On the face of it, rage and joy are not an easy aesthetic fit. Rage is engaged, rope-veined; joy is free and light – frivolous, even. And yet the collected works of musical activist Kathleen Hanna – across three bands: 1990s punk outfit Bikini Kill, her electronic bedroom pop project the Julie Ruin, and Le Tigre, a multimedia collaboration alongside Johanna Fateman (mostly guitar) and JD Samson (mostly synths) – dance along the tightrope between fury and fun.
Now on a reunion tour – they’re in the UK for the first time in 18 years – Le Tigre began as an intersectional feminist pop project in 1998 before folding, three albums later, in 2007. Then as now, they dive headlong into what seem to be contradictions but aren’t, having a mischievous, righteous good time all the while. Hot Topic, a particularly tuneful, finger-snapping anthem, thanks a long call sheet of inspirations for their work.
A bit like improv, this is a band of open-ended “ands” not “buts”. Le Tigre remain punkishly scathing – and partial to bouts of stylised choreography. Although their setup tonight is minimal (guitar, synths, a video backdrop, a few lights), they come equipped with a protest loudhailer and 1960s girl group-style tambourines. For the grand finale, there are props: a broom and a skipping rope. Le Tigre’s music encompasses heated debates – was the director John Cassavetes a genius or a misogynist, asks the succinct What’s Yr Take on Cassavetes? – and their set also features costume changes, plus karaoke-style lyrical displays on a giant screen, because clothes are a form of creativity, and words matter.
It’s hard to explain in 2023, now that genre has become so malleable, exactly how radical it was for uncompromising punk icon Hanna to make the leap into tinny pop music you could dance to; to Le Tigre’s matching costumes and colourful video installations. There was considerable static – especially from the DIY punk congregation. (“Wanna disco? Wanna see me disco?” Hanna fulminates on Deceptacon, one of the band’s most defining songs.)
There are a number of reasons why Le Tigre are back. A big factor in this reunion, and the Bikini Kill respawn that preceded it, is Hanna’s restored health. (For many years, she battled Lyme disease.)
In the meantime, Le Tigre’s work has stealthily connected with another generation. Inevitably, TikTok has played a role. Deceptacon – “Everything you feel/ Is alright, alright, alright, alright, alright,” it goes – has been adopted by a largely female usership in clips that validate their emotions and decisions. Multimedia genre mashups are now, self-evidently, a good thing.
Another contributing factor is that the gains of feminism – and anti-racism, and LGBTQ+ equality – are being rapidly eroded in the US, and the band’s work continues to provide inspiration and succour. It’s a fresh crisis, but really it’s the same old crisis – a feature, not a bug, of the struggle, captured in a Le Tigre track called FYR. “One step forward, five steps back,” hollers Hanna. FYR, meanwhile, stands for “50 years of ridicule”, a coining by the feminist author Shulamith Firestone that identifies how moves towards equality have been met not just with outright aggression, but a backlash of gaslighting, deflection and accusations of absurdity. During the brief costume intermission, a Czech-style cutout monochrome animation depicts burning hills and oilwells, while a recording of Get Off the Internet plays out: “This is repetitive/ But nothing has changed.”
This, then, is a pointed party band who take no prisoners – while pulling goofy faces from time to time. Some of Le Tigre’s songs have dated a little more than others, particularly those expressing hyper-specific political positions. My My Metro Card inveighs against then New York mayor Rudy Giuliani. Seconds is a punk-leaning song about hating George W Bush.
Predominantly, though, Le Tigre’s songs are about exasperation: an evergreen state. The The Empty is one of a number of tracks where Le Tigre express scorn for unengaged mediocrity; for art that fails to move. “I went to your concert and I didn’t feel anything,” sneers Hanna, as a drum machine channels her outrage. Later, Fateman, who is now an art critic at the New Yorker, snarls: “I can’t stand yr fake rebellion/ Misdirected and anti-art” on Yr Critique. The band rotate instruments; Samson, who is now a professor, sings Viz, a track celebrating lesbian visibility (“They call it way too rowdy, and I call it finally free”) to especially joyful cheers and a chant of “JD! JD!”
Just as nourishing is the between-song talk. As of old, Hanna ministers to abuse survivors (“You don’t have to raise your hand!”), thanks the Raincoats for showing her that art was not about “being a virtuoso”, and despairs of a burning world. As everyone bawls Deceptacon’s chorus back at the band – “Who took the bomp from the bompalompalomp?” – it feels like a night of communion. Or, as Hanna put it earlier: “A joyous way of dealing with fucked-up shit.”
