Turning Up the Volume for Women in Music: On Girl Noise with Founder Simone
By Alivia Stonier
Girl Noise is a music festival created for girls by girls. Founded in NYC by artist Simone, the Brooklyn-based festival aims to bring together artists and fans alike to be able to have a safe space to share their love of music.
The initiative doesn't stop there, as it is entirely non-profit, with all of the proceeds from tickets going to charities that directly support women. Previous iterations of the festival proceeds went to Girl Be Heard, a Brooklyn-based nonprofit supporting young women and gender-expansive youth.
The festival just had its latest iteration this past Sunday, March 29, in Brooklyn, New York, at the Sultan Room—featuring acts included Buffchick, Caitlin Starr, For Opal, and more.
Courtesy of Girl Noise
To understand the passion behind this project, I sat down with Simone to discuss the upcoming event. “I was really craving something like this because it felt like something that felt community-driven wasn't really happening, that combined music and activism, it felt like there was a real lack of that,” she said.
“I think I felt that as an artist, I felt like I wanted to be surrounded by women, and I wanted to be in spaces that I felt would nourish people to be their full, authentic selves and [allow] people to feel safe and supported. I was like, maybe I can try to make this myself if it feels like it's missing. I was really inspired by a lot of these initiatives that happened in the nineties that did similar things with combining music and activism, [including] Rock For Choice, which was this abortion access benefit series, Lilith Fair, which was this all female festival, all very innovative new ways to kind of get people involved and aware about certain issues facing the world. I felt like there was kind of a lack of that right now… and I thought it would be fun.”
Going back to 1991, founded by the band L7 and LA Weekly editor Sue Cummings, Rock for Choice was a response to the Riot Grrrl Movement. The festival aimed to bring awareness to reproductive rights and was partnered with the Feminist Majority Foundation.
Having been able to have a similar effect as Live Aid but with a focus more on women, the festival was able to bring in notable acts including Hole.
The performance was then followed up in 1997 by festival organizer Sarah McLachlan after directly facing frustration with the industry. After bubbling frustration came to a head when promoters and radio stations said they wouldn’t book two women back-to-back.
The festival would go on to be the highest-grossing music festival of the year, with over 60 artists and featuring notable acts including Fiona Apple and Sheryl Crow.
It's undeniable that the lineup of a festival is what helps to bring the production to life. When discussing what it was like to be able to find the right people who would uplift the mission of Girl Noise, the organizer shared some insight. “It's always really awesome to talk to other artists about the show. Everyone who does the show is really doing it because they believe in the mission and they trust me. I think that's really special. I always try to start every interaction with any artist, pitching the show just person to person, trying to explain it to them directly, and connect with them before going any further and just starting a conversation.”
“I'm really lucky to be living in New York because there's just so many incredible artists here. And so it's not hard to put together such a strong lineup of amazing women. I'm really excited about this, this upcoming lineup. I really try to find people that I'm a fan of, honestly. I don't really pay attention to numbers or things like that. It's mostly just do I connect with the music and do I think their artistry and individuality aligns with Girl Noise, and are they excited about it?”
Courtesy of Girl Noise
The ultimate goal of the festival is also to allow a space for women to make noise and be themselves in whatever ways those waves take shape across the stage. When talking about the definition of making noise and how it has evolved, Simone shared how the experience has shaped her. “This event has really encouraged me to be more independent. It's a lot of work that goes into this, and to be able to see it kind of come to life has been really inspiring to me. I'm very driven when it comes to this festival. I want to put on a good show. I want to make sure that these artists and the audience are a part of something really special.”
“That has really given me this new drive to create something bigger than myself. I think it's really encouraged me in my own artistry as well to continue to kind of just put my foot down creatively and really take ownership by being empowered to do what I want to do and what I want to say. I think that's really the mission behind Girl Noise, to have the confidence and space to be yourself and do only things that feel authentic to you, not things that other people are telling you to do or be someone who people are telling you to be. This past year of working on the show and working on my own music project [has] felt very aligned as far as discussions about womanhood and politics and the world as I live in. I think it's all kind of bleeding into my music as well, which has been really fun to explore and also felt really empowering. So it all feels really aligned. That's been really exciting to kind of see it all come together, and I feel like it's all just one big extension of itself.”
Given that Simone, as an artist, has found the mission bleeding into her creative work through her music, I wondered what she was most excited to be able to perform for the audience. “ I'm actually playing a set of all-new songs that aren't out yet. So I feel really excited about that. I played some new ones at our last show, but I've been working on an album for a while now, and we're very close to being done with it. So I figured it would be fun to play a bunch of new songs and try them out. I can't wait to play all of them. It's going to be my first time playing some of them, and I have a really amazing all-girl band playing with me. I'm doing a cover that I'm really excited about. I don't want to spoil it, but it's going to be really fun. I always try to do a cover that feels aligned with the crowd and feels like something they would want. I tried to choose a song that really resembled girlhood to me and growing up. At the last show, I did “Fifteen” by Taylor Swift, which was really fun. I tried to do something along the same lines of [feeling] nostalgic.”
When reflecting on what the festival has been able to create for others, the founder shared some moments that cemented its place. “I think the fact that this show sold out yesterday was insane. It was just so unexpected and so wonderful that people responded in that way to this show. To see how we've grown in the last nine months since our last show and see the excitement from people.”
“I think specifically after our first show, I was really unexpectedly so blown away by the energy in the green room and between the artists themselves. I think I kind of overlooked that part, or didn't think about how that would go. When I was there and when we were all hanging out backstage and watching each other perform just seeing all these girls come together and now to see a lot of them continue to play shows together and continue to support each other, that has been so rewarding and feels really special and is another goal that I have with these shows to not only, get the audience to make friends and be a part of something, but also for the artists to feel like they're a part of something bigger than just one show, to make friends and connection and continue to be a part of the community we're building even outside of this one show.”
“I have been in the music industry for a minute now, and I feel like I have really grown up making music and being in different rooms, meetings, and studios, really finding my voice throughout this time. What would have happened, whether or not I was doing this professionally, when you're a girl, and you're growing up, you discover yourself and what you like and what you don't like and what you want to say and who you want to be. I think coming into my own in these past few years of the transition between teenagehood to adulthood and being out in the world outside of school and really having time to discover myself has really been a truly enlightening experience to kind of figure out who I am and what I want to say in my artistry.” The artist explained when talking about the experiences that led to wanting to create this space.
“I've just really become more confident in my own womanhood and really have just taken note of how inspired I am by other women and how much I love working with other women and have kind of collected information over the years about this career and this life that we all live. I feel like I'm finally figuring out what works for me. That learning experience was definitely a catalyst for this show and the music I'm making now which is about discovering yourself and figuring out your place in the world and all of that existential stuff, but also very important stuff to figure out.”
Courtesy of Girl Noise
For this specific lineup, I was curious why Simone was compelled by these particular artists and what about their stories spoke to her. “I'm really drawn to artists who prioritize their artistry and prioritize their individuality and who you can tell they care deeply about, about the music, shows, and at the end of the day, the purity of the art form. I really feel like all the artists on this bill have that.”
“For Opal I discovered, they started putting music out not too long ago. I heard their first song when it came out, and immediately was like they would be so awesome for the show, and kind of just kept in touch and kept following their path and their journey. I was so excited when they were down to do the show… Caitlin Starr is someone whom I'm so excited to see play. She's just a fantastic guitarist. I've just heard so many good things about her live shows, and she is someone who, to me, resembles Girl Noise in a perfect way because she's just purely herself. So authentic. So driven by her individuality and her creativity and the music itself, nothing outside of that, which is really inspiring to me.”
When it comes to the authentic mission, Simone also opened up about finding the right charity organizations that also feel in alignment.
“It was definitely important to me to support different charities for each show. I wanted to make the impact as big as we could. And I think we've been so lucky with the partnerships. The first show we partnered with Girl Be Heard, which is this really wonderful theater-based non-profit that is in Brooklyn and works with young girls to empower them to use their voices… I grew up doing theater and being on a stage like that so young, really helped me find my voice. So it felt very aligned and special to me to be working with them.”
“This time around, we were lucky enough to actually have someone who worked at the Lower East Side Girls Club reach out after our first show to see if we would ever be interested in partnering. We were immediately like, yes, please, we'd love to, and so we're working with them this time. It’s another incredible non-profit that does free year-round programming and mentoring for girls. We got to see their space where they work. I'm just blown away by the work they do. I think it's just so important to highlight that work in any way we can, even if it's in a small way. Having grown up in New York, I know firsthand how important those programs are, and finding any way to nourish your hobbies and passions at a young age. The fact that there are these incredible organizations helping girls do that is just really inspiring to me. It was really important that was the driving force of the show, which is for charity, and it is to help these organizations continue to do this incredible work. Absolutely.
Despite the great successes, I also wondered what the challenges were of putting something as community-driven together as Girl Noise. “It's all kind of been a learning experience because I've been playing shows for a very long time, but as far as putting together a show like this I'd never done anything like it. And so the first show specifically was [me] learning as I go and seeing how. It was all kind of just like a test run. I didn't know if people would even get back to me or my emails about booking them. The fact that we booked that incredible lineup for our first show is just like–I'm just so grateful to those artists for playing. I think I learned so much from that experience. This time I really tried to step it up as far as press outreach and social media… it all feels very worth it and so rewarding to know that, you know, we sold out the show and now to see it all come together on Sunday. I know it will all definitely be worth it… And it's cool to try on different hats and do stuff that maybe I wouldn't be doing if I was just doing the artist project.”
“I definitely dream very big. I constantly am thinking about the future of this because I try to tell people this too. When I am booking artists, this isn't just a one-off show for me. This is definitely a long-term commitment that I really believe in. I really feel like the response to it has been so encouraging in that sense. My hope, I think, when I first came up with the idea, was always to make this a touring thing that could be outside of New York, and we could go to different states in the country and be able to highlight different charities and different artists in different cities. That's still like a really big dream of mine. I really want to also stay true to the political element to all of this. I would love to tour during election years and be able to highlight different candidates in different states and raise money for different candidates. The bigger this gets, the bigger artists we get, or the more impact I want it to have. I'm just excited to see where it all goes and where it all leads.” Simone shared when talking about the future of the initiative.
“I think something that I noticed immediately is a lot of people when I announced the show and when I talked about this mission for the first time, people immediately were really excited about it, which I think just proved to me that a lot of people were feeling exactly what I was feeling like this was missing and wanting to have a mission or initiative like this happen. I hope that it encourages people to do similar things, but also to be a part of this. Mostly, my big dream is for girls in different cities to get together with their friends and try and do something like this as well. That's kind of how I started, it's just me and my friends helping out and it's really just love of the game. If there's young girls out there that feel inspired and that know bands in their town that would want to play something like that to me would be just incredible. I hope that people are inspired to take initiative in that way and take things into their own hands because I feel like it's really, if you want something to get done, do it yourself. That has proven to be true for me.”
Courtesy of Girl Noise
As previous women did for Simone, it's clear that the goal of this festival is to carry its torch for more movement towards women's voices being amplified. To round up the interview, we did some rapid-fire questions.
Q: What are three words that capture the spirit of girl noise?
A: I would say community, celebration, and defiance.
Q: What's one song that feels like the Girl Noise anthem?
A: My Girl Noise anthem is a song called Modern Girl by Sleater-Kinney. I love that song so much, and that makes me feel very powerful.
Q: What were some of your favorite women growing up in the music world that inspired you?
A: I've always been really inspired by women from the nineties. My dad was always putting on Sheryl Crow and Alanis Morissette, Cyndi Lauper, and Pat Benatar, who my mom was obsessed with as a girl. Artists who were doing their own thing and kind of paving their own path were always super inspiring to me.
Q: In one sentence, what will someone experience attending a Girl Noise event?
A: I want people to have fun. That's it, simply put.
