Unabashed Teenage Whore: My Labor of (Courtney) Love - Part I

Lisa was a jappy but sweet Sephardic jewish girl, who, when we took a 3-family trip to Disney World, kept on being mistaken for a Latina, with people speaking to her in spanish wherever we went. She got to wear the cutest tacky outfits like a lime green top with matching spandex pants and dice glued all over it. I usually only saw Lisa on Hanukkah when our dysfunctional families met at her house to light the menorah. A screaming fight between her father and older brother would inevitably ensue at these gatherings. After potato latkes and dreidels and screaming, Lisa and I would retreat to her luxurious bedroom suite in the huge finished basement for playtime.

As a 12-year-old, I had never been exposed to even a semblance of punk rock. My musical taste at the time was more Madonna, En Vogue, and Tina Turner just like all the other boys my age. Not. So G-d help me if it wasn't dice-laden-outfit-wearing Lisa herself, who would be the one to expose me to the comparatively hardcore, screaming, yet melodic music of Courtney Love and her band, Hole. It makes sense in retrospect, Lisa was on the cutting edge of fashion and she had just been Bat-Mitvahed.

Lisa handed me the album, Live Through This, like she was passing me a joint. "Shhh...just inhale..." I was instantly intrigued by the cover which depicted a post-win beauty pageant contestant with feathered blonde hair and running mascara, cradling her bouquet of flowers like a baby. The music began and I heard a desperate, angry, somewhat frightening voice coming from a woman. I had never heard anything like that. The songs managed to be melodic and surprisingly appealing to my 12 year-old feminine sensibility. I convinced Lisa to let me borrow the CD knowing that I wouldn't see her until next year's gathering and she wouldn't want it by then. Anyways, I needed the music more than Lisa. I was troubled and misunderstood--her biggest challenge was being mistaken for a Latina which was quite a compliment because it meant she was non-Semitic and exotic looking.

This contraband became my favorite secret gift of the evening. I felt a certain power finally having music my mother wouldn't want to hear in the car. Was this puberty? Live Through This became my floor-rattling anthem after door-slamming fights with my parents. Even if I didn't understand all of the lyrics (and I certainly didn't), the tone and intention of Courtney Love's music was crystal clear and gave voice to my mind-boggling rage and isolation.

New York Times Rock Critic, Neil Strauss, reported in his 2003 year-end wrap-up that his editor had asked him months earlier to prepare an obituary for Courtney Love. The Courtney Love who formerly entranced me, died in 1997. That year, after costarring in The People vs. Larry Flynt, Courtney made a concerted effort to go the straight-and-narrow, beginning (and ending) with her physical appearance. Courtney finally succumbed to the kryptonite of Hollywood ideals of beauty which she fought for so long. She underwent plastic surgery to “correct” her hook nose and traded in vintage baby-doll dresses and dark roots for Versace gowns and perfect make-up. She spearheaded a campaign as “The New Courtney Love,” posing for multiple covers of stupid magazines like US Weekly. She waxed poetic about the “old” Courtney Love, herself only a few years earlier; like an elderly woman reminiscing about her crazy teenage years: When Hole was first playing, I was embracing my life fully. But there was a later period when bad things happened. Someone should have locked me in my damn house. You just don't go through something (Cobain's death) and walk out onstage. It's too much. I think it was amazing performance, because you can't get any more real...To them [my fans], I represented whatever female form of freedom that Patti Smith and Exene represented to me, and that's great. It's a part of me that didn't care about anything. But that's not for me."

Courtney Love was most fascinating on stage. Say what you will about who actually penned her music and lyrics, her guitar skills, breaking up Nirvana; her charisma was undeniable. She borrowed a mostly underground female punk performance aesthetic from her predecessors, such as punk icon Lydia Lunch and Exene (mentioned above), and mainstreamed it. Screaming until she was hoarse while simultaneously glaring up at God and the heavens, she would often end up stage-diving into the crowd. She was the Bad Seed all grown up; a real-life version of Pizzazz from the 80’s cartoon, Jem and the Holograms. Kathi Wilcox of the ferocious female group, Bikini Kill, likened watching Courtney perform to a religious experience. Her off-stage antics only enhanced her onstage persona. Who else would have the audacity to turn down a record deal from Madonna’s label, and shortly after, throw a compact at her on live TV? Jesus? Mary Magdalene?More to come...