D-Filed's Publisher Spouts Off by Chris Parcellin
JUNE, 2001
This month D-Filed's newest staff member--Detroit's own Erin-Elvis--takes over SCREED and gives our jerky, no-good publisher a rest.
BITCH MODE (PART ONE)
by Erin-Elvis
In my perfect world, there would be a hell of a lot more chicks playing kick-ass rock-n-roll without it being a stupid gender issue. A place where we could all make smokin' records, play killer shows, and be interviewed ABOUT OUR MUSIC without it being declared a "women's movement" or a "feminist statement". But, in reality, that's not the case.

It's so frustrating for me to see bands like Tribe 8 or the Lunachicks come to town and be advertised as "lesbian punk-rockers" or with the prefix statement of all girl band, riot grrrls, or womyn's music.

When women like Joan Jett are interviewed, the first question they ask her is "How's it feel to be a woman in rock?" Or they ask her about her sexuality. Why don't they ask her about her gear? Or some road stories? What the fuck does her sexuality have to do with her ability to play guitar and sing? Our society still doesn't take women-rockers seriously because it's still considered "dude stuff."

That shit pisses me off because I wanna know about Joan's gear, or anyone else's for that matter. And, I know I'm not the only one who feels this way. I've found that a lot of us, male and female, would rather know about the rock-n-roll aspect instead of the political.

Don't get me wrong, politics are an important thing, but I swear I can quote Joan Jett verbatim on every interview she's ever given. It's all about being a woman instead of being a musician.

We live in a society that feels they have to know everyone's personal business like their sexuality. It's not necessarily a judgement, but it is a label. Now people like Melissa Etheridge have found success with that annoying in-your-face label "lesbian."

It's not that anyone should be ashamed of who or what they are, not at all. But does it have to be everyone's business? If you like someone for their tunes, does anything else matter? I know that the gay rights activists, and the feminists feel it's all important for equality but it's not. People should just be themselves and everyone else needs to swallow it and DEAL WITH IT! YES FOLKS, THERE ARE GAY PEOPLE AND WOMEN OUT THERE WHO ROCK!

I hate labels, I hate p.c., especially when they're wrong. Someone on MTV said that Celine Dion is a part of rock-n-roll history. WRONG!

Take the Lillith Fair for example. Who the hell would really want to pay $45 to hear seven hours of the same shit? All's it is, in a nutshell, is a bunch of generic women with acoustic guitars, and an all male back-up band wondering where all the cowboys have gone. This is the corporate mainstream wet dream of women in rock. It's like they're all settling to be carbon copies of each other. One chick makes 20 million ripping off Joni Mitchell and the next thing you know, there's 40 others out there riding the wave. Do you all know that Joni Mitchell was FORCED to play the music she played? She really wanted to play rock-n-roll but the record company told her that if she wanted to make records at all, she had to play folk!

And what the hell happened to Pat Benatar? She's become one of them. That woman fought hard to be taken seriously, now she's "swaying" right along with them! Thank God someone put a stop to the Lillith Fair. It's all over now.

But as soon as that died, low and behold, the corporate mainstream has given birth to another Anti-chick-rock genre. It's unofficially called the Josie and the Pussycats movement. Or the Susanna Hoffs girls. All of a sudden, the establishment has decided that women can rock now...but only a little bit! All's it is, is a bunch of jailbait looking hookers who look like they can suck the dimples out of a golf ball. If you give a man a hard-on, he'll buy your record. If you really rock, you'll threaten his masculinity and he won't buy your record. So fucking what?

What I wanna know is when is it all gonna end? I guess that's why I'm writing this. I guess it's my goal to let you know that there is some killer rock-n-roll out there that just happens to be made by women.

Chris has been very cool and generous to let me have this opportunity to rant and rave with him. Although I do love rock-n-roll from men, my main objective is to bring to light the talent and kick ass music that's gone unnoticed for way too long!

If you know any rockin' chicks out there, by all means, SEND ME THE INFO!! I'm always open for discussion as well. Keep in mind that I am not a man-hater by any means! Other than that, prepare yourselves for a kick in the nuts! COMING SOON...FROM DETROIT...BROADZILLA!!

MAY, 2001
Is it just me or has anyone else noticed how much music has sucked in recent years? The deluge of teenybopper bands and girl singers, gansta rappers, fifteenth-generation "punk" bands, etc. Where are the real rock'n'roll bands?

Do you know what I'm talking about? Bands whose roots come from Chuck Berry, Elvis, Johnny Cash, The Rolling Stones and Jerry Lee Lewis. Not from Fred Durst or that idiot from Creed...Music that has real soul and real roots in the music that goes back to Robert Johnson, Leadbelly and beyond. Sure, there are some out there. But they are few and far between and they sure as hell aren't getting as much airplay as Kid Rock or that even bigger douchebag Eminem.

It's just too bad that people, in general, settle for the stuff they are fed by the corporations instead of using their brains and seeking out the music that has a little more content.

This is just part of how something like MTV cheapens things on every level. They push mediocrity in music, fashion and just by making huge media heros out of rappers--and washed-up '80s metal knuckleheads like Tommy Lee--who can't articulate a sentence in the english language. That show "Cribs" is Exhibit A. It's basically "Lifestyles of the Rich and Stupid". Watching the drummer from the Foo Fighters strut around his house crowing about all his worldly possessions makes me want to fly out to L.A. and bitch-slap some sense into him.

This bullshit is not what music is about. It's about conveying emotions and having fun. Not about watching thinly-disguised infomercials for these pompous slobs and the half-baked, lame bands they're in.

As it stands, the music is definitely way less important than the goofy images. And it's not going to be changing any time soon. It's annoying to be bombarded with this stuff, but I suppose the smart thing to do would be to throw my TV out the window. We'll see. Maybe after "The Sopranos".

APRIL, 2001
This has definitely been a sad month for punk. The passing of legendary Ramones frontman Joey Ramone, on April 15th, from lymphoma--as well as the 10th anniversary of Johnny Thunders death in a New Orleans hotel room on April 23rd are two huge events. It would be fair to say that the overall media coverage of Joey's unfortunate death has been rather light. He certainly hasn't been afforded the kind of booming tributes given to bigger name mediawhores like Kurt Cobain and Jerry Garcia. And Johnny has been completely ignored, as he was when he died back in '91.

It's quite possible that a lot of mainstream media hacks don't realize the influence that Joey and Johnny both had on music and popular culture. When the "hip" guy at MTV is the fiftysomething Kurt Loder, you know that if they do anything on Joey's death at all it will be crappy. Essentially, they're trying to reach the gangsta rap crowd and little braindead zitheads who worship Eminem or Britney Sneers.

Even allegedly more sophisticated media outlets like CNN have little or no time for punk icons. They believe their time is much better served having a walking corpse like Larry King sit around for an hour in prime time sucking up to celebrities and politicians. And I'm sure the ratings bear them out. Television news is a business like anything else. Which is why Dan Rather is going to MC a wet t-shirt contest in Daytona Beach next week along with Stuttering John and D-Filed's own Feck Dangler. Dan wants to get the word out to the common folk: "Watch CBS...Buy Pepsi."

Which brings us back to Joey & Johnny. Why didn't these guys make a bigger dent in the mass consciousness? Why do most people respond only to the most dumbed-down music, art, films and books? Are they idiots? Well, of course they are! :-) But don't go by what I say, I just work here.
© 2001, Chris Parcellin & D-Filed. All rights reserved.