The Go Go’s

The Go-Go’s

Kathy Valentine
Gina Schock
Jane Wiedlin
Charlotte Caffey
Belinda Carlisle

The Go-Go’s are a very original, kind of organic thing.
~Kathy Valentine

Pioneers of Women in Rock
by Michael Holloway

The Go-Go’s are the first female band who wrote their own music, played their own instruments, and largely managed themselves; with support from official manager Ginger Canzoneri allowing the band total freedom.

1978

The band first formed in 1978, originally consisting of vocalist Belinda Carlisle, lead guitarist/keyboard player Charlotte Caffey, and rhythm guitarist Jane Wiedlin. In 1979 and 1980 respectively, drummer Gina Schock and bass guitarist Kathy Valentine were added.

The new line-up of the band decided to write and record their first album. The core of The Go-Go’s songs were written by Caffey, Wiedlin, and Valentine, although Carlisle and Schock did write some songs on occasion.

Living At The Canterbury
The Go-Go’s have many interesting stories to tell from their early days living in seedy hotels like Los Angeles infamous Canterbury.

As Belinda Carlisle recalls:

“At least fifty punks were living at the Canterbury. There were a few homeless street people hanging out there too, but there was music coming from every room. You’d walk into the courtyard and there’d be a dozen different punk songs all playing at the same time. It was an incredible environment.”

It was also a haven for drugs as Carlisle ruefully remembers.

“When heroin came into the scene, that was the great divide. Either you did it or you didn’t. In the beginning, they were my friends, but the heroin thing kind of scared me. At the Canterbury, there were pills and lots of booze, there were these girls bringing in Demerol. That got really icky, everybody nodding out.”

Charlotte Caffey adds that the Canterbury and much of the surrounding neighbourhood had quite a reputation for being raided by police, on a nightly basis, in search of contraband.

“The Go-Go’s played the big Elk’s Lodge show on St. Patrick’s day at MacArthur Park. After us The Plugz played, and that was when the cops came in and tore the place up all night. The riot squad comes storming in, I was flipping out. I was so scared. That was a frightening night.”

According to Jane Wiedlin, “There was no riot. The cops just came in slamming. They just started beating everyone up.”

Sex, Drugs & Rock ‘N’ Roll

If drugs and rock and roll weren’t enough of a rock and roll fantasy, there was always plenty of sex, though admittedly much of it was talked about more than it actually happened.

Wiedlin mischievously remembers some of the girls’ discussions on the subject.

“I’d go to Rodney’s with my girlfriends and we’d all try to get laid. We were all virgins. It was a lot of fantasy. But then we’d go back to school and in gym class, we’d talk really loud about how we screwed Mick Jagger, and we screwed David Bowie, and we screwed so-and-so, and how great they were in bed.”

Eventually The Go-Go’s grew disenchanted with the changing scene of the post-punk era, and after they returned from a very successful tour of England in early 1980, too much had changed and the band decided to polish their talents in the emerging pop era that would dominate the 1980’s.

Wiedlin explains: “The whole LA scene had changed by the time we got back from England. It had been taken over by all these real angry young white boys, Black Flag, and such. We were like ‘What’s this all about? It’s really gross.’ We were lumped in with all those stupid bands, but we never even knew those guys. What had started as our scene of “girls and gays and stuff” was nearly all gone.”
They Got The Beat

Eventually, the girls were signed by I.R.S Records, spurred by Ginger Canzoneri’s adamance that their new sound would go over big with the newer, hipper audiences, and she proved to be right. Producer Miles Copeland discusses the formula for their success.

“The Go-Go’s, when you saw them, they were fun and disarming and all that. And you could listen to them at the volume that you wanted to, and you could put forward the visual that you wanted it to be because you were controlling the camera and whatever. So you’re sitting and there’s an audience tuning in saying ‘Gee, this stuff is actually quite good. I quite like this stuff,’ Also, MTV coincided with the new generation, still attracting the punk generation, and the marriage worked.”

Over the course of the next few years, The Go-Go’s recorded three albums with I.R.S Records: ‘Beauty And The Beat’ in 1981, ‘Vacation’ in 1982, and ‘Talk Show’ in 1984.

Their Favorite Projects

The Go-Go’s each reminisce about their favorite experience with a song they wrote and collected for the project:

Charlotte Caffey: ‘Head Over Heels’

“Sometimes when I write, I switch between guitar, bass, and piano. I was messing around on the piano and came up with the opening riff for the song. Some of the music came to me and Kathy seemed to have a title that seemed perfect. We worked on the song and before we knew it, it was done. And then in rehearsal, along came the groovy ‘Mott The Hoople’ piano solo”.

Belinda Carlisle: ‘Skidmarks On My Heart’

“Of all the songs I’ve written, I think my fave is ‘Skidmarks On My Heart’. I wrote the lyrics in about ten minutes while I was sitting behind a desk at one of my many secretarial jobs. It’s about my brother and some people I knew growing up”.

Kathy Valentine: ‘Vacation’

“This was a song I wrote when I was in The Textones. I went home to Texas for a – you guessed it – vacation, and met a boy – surprise, surprise. When I brought it to The Go-Go’s, it didn’t have a chorus really so Charlotte and Jane brought that catchy chorus into it”.

Jane Wiedlin: ‘Yes Or No’

“When The Go-Go’s were on hiatus (because of Gina’s heart surgery) I worked with the Mael brothers from The Sparks. They came to my house in Malibu with loads of ideas for songs. We literally pieced this song together from about ten different ideas, adding my own of course! The line “all those dancers can’t be wrong” came from an old Elvis poster that Russell Mael had that read, ‘A Million Fans Can’t Be Wrong!”

Gina Schock: ‘I’m With You’

“This song actually started off being a song, or gift, to my parents. I was on the train from Baltimore to New York City. At the time, I was feeling terribly sad about leaving them. It evolved into more of a guy/girl love song ‘missing you kind of thing’. But my parents were the original inspiration”.

Burnout, Dysfunction, Tension

By the time, ‘Talk Show’ had been released in 1984, everyone in the band were suffering burnout. Discontent arose due to conflicts between Carlisle and Wiedlin, as well as ill health suffered by Caffey (Carpal Tunnel Syndrome) and Schock (heart surgery). The Go-Go’s decided it was time to part ways a year later, though they would reunite briefly in 1994 for a compilation album of their greatest hits, and fully reform the band in 2000.

Carlisle sums up the nature of The Go-Go’s relationship with each other: “We get along. We’ve had a relationship with each other, pretty much, for the last 30 years, with the exception of from about 1985 to 1990; there were five years where we weren’t talking that much. It’s like being married to four other people; it’s complete dysfunction. Sometimes there’s a lot of tension, but at the end of the day we love each other very much.”

Reunion

The hit single from 2001’s ‘God Bless The Go-Go’s’, their sole album since the reunion, was ‘Unforgiven’. Caffey and Wiedlin wrote this hard rocker with Billie Joe Armstrong from Green Day, also playing guitars with them.

Another milestone, ‘Throw Me A Curve’ and ‘Sonic Superslide’ were written by all five members together, marking the first time this has ever happened.

Jill Sobule, famous for ‘I Kissed A Girl’, co-wrote a song with Wiedlin and Valentine about The Go-Go’s history as a band, thus paying homage to their 27 year history as the pioneers of women in rock.

The Go-Go’s Discography

For more information about The Go-Go’s
check out their Official Website and MySpace.

Tagged music, The Go Go's