“After decades of dudes telling their stories of punk’s formative years in memoir, we finally get one of L.A. punk’s most crucial figures—Alice Bag, frontwoman of The Bags—telling her tale. Unsentimental and tough, she gets out from under her patriarchal family and finds her place among a crew of motley, misfit kids as they accidentally invented the American West Coast punk in bands like X, Black Flag, Germs and her own band, The Bags.”
"One two three four! My band rips into our opening song. The music is loud, tight, fast and intense. A wave of bodies surges at the front of the stage as the audience explodes into frenetic dancing. The music blaring at my back, I’m going to ride this wave. I grab the microphone from the stand and belt out the words.
She’s taken too much of the domesticated world, she’s tearing it to pieces, she’s a violence girl!
I’m bouncing on stilettos like a fighter in the ring, I charge out onto the edge of the stage, full of adrenaline and fire. I sing into the faces in the front rows. They are my current, my source of energy. I urge them to engage. I know there’s something in them, some inner carbonation lying still, waiting to be shaken. It’s fizzing in them as I shake them up. Shake, motherfucker, shake! I want you to explode with me. I’m stomping, jogging and dancing all over the stage, teetering precariously on my high heels. I spot an area of spectators in front of Patricia, my bassist. Fuck that! No spectators, we’re all participants here! I get up in their faces as I continue to spew out the words. Now they’re dancing, that’s right, keep it going.
She’s a violence girl, she thrives on pain, she’s a violence girl, you can’t restrain!
I am in my element, en mi mero mole. There is so much energy coursing through my body that surely I am dangerous to touch." - Violence Girl
The Bags, 1978 photo by Melanie NIssen