Yay grrrl power: roller derby, good contest tunes and Civet!

The last few days have been all about grrrl power for me and I'm loving it. I owe Melissa Marr a night's worth--or perhaps a whole week's worth--of drinks for the contest she is running for IWBYJR. I have a list of awesome bands and female musicians sitting next to my computer and I have no idea how I am going to select six winners from the bunch. But I hope people continue to enter and make it even harder for me because I love discovering all this new music. So please, please, please, go to Melissa's livejournal and enter by leaving a comment or emailing me at the address I provide there.

I can tell you for sure that one of the winners will be the person that turned me onto Civet. I heard the song she suggested (which is the first one on their myspace) and I immediately checked to see if they had albums besides the one that is forthcoming in August. They do, it's called Massacre and I wanted it immediately, but I couldn't find it on downloadpunk. My local record store is going to get an email from me as soon as I finish this blog because they have to track down this album for me ASAP. Seriously, I don't think I've been this excited by a female band/female-fronted band since The Distillers. I want to send these girls my book and beg them to come to Chicago so I can see them play. Major swooning.

Another highly exciting grrrl power thing that I was exposed to this weekend: ROLLER DERBY! My friend Kathy goes to see the Windy City Rollers regularly and has been inviting me along, but it never worked out with my schedule until last night. Amber and Ryan came, too, and Scott got there as soon as he could and holy shit it was so much fun! I love anything that showcases ass-kicking women and roller derby girls are about as tough as they come. The whole time Amber and I were like, "I want to be those girls, but I'm way too big of a wuss." From the cool names, to the cool outfits and tattoos, to pure stamina and athletic ability, I have nothing but the utmost admiration and respect. Why is this not on TV instead of football? Seriously. It's way more entertaining. Tix only cost us 16$ and it was three hours of nothing but fast-paced fun. It was the championship match and the team we were rooting for (cause Kathy has friends on the team), Hells Belles won. So much fun. I fully intend to go to more of these and would highly advise everyone to see if their city has roller derby league. If so, get out there and support those cool chicks. You'll have a blast, I promise.