CONVERSATIONS WITH PUNX

My interview with Le Butcherettes’ Teri Gender Bender…enjoy! :)

sargenthouse:

I’ve listened to Le Butcherettes practically every single day since I first discovered them last year. There are not many bands that have made my daily playlists, especially so quickly. I get the same feeling listening to Le Butcherettes’ Kiss & Kill and Sin Sin Sin records as I did when I first discovered Hole’s Pretty On The Inside and Live Through This as a 15-year-old. Le Butcherettes have become a really important, special band to me in the same way Hole (the real Hole with the Love/Erlandson combo) is. All the things that I love about Hole frontwoman Courtney Love – the intelligence, the love of literature and culture, the introspection and commentary of the female experience in the world, the strength, heartfelt soulful lyrics, musicianship, powerful live shows – I find again in Le Butcherettes’ frontwoman Teri Gender Bender. Le Butcherettes are a band that matter.

TERI GENDER BENDER: I’m nervous because my answers always suck!

No, they don’t! Every interview I’ve ever read with you is so incredibly thoughtful. You answer every question with such grace and no matter what is asked you always answer it really considerately.
TGB: That’s probably because the writer made it sound thoughtful.

No way. You’re selling yourself short lady.
TGB: Thank you, you are very kind [laughs].

I wanted to start by asking, what does music mean to you?
TGB: Honestly, it means [pauses] aw fuck, it just means so much to me. All these words want to come out but my throat stops them—the act of living and doing, that’s what music means to me. Being able to express oneself, even when you’re not playing it, the act of listening to it makes me feel so alive. It makes me feel like I can do anything, that I can conquer any man or any animal – that I could just go up to any bear and just hug him. Maybe that might not be the case but to me, music is just a big part of my life. Thanks to music, it prevented me from being depressed, or when I was depressed music helps lift my spirits up. I guess it has something to do with the vibes, the vibration, maybe some kind of molecules; I’ll go along with it. Its medicine, music is medicine.

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