Search - Julie Ruin :: Julie Ruin

Julie Ruin, the alias of Bikini Kill vocalist Kathleen Hanna, is a solo artist who makes up tunes on a broken sampler and a $40 drum machine. In the hands of lesser talents, this would be a project best left on a homemade cassette. But Julie Ruin's self-titled debut deftly regenerates the angry themes of Bikini Kill harangues into thoughtful songs whose primitive stylings effectively showcase an emerging feminist polemic. "I Wanna Know What Love Is" is as devastating an anti-cop rap as "Fuck tha Police," and "Crochet" takes out the fawning media that turned Hanna into a spokesmodel for the riot-grrrl movement. It isn't the direction one might think she would have taken, but Hanna's metamorphosis into Julie Ruin is fascinating. It's like watching someone think out loud in stereo. --Lois Maffeo