Interview by Malcolm Lasky
War on Women are a feminist hardcore band out of Baltimore, Maryland. After releasing their debut 10”, Improvised Weapons, in 2011 on Exotic Fever Records, they recently made the move to Bridge 9 Records as their most recent signing to release a full-length album in early 2015. Rice and Bread caught up with guitarist Brooks Harlan before their show at the Royale in Boston, Massachusetts to talk about the inception of the band, the band’s feminist themes and a well-placed nerdy lyrical reference.
How did War on Women start?
We’re all from Baltimore. We all knew each other already. I didn’t actually know [guitarist] Nancy [Hornburg] all that well; she was in a band I liked before called High School Hellcats, so I sort of knew her from that. [Vocalist] Shawna [Potter] and I were in another band called Avec, like “with” in French. It was much more technical indie rock. The lyrics were very vague and meandering and we did that intentionally. As we sort of toured around and saw other bands and became more educated politically, we sort of wanted to do something harder hitting and more direct. She was a great guitar player, she played guitar for Avec. I actually came up with the name War on Women; I’d heard it around before it became a media catchphrase. I came up with that name and we did some demos in my apartment when Avec was still going. We thought it’d be cool to try to get people to play. We wanted to just play one show at the Charm City Art Space. So we tried a few drummers, and we got a few flat-out “nos.”
Was that because of the feminist bent?
I don’t think so. I didn’t force it. Someone says no, I’ll just say fine. I don’t know if it was that or the music. It’s still not really that cool to play hardcore music. I knew [drummer] Evan [Tanner], I used to work with him and I was fan of other bands he was in, like Liars Academy and Cross My Heart; big, heavy-hitters in the emo world. I just sort of said, “What do you think of these demos?” And he didn’t say yes or no, he just started giving me feedback on the demos, like, “What if we did this on this part? Or this part was half as fast?” so he was just in. It kinda evolved from there and we played our first show.
Was it at Charm City Art Space?
No, actually, it was at a warehouse for a friend’s birthday. We didn’t even have enough songs for a full set, so we did a Minor Threat cover. Which I’d actually like to bring back into the set.
Which Minor Threat Song?
It’s the one that goes, “Sit in the same room, we look the other way, fuck conversation, we’ve got nothing to say.” I always forget the name, but it’s my favourite Minor Threat song. [“No Reason” - ed.] That’s the long story of how we got started.
Yeah, and now you guys are on Bridge Nine Records and releasing an album next year.
Yeah, we stopped by their offices today. We’d never met them face to face. We met [owner] Chris [Wrenn], and he showed us where they run the label; they had a whole floor where they run the label and with all the merch and stuff. From the start, they seemed genuinely interested in what we were doing, and that’s important to us; that they’re not trying to cash-in, that they’re genuinely interested in putting what we have to say out there. When we started the band, we thought it’d be cool to be on Bridge Nine, never thinking that it would ever happen.
In your travels, are there any spots for food that you’ve really been into, or that you visit repeatedly?
I maintain a vegan diet so, I usually try to hunt down vegan food in any town I’m in. The problem is remembering the names of places. I can tell you for a fact, any time we play the Black Cat in DC, I get the vegan nachos. They don’t try to make a fake cheese; it’s this tahini sauce and olives and it’s like a salt attack and I love it!
Any good vegan spots around Baltimore?
Yeah, there’s been a few places that have come and gone. Right now, there’s this place called Land of Kush that does vegan soul food. So they do like citrus ribs, but the fake version. Just really great vegan soul food. There’s also a place a block away from the Ottobar in Baltimore called Meet 27. They’re associated with a place called Sweet 27, which I go in more. They have sort of Indian food. I always get Indian tacos, so it has that spice that makes Indian… masala flavour. But with salsa and avocado on it. Which sounds odd, but it’s fantastic. And they have vegan and gluten-free cupcakes, so you can really knock yourself out at that place.
Alright, this is something that’s been bugging me for a while and I keep forgetting to ask. The opening line of “Effemimania,” where it says, “No man can kill me, I am no man,” is that a reference to Lord of the Rings: Return of the King?
Yeah, absolutely! I mean, I could talk Tolkien all day long with you. I’ve read through the books multiple times, and Shawna’s read it and we were both sort of taken with that moment. We all have differing opinions on Tolkien’s literature; whether or not it is sexist. I feel like, if you read through everything, including the Silmarillion, that the men in the books are the ones with all the problems, which is why the stories struggle with their weakness and their pride. The women in the story are the perfect ones. Anytime a man and woman marry in Tolkien, the man always marries up. Even in the end, Aragorn marries up to an elf. So, in my opinion, Tolkien is saying that woman are the superior, smarter, more perfect beings, but the reason the stories are focused around the men is that they’re the flawed ones. But getting back to your question, it’s really stating the power that women have in the story and it fit lyrically, and was sort of a “hey, we’re just nerds, too.”
That’s interesting, because I find a lot of bands that have that, nerdy pedigree, if you will… it’s sort of a defining factor. Like Teenage Bottlerocket write songs about Comic-Con and Top Gun, or Save Ends having songs about Dungeons & Dragons and naming a song after a type of ship in Battlestar Galactica. It tends to be on their sleeve.
Well, yeah, I think the reason we liked it so much was because of what it says. It fit into the line and that whole song, which is about gender identity. There’s this problem in the United States where you have to be on one team or the other, and specifically about gender. That song is just saying we don’t have to choose sides, you know, we can support each other. That stuff seen as effeminate is not bad, it’s just different. But, yeah, a lot of people have asked us that and we’re like, “Yeah, it’s right out of the movie!”
I think it’s interesting because for you it’s so out of character. There aren’t a lot of nerdy references, to my ears, in your music. But you stick this one in and it’s right where it should be, and it makes perfect sense.
Yeah, and what’s funny is some people who aren’t nerds don’t get it. Like, there was the comment on the youtube video for it, where someone said, “No man can kill me? That seems inaccurate.” You know, completely missing the reference. [Laughs]
So, what’s the method of writing a War on Women song?
Well, things are sort of changing in that department, but I’ll tell you about the songs on the 10” that’s already out. You know, some of those songs, they were the demos that I did in my bedroom. The rest of the songs Evan and I sat down to hash out the music for. Let’s just say Shawna has plenty of fuel for lyrics, so we didn’t really help out on the lyrics. The point of the band wasn’t to be too complicated; we wanted the songs to be short and fast and direct. I think when you listen to the 10”, it’s pretty raw; we recorded it very quickly, mixed it very quickly. We just kinda wanted it to seem like you just saw us at a garage show. That’s sort of the first phase of the band. For the new record, we wrote some of it more as a group. Nancy and I had some guitar ideas, but things got fleshed out more in rehearsals and we did some writing in the studio, which we’d never done before. On the last record, Nancy and I, we were just sort of double guitars, because we wanted to sound fatter. But on this one, we were like, “What if we had two guitar parts?” So, that’s how stuff gets written; we do the music and then Shawna comes in with her massive lyric book and lays stuff on top of it.
On Improvised Weapons, street harassment comes up as a pretty steady theme. What sort of themes are you going to tackle on the new album?
We definitely tackle a lot of women’s issues. We tackle abortion. We tackle rape. There’s a song we just started playing live about the conflict between second- and third-wave feminism. Specifically, that there’s this fear or non-acknowledgment of transgender rights, and the fact that it exists at all with second-wave feminists. We have this song about this vigilante woman in Juarez, Mexico who’s trying to do something about all the disappearing women in Juarez, Mexico. I think that’s turning out really well; I’m really happy with it. With a band that just focuses on women’s and trans’ rights, there’s so much to go on. Because it’s so much in the media lately, you hear a lot of backward, hateful stuff spewed out. Which gives us a lot of fuel to say what we have to say back at them. I don’t see us running out of material anytime soon, which is both fortunate and unfortunate.
War on Women‘s Improvised Weapons was released in 2011 on Exotic Fever Records. Their new album is due in early 2015 on Bridge Nine Records.
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