Last night and I went to Tonawanda with a coworker to see the Queen City Roller girls battle it out. I won't review the history of this sport, which is readily available online, but I will say that although it's been around since the 50s, it was the late 80s aeshetic of the roller rink that drew me in. The huge cement edifice was exactly like the one I went to when I first started holding hands with girls--no kissing! no sitting on laps! no ripped jeans! learn the rules!--and listening to Guns N Roses. There were neon lights in rainbow patterns, painted pastel arrows zooming across the walls, occasionally becoming "graffiti." Black lights added a "stoner bedroom/fortress of solitude" quality.
The girls divided into two teams--red and black, Sluggers and Kissers (nice parallel with Guns N Roses, I thought). The battle itself is a set up to stop and go like baseball or football, which can get frustrating, but they must play by the rules or else it devolves into mud-wrestling-style anarchy and then, whoops, we're in ancient Rome. Not that it wasn't already heavily sexualized: my favorite roller girls' names were Banana Ram-Ya, Pissy Longstocking (with Piss Off written on her ass), Rita Slayworth, La Mala Rubia, Her-Ass-Her, Lease A Hearse, Nadia DamBusiness, and Sweat Pea (watch out--she's more like Bluto). The music was lame, except at half-time, when they played...Guns N' Fucking Roses! Nothing like Axl to urge on a little gross unsportladylike conduct. Every time someone fell there was a collective "oooooohhhh!" from the Zion-like crowd. By Zion (the Matrix one), I mean that everyone was invited--old and young, trashy and classy. A veritible utopia of "family values" and gay couples holding hands--wha-what? That's right--if only queerdom had been more visible in my small town 80s world, it would have been an even better piece of nostalgia to piss Asenath off about. Rocking out on a daily basis PLUS queer rebellion=utopia.
Oh, except everyone in Tonowanda is white. That was a major drawback. But still--much better than the Matrix's Zion or Shortbus's Shortbus Club. All Utopias have at least one glaring flaw and Shortbus's was the exlcusion of non-"Sexy" people and Zion was the exclusion of non hippy people. Tonowanda is honky town indeed, but man oh man was this a much better crowd than the fuckin Old Pink, the local coffee shop, or Hallwalls, etc. etc. Not that I bonded instantly with anyone--I wasn't looking for that--but I had this feeling that trash and class could co-exist. I was IN a John Waters movie one moment and at a Unitarian Universalist Church the next. The music was period-specific--good: pick an era and stay with (you hear me, iPod?). Even little girls, like six or seven, were wearing skull and crossbones t-shirts. Little boys would now know what it feels like to be a girl and dragged to a Monster Truck Arena. Ha ha! You don't own masculinity, son! And Fuck yeah, sister--you'll be getting tattoos WAY early! And here comes grandma, barreling down the aisle alongside her granddaughter--and she's not offended by all the young people with beer sloshing around. She's happy to be there right alongside the requisite sports-venue heckler dudes who have something raunchy and witty to scream every 15 seconds. My favorite from them was when all the girls were announced--name and then number, as in Metal Mistress #96--one girl in particular had the number Square Root of Pi Minus 1. These two dudes were all "Shit. What the fuck do we scream about that?" And then one belows, "Punk n' Pi! Number Empty Set!" It was so Metallica Mathlete.
I've talked with La Mala Rubia previosuly--she's friends with Amber--and she kicked butt out there--but I don't know any of the others. I bet you guys know some but never dreamed. Some of them took more risks than others, as in rather than sticking to the phalanx method of preventing the jammer from busting through, one might stop suddenly and force a carrening-into, which is legal (but tripping isn't). Am I getting this right? I'm still sketchy on the rules, but since Jess K is a big part of it (see the second link below for her interview), she can chime in. She probably doesn't read my blog, but any of you can link back or whatever. Next show is in March, people. We're going and that's final.
http://www.myspace.com/queencityrollergirls
http://www.tonawanda-news.com/features/gnnlifestyle_story_026153815.html
http://www.queencityrollergirls.net/
