Author: Shelby Leone
Cover photo by by Tammy Rae (from left to right: Tobi Vail, Kathleen Hana, Kathy Wilcox)
I’m not crying, you’re crying. To be honest, we probably both are, because Bikini Kill—the legendary Riot Grrrl band—has announced tour dates for the first time since their split in 1997. The band announced tour dates in the spring in New York and LA only (sorry, middle America). The original shows were set for Brooklyn Steel (a 1,800 person venue in Brooklyn), Terminal 5 (a 3,000 person venue in Hell’s Kitchen), and at the Hollywood Palladium (a 5,000 person venue in Hollywood). Unfortunately, reports state that a majority of the tickets were taken by bots and scalpers. The tickets, which originally sold for $40 or $45, now are priced up to $900.
Fans have lamented this is “the least riot grrl thing to ever happen”
Bikini Kill tickets selling out in 1 second and then going for $379.05+ on StubHub is the least riot grrrl thing to ever happen
— mika simone ✰ (@mika_simone_) January 18, 2019
Bikini Kill, in turn, have put out an apology to fans along with the addition of two more shows at the Hollywood Palladium and one on Wednesday June 5, 2019, in Brooklyn at Kings Theatre.
If you are following along, that’s now:
04/25 — Los Angeles, CA @ Hollywood Palladium
04/26 — Los Angeles, CA @ Hollywood Palladium
05/02 — Los Angeles, CA @ Hollywood Palladium
05/31 — Brooklyn, NY @ Brooklyn Steel
06/01 — New York, NY @ Terminal 5
06/05 — Brooklyn, NY @ Kings Theatre
In an official statement on the band’s cite, the band said this:
“Hi everyone, we wanted to apologize to anyone who had a bad experience trying to get tickets to our upcoming shows. We weren’t aware of the pre-sale for people with a certain credit card in NY until it was too late and that will not happen in the future. Also as soon as we realized there were problems we tried to put as many obstacles in front of scalpers as we could and are trying to figure out a better solution going forward. Thanks for all the interest and support of these shows – it is beyond anything we expected and we are excited to play for you!”
Regardless if you are going or not, this reunion is a big deal. Bikini Kill are widely considered THE riot grrrl band. The culture they—and other bands such as Sleater-Kinney, Bratmobile, and Heavens-To-Betsy—created fed femxle musicians’ and fans’ need for non-male centered spaces. Though the movement was criticized for its inherent focus on white feminists of the middle class, their music undoubtedly inspired this current generation of non-cis-male-centered bedroom rock and punk, and was the first of its kind when it began in the early 90s.
Though it’s been gone for a while now, all I can say is: let the riot continue.
SHELBY LEONE | Grrrls to the front of the ticketmaster line | KXSU Music Reporter