The historic Center Stage Theater in Atlanta, Georgia, welcomed influential, all-female punk rockers L7 to town on Friday night. Built in 1966 to honor Atlanta’s performing arts community and to memorialize Helen Lee Cartlidge after she and 100 other arts patrons perished in the Orly plane crash of 1962, Center Stage is an iconic live performance destination that has played host to major stars, including Sir Elton John, Lady Gaga, and Katy Perry, just to name a few. With a large stage experience supported by great acoustics, this intimate 1,000-capacity venue was the perfect general admission spot for another fist-pumping night in the South.
Shortly after 8:00pm, the all-female, Manhattan-based cumgirl8 strolled out to the stage, dressed in a variety of DIY outfits and skimpy lingerie. With a band name reportedly inspired by a cam girl screen name, Lida Fox (bass), Veronika Vilim (guitar), Avishag Cohen Rodrigues (guitar), and Chase Noelle (drums) took the early Atlanta crowd on a nearly 45-minute long raunchy, sexually-charged modern punk musical journey. With songs like “Cherry Nipples,” “Dumbitch,” and “Take Me Home,” my ears and eyes struggled to comprehend and absorb the amazing uniqueness cumgirl8 put on display. I wasn’t familiar with them going into the show, but I also couldn’t look away. The band was also highly progressive in their political stances, as at one point Vilim took to the mic and let the audience know that abortion pill information was available at their merch table. For those looking to experiment with some new sound, don’t shy away from cumgirl8.
cumgirl8:
Lida Fox – Bass
Veronika Vilim – Guitars
Avishag Cohen Rodrigues – Guitars
Chase Noelle – Drums
Setlist:
1.) Bugs
2.) Cherry Nipples
3.) Dumbitch
4.) Waffles
5.) Glasshour
6.) Cicciolina
7.) Dead Pixels
8.) Take Me Home
9.) Picture Party
With cumgirl8’s equipment cleared out and the clock slowly closing in on the 9:30pm hour, the L7 logoed backdrop lit up while long-time bandmates Donita Sparks (lead vocals/guitar), Suzi Gardner (guitar/vocals), Jennifer Finch (bass), and Demetra “Dee” Plakas (drums) entered the stage to screaming audience adulation. L7 then broke open their evening with “Deathwish,” a track off their second studio album, Smell the Magic (1990).
No matter the musical genre you try to label L7 with — grunge, punk rock, alternative metal — it really doesn’t matter, and the truth is they are just four (now middle-aged, as they joked) ladies that can still kick ass and melt faces with their decades-long catalog of tunes. In fact, Sparks pointed around the room and reflected that they enjoy seeing the younger fans now at their shows, to which Finch looked at the front row and responded with “Is your dad hot, and is he here?”
While the 20-song main setlist was a celebration of their entire musical legacy, the crowd was treated to nearly half (nine songs) of it being pulled from arguably their most recognizable release, 1992’s Bricks Are Heavy. Sparks’s vocals were as on point live as you would hear now if you slid that release into your Spotify playlist today. Along with Plakas slamming the skins while Finch danced around barefoot playing bass, Gardner and Sparks delivered that crunchy, grinding guitar sound that is synonymous with L7’s identifiable tone.
With a sizeable crowd that was already whipped up into a mosh-worthy frenzy by mid-set, L7 powered through three consecutive fan favorites off Bricks Are Heavy, including “Wargasm,” which Finch joked was “a song that never goes out of style,” immediately followed by the iconic “Pretend We’re Dead,” while then wrapping up pre-encore with the punchy “Shitlist.”
Returning to the stage after a short break, Sparks asked “for grace” as they were going to perform “Scatter the Rats” for the first time live, much to the joy of their fans. As if to bookend the night, L7 revisited Smell the Magic and performed the track “Fast and Frightening” to place the final punk exclamation point on the exhausting evening of headbanging.
L7’s short May run concludes in just a week at the Sonic Temple Festival in Columbus, Ohio, on Sunday, May 19th. The band will then pick up some overseas dates starting on Sunday, June 16th at the Electric Ballroom in London, United Kingdom.
L7:
Donita Sparks – Lead vocals, Guitars
Suzi Gardner – Guitars, Vocals
Jennifer Finch – Bass, Vocals
Demetra Plakas – Drums, Vocals
Setlist:
1.) Deathwish
2.) Andre
3.) Everglade
4.) Mr. Integrity
5.) Shove
6.) Stadium West
7.) One More Thing
8.) Scrap
9.) Slide
10.) Fighting the Crave
11.) Human
12.) Bad Things
13.) Monster
14.) Fuel My Fire
15.) Non-Existent Patricia
16.) Freak Magnet
17.) Dispatch From Mar-A-Lago
18.) Wargasm
19.) Pretend We’re Dead
20.) Shitlist
Encore
21.) Scatter the Rats
22.) Fast and Frightening
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Elliott is a music photographer covering shows in Atlanta, Georgia, and the surrounding area. The highlight of his photography career was back in the early ’90s, when he sold Neil Diamond the rights to his negatives from a show and then purchased a set of tires for his 1979 280ZX during college with the money.
