The comment section may have disagreed, but Mannequin Pussy is used to that. Nine months later, as the band is touring the U.S. for the first time since the election, they haven’t wavered on their stance.
“I’m a trans woman. Bear can speak to his life experience, as can Missy and Kayleen. But I agree with what Missy said last October,” guitarist Maxine Steen told Jezebel on a recent Zoom call with bassist, Colins “Bear” Regisford. “I think presenting your true self—especially when there’s a lot of powers trying to shut that down—as opposed to just spewing out some bullshit to please someone is not in any of our interests.”
Frankly, Mannequin Pussy couldn’t spew out “some bullshit” if they tried. Doing the exact opposite has become part and parcel of their performances. At All Things Go in September, for instance, Dabice ranted against the intergenerational shame that’s common to most organized religions, before segueing into a call for Palestinian liberation. At the time, they were one of the few headliners to do so.
“Here’s the thing about shame…for some reason, it keeps getting passed down from generation to generation. And wouldn’t it be beautiful if it stopped with ours?” Dabice asked the crowd during their set before eventually ramping up. “This is a band that stands for the liberation of all people, this is a band that stands for a free Palestine, and this is a band that stands for people to live freely and respectfully as they are.”
It’s already been a banner year for Mannequin Pussy thanks to their widely-acclaimed fourth studio album, I Got Heaven. It landed third on Pitchfork‘s Best Rock Albums of 2024 list and was heralded by critics as their “pop punk peak” and a renewal “of one of punk’s lasting tenets for a new era of activism.” So far, they’ve made festival stops at Governor’s Ball and Dog Days, delivered an iconic performance invoking Sinéad O’Connor on Everybody’s Live with John Mulaney, and sold out a U.K. tour. Yet, criss-crossing the states as—in Steen’s words—an “inherently political” band during a politically terrifying moment is top of mind.
“The biggest thing is that we’re trying to create more of the idea that community over individualism is the most important thing, because they’re trying to divide us,” Regisford said. “They’re trying to separate us. They’re trying to think that what’s going on should be normalized, and that’s not fucking true.”
Watch a video from any of their shows (or go see them live; they’ll be back on the road in August after a brief break) and you’ll find raw guitar riffs, entire diatribes dedicated to an imagined end to oppression, and Dabice whispering that she’s going to tell men what to do “for once in their fucking lives” (read: join her in loudly repeating the word “pussy”) to the absolute glee of crowds. The term “safe space” has all but lost its meaning, but Mannequin Pussy is committed to creating one in venues across the U.S.
“I feel like the main thing that we try to do while we’re playing the show is get all that energy out—all that pent up aggression about what’s going on—into the show,” Regisford told Jezebel.
The band also knows their audience includes young people developing political awareness, who are looking for artists that not only provide opportunities for them to learn, but also affirm their own outrage. So, I think the Mannequin Pussy effect is best measured by concert reviews from student journalists in middle America.
One young writer in Iowa, for instance, recently wrote that they were “shocked” by the band’s candor and class commentary during their set at Mission Creek Festival. “As someone who has grown up in Iowa, I’m no stranger to the ideas of the reigning majority in the government,” they wrote. “It felt surprising because I had really only delved into discussions like that online, in small circles of friends, or in books.” Ultimately, they concluded: “Mannequin Pussy are not only extremely musically gifted, they are a visionary group and their shows fabricate a compassion for their craft and the people impacted by it like no other artist I have encountered.”
Make no mistake, Mannequin Pussy understands the importance of establishing bonds with their audiences. If they happen to be built upon a shared rage over the state of the world, so be it.
“We know that the kids and the people that are coming to our shows feel it, too,” Regisford told Jezebel. “We’re not going to ignore that. It’s all happening as we’re trying to live our lives, so it’s a great opportunity for us to connect with the crowd as we’re all just collectively being like, ‘isn’t this fucking crazy right now?’ We need community so badly.”
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