In 2003, my band was on tour and got booked to play a hardcore festival in an arena in Shitballs, Iowa. We were the only guys there without basketball jerseys and chinstrap beards. I decided to take a crap after the first band’s first song and, from the men’s room, with a pair of Sauconys in each adjacent stall, I heard the singer say, “This next song’s about slitting bitches’ throats.” I farted. At the time, metalcore with misogyny-disguised-as-emo lyrics that followed the “you hurt my feelings, so I want to kill you” template was popular. My bandmates and I called that stuff “Kill Your Girlfriend-core” and, for the rest of that tour, would shout, “This next one’s about slitting bitches’ throats!” in between songs on our van’s radio. When I saw the band name Rhonda Is A Dead Bitch, I raised an eyebrow, worried that Kill Your Girlfriend-core was making an unwelcome return. But the first song was reverby garage, without a floorpunch or spinkick part to be heard. Then the next song was a creepy, ascending keyboard melody and the next two were ambient and synthesized, sounding like the score to an artsy student horror film. Well, the band name is still unfortunate to say the least, but the music was pretty interesting. It didn’t stand on its own very well, but it would be very effective playing behind images of people in occult masks, lurching through fields.
–CT Terry (PO Box 41162, Des Moines, IA 50311)