Los Angeles has apparently been percolating a surprisingly hip underground culture for quite awhile with apparent nexus points at Channel 101, Paul Thomas Anderson’s films, and the L.A. club Largo, among others. Out of this petri dish of alternative L.A. culture grew a short-lived musical comedy group called Girls Guitar Club that appears to have preceded similar acts such as Flight of the Conchords and Tenacious D. Born from a collaboration of Mary Lynn Rajskub and Karen Kilgariff, Girls Guitar Club had a brief yet brilliant comedic life with lyrics that expressed snarky, meta riffs on hipster culture and indie female rockers. Their brief existence was captured in at least one late-night television appearance, Alan Cumming’s and Jennifer Jason Leigh’s The Anniversary Party [2001], and the crown jewel in their brief life: the hilarious short film Girls Guitar Club [2001]. Why they disbanded such comic brilliance is perplexing.
Justin Baker