Le Tigre
Photo: Mr. Lady

Standing onstage Thursday (August 16) in Chicago's Congress Theater, Kathleen Hanna caught her breath between songs and attempted to boil down the impetus behind this month's feminist Ladyfest music gigs to a single sentence.

Society, said the former Bikini Kill frontwoman, tries "to make you feel stupid because you're making work about your friends and neighbors." But your friends — and your bands and festivals — are just as valid as anything else on the mainstream's radar, she implied.

Then Hanna and her new band, Le Tigre, laid waste to the mainstream's dismissals with a new stick-to-your-guns tune called "My Art Is Better Than Your Art."

Le Tigre's lo-fi, disco-punk set was a clear rallying point for Ladyfest Midwest, underscoring that women of all genres could and should create their own art, with their own values, based on their own experiences.

The four-day event, which ended Sunday, saw more than 1,000 women (and dozens of men) trek to the Windy City for sets by minimalist funk pioneers ESG, Indigo Girl Amy Ray backed by queercore punks the Butchies, country singer and Mekons member Sally Timms, art-metal punishers Loraxx and scores of others.

The Chicago festival followed the smaller but equally energized Ladyfest Scotland, held August 12-14 in Glasgow. Like its Midwestern sister, Ladyfest Scotland featured numerous do-it-yourself and feminist workshops on topics such as DJ skills, violence against women and alternative ways to deal with menstruation. Scottish synth-pop outfit Bis, American garage acts Bratmobile and the Gossip, plus Katastrophy Wife — Babes in Toyland leader Kat Bjelland's new band — all took the stage, along with numerous other rock and spoken-word acts.

Both events took their cue from last summer's inaugural Ladyfest, a stridently independent arts and activism conference that took place in Olympia, Washington, a hub of the 1990s riot grrrl feminist-punk movement.

"This time, people haven't allowed it to remain in Olympia," said Glasgow co-organizer Lee Beattie, 22, taking a breather in the basement of the 13th Note Club on LF Scotland's opening day. "With Riot Grrrl, lots of people were happy to just sit back and take what they were doing. The riot grrrl creators were exhausted. You cannot maintain the energy to keep doing that and produce things all the time. This time it hasn't just moved from Olympia to Seattle or Washington, D.C. It actually moved across the world."

An emphasis on empowerment connected events within each festival and linked the independently organized Midwest and Scotland Ladyfests to each other.

In Glasgow, women plotted to commandeer the reins of publishing during a workshop on postering zines throughout one's neighborhood; in Chicago, they got seductive in "Kinky Crafts: Cheap and Fun Ways to Enhance Your Sex Life."

Meanwhile, Amy Ray and the Butchies stomped through a cover of Tom Petty's "Refugee," turning the song's chorus ("You don't have to live like a refugee!") into an anthem of lesbian and gay rights. In the cloistered confines of the 13th Note, the Gossip's hefty singer Beth Ditto spread her "fat positive" message by shimmying and shaking through a raucous set stripped down to her underwear.

Numerous fans at both Ladyfests said they came to the events for the music but were heading home inspired to become producers of zines, shows and festivals of their own. Just as last year's Ladyfest inspired Beattie and Ladyfest Midwest organizer Marf Wright, this year's events have sparked the DIY urge in other attendees. A handful of Glasgow fans began talking about staging a Ladyfest in Nice, France, next summer, while in Chicago flyers circulated for a 2002 Ladyfest South in Atlanta.

Another offshoot, Ladyfest East, will take place in New York in early September.

Standing out in the Glasgow rain, getting ready to catch a set by Brighton, England's electronic-buzz band Electrelane, Bratmobile singer Allison Wolfe observed that a resurgent energy is coursing through women in the indie punk scene.

"It feels like the spirit of riot grrrl all over again, though maybe in a slightly modernized package," said Wolfe, 31. Bratmobile were one of the earliest Riot Grrrl bands, and the only act to play Ladyfests in Olympia, Glasgow and Chicago.

"It's interesting, because it's a little bit looser-knit. People can put on their own festival and make it however they want, whatever suits their communities. And a lot of us will attend. It's great that the pressure's not always on the same people. I don't think it has a chance to get too stale."

• Bratmobile
• Le Tigre
• Amy Ray
• The Butchies
• Bis

David Byrne, Frank Black, Devo, and The Apples In Stereo have heeded the call of "The Powerpuff Girls" and have contributed tracks to "Heroes & Villains," a new album of music inspired by the Cartoon Network series due out on July 18.

Others power-pitching in for "Heroes & Villains," which was produced by Devo's Mark Mothersbaugh and Bob Casale, include Shonen Knife, Cornelius, and Bis, the band responsible for penning "The Powerpuff Girls" original theme (see "Bis Lends A Hand To 'The Powerpuff Girls'").

The "Powerpuff" series' creator, Craig McCracken, also oversaw the "Heroes & Villains" project, and says that he's pleased at how the resulting tracks that ended up on the record all seem to fit together.

"Each song on the album focuses on a different aspect of The Powerpuff Girls," McCracken wrote in a statement heralding the "Heroes & Villains" LP, "and together they tell a story. From Townsville being in danger to the day finally being saved, what you hear throughout is a sonic Powerpuff adventure."

The track listing for "Heroes & Villains:"

• Devo - "Go Monkey Go"
• Frank Black - "Pray For The Girls" -
• The Apples In Stereo - "Signal In The Sky (Let's Go)"
• Optiganally Yours - "Walk & Chew Gum"
• Shonen Knife - "Buttercup (I'm A Super Girl)"
• Komeda - "B.L.O.S.S.O.M."
• Dressy Bessy - "Bubbles"
• Bis - "Fight The Power"
• The Sugarplastic - "Don't Look Down"
• Cornelius - "The Fight"
• David Byrne with Malu - "Buttercup, Blossom, & Bubbles Say"
• Bis - "The Powerpuff Girls (End Theme)"
• Marty & Elayne - "Love Makes The World Go Round" [hidden track]

• Bis
• Frank Black
• David Byrne
• Devo
• The Pixies

While their new album won't be hitting the States until early next year, the pop-fueled and techno-punk adorned trio Bis have delivered at least some new material to these shores in the form of the group's theme song for the new animated series "The Powerpuff Girls."

The show will debut on the Cartoon Network later this month, and will sport an amped-up action packed theme song courtesy of the Scottish trio.

"It's completely cheesy. It's like ideal," the band's John Disco told MTV News recently of the track. "We're very pleased about that, and they love it as well. It's something that... we've done it now, so we don't really have to do it again, unless someone asks us and gives us loads of money to do it.

The band, which is in the States to play the annual CMJ Music Marathon in New York, said that the Hanna-Barbera camp had been in touch with the group for some time, and the two parties were simply waiting for the right project to come along. Enter the creative team behind the Cartoon Network's "Dexter's Laboratory" and three cutesy-pie superheroes known as the Powerpuff Girls.

"I think it's a good thing for us to do," Bis' Manda Rin said of the song. "It shows that we can do these kind of things when asked. Like, not many bands could you say, 'Right, you've got a week to do a cartoon theme tune. Can you do it?' Not many probably could, but we turned it around and they're so happy with it. They just say, 'Oh, it's the best chorus you've ever written,' and stuff. It's like, 'Oh god, it's really cheesy.'"

"'Oh my god, it only took me five minutes,'" [28.8 RealVideo] the group's Sci-Fi Steven added.

"And we got into New York yesterday and we saw a trailer for it on the TV, and we're like, 'Oh my god, it's going to be… it's bigger than we realized it's going to be.' So it's quite a good thing," Manda added.

The band is also hoping that the theme song will perk up the ears of those unfamiliar with the Bis experience.

"Cartoon theme tunes down the years have been quite good really," Sci-Fi Steven said. "I mean, I quite like the Primus one on 'South Park,' and I don't like Primus. So hopefully this will get people buying our records who actually hate us."

"That's a lot of people," Manda added.

Bis can be heard when "The Powerfuff Girls" debuts on the Cartoon Network on November 18, and in the band's more natural element when its next album, "Social Dancing," arrives early next year.

• Bis

July 23 [7:55 EDT] -- The Bis message of teen power over all doesn't mean that the group wants to rid the world of old folks... they just want to make everyone, well, younger.

"It's all about enthusiasm and just sticking to what you believe in and not being pressured into something by other people," the trio's Manda Rin told MTV News Online of the group's youth-over-all message.

The trio pulls together the influences of keyboardist/vocalist Manda (a fan of "powerful female bands like Bikini Kill and Sleater-Kinney"), guitarist/vocalist John Disco (who has an affinity for techno and hip-hop), and guitarist/vocalist Sci-Fi Steven (who has an "obsession" with disco and ska).

So far, the mix has made for a string of hits in Great Britain, and a smashing stateside release with "the new transistor heroes." ["This Is Fake DIY" Video Clip, 1MB QuickTime]

Much has been made of the mind-bogglingly exuberant fuzz pop of this Scottish outfit, and the youth brigade message behind it (the band's elder statesman, Steven, is only 21).

However, the group is quick to point out that it's not about age... it's about fun.

The group looks no further than the executive pool of their record label, Grand Royal, for proof that you don't have to calm down when you get older.

"I don't think the Beastie Boys have ever grown up... That's the best example," Steven said. "They still have fun with what they do."

"That's the thing," Manda added. "Every band that we like... they're a lot older than us. Even like just five or six years, but still. Even a band like Bikini Kill... they're not 20-years-old... they're still singing like you wouldn't expect someone of that age."

Bis' admitted prime directive is to pull concert-goers out of their self-conscious cocoons, loosen them up, and yes, even get them to dance.

"In Britain especially, there's too many people who are scared to dance at clubs because they think they're too old to enjoy a band," Manda said.

"You have that in America too," John noted.

"We'd like to bring the entire audience out of their shell," Steven said.

And the best way to achieve that goal, as far as Bis is concerned, is to set a good example.

"That's what we're trying to encourage," Manda said. "I think if you can see us acting like a bunch of twits on stage, then everyone else can too."

"You've got look like you're enjoying it yourself," Manda explained. "Bands like Oasis, you can't see anyone in the crowd jumping around like crazy, because they're not. They look really bored, and as if they want to go home. That's a horrible thing to watch."

Bis kicked off a brief U.S. tour with a performance in New York City at the Intel Music Festival last Friday. If you want to catch the buzz, Pollstar says you can check out the band at the following venues:

• 7/24 - Detroit, MI @ Magic Stick
• 7/26 - Chicago, IL @ Metro
• 7/27 - Minneapolis, MN @ 7th Street Entry
• 8/5 - Mesa, AZ @ Hollywood Alley
• 8/7 - Palo Alto, CA @ Edge

• Bis