Well, basically six years ago I started the event in New York City as just a single annual event and what was going on was, I sing in a band called G-Spot. We do sort of rock, punk, pop and what I had found was that there were a lot of organizations that were doing women in rock so to speak but they weren’t necessarily really doing heavier, harder rock. So when I would be involved in shows like that, I just felt like there wasn’t really a place for women that were doing heavier stuff and I knew several other bands that were doing that sort of thing. I had actually been involved with another show, again a festival for women the year before that and it was the same thing. There were a few rock bands but it was a lot of the singer/songwriter girl with guitar so I really wanted just to create something that was more about women really doing heavier rock, punk, metal, and everything in between. So that’s how the whole thing came about initially.

Yeah, because some of us just aren’t into wimpy, wimpy, wimpy.

Yeah, it’s just interesting. I love all that stuff. There’s nothing wrong with it. It’s just that more and more, especially as the tour has evolved, we’re just seeing more and more women that are out there doing stuff that’s just as hardcore as guys are doing but you don’t really hear about it. You don’t really see it. You see the Britney’s and there was kind of a little bit of it around Lilith Fair back in the ’90s but it kind of went away. We’re just really trying to bring attention to women who are doing a heavier sort of sound and a kind of harder rock music. Our stuff runs the gamut. We might have some pop rock but it will go all the way to where I’m doing like death metal. It runs that whole spectrum versus the other end of the spectrum which might be from folk to pop rock.

Goodness knows that I love my Madonna and I love my Cyndi Lauper but I also love my Lamb Of God and my Children of Bodom.

Right, exactly.

It just started out as something you did in New York City and now it’s turning into something you do in the tri-state area.

It’s actually even gotten bigger than that. It started out as an annual event in New York and I did that for four years. The second year we started linking in with charities. We always give a percentage of the proceeds to benefit charity which right now is Willie Mae Rock Camp For Girls and we’ve worked with other organizations in the past. I guess about three years ago I had this idea that it might be really interesting to see if we could take this out to other cities and partner with bands locally so we did one event in Hoboken, New Jersey at a really well known club called Maxwell’s and it went really well. Then in 2006, that was the first year that we really did a tour and we did some shows locally but we actually did six cities in 2006. We were in New York and New Jersey but we also went all the way upstate to upstate New York and down into Pennsylvania. Then this past year was really when we took the next leap and we did 12 shows. Three of them were tri-state. We anniversaried a show that we had done in Long Island and a show that we had done in New Jersey. We have our anniversary show in December every year but we actually did an eight date tour and we went all along the East Coast. We went to D.C., Baltimore, Delaware, Philly, Rhode Island, and Massachusetts and then back up to upstate New York and back home to Brooklyn. Each year it’s expanding further and further. This coming year in 2008 we’re actually planning to go all the way South and all the way West so we’ll do our tri-state shows because they’re here and we do them as a preview in the summer and early fall. Then at the beginning of October we’re going to start out the shows in D.C. but we’re going to head South and we’re looking to go to Virginia and North Carolina. We just booked a show in Nashville and then come around through Ohio and Pittsburgh and then back to Baltimore and New York.

So one of these days you guys might even make it to Texas.

Exactly. I can tell you that you are probably the third or fourth person since we started playing the 2008 tour that have been asking when we’re coming to Texas. Are we coming to Austin. I would love to. I would love to do it this year but basically there are three other women that I work with and we are the four core bands on the tour. They also help me organize it. Then in any city we bring in some local bands to play with us. Sometimes those local bands will play in other cities with us as well and right now we’re all limited by the fact that we have other gigs and day jobs and funding things. Hopefully we’ll get to a point where we’ll grow enough to where we can be funded and we can do this more as a full time thing. I’d love to be going everywhere. I think that would be all of our dreams but right now we’re limited by how much time we can take and the budgets and things like that. But maybe next year Texas because we could go there and see that area and come back. Or make our way out there. I would love to get out that far. Then to the West Coast and everything else.

Tell me a little bit about the Willie Mae Rock Camp For Girls. What is that exactly?

Willie Mae is a camp for young girls from eight to 18. It takes place during the summer and they actually do two week long sessions and then they do a weekend session called Ladies Rock Camp. Basically what happens is the whole program is really about encouraging girls. It teaches them to rock out and they go to camp for a week. They form bands. They get to pick an instrument that they want to play. Learn something either that they’re already playing or something that they have never played. They learn all about different things like how to make band art and about different instrumentation and songwriting. They form a band and they write a song that week and at the end of the week they actually get to perform at the showcase. It’s really wonderful. The thing about it is, is it’s not just about being in a band and all that but the whole week is really about encouraging young women to express themselves. To not be afraid and to make them understand that they can be and do anything that they want. It’s very much about learning how to collaborate and it’s a very positive, uplifting, empowering environment for these young girls that a lot of times they don’t get that encouragement.

Yeah, especially with the way things are now. A lot of these politicians are being so sexist. We’re kind of living in an atmosphere where women are fixing to go back 100 years. It’s definitely important to show girls that it’s better to be progressive than regressive.

Yeah, and that they can be empowered. It’s also about expressing themselves however they want to. Not feeling like they’re not good enough. It they want to have two drummers in their band and three guitarists, that’s fine. It’s however they want to express themselves is okay. I think especially in the music world, women are not always encouraged to pick up a guitar and rock out and just totally express themselves in any way that they feel that they should. It’s great because I volunteered there two years ago and they’ve been in Brooklyn for three years but there’s a group that started in Portland six or seven years ago which they’re built off the same similar type of model. There are more of these rock camps popping up in different places.

That’s very cool.

Yeah, like I said they also do a weekend version for ladies once a summer and we actually had a band that played with us in Brooklyn when we came back at the end of the tour this year that actually founded a ladies rock camp called Royal Paint which is very cool. They [Willie Mae Camp For Girls] have an after school program now and at the anniversary show we had the after school Willie Mae band play at that show and open it up and play some of their songs. It’s a great organization and it’s a really empowering week I think not just for the girls that are there as campers, but I think for the people that are involved as volunteers and band coaches and everything else.

You guys are doing a fundraiser at Hank’s Saloon.

Yeah, Girls Rock & Girls Rule are doing a fundraiser for us on February 9. Like I said, normally every show that we do, we generally give a portion of the proceeds to whatever charity is working with us at the time which right now happens to be Willie Mae. This particular show that we’re doing in February is actually a fundraiser for the tour itself. Something that’s an emerging type of platform, we just need some funds in order to keep everything going. It should be really fun. We have the four core bands playing and then we have two new bands that haven’t played on any of the shows before from the New York area. We’re still keeping up the mission of being able to bring exposure to other artists and other bands. We try to always incorporate that.

That sounds like a very cool thing. I was tickled when I read about that. Any other thoughts or comments?

We’re definitely going to have to do a Texas tour. I think that’s a whole tour because Texas is so big.

Yeah, you could have the Girls Rock & Girls Rule Texas tour.