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Until I stumbled on Skip the Needle, I never really understood Beatlemania. Videos of the Fab Four’s first visit to the United States in 1964 show hordes of mostly young, white females gnashing their teeth and sobbing hysterically at the sight the lads from Livermore. For me, it was a reason to laugh. To use a word trending in 2024, I thought it was weird.
That’s not to say I didn’t recognize and respect The Beatles’ obvious musical talents and brand, or that I wasn’t passionate about their music and that of other artists. I have listened to a wide range of performers, voraciously: Beethoven to Billy Joel to Kiss, Cardi B, Beyoncé, the incomparable Nina Simone, and beyond.
But they never made me fantasize about actually being them.
Now, I dream of dumping journalism and becoming a drummer in all-queer rock band. Seriously weird, but not nightmarish. In my dreams, I have all the chops.
The Oakland-based Skip the Needle includes Shelley Doty (guitar), Kofy Brown (drums), Katie Cash (guitar), and Vicki Randle on bass. They’re all queer and except for Cash, all Black. More importantly, all of them are incredibly talented. They are tuned for contagious exuberance, adept and nuanced as songwriters, and uniquely connected on every project. Rehearsals, I have been told, often dissolve into laughter, although the topics they address and their focus on technical and artistic excellence is heavy, loaded, and unwavering. Brown once told me that rocking out as a drummer is a mental and physical workout and “pure bliss” when surrounded by people who love music. I hear bliss along with the boldness on their every track and at every concert.
On the band’s first album We Ain’t Never Going Back, the influences of rock, funk, and soul can be found. There’s intensity in the lyrics that speak to Black lives overlooked, but also liberated through power, love, perseverance, truth. Their newest album Octavia of Earth, Volume 2 came out in 2023. Its six tracks are part of a larger docu-musical project inspired by the life of feminist and sci-fi writer Octavia E. Butler. Positioned as the founding mother of Afrofuturism, Butler is the springboard for an album about Black women and the ways in which their lives and minds prove to be immortal, despite the many forces throughout history and in the present time that seek to oppress, cloud, or distort them.
Sounds heavy, and it is. But remarkably, Skip the Needle provides some of the most uplifting energy on the planet. It’s their constant invention, their spirit and soul, and the synergistic flow of four musicians at the top of their game. Reviews often call them “fearless” and “fun.” I call them four rockers who cause me to dream freely of drum kits and being a smashing, dashing rocker.
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SKIP THE NEEDLE more info here.
