After a lot of reflection, I've decided to be proud of coining the phrase 'She-Punks' rather than being annoyed with other people for claiming it as their own idea. Now, the concept seems to have entered the vernacular, so-to-speak.
Way back in 2015, me and Gina Birch went to see the late and wonderful Andy Linehan at The British Library with the idea for a film based on my book The Lost Women of Rock Music. We had no idea until we met him that the BL was planning a big punk exhibition for 2016 celebrating the anniversary of punk, which they dated as beginning in 1976. He offered us a night to ourselves, even if we only had ten finished minutes of our documentary.
He emailed me to confirm the booking, and asked for a title.
On the spur of the moment, I called it 'Stories from the She-Punks', and the name stuck.
We spent the next few months filming, editing, and generally putting together a DIY documentary that after its initial screening in June 2016 and attendant publicity (we did a screening at The Roundhouse too, shortly afterwards) took a while to finish properly due to lack of funding. I believe there was an informal screening in Philadelphia hosted by Jenn Pelly in August 2016 too. I think the women we interviewed were really behind what we were doing, putting them in their rightful place in music history.
Anyway, the finished film was later taken up by Doc'n'Roll and went on a UK tour in 2019 (thanks so much!) and is currently still shown sporadically, though we haven't 'monetised' it yet.
The name has since been used for a book, a recent fashion range, and also a compilation of music made by... she-punks.
I understand that you can't keep an idea to yourself with big pointing fingers in the clouds: "It was me! It was me!" and I've heard through a group that I'm a member of that things like this are commonplace.
But it WAS me!
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