminism with race and culture. Nyugen discusses in her article titled “It’s (Not) a White World: Looking for Race in Punk” how the punk scene in an attempt to create a inclusive music scene ended up generating an environment where in order to be included you had to shed the aspects of your personality that could be seen as divisive. As Nyugen describes it, “To get our official membership card, we’re supposed to give up our put certain parts of ourselves aside — or at least assign them to a secondary rung. Differences are seen as potentially divisive” (Nyugen 1998). I find that by creating such homogeneous environments discounts people who have been pushed out of communities by the very differences that they are told are too divisive. It is almost as if in an attempt to create an inclusive music scene the white-male driven punk industry was fortifying the very boundaries they were trying to tear down in the first place.

DJ Selections:
Chastity Belt - Different Now: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ntfEZySu1A
Nirvana - Smells Like Teen Spirit: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hTWKbfoikeg

I chose these songs, as they are both Washington based bands that fall within the genre of alternative rock, but show very different sides of the same genre. Smells Like Teen Spirit is one of the most well-known songs in alternative rock, comprising a more aggressive grunge sound. In contrast Different Now is a much slower song with a more calm tone. I found it interesting that both of these bands fit within the genre that has attempted to ‘change the music industry’, yet embody such different sounds and notoriety.