Carla Desantis of Rockrgrl Stops Rocking

The mid-'90s was a good time for music in Seattle. The media was flocking to the Northwest city to proclaim bands like Nirvana, Pearl Jam and Soundgarden part of "The Next Big Thing!" and teens and twenty-somethings across the U.S. followed suit.

At the same time, in the same city, bassplayer Carla A. Desantis was reading a Rolling Stone issue with the theme, "Women in Rock." Inside, female artists weren't asked about their music, like Kurt Cobain or Eddie Vedder. Instead, they were asked about their favorite perfume.

Upon the advent of the riotgrrrl movement of the '90s (also started in the Northwest,) Desantis began a survey of music magazines and came up with an answer she had sadly predicted: women musicians were only featured based on what they were wearing and who they were dating.

Desantis immediately set out to produce a publication that would serve as an alternative to the testosterone-driven magazines that women like her were reading because they had no other choice. Rockrgrl was first published in January 1995, a Xeroxed cluster of 16-pages that featured interviews and technical overviews on women and their music.

Rockrgrl has seen moderate success. The magazine is now a bi-monthly full-color glossy with national circulation. Desantis only has herself and one other full-time staff member and is unable to pay contributors to the magazine, yet she receives thousands of e-mails from subscribers, writers, and photographers who want a say in the music industry and its coverage of women as artists and musicians, not as "women artists or women musicians."

Since its inception, there have been a few other publications in the same vein. Venus and Women Who Rock have attempted to reach the same audience as Rockrgrl, but both fail to give the same type of insight and information that Desantis has made sure to put into her publication.

Because of the growing success, Desantis has been dubbed "The Gloria Steinem of Rock" and has been featured as a commentator on VH1 as well as having written articles for Rolling Stone, MSN and Bass Player.

But Desantis has had enough. She recently decided that the winter issue of Rockrgrl would be its last. Instead, she will concentrate on the annual Rockrgrl Conference in November, where over 300 artists will perform, and keynote speakers will honor Patti Smith and Bonnie Raitt for their contributions to music.

Have you made a formal announcement to readers or anyone about the demise of the magazine?

I've made an informal one. The last issue is going to press today. We're not taking subscriptions anymore. On our cover it says 'Celebrating our last issue ever. Ciao for now!' We're going out very quietly.

Why are you ceasing publication?

Independent press is brutal. The grueling schedule of getting information, distilling it, making sure it's correct, getting photos, photo credits, proofreading. Then there's the really sucky part of selling ads and dealing with distribution. In the main years back in my day when I started, we didn't have Google and the Internet wasn't really the behemoth it is now. Now a16 year-old who wants to read about Aimee Mann or Rilo Kiley can hit Google and read whatever, music reviews or interviews. I think indie press has same basic problem as music. People are so used to getting it for free that they can't really see the value in paying for it, except for maybe cool art and cool pictures, but Rockrgl has never been about cool art and pictures.

Was selling Rockrgrl to someone else ever a consideration?

I can't imagine that…If somebody would want to do it the way I had been doing it, I would entertain the idea. But what's important to me is that women musicians get treated a certain way, that music editorial copy is not patronizing and condescending. Most publications write about women musicians like "She's good for a girl," and that's the underlying message. Or "She's good because she's a girl." Those things make me crazy. If I was very, very certain, that someone would have the sensibility I have…I have yet to meet that person, in my eleven years of doing this. I'm not saying they don't exist, but I built this with my own hands and ideas, and I'm not saying I wouldn't sell it or wouldn't turn it over to somebody, but they'd have to have the same idealism.

When you were first developing Rockrgrl, what was the response like from friends and other musicians, male or female?

Everybody thought I was crazy. I quit my job to do 16-page black-and-white Xerox mag. At the time, there were bands that didn't want to be considered women in rock because it was being part of a huge ghetto, and I agree. But I think it's important to dismantle that ghetto, for women to see other women playing music, that other women do play guitar and do play drums, even outside of the indie world. The indie world is great, but it's a cacoon. There are no women artists other than singers that are playing arenas and that to me is very distressing.

What was the most difficult part , aside from funding, of putting out the magazine from the beginning to where the magazine is now?

Mostly doing it myself. I couldn't afford to hire staff, and I couldn't afford to hire staff when I did hire staff. Trying to sell advertising to guitar magazines that put out girlie calendars every year. I was told everyday that girls aren't interested in playing guitar, but I was getting 200 CDs a month with girls playing guitar.

Do you think there is a large enough market for a magazine like Rockrgrl to continue and thrive amongst larger music magazines like Spin or Rolling Stone?

The reason I did Rockrgrl was because I don't think Spin and Rolling Stone cover women respectfully. Not so much Spin, but Rolling Stone, Maxim, Blender…I would rather those magazines include women in regular features and not "Year of the Woman" with Madonna on the cover.

What do you think of magazines like Venus that cover women in music now?

Venus does a great job in the indie world, but it's more geared towards covering women in musical culture. It's not necessarily musician oriented, it's fan oriented.

How have you dealt with critics and feminists who claim that separating women musicians into a publication is ghettoizing like you talked about before?

You just can't please everyone. With the conference that's never become more clear. There are people who think theirs is a terrible slot and others who think it's a great slot. People are individuals. There's no female agenda in music. I've heard the most amazing stories. I think when you're a fan, you don't really know that separatism exists. As a musician, as I was for many years, it was kind of shocking. That to me is where there's a problem. I know a girl who went to the music store and the worker asked her if the bass guitar was for her boyfriend. There's another story of a guy who wouldn't let a girl buy a black guitar because he said pink guitars were for girls. It sounds ridiculous and you start wondering if you're going crazy. I was in an all female band and after every show, we'd be asked if we were lip synching. That to me is what the mission is, not just an article about somebody because they're female. They're either not covered or not taken seriously.

During your ten years of publishing Rockrgrl, Has the media changed at all?

The media is even worse. It's consolidated, there's a greater divide between the independent and the mainstream. The mainstream is very moneyed and every outlet is thinking a certain way; reality shows, clothing lines. Very little, it seems, has to do with music. This year at the Rockrgrl conference we have Patti Smith as one of two speakers. When's the last time you saw someone who looked like Patti Smith get signed? Not since 1975. I think the culture would suffer to not have artists like that. it is suffering, because the artists in the forefront have nothing to say.

Do you consider Rockrgrl having been successful?

I haven't dismantled sexism in the music industry, so not completely. But getting it out to girls who say it's changed their life, brought music in their life. I get letters from girls thanking me for being able to see other women playing music. I even have well known artists saying that to me. It made them feel like they were part of something bigger.

What about the conference inspired you differently than the magazine?

It creates community. With people in a room together, it's powerful, more powerful than reading something at the airport. Being in a room with Patti Smith, Cathy Valentine of the Go Gos, Ann Wilson, Bonnie Raitt or any of these bands or artists who are really inspiring with their survival stories, they have cautionary titles. For a weekend it's summer camp. Sometimes it's the same experience you have, or maybe you have not.

Do you see a future in magazine publishing?

God I hope not. [Laughs] I'm interested in the mission, not the means of detonating it.