Don't Google Sex Stains unless you add some keywords: Allison Wolfe, '90s riot grrrl, Bratmobile. Formed in L.A. a couple years ago with Wolfe and choreographer Mecca Vazie Andrews, plus former and current members of Warpaint and Prettiest Eyes, Sex Stains just released its self-titled debut. This is hilarious, raunchy, sneering feminist punk rock to inspire spastic dancing — and everyone else can just piss off.
Appropriately (or inappropriately) enough, director Christopher Slater's video for "Period. Period.," a breathlessly fun stab of two-minute dub-punk, was filmed in an extremely colorful — and questionable — bathroom.
"It's the bathroom of the long-standing all-ages punk community venue The Smell, which is being threatened with shutdown, seriously, to be replaced by a parking garage," Allison Wolfe tells NPR. "Three of my bandmates — Sharif [Dumani], Mecca and David [Orlando] — all grew up in L.A. and have attended (and probably played) many shows there. I also have played there in several bands and gone to shows there over the years. I have always been fascinated by the colorful chaotic beauty of their bathrooms, though I'm a little afraid to actually go to the bathroom there."
Sex Stains is out now on Don Giovanni.
Copyright 2021 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.
