Hearing Belles: Odd Girl Out Seeks to Erase Novelty Image

For a local rock group that plays mostly original music, Odd Girl Out has made the transition from the garage to the stage in relatively short time.

The current line-up has only been together since June, but already the band is regularly headlining such top San Diego clubs as Metro in Hillcrest, the Spirit in Bay Park, Club Mirage in Mission Valley and the Mannikin in Pacific Beach.

With a bashful grin, bassist Jeanne Stawiarski concedes that a certain amount of that success is because all four members of Odd Girl Out are women.

“To most people, it’s a novelty to find women who aren’t in a vocal group, who are actually playing instruments and doing original rock ‘n’ roll,” Stawiarski said.

“As a result, you get a certain amount of attention if your band happens to consist of four attractive females. That alone can draw people to see you, and prompt club owners to book you.

“In a sense, that’s a shame--I’m personally hoping that some day bands like ours won’t be the exception, that people will judge us for our music and not for our gender.

“But for the time being, that’s the way things are, so we might as well take advantage of it.”

Still, Stawiarski bristles at the suggestion that Odd Girl Out is merely looking for an easy ride to stardom by latching on to the coattails of nationally known all-girl rock groups such as the Go-Go’s and the Bangles.

The novelty factor might open some doors, she said, but ultimately the music is what’s going to carry Odd Girl Out across the threshold.

“That’s our strength--the fact that we’re not trading off too much on the girl thing,” Stawiarski said. “Yeah, we’re an all-girl band, but our sound isn’t necessarily the stereotypical all-girl sound.”

She added that unlike most female groups, Odd Girl Out is “doing stuff that’s normally associated with the boys. . . . We’re not trying to be sexy or cute; we’re into rocking and having a good time.

“When you’re up there on stage, playing music, there’s an energy that’s completely androgynous. It’s not how a girl plays a guitar or how a boy plays a guitar, it’s how a guitar is played, period. Gender distinctions don’t really matter.

“And I’d like to see us given the chance to be evaluated not as an all-girl band, but as a rock ‘n’ roll band, in the company of the Rolling Stones, R.E.M. and everyone else.”

Bassist Stawiarski, guitarist Anni Madafferi, singer Teness (she dropped her surname five years ago) and drummer Michelle Anderson perform hard-driving rock ‘n’ roll songs about everything from relationships (“Fear in Your Eyes” and “You’re Gonna Want Me Again”) to homosexuality (“Bendi Boys”). Most of them were written by Madafferi and Teness.

“Bands like the Go-Go’s and the Bangles were pushed into the limelight too fast,” Stawiarski said. “There was all this hype and publicity about the fact that they were all-girl bands, and they simply weren’t able to carry the momentum.

“Once the novelty wore off, the Go-Go’s fell apart because the musicianship wasn’t there. The Bangles, on the other hand, were able to sustain the novelty by accepting songs from people like Prince and by wearing the shortest skirts they could find.

“I don’t want to see the same thing happen to us. If we make it, I want it to be because of the strength of our material and the quality of our music--not the way we look, or what image the record company wants us to project.”

The groundwork for Odd Girl Out was laid more than a year ago, when longtime friends Madafferi and Teness started writing songs together. A few months later, they teamed up with Stawiarski and began playing informally in garages and at private parties, with a male drummer sitting in, as Dear John.

After several trial club dates earlier this year, the three women in June recruited drummer Anderson and changed their name to Odd Girl Out.

“We figured that since there were already three girls, why not go to an all-girl thing and play off the novelty aspect to help us get started,” Stawiarski said.

“And ever since, we’ve been growing musically as well as popularity-wise, to the point where we’re now ready to go into the studio and record our first demonstration tape.

“After five months, it’s time to stop being a novelty act and start being a regular rock ‘n’ roll band. And whoever we end up working with--as a manager, as an agent, as a record company--has to understand who we are and what we’re trying to do.

“We’re not going to compromise. Our integrity is more important to us than success.”