#a tight 24 episode banger

[batcows]

hot take of the night: the 100 should be an anime

[girlsagainst-archive]

October Newsletter

Hey everyone, welcome to our October newsletter! This month, we've grown as a team, taking on a few reps to help us with socials and stuff you'll definitely see a more active Girls Against online (not just behind the scenes). All our links, socials and reps contact info for any questions you may have will be at the end of this post!

The #metoo campaign took over social media this month and we 100% fully support it. It is so incredibly brave and inspirational of all these people, not just women, to come forward and share their stories. It helped to expose the shocking behaviour of Harvey Weinstein and further helped other people come forward following his allegations. Many well known women gave their experiences and helped the media and the public really understand this apparently hidden situation. Everyone who tweeted spoke with such courage and its very important to say that we are absolutely here for everyone, if they  want to confide in us to tell us their stories or look for help.

Our rep Sophia has been busy with interviews this month, bands featured include The Regrettes, Idle Frets and Beyond Recall. All can be found on our tumblr. They're all really in depth and interesting so check those out!

From Sophia: 'The Regrettes supported SWMRS’ on the Europe + UK leg of the Farewell Drive North Tour. I followed the tour around the UK and had a great week watching these bands every night. I spoke to The Regrettes ahead of the London show – the biggest show of the tour, and my last one! They were very warm and welcoming, and answered my questions thoughtfully – even though they were on a very tight schedule! They were reflective and nuanced, particularly when discussing how women in music are talked about. I felt like they really embodied what we’re about as a campaign – both during the interview and on stage every night. They truly interacted with the crowd, Lydia coming into the pit most nights and getting various people to sing a line. They treated me like a peer, and I saw them be the same with so many fans after the shows every night.'

We started our 'Women Creating Waves' Instagram theme (#wcw)! This takes inspirational women, not just in music, and showcases how amazing they all are! If you have any thoughts of women we should be including over the next few weeks, send us an Instagram DM!

International

Our international rep Andrew has been even busier this month! He was featured on a great podcast by ChunkyGlasses. It can be found here: http://www.chunkyglasses.com/content/episode-318-girls-against-how-to-combat-sexual-harassment/assault-in-the-music-industry-and-beyond

The podcast discusses what we do, our book club and giving a wider view of sexual harassment in the music scene.

Book Club

During October, the Girls Against Book Club has been reading ‘The First Collection of Criticism by a Living Female Rock Critic’ by Jessica Hopper. It’s a set of essays about various issues in and surrounding the music industry and I chose to read this for the book club to learn more about and amplify the voice of a woman’s experience in a largely male-dominated industry. In the book club blog post I talk about some of my favourite essays, including  ‘Emo: Where the Girls Aren’t’ and ‘Deconstructing Lana Del Rey’, and the reasons why I didn’t like some of the other essays as much. For the month of November, the book club will be reading Carol Ann Duffy’s collection of poetry ‘Feminine Gospels’ which I’m really looking forward to as this is the first time our book club has ventured out into reading poetry and I’d love it if you joined us in reading the text! If you’re interested in reading more about my thoughts on Jessica Hopper’s set of music criticism, the fourth book club blog post is up now. Don’t forget to join our GoodReads group by following this link- https://www.goodreads.com/group/show/230714-girls-against-book-club

This piece was written by our rep Alice Porter; Alice writes and picks the book club books so please get involved with that and send her suggestions for the following months book to her email.

Music

So much good music has been released this month. Honestly, it’s been quite overwhelming. Especially as I’m still not over Architects’ ‘Doomsday’, which was my main pick from last month. My absolute favourite new song is ‘Temple’ by Tonight Alive – which was dropped with less than 24 hours warning. It’s safe to say that day I was…annoying. It’s a triumphant return, one which sees the band return to edgier, punkier sounds than their last album, Limitless. Thematically, it remains spiritual, but explores darker ideas than they dared approach previously. It’s a song that came at the right time, and one which hit hard – the upcoming album, Underworld, is undoubtedly going to be astounding. I already know it’s going to be honest to an uncomfortable degree, and that’s going to be the most freeing thing of all – for band and fans.

My next favourite is ‘Still Alive’ by The Spook School. A friend recently introduced me to this band, and as soon as I heard a couple of songs, I was hooked. This is their most recent release, and I love to play it on repeat. The standout line in the chorus – “fuck you I’m still alive” – is perfect to shout loud, over and over. Bad moods cannot persist when playing this song – that’s a fact.

There’s been so much this month though! We finally have a new Sleater Kinney song – mother Carrie answered my prayers! – and all proceeds go to Planned Parenthood! Idle Frets – an interview with whom is up now – released a new single which is a smasher! Marmozets dropped another banger! We have been very fortunate this month. Listen to all the best tunes in this month’s playlist:

https://open.spotify.com/user/girlsagainst/playlist/0QBhIV7RP6YWzSYxLH7sv8 

This Spotify playlist and piece was written by our rep Sophia Simon-Bashall.

Thank you so much for paying attention to us and following our campaign! Aforementioned, there will be a lot more action on our socials and we have SO many exciting things planned (that we can't yet give away, even more reason to stay tuned).

Our tumblr submissions are open for your thoughts but also for pieces you would like to write for us! These include anything creative, writing, poetry or anything that you think might be relevant or that we'd like to hear! We always welcome constructive criticism and are always looking to improve. We recently opened up the search for new reps which we will be announcing week commencing the 13th so keep your eyes peeled if you've applied and hopefully you've been successful. Finally, thank you so much to everyone that did apply to rep for us. We really appreciate all the messages and all the reasons why you were interested in becoming a rep were so insightful.

The Girls Against team xxx

Contributers for September:

Alice @aliceporterX        Book Club

Sophia @hurricanegrrrl    Music

Ellen @iimmortals            Editor and Coordinator

Andrew @andrewjwkoh   International

Our socials:

twitter: @girlsagainst

facebook: https://www.facebook.com/girlsagainstgroping/ 

instagram @girls.against

email: girlsagainstgiggroping@gmail.com

If you need to contact any of us individually (reps), our twitters are @iimmortals (Ellen), @aliceporterX (Alice), @hurricanegrrrl (Sophia), @monica_gems (Georgia), @wardeeey (Isabella) and @azzannedale (Azzanne).