Have a Splash of GASH: The BDSM Music Revolution is a Bum Smacking Cocktail

I now know how David Lynch felt when he first walked onto the set of Dune.  It was the same feeling that I had when I entered the excessively elegant clubroom of the apartment building where Tibbie X, front woman of GASH, lives with her husband and young son until they move into a house big enough to share with her entire band.  “Am I in over my head?” I thought.  “What Questions do I ask?”   For Pete’s sake, I barely know anything about Crass or Black Flag, and despite my working knowledge of The Sex Pistols, I have discovered that “true punks” do not take the Sex Pistols very seriously.  “Maybe this interview will be my Dune,” I prayed to Zeus, because just as Lynch did not know the first thing about directing a big budget film at the time, I was clueless about punk music and even more clueless about conducting an interview with an “interactive S&M” punk band.

GASH is comprised of a truly magnetic cast of characters, and their outlook on life as a “celebration of liberation,” embracing the BDSM culture, is just as unique as they all are.  BDSM, for the uninitiated, stands for an overlapping of Bondage and Discipline (BD), Dominance and Submission (DS), and Sadism and Masochism (SM).  Most of the members of the band are wearing black when I meet them, and the two ladies of GASH are dressed in tight, sexy, latex and leather outfits.  Tibbie X is a tiny woman, but stands tall in front of us, balancing on 3-inch heel-less, black shoes embellished with the band’s name.  She played bass for Reagan Youth and was the vocalist for X-Possibles, and has had plenty of experience tearing through the punk rock scene.  Her Domme, who goes by the name “Stephxecutioner,” is the band’s Dominatrix.  Steph rides a motorcycle and used to be a pro-wrestler.  As a teen, she would quickly realize her love of fighting was a passion for domination that came after wrestling with a lot of her male friends, and winning. “I worked out all day every day, and built up my strength. I then began dating wrestlers in high school who helped train me, and I also realized how extremely erotic it was for me.”
 

These two women are accompanied by four male counterparts: A.J. Delinquent and Hit Cunningham both on guitar, Travis Travesty on bass, and Chris Wiz, the band’s Official Pet.  I’d be lying if I said Tibbie X and Stephxecutioner didn’t steal the scene, at least during the interview, but these four chaps are absolutely essential to the band’s sound and outlook, as much as the ladies.  They describe their set as “purposefully ritualistic” and naturally, begin all of their shows with their song “Ritual.”  Tibbie X says they always have a set list, but the experience between band and audience is nevertheless interactive, and the two groups feed off of one another:

At live GASH shows I surrender myself to the music and people that have inspired me and shaped my reality as I hope to manifest inspiration in return…We are transitioning from one state of consciousness to another – together band and audience.  By the time in our set where I’m bound, blindfolded and in the audience we have already been through that shift.  I share that power exchange so we all can bliss out on that trust bond and be energetically united in the moment.
 

– image courtesy of GASH –

As one might imagine, GASH’s music has a lot of punch to it.  But it is clever shock rock: a sound accompanied by a powerful, positive message.  They take the bond between their band and their fellow audience members very seriously; they are open to every audience member as every audience member is open to them, a give and take trust exercise that is central to the BDSM culture.  “Ritual,” for example, will have you tossing and turning at night, thinking about your own rituals and who you want to share them with.
Talking to GASH was an enlightening journey into the culture of BDSM and how it plays into punk music in the 21st century where they invite you to join in their vision of liberation.  This is a trip that I would gladly embark on with GASH before returning to my tough guy jams by The Culture Club.


 

Only time will tell if this piece will be my Dune.  But regardless of its literary outcome, I highly recommend picking up GASH’s Liberation Edition CD, as well as the compilation album Punk Rock Christmas, on which they are featured alongside Iggy Pop, Smash Mouth, and The Suicide Machines.  Two ball gags way, way up for this band’s explosive energy and openness to their audience.

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story /  David Leigh Abts & Elizabeth A. Abts
edited by /  Ashley K. Goodwin
photography  /  Elizabeth A. Abts
For more GASH /  http://gashofficial.com/
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