The bitch is back

Armed with an electric violin, a ukulele, and a bass guitar, Bitch (formerly of Bitch and Animal) takes the stage with her band The Exciting Conclusion, featuring “The L Word”’s Daniela Sea.

The bitch is back

By Gary M. Kramer

The singer/songwriter known as Bitch sounds sweeter than her name implies. “It’s part of my performance art — the walking oxymoron of me,” she said over the phone from Los Angeles. Currently on tour with her new, solo CD “Make this/Break this,” Bitch will be performing with her girlfriend, Daniela Sea of “The L Word,” at Joe’s Pub on February 27.

The couple spent the summer together in Vancouver, and also forged a creative collaboration working on a pair of screenplays they are co-writing.

The singer/songwriter made the break from Animal because, she said, “We were ready to explore new things in our lives and music. ‘Make this/Break this’ is a huge heartbreak piece. This is the most intimate thing I’ve done—more like a diary, and less like a dialogue. And also it’s inspiring for me to be trying something so scary and new.”

In the last year, Bitch has been doing many new things, and forming some exciting new collaborations. In addition to getting the opening song from “Make this/Break this” entitled “Unstuck” played on “The L Word,” she changed her label from Ani DiFranco’s Righteous Babe Records to Kill Rock Stars. Bitch also appeared in John Cameron Mitchell’s “Shortbus,” and traveled with the film to Cannes and Toronto; and she toured with the Indigo Girls, under the name “Capital B.”

“Capital B came about when one of my good friends started calling me that. I liked having two names to dodge in and out of public spaces with. I did a whole tour under the name Capital B with Amy Ray, but I missed Bitch,” she said of the name change.

Whether she is known as Bitch or Capital B, her family knows the rule of what to call her in public. “My sister and I were in San Francisco and she was calling me by my real name, and I wasn’t responding, so she yelled, “Bitch!” and I turned around — along with 100 other people!” she recounted, with a laugh.

Her new direction appears to be her true path, and Bitch seems proud of the more personal spin she is giving her current work. Her show at Joe’s Pub will be more stripped down than in the past. She described it as “more performance art-esque electronic folk sounding carefree spirited music.”

Her heartfelt songs are poetry put to music and many of the tracks on “Make this/Break this” are delicate, ethereal tunes. But there are some hard-edged tracks, too. Bitch admits that her method for creating a song generally starts with her poetry, and then adding a melody, base line, or violin. Her title song, however, took an extra long time to create, because it features a long mid section that was, she explained, “a poem that kept growing and growing in my head.”

Bitch’s song “Rise” on the new CD is a powerful anthem that encourages folks take a stand and protest.

“One of the ways we will have the loudest voice is to reclaim our own economic power,” Bitch said. “If Oprah and George Clooney stop paying their taxes until we got out of Iraq, it would make a huge difference. In a basic way, I think [rising up] is about speaking out and not feeling silenced by this regime.”

And while Bitch gets political, she admires the views of Amy Ray and the Indigo Girls who embraced her work and persuaded her to perform her classic, “Pussy Manifesto,” while touring with them. She mentioned that she would like to be spread out on a grand piano performing “Pussy Manifesto” on “The L Word,” but sighed, because she has not been asked to do this yet.

While she waits for that opportunity, fans can check out Bitch and Sea in “Shortbus” when it is released on DVD in mid-March. She recalled making the film as a “great time… it was like a real salon. We had dinner with the actors, and played card games, and created happenings.”

Nevertheless, she was shy about having sex on film, and found that it was difficult enough not to be nervous during shooting.

As Bitch continues to explore new things—music, films, collaborations and relationships—one thing has been constant, her trademark dreadlocks. But given they symbolism in literature of women cutting their hair to signify change, does Bitch have any plans to cut her dreads?

“Someday,” she answered with a laugh. “You know, I’m not going to keep carrying them around forever.”