Fangless

Hunger Makes Me a Modern Girl is a memoir written by Carrie Brownstein, but if you are looking for details about her time in the band Wild Flag or her show Portlandia you are going to be disappointed. This memoir is all about Carrie’s love of music and her band Sleater-Kinney.

The book starts with Carrie telling about her family, her upbringing and how her love of music began. The way that she talks about being a fan is something that I have tried to describe to others and until now have not heard a proper description of outside of Almost Famous. Soon we transition into how Carrie became involved in the Olympia scene and how she met Corin Tucker.

The rest of the book documents Carrie’s time with Sleater-Kinney moving from the formation into descriptions of each album and finally the ultimate demise and breakup of the band. I love the chapters in which Carrie’s talks about how they wrote and recorded the songs for each album. There are some really great insights into what the songs are written about and also how they came to create the sound of Sleater-Kinney. The chapters that talk about touring are also really interesting…it is not as glamorous as people think. As a fan of Sleater-Kinney I love getting an inside look of the creation of the songs that I love.

Carrie also talks about the relationships she has with the other members of Sleater-Kinney. Carrie has such an interesting connection with Corin Tucker, it has not been an easy road for them but they have such an incredible respect and love for each other. Sleater-Kinney, and also Carrie’s music career, could not have happened without Corin. I think that this book made me love Janet Weiss more, if that is possible. Carrie really only has good things to say about Janet and really Janet is one of the best drummers ever.

Throughout the book Carrie openly talks about her mental health and everything that she says is completely relatable. It blows my mind that someone who is so confident on stage can suffer from anxiety and depression…it made me feel a little bit less alone. I believe that it is so important that people like Carrie talk about metal health, you never know who it might affect.

The writing is engaging, thoughtful, and poignant. I was never once bored while reading this book…which is saying a lot for a memoir. I know that for years to come I will reread Hunger and will find new things held within the pages. I believe that this should be required reading for not only fans of Sleater-Kinney but fans of music.

Carrie Browstein is my Hero

Today I finished watching all the episodes of Portlandia, I feel like I am little bit late to the party, which I have decided is one of the best shows ever written. If you don’t know, and I’m sure that you do, Portlandia is a sketch comedy show created by Fred Armisen and Carrie Brownstein that is about life in Portland Oregon. It is so clever and funny, to me this is what comedy is and should be. All in all this show has confirmed that Carrie Brownstein is, in fact, my hero.

I have written about Carrie Brownstein’s band Wild Flag before, but my love affair with Carrie really began back in 2005. During the summer of 2005 by brother and I purchased tickets to see Pearl Jam, it was going to be my first time, and we discovered that the opener was going to a band called Sleater-Kinney. I proceeded to look them up on the internet and found out that they were an all girl, or riot grrrl, band that had just released their latest album called The Woods. I rushed out and bought The Woods at the first chance that I got and the music that one small disc held was, honestly, life changing.

The Woods is so grungy and raw. It was like nothing I had heard before, and I had never heard women play music like that before. It was powerful and it made me think about women in music differently than I ever had before. Knowing that the sounds coming from my speakers were coming from three women was an awesome experience and I related more to this music than a lot of the female musicians that I was listening to at the time.

When Sleater-Kinney opened for Pearl Jam that September it was such a cool experience. Up until this point I had never really seen a female band or artist live and watching these three women kick ass was an eye opening experience. It made me realise that women can rock as hard, or harder, then men. When I listen to Sleater-Kinney, and their offshoots Wild Flag and The Corin Tucker Band, I feel empowered and like I can do anything.

It is really difficult for me to choose my favourite song off of The Woods, they are all so great, I’d have to say that it is probably Entertain. This is a great song because it highlights what each member of the band brings to the group. I love everything about this song; I could listen to it over and over and never be tired of it. I can still remember Sleater-Kinney playing this song live, it was one the best performances of a song that I have ever seen. The band killed it and there were these strobe lights that would flash with the drum beat, and all I can remember thinking is Holy crap, that. Is. it. It blew my mind.