rock bottoms
a lavishly (if not lasciviously) illustrated guide to bodacious bass babes

Erin Fisher Wright pretends to consider Bill Clinton's request for "Free For All."

"Well, she held a bass guitar and she was playing in a band..."
                                     --"Behind the Wall of Sleep," the Smithereens

There have been thousands of guitar goddesses from Joan Baez to Joan Jett, not to mention dozens of drum dolls (hi, Karen!), and even a few keyboard kittens (hi, Tori!). But no instrument in the rock arsenal twists the ol' lipstick tube quite like the bass guitar.

 
Belly/L7/Benny Sizzler's Gail Greenwood models the Official Bodacious Bass Babe Axe, the Gibson Thunderbird IV

beat me, slap me, pluck me, use your fingers!

What is it about the bass that makes women wanna wrap their dainty fingers around those tree-trunk necks? Contrary to popular belief, bass is not an easy instrument to master; oh sure, you only play one note at a time, but for every chord coming out of the Stratocaster, bassists often hammer multiple separate notes (guitarists like to call this "soloing").

The Runaways' Jackie Fox shows Lita Ford the proper way to play
"Queens of Noise" on the original bass-babe Thunderbird

 
You know you're bodacious when you manage to break your Thunderbird's G-string like Sonic Youth's Kim Gordon

the curse of the bodacious bass babe

Van Halen vocalists. Deep Purple guitarists. Grateful Dead keyboard players. Spinal Tap drummers. Women musicians who specialize in four strings suffer from the same annoying tendency to wander off the plantation, as evidenced by the turnover in the Runaways (five!), L7, the Bangles and Babes in Toyland (four and counting), Nashville Pussy, Elastica, Hole, the Pandoras and Girlschool (three apiece), and Precious Metal, Imperial Teen, Smashing Pumpkins, Vixen and the Slits (the terrible twos). And they say men can't make commitments...

Nashville Pussy's Tracy Almazan: T-Bird is da word! 

the holy trinity of bodacious bass babe archtypes

Spotlight princess (sings lead, writes songs): Suzi Quatro, Johnette Napolitano, Bianca Butthole. Often morphs into guitar goddess (Juliana Hatfield, Aimee Mann, Jennifer Finch) or marries lead guitarist (Suzi again).

Synchronized periods (all-girl bands): Jackie Fox, Kathy Valentine, Michael Steele, Donna F. Think Witches of Eastwick with Ampeg SVTs.

One of the boys (token female): Tina Weymouth, Kim Gordon, Kim Deal, Sean Yseult. Shares dressing room, but not songwriting credits. Fuck (with) at your own peril.

In addition, there are various sub-genres, like cute bass chicks in babe bands with random boys (Hole, Elastica, Breeders, Nashville Pussy) and single-name bass babes (Kira, D'arcy, Britta, Greta B, Donna F, Mona).

But they all have one thing in common; they're cooler, louder and way more bodacious than you.

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