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A review by theresidentbookworm
Rebel Girl: My Life as a Feminist Punk by Kathleen Hanna
3.0
I feel like I need to start this review with this disclaimer that I've never had cool music taste. I love Taylor Swift, and I'm notorious among my friends for "discovering" a great song two years after it was considered cool. Also, as someone born in the late 90s, I only have a passing knowledge of Riot Grrl and the Seattle grunge scene. Of course, I know about Kurt Cobain and Nirvana, but my knowledge of Bikini Kill is almost completely limited to Julia Stiles liking them in 10 Things I Hate About You and their song Rebel Girl, which is the intro music to a podcast I like. I did not have the familiarity with Kathleen Hanna that many coming into this book might.
That being said, Hanna is an honest and engrossing writer. She describes her childhood and her involvement in the early grunge Olympia scene with both love and frankness. Listening to this book is like listening to a friend tell you a story that's a little jumbled in order. Sometimes, I had trouble knowing where we were in time until Hanna said a specific year or mentioned an event. Again, anyone who was into grunge music would have much more context for this than I would, but Hanna throws around so many names and bands I kept losing track. Part of the book feels like an honest exploration of her relationship to art, music, and fame, and sometimes it just feels like her responding to specific grudges/criticisms. There's an extended bit where she talks about someone named Susan who was running the Riot Grrrl press, and I thought to myself, "Why even give this woman space in the text? What's the point?" All the Kurt Cobain information was new to me as was the stuff with Courtney Love. It was more engaging for me when I could place Hanna and Bikini Kill in context of the larger culture of the time (her comments about Spice Girls, etc.).
As a memoir, Rebel Girl loses focuses after Bikini Kill breaks up. Hanna works on her own music, falls in love with a Beastie Boy, forms another band, and struggles with chronic health issues. I think her detailed descriptions of her battle to get correctly diagnosed and recover from Lyme's disease was the most interesting part of the later half of the book.
If you're a Bikini Kill or Kathleen Hanna fan or simply someone interested in that era of music, Rebel Girl is probably for you. It definitely made me want to go listen to some of these songs. However, if you're like me and don't have an attachment to any of this, maybe skip it.
That being said, Hanna is an honest and engrossing writer. She describes her childhood and her involvement in the early grunge Olympia scene with both love and frankness. Listening to this book is like listening to a friend tell you a story that's a little jumbled in order. Sometimes, I had trouble knowing where we were in time until Hanna said a specific year or mentioned an event. Again, anyone who was into grunge music would have much more context for this than I would, but Hanna throws around so many names and bands I kept losing track. Part of the book feels like an honest exploration of her relationship to art, music, and fame, and sometimes it just feels like her responding to specific grudges/criticisms. There's an extended bit where she talks about someone named Susan who was running the Riot Grrrl press, and I thought to myself, "Why even give this woman space in the text? What's the point?" All the Kurt Cobain information was new to me as was the stuff with Courtney Love. It was more engaging for me when I could place Hanna and Bikini Kill in context of the larger culture of the time (her comments about Spice Girls, etc.).
As a memoir, Rebel Girl loses focuses after Bikini Kill breaks up. Hanna works on her own music, falls in love with a Beastie Boy, forms another band, and struggles with chronic health issues. I think her detailed descriptions of her battle to get correctly diagnosed and recover from Lyme's disease was the most interesting part of the later half of the book.
If you're a Bikini Kill or Kathleen Hanna fan or simply someone interested in that era of music, Rebel Girl is probably for you. It definitely made me want to go listen to some of these songs. However, if you're like me and don't have an attachment to any of this, maybe skip it.