Melissa York | |
|---|---|
 Melissa York with fist in air during performance at The Saint in Asbury Park, NJ, April 2012 | |
| Background information | |
| Born | February 22, 1969 |
| Genres | Punk rock, hardcore punk, indie rock |
| Instrument(s) | Drums, percussion |
| Years active | 1990–present |
| Labels | Vermiform, Kill Rock Stars |
Melissa York is a rock drummer noted for her work with iconic lesbian bands such as Team Dresch, The Butchies, and Amy Ray. She lives in Durham, North Carolina.
York first began drumming with the New York-based hardcore punk bands Born Against, the Manacled, and Vitapup. Following this, she moved to the West Coast to drum for Team Dresch in 1993. [1] When Team Dresch broke up in 1998, York and band-mate Kaia Wilson, together with Alison Martlew, formed the power punk lesbian-feminist band, The Butchies (1998-2005), which put out four albums.
She has remained active in the lesbian and punk music scene, touring with the Indigo Girls' Amy Ray and playing in a band called The Ex-Members and the band Humble Tripe. [2]
Her name appears in the lyrics of the Le Tigre song "Hot Topic." [3]
Indigo Girls are an American folk rock music duo from Atlanta, Georgia, United States, consisting of Amy Ray and Emily Saliers. The two met in elementary school and began performing together as high school students in Decatur, Georgia, part of the Atlanta metropolitan area. They started performing with the name Indigo Girls as students at Emory University, performing weekly at The Dugout, a bar in Emory Village.
Queercore is a cultural/social movement that began in the mid-1980s as an offshoot of the punk subculture and a music genre that comes from punk rock. It is distinguished by its discontent with society in general, and specifically society's disapproval of the LGBT community. Queercore expresses itself in a DIY style through magazines, music, writing and film.
Amy Elizabeth Ray is an American singer-songwriter and member of the contemporary folk duo Indigo Girls with Emily Saliers. She also pursues a solo career and has released six albums under her own name, and founded a record company, Daemon Records.
Fifth Column was a Canadian all-female post-punk band from Toronto, formed in 1980 and breaking up in 1995.
Phranc, is an American singer-songwriter whose career began playing in several bands in the late 1970s Los Angeles punk rock scene. Her musical style later shifted during the 1980s as a solo artist, into a self-proclaimed "All-American Jewish lesbian folksinger."
Patricia Theresa Schemel is an American drummer and musician who rose to prominence as the drummer of alternative rock band Hole from 1992 until 1998. Born in Los Angeles, Schemel was raised in rural Marysville, Washington, where she developed an interest in punk rock music as a teenager. She began drumming at age eleven, and while in high school, formed several bands with her brother, Larry.
The Butchies were an all-female punk rock band from Durham, North Carolina, that existed from 1998 to 2005. They reunited from their hiatus to tour with Amy Ray of the Indigo Girls promoting Ray's new album in 2010. The frequent focus of their lyrical content concerned lesbian and queer themes.
Team Dresch is an American punk rock band originally formed in 1993 in Olympia, Washington.
Chainsaw Records is an independent record label run by Donna Dresch that is devoted to Queercore bands. The label is in Portland, Oregon.
Kaia Lynn Wilson is an American musician from Portland, Oregon, best known as a founding member of both Team Dresch, a revered 1990s queercore punk band, and The Butchies, a pop-rock spin-off from her solo work. In addition to singing, songwriting and guitar, Wilson co-established and operated Mr. Lady Records from 1996 to 2004.
Tammy Rae Carland, is a photographer, video artist, zine editor, current provost at California College of the Arts (CCA), and former co-owner of the independent lesbian music label Mr. Lady Records and Videos. Her work has been published, screened, and exhibited around the world in galleries and museums in New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Berlin, and Sydney.
Mr. Lady Records was a San Francisco-based lesbian-feminist independent record label and video art distributor. Artists on the label included Le Tigre and The Butchies. OutSmart magazine noted that Mr. Lady was "queercore's strongest label."
Personal Best is the first studio album by the American queercore band Team Dresch. It was released on January 23, 1995 by both Candy Ass Records and Chainsaw Records. It was reissued on Jealous Butcher Records in May 2019. The label reissued their entire back catalog in order to help reaffirm the band's legacy as queercore icons.
Donna Dresch is an American punk rock musician, perhaps best known as founder, guitarist and bass guitarist of Team Dresch.
Longstocking were an American, Los Angeles–based queercore-punk band.
Rachel Carns is an American musician, composer, artist and performer living in Olympia, Washington, U.S. Raised in small-town Wisconsin, she went on to study painting and drawing at Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art in New York City, where she completed her B.F.A. in 1991. Carns began her career as drummer for Kicking Giant, later collaborating with several bands, including The Need. She is a celebrated graphic designer, working under the name System Lux, and plays drums and percussion with experimental performance art group Cloud Eye Control.
Adickdid was an American all-female punk rock band, started in the early 1990s in Eugene, Oregon, United States, by Kaia Wilson, Nalini Cheriel, and Sara Shelton Bellum. They toured alongside other riot grrrl bands. Their first single "All American Girl" b/w "Columbus" was put out by Imp Records in 1993. One of their opening acts was Beck at the Jabberjaw in Los Angeles. They recorded the song "Hair" on the Stars Kill Rock compilation for Kill Rock Stars. They also recorded a song for Yoyo Records. Their album, Dismantle, was put out on Imp and their own record label G Records in 1993. Members went on to form The Butchies and Team Dresch. Adickdid broke up in 1995.
Stag is the debut solo album by Amy Ray of Indigo Girls, released in 2001 on her Daemon Records label. Ray is accompanied by the Butchies, the Rockateens, Joan Jett, Josephine Wiggs and Kate Schellenbach on the album. She attributes the Butchies with contributing a punk rock influence to some of the songs.
Make Yr Life is the fourth album by the American lesbian queercore band the Butchies, released in 2004. It was the band's final album.
Riot grrrl is an underground feminist punk movement that began during the early 1990s within the United States in Olympia, Washington and the greater Pacific Northwest and has expanded to at least 26 other countries. A subcultural movement that combines feminism, punk music, and politics, it is often associated with third-wave feminism, which is sometimes seen as having grown out of the riot grrrl movement and has recently been seen in fourth-wave feminist punk music that rose in the 2010s. The genre has also been described as coming out of indie rock, with the punk scene serving as an inspiration for a movement in which women could express anger, rage, and frustration, emotions considered socially acceptable for male songwriters but less commonly for women.
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