Article – Drummers To The Front

There is a renaissance happening in the music scene of the Twin Cities, one that has everything to do with a woman sitting behind the drum kit. It harkens back to the spirit of the first time that I ever saw Lori Barbero banging away.

I was influenced by all three members of Babes in Toyland, but Barbero was it! She was at the center of the Twin Cities music scene and had everything to do with the fact that it could no longer be overlooked by the rest of the world.

In a music industry that is energizing, polarizing and political, I felt compelled to reach out to several of the Twin Cities’ most amazing female drummers to pick their brains about the state of music.

Of the many local drummers, I was fortunate to work with Katharine Seggerman (Lunch Duchess, Bae Tigre & B.O.Y.F., previously: History Books), Laura F. Bennett (Ultimate Boyfriend, previously: Red Pens, The Mood Swings & Soap Scum), Casey Sowa (Strange Relations, previously: Post Post), Nikki Jean (Teenage Moods & The Cult of Lip, previously: Royal Brat & Shakin’ Babies) and Crystal Stockert (Catbath, previously: The Pink Slips, The Sweet Faces, Hot Rash & Lunch Duchess).

I owe them my sincere thanks for their honesty and bravery in answering my queries with such aplomb. I found their personal observations and opinions quite invigorating and fascinating, I hope that you do too.

Rift: When did you pick up the sticks and who influenced you to do it?

LFB: I guess I was in fifth grade and it came time to pick an instrument and I was jealous of all the boys that picked drums. It was intimidating-the boys haven’t changed, whether their in fifth grade or fifty. I almost picked the saxophone because at the time I was really fascinated by Men At Work. Then I saw the actual instrument and all the buttons on it and thought: “That seems like a lot of work”. I looked at the sheet music for the drums and saw that it was all in a straight line as opposed to all over the place and thought: “I think I can do that”. If I’m going to read music I want it to be in a straight line, because that’s how I think-black and white. In fifth grade the music that was played in the living room was the Rolling Stones. My dad always played the Stones, and I thought that Charlie Watts was a really good drummer to be like.

C Sowa: I’ve been drumming since I was 8 years old. I first got involved in kit lessons & quickly shifted focus to percussion when I joined band at school starting in 5th grade. My parents were both in a band growing up, so we always had a band room in our house. When I was really little I’d sit on their drummer’s lap& he’d guide my hands around the kit. I guess I was just always really drawn to the drums.

NJ: I picked up the sticks for real when I joined The Shakin’ Babies in like 2010 or 2011 but I’ve always been a drummer. I was never able to have a kit when I was younger because we never had the space so I would listen to my favorite bands (mostly White Zombie and Sleater-Kinney) and visualize a drum set and air drum along.

C Stockert: I started drumming about 3 years ago. No one influenced me but myself. It had been a long time coming.

KS: I started drumming when I was 12, at an artsy summer camp. My first choice for one of my classes was fencing, but I got into my second choice instead: drums.

Rift: What made the drums stick?

C Sowa: I don’t really know, I’ve just always really loved drumming & haven’t felt compelled to give it up since I started. I do think having some really great instructors growing up & a mother willing to drive me to lessons (and force me to attend them when I was feeling lazy that week) was a big deal and is something I am eternally grateful for.

NJ: I have always loved the drums. I think maybe not having had them growing up made them more appealing.

C Stockert: Is that a pun? -“drums stick”… haha. Honestly, I’ve been drawn to the drums since before I ever bought that first guitar. I asked to play drums in grade school band, and my parents wouldn’t let me- clarinet was my sentence. (I quit that in a hot minute.) Over the years, while playing other instruments in my own bands, I would hop behind the drummer’s kit when they went out for a smoke or piss (even during sound check once!). I had years of watching, and I would just sit back there and do stuff. Finally, I moved into a house with a drum set in the basement. I sat down and never got back up. I recorded an album after only 5 months.

KS: I liked the dual mental/physical discipline of training different parts of my body to move in new, precise combinations every time I learned a new beat. As with any instrument, I imagine, it was like learning a new language.

Rift: What is the hardest thing about being the drummer?

LFB: Roadblocks, not having a vehicle to transport the drums in, not having a place that I can set up the drums to play whenever I want to, it keeps me from practicing. Only hard circumstantially: I play on a practice pad on my bed, on my cat. The difficulties can be emotional-not being taken seriously, and of course hard as a female because I wanted to be one of the guys. When I moved to Mpls, I was so fascinated by drummers and watching them-a lot of men drummers. Then I saw Laurie Barbero play and I was like: “okay, maybe I can do this too, she looks fearless and she’s having fun” and she owned those drums. I wanted to gain some respect by becoming one of the guys and people would ask: “Are you a groupie?” I know that it looked that way because I went to a lot of shows alone and liked to meet musicians and talk with them, but I didn’t care what anyone thought. I wanted to get in there, talk to them and learn by watching. I learned so much by watching other drummers! First Ave is great because the drummer is up high and I was eye level to their foot, so I’d go to the side and watch. I was intimidated by the kick pedal and they’re making it look like you don’t have to stand up and lean your whole body into it.

C Sowa: In Strange Relations, the hardest thing is probably the fact that most people have a difficult time grasping my role as the lead songwriter in the band. Even when I’m fronting the band live, and even though I manage the band and am definitely the most vocal representative of the band, there is a prevailing assumption that my guitarist writes the songs. He’s also the only guy in our band, which seems to play a role in garnering that impression for people. It’s lame. However, in my past project I wasn’t the lead songwriter, and I stuck to drumming live. I have to admit that sometimes I miss the freedom of movement and the ability to just tunnel-focus on my drumming that came along with wearing only that hat in performances. It allows me to come up with slightly more creative & demanding parts. I think there’s a general lack of appreciation for drummers and how crucial they are to having a solid band. In my mind, there’s no such thing as a great band with a lousy drummer. The drummer is the unsung hero of any standard-lineup rock band, and can make or break a set.

NJ: The two hardest things for me are hearing the rhythm I want to play and finding more than one way to bang it out and secondly loading out at bar close with a room filled with people. Drunk people are hard to move while carrying stands and shells.

C Stockert: Since I’ve always had creative input and helped in the writing process, it’s hard when people assume I just pound on stuff or when they don’t even know I’m part of the band.

KS: Being the designated driver for the tempo. It’s easy to keep it steady when I’m just drumming, but if I’m singing at the same time, I’m also transmitting intense emotions that threaten to hijack the tempo.

Rift: The drummer is often overlooked, behind the kit-your thoughts on this.

LFB: I love bands that actually switch instruments or bands that communicate with one another & you can see that they get along. The body language, conducting with your heads, the eye contact between the members. I’ve had situations where I haven’t felt like I was in the background. I played in a two-piece band and the sound person often suggested moving me up to be side by side. I’ve always felt like I was in the right seat, like I was driving it. I never felt like I was left out, always got enough feedback that I never felt invisible. That’s the only time it felt really important for me to be heard and seen, because that is where I felt the safest, on the stage on the drums. Life can be really creepy and people can be really weird, but if I’m onstage, I can get along with anyone. When you are in the middle of a song you don’t have time to fight or argue or get catty. When you’re playing a song it’s the only job you have at that moment. That’s when I felt like a million bucks, the next day I might think something was wrong-some kind of post partum-like I wanted to go back, can’t live on the stage though.

NJ: I have never experienced being over looked behind the drums. In fact when I first began playing locally a few years back because my assigned gender is female people seemed to pay closer attention to what I was doing behind the kit than they did some of the talented male drummers I may have been playing with on a given night.

C Stockert: I’m not going to lie. It bothers me with all my soul. I’m back there singing my heart out and helping to write material. Yet, somehow the lights back there are always dimmer. I guess I can understand not being in most of the photos, but that sux too. Yeah, yeah, WAH WAH- That’s the gig and I should grab the guitar again if I wanna be taken more seriously, but I don’t care. Pounding the drums makes me feel ALIVE!

KS: I used to relish hiding my stage fright behind cymbals, but now that I’m fronting a band, I really enjoy making myself visible and engaging with the audience.

Rift: Historically, the Twin Cities has had a lot of amazing female drummers throughout its storied music history, what I find interesting is that right now there seems to be a renaissance-more women drummers than ever. Why do you think right here, right now?

LFB: I’ve noticed that things go in cycles. The world in really upset, extra tense-as far as war, race, poverty, presidential race, a lot of problems out there. Music is always just really healing & medicinal. Mpls is known for being a musical city, one with opportunities & programs available-rock camps for girls that didn’t exist when I as young.

NJ: Honestly, I think that given the times people are only noticing that there are more females drummers but i would guess that Mpls has always had its fair share people just didn’t pay attention to gender as much as they are right here, right now.

C Stockert: Holy crap, it’s so out of control right now!! I was just discussing this recently, and I have no idea what happened. When Catbath started 3 years ago, I maybe knew a couple ladiez. But now, NOW is the time! I think women have been taking over music in the Twin Cities, and this is proof.

Rift: There seems to be a high level of not only respect, but also camaraderie amongst the women drummers in the Twin Cities-would you agree?

LFB: I think so; I’ve seen both sides. It’s easier for women to get targeted-sexism, it seems like if women stick together more and are sisterly to each other that women feel stronger and more bold to go out in public and play music, men don’t really get catcalled or harassed because of their short skirt or maybe they do in certain settings. The things that have been said to me used to bug me, but don’t anymore-“You hit like a girl” or “Play like a girl”. Now I can see that is it the first thing that comes to a simple person, sometimes they mean to be complimentary or sometimes are blatantly hitting on you because they are desperate to try and especially when alcohol is involved.

NJ: I would agree. I love all drummers and support any woman who wants to smash but honestly I think gender is over. It’s becoming a thing that some of us have to jump over in order to be seen as the people we are behind all of that. When we stop looking specifically at gender as a defining factor I think we can all begin to breathe easy and see each other in a clearer light.

C Stockert: Yes, without a doubt! I think we all have such a genuine love and respect for each others’ work. I believe we all have very unique styles and contribute much more than just beats in our creative endeavors. I am beyond pride for this diverse and powerful collective! I’m happy to use the ‘actual friend in real life’ word. I love those first moments, when you go out to the show and say, “WOW, who is SHE?!”

KS: I do agree! Women are often taught to see each other as competitors, so I try to make a point of being obviously friendly and respectful towards other women in the scene…perhaps especially towards other drummers, since we have that much more in common.

Rift: That seems to fly in the face of the common stereotype that women can’t get along, and are too competitive to build one another up. What makes this drumming community so supportive of one another?

LFB: I do see the camaraderie, and I see it in men too, but there are fewer women drummers that I know. I’ve been lucky to be able to have great Internet conversations with female drummers even though everyone is so busy.

C Sowa: Real talk: I feel uneasy that the Twin Cities music scene has this unyielding devotion to a self-congratulating narrative. Is it cool to talk about what makes the scene interesting or positive? Yeah! Is it important to acknowledge the role of community in art? Hell yeah! But is it really productive, let alone appropriate, to suggest to an artist what their experience is in terms of what type of support they feel in the scene, or how the scene shapes them or their art? I am grateful for the friends I’ve made in this scene, and the support I and my bandmates have received from a wide range of people in the community, but I definitely do not feel particularly empowered by this scene as a whole, nor am I friends with everybody just because we share some portion of our identity or are operating tangentially. I think that while the majority of people attached to the Twin Cities music scene have the best intentions, the culture suffers from this obsession with talking so much about how great everything is and how we’re all best friends, at the direct expense of recognizing spaces for improvement or lifting marginalized voices.

NJ: I have no idea. I have no problem building other women up. I have no problem cheering anyone on. I don’t get along well with people who are rude and can’t pull their own weight. I don’t pick fights or tear people down based on whether they are a man or a woman. People get my respect when they give it.

C Stockert: I think it’s women in music in general that build each other up- we NEED to. I like to think we’re a cut above the rest, and don’t need resort to petty competition.

KS: Right, exactly. I couldn’t really say…personally, I really like the music these ladies are making, so it’s easy to want to support them.

Rift: Do you have a particular local drummer that you really admire or go to for support?

LFB: I’ve messaged Christopher McGuire (Kid Dakota) he’s really passionate about the drums and I took some lessons from him, great to talk drums to. I had great friends who cared about how I played, Peter Anderson for one. He has played in so many bands-he introduced me to so many great drummers, showed me great techniques and how to chart music. I can’t say enough about Laurie Barbero; I had to remember to look at the other musicians onstage when she was there. I wanted to be a powerful player, my own boss and be someone other girls looked up to, be self-sufficient.

C Sowa: Crystal from Catbath is definitely one of my favorite drummers in town. I think she owns on stage– her charisma is infectious, and she has such a fun, unique style to her playing and singing. And she’s always been super cool from the first time our paths crossed, and was instrumental in inviting me & SR into the split we put out on Guilt Ridden Pop this fall. Also wanna shout-out to my fellow local drummer friends Gunnar from Pale Spectre, Chris from Bad Bad Hats, Seth from Ego Death, Eric from Brilliant Beast, Alyse from Cadence & the Wolf, Charlie from Carroll, Steve from Maeth, Josh from Gloss, Gage from Straya, & Andrew from Fury Things. Every one of them has their own style & approach, and it’s fun watching their work evolve. Bonus points that they’re all rad people.

KS: Not to creep her out, but I am SO impressed with Casey Sowa’s technical chops. She is another singing drummer, and she manages to play some of the most complex and interesting lines of anyone drumming throughout the Twin Cities, all while keeping her head turned toward a microphone stand (I use a Justin Bieber-style headset mic, which allows me to move more freely).

Rift: For a lot of women out there, women who play music have been inspirational. Women like Kim Gordon, Patti Smith & Lori Barbero who are all thoughtful, intelligent artists & are seen as feminist role models. Do you see yourself as such a role model for women?

LFB: I’m into feminism and ways for women and men to get along. Goal is for a woman to be strong  and to not care what a man, or anyone thinks.

C Sowa: I hope women are into my art & gain a sense of understanding or empowerment from it. Beyond that, I can’t really speak to that, except to say that I hope I could inspire someone out there even 1/100th as much as some of my favorite artists have inspired me over the years.

NJ: I would be absolutely honored if anyone saw me as a role model.

C Stockert: Let me say the band “L7” virtually made me what I am today. Seriously, so tuff and awesome! Anyway, I really hope to be such a role model. It would be that ‘circle of life’ thing, if you think about it. There was a great moment, when I returned to my home state of ND for the first time in over 10 years to play a show. I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised when 99.99% of all the musicians in a 3 day festival were male. After our set, there was a super long line to buy our merch, and it was 99.99% women. Many of them were just staring at me. I was so, so proud and so, so bummed at the same time. The Twin Cities is awesome, but maybe also a microcosm.

KS: Anytime I see a woman taking creative control of a band or kicking ass at her instrument, she becomes codified as a role model for me, just because I didn’t see enough of that growing up. If anyone feels that way about me, that’s very cool.

Rift: I can’t talk about women drummers without wondering out loud if it feels empowering to do what you do? From where I stand in the audience it absolutely looks that way. What is your reaction to the fact that a young woman might see you onstage and feel empowered or inspired by your drumming?

LFB: I’d love that, to have girls hear me play and want to play the drums; I wish little girls would pick up an instrument that would create an income for them. You hate to put the money part in there, but it is nice to have gas in the tank, new sticks, lunch & recording money. You can’t play the drums if you’re malnourished or dehydrated; you need sleep because those parts of your brain need it-you are the metronome. It would be so nice to hear that someone likes my drumming, I just never really expect that, but those little things make me feel good. Onstage is the only time I feel like a ham; otherwise I’m pretty shy. A lot of Drummers are fine being alone because they can self-entertain so well.

C Sowa: For me, empowerment doesn’t come from simply picking up a pair of sticks and banging on things. I think that’s where a lot of people see empowerment in drums– in the immediate, cathartic physicality of it, or perhaps the spectacle of it. But I gain the greatest sense of personal empowerment from the craft and the discipline of drumming, from feeling confident in my skills. I also write very personal lyrics, so having the opportunity and the challenge to put myself in that vulnerable position before an audience is crucial. I hope that to the extent other young women, or anybody for that matter, feels empowered by my performance, it would be because they identify with the sentiments I am sharing, as opposed to feeling excited by the spectacle of my performance.

NJ: Again I would be honored if someone felt empowered or inspired by my drumming. I take drumming and music very seriously and I put a lot of time and energy into my work as I’m sure all the wonderful and talented women you’ve chosen to interview for this article do. It feels incredible to be acknowledged for that effort and if anyone saw what I do and felt compelled to put that same effort into any instrument I’d be elated.

C Stockert: My first reaction is to call for more all ages venues. We typically play 21+, occasionally an 18+. I’d love to spread the word to the younger generation!

KS: Despite all the jokes about drummers not being real musicians, it does feel empowering to do what I do, precisely because I do sometimes catch young women watching me with inspired looks on their faces. If my presence and competence on stage can help expand just one woman’s horizons of what is acceptable and possible as a woman, then I can die that much happier.

Rift: What advice would you give a young woman, or any age woman who wants to get into music?

LFB: First, convince your parents or guardians to get the gear. Embrace the deep down drive and find a way to play.

C Sowa: Do it, and work hard at it! Don’t settle for anybody else’s standards but your own, and don’t compromise your voice for anything. And I mean that in terms of being a drummer or other instrumentalist, not just a lyricist or vocalist. Every musician has their own style, and learning to balance that with the skills that will be your “tool kit” for expression is one of the greatest challenges and joys of being an artist.

NJ: Be your own inspiration and don’t ever let anyone tell you that you can’t do something.

C Stockert: That really depends on the person… I was drawn to it at a very young age. I ended up in some very unsavory scenarios in my younger years. I would tell my younger self not to waste time on those haters and creative energy suckers. Also, the most rebellious thing a woman can do is feel confident in herself.

KS: Your legitimacy will always be questioned. So do it for yourself, no one else, and don’t stake your worth on anyone else’s opinion of you.

Rift: Women and the treatment of women in the music industry is quite a hot button subject right now, personally what message would you like to give the music industry in regards to the way that women are perceived or treated?

LFB: Use any negativity as fuel to keep on, keep creating! Someone somewhere will always have criticism or insults. There’ll be compliments too. But if someone hits on you and you don’t like it, ignore it and play harder. You can’t control what people say, but you can control how you react. For me, I need to keep stress low, so that’s how I deal with it. Women can also be competitive so I still feel like I’m looking for solidarity in that. It come and goes, but drums are forever-no matter what the gender. I’m here to drum, not to show off my boobs.

C Sowa: “Women” is not a genre. We are not living in the “era of women in music”.

NJ: Stop making excuses for rapists. Women are not the enemy.

C Stockert: I kinda live under a rock and can’t speak one iota about pop culture these days. I think we’ve got a long way to go with objectification in music (and in general), but I’ve seen some hope in progressives like “She Shreds” mag. I don’t consider myself a part of the “music industry.” That’s always seemed really oxymoronic to me. I think true music and art should not be corrupted by an industry. It all just feeds the wheel… I really hate pop culture.

KS: You have been asking us to do the impossible–to walk the lines between all the dichotomies–for a very long time. And that is finally backfiring, because we are finally too tired to do the emotional labor of shielding your fragile egos from our immense talent. R.I.P., white male mediocrity.