Bait Bag - Tell Them You're Women
Meet Bait Bag, a pop-punk trio from North Haven Island, Maine. The band just dropped their new EP, Tell Them You’re Women.
Bait Bag
Made up of Courtney Naliboff (vocals, bass), Fiona Robins (vocals, guitar), and Claire Donnelly (drums), Bait Bag came to life in 2018. Inspired by the riot grrrl fem-punk of the ‘90s, the three women hooked up to churn out loud, raw music influenced by Le Tigre, Blondie, and Sleater Kinney.
The band’s musical backgrounds display an eclectic divergence. Naliboff began her musical career when she was five-years-old, and later studied music at Brown University. On her part, Donnelly began playing drums as a freshman in high school, and played in a punk band. A self-taught guitarist, Robins played in a number of bands.
Billed as a feminist punk band, Bait Bag is not anti-men. They are advocates of gender equity and mutual respect. Donnelly told Aimsel Ponti of Maine Today, “Being a feminist doesn’t mean we’re anti-men. It just means that we believe all people should have equal rights regardless of gender or sex.”
The best tracks on the EP, from a purely subjective perspective, include "Horses" and “Tear Me In Two.”
The EP comprises four-tracks, beginning with “Girls,” opening on a cool, retro-bluesy punk melody stripped down to the bare essentials: a sparkling guitar, a plump bass line, and taut percussion topped by velvety vocal harmonies delivering momentous lyrics.
“GGGGirls WWWWomen / GGGGirls WWWWomen / You think we owe you / But we do not / So keep your hands to yourself / Or be forgotten.”
The best tracks on the EP, from a purely subjective perspective, include "Horses" and “Tear Me In Two.” The latter track travels on skintight droning guitars, a rumbling bass line and a crisp snare. Full of a wicked, lethal dark energy, the harmonics contrast against the vibrant intensity of the vocals.
“Horses” opens on a rough and tough Spartan melody, full of searing visceral energy, especially on the chorus. I love the dirty guitar coloration just prior to the breakdown.
On Tell Them You’re Women, Bait Bag delivers slashing colors riding contagious rhythms, topped by deliciously piercing vocals.
