TNG reader Kameko submits this post.

When I was eight years old, I picked up a guitar.  As a little girl completely disinterested in barbies, Lisa Frank, and jump rope, and not the best athlete, I was drawn to punk, grunge, and ska, crowd surfing for the first time at 11 years old.  I was mostly alone in my love for rockin’ out among my girl peers, and never taken seriously by the male musicians.  If only Girls Rock! DC was around back then to show me how to bend, slide, and jam out and to point me towards fellow fender aficionados of my gender, I could have built the confidence to stand proud, guitar pick in hand.

Girls Rock! DC is an all girls rock camp in which girls ages 8 to 18 form bands, write songs, and learn about the history of girls in rock as well as gender and cultural identity and band management. As the camp’s director said in between sets, “This is really a female empowerment camp disguised as a music camp,” and the enthusiastic crowd roared as she deplored the lack of female musicians in mainstream rock media.

As a rock camp centered around female empowerment, Girls Rock! organizes workshops on body image and the history of girls in rock.  The camp even houses concerts by leading area female musicians.  But the camp is also about learning music, creating a band, and performing a show, and in the name of Les Paul can these girls rock.  With names like “Pie in Your Face,”  “The Queens of Rock”, “Exploding Pops,” and, “Silent District,” the bands took control of the stage as a packed 9:30 Club cheered them on.

A highlight for me was the “Pie in Your Face” set, during which the rockers screamed “eat this” while throwing candy into the audience for a big finale.  In addition to rock bands, three aspiring DJs took the stage, along with all of the band coaches who danced along while the Girls Rock crew spun records and pumped up the crowd.

Seeing these girls on the 9:30 stage, on which I have seen so many incredible acts, was like a shot of Obama to the bloodstream.  Incorporating lessons of female empowerment and women’s history into a rock camp is a natural combination, and provides girls with a space not just to hone music skills but to nurture their inner feminist and gear up to confront that daunting male hegemony, which extends beyond the music industry.

The whole show screamed, “we are women, hear us rock,” and that female empowerment feeling I get from Hilary Swank movies and reading Bell Hooks was magnified to the extreme.  It also helped to be in crowd of many like-minded feminist women (many pretty cute…) who were cheering not just for the girls, but for a regime change in rock and roll.  To those who rocked the stage, and to the organizers of the camp, I salute you.  Rock on my fellow female rockers.  Rock on.

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