The youngest member of the Linda Lindas is only 10, and yet the band has already opened for feminist rock trailblazers Bikini Kill and Alice Bag, cameoed in a Netflix movie directed by Amy Poehler, and signed to legendary punk label Epitaph Records. Last week, a clip of the quartet performing their snarling original track “Racist, Sexist Boy” at a Los Angeles library as part of an AAPI Heritage Month event exploded online, collecting nearly 4 million views on Twitter so far.
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In the video, Mila, the 10-year-old drummer, introduces the song’s inspiration: “A boy came up to me in my class and said that his dad told him to stay away from Chinese people. After I told him that I was Chinese, he backed away from me.” Then the whole band, whose members are Asian, Latinx, or both, lunges into an eviscerating critique of the boy’s close-mindedness. “We rebuild what you destroy,” they promise defiantly.
The clip has been shared by everyone from Hayley Williams to Questlove, and deemed “song of 2021” by Thurston Moore. Being recognized has been hectic but fun. “We kind of didn’t talk to anyone at school about the band—it was like we had a secret life,” says 16-year-old guitarist Bela, the only band member on social media, over Zoom.
While they’ve known each other for years—Mila and guitarist Lucia (14) are sisters, bassist Eloise (13) is their cousin, and Bela is their friend—the girls first played together at the 2018 Girlschool festival, where they performed with Yeah Yeah Yeahs’ Karen O and Best Coast’s Bethany Cosentino, whom they lovingly refer to as their “stage mom.” (Their name is inspired by the 2005 Japanese film Linda Linda Linda, about a group of girls scrambling to learn songs for a high school performance.) In 2019, they opened for Bikini Kill at one of the riot grrrl legends’ first shows in 22 years. “They were so positive and electric it made me feel like, I want to start a band!” says Bikini Kill leader Kathleen Hanna. “And then I realized, I am in a band, and we’re playing tonight.”
After school yesterday, the Linda Lindas called in from a studio run by Lucia and Mila’s dad, Carlos de la Garza, a Grammy-winning producer-engineer who has worked with the likes of Paramore, Bad Religion, and Jimmy Eat World. “There’s something about the air of the studio, it has like incense and scented candles,” says Lucia. Bela adds approvingly, “It feels so bougie.” Crowding into the Zoom frame, the band members are alternately poised and excitable, often chiming in to finish each others’ sentences. We spoke about their origins, going viral, and what’s next.
Mila: After the [racist] incident happened, I was a little confused—I didn’t really know how to respond. Then, after talking about it with my family and bandmates, I realized how messed up it was. We had the idea for the song, but we didn’t really write it until the presidential election started last year.
Lucia: Mila and Eloise wrote it over Zoom in five hours. It’s become so big that we’re trying not to make it about [the boy] anymore—it’s about how we can help prevent racist, sexist kids from becoming racist, sexist adults.
Lucia: I was in bed in my pajamas, and our dad just came in and was like, “You guys are going viral!” I was like, “No, we’re not—what is that supposed to mean?” That’s a weird term to us.
Mila: He told us like three times that day.
Eloise: I didn’t know until Mila messaged me.
Bela: I was just looking through my Instagram feed. People that we looked up to were posting it, and we were like, “How do you even remotely know who we are?”
Mila: Kathleen Hanna emailed us. During the library show, the others were wearing these shirts that are part of her project called Tees for Togo, which helps raise money for girls’ education and healthcare in Togo. She said that we helped her raise $4,000 in two days. I’m really glad we got to do that.
Lucia: Kathleen Hanna has done so much for us. She saw a video of us playing “Rebel Girl” at a benefit show for [L.A. school board member] Jackie Goldberg and then invited us to open for her at the Hollywood Palladium. Like, who does that? She also helped us get that part in Moxie, the Netflix movie.
Bela: That was our first real show!
Lucia: That was the biggest show we’ve ever played.
Eloise: When we heard that she had asked us to open for her, we were like, “what!!!”
Lucia: I’m a pessimist, I don’t believe things until they happen. My mom came up and showed me this email, and I was like, “We’re not actually going to open for her, she’s just saying that.” We had been in the band for less than a year at the time, and we were still working it out, playing only covers, getting the hang of our instruments. The opportunity came along, and we practiced almost every day. It was like, “We have homework? Just stay up until midnight doing that.” When we got on stage, it was half an hour but it flew by so fast. Eloise and Mila cartwheeled on stage.
Mila: We like it because it’s anything you want it to be.
Eloise: It’s just doing whatever’s fun for yourself.
Mila: That’s right up Eloise’s alley.
Lucia: She’s the best at it, really. Whenever any of us try to do it, it just sounds like—
Mila: [yells mildly]
Eloise: Ever since I was little, I’ve always gotten to go to DIY events and punk shows. [Eloise’s dad is Martin Wong, co-founder of the culture magazine Giant Robot.] Since Chinatown has this history of punk shows, my parents put on shows to raise money for my elementary school music program with bands like Phranc, Alice Bag, and the Alley Cats.
Lucia: Our dad works in the music industry. I have played classical piano since I was in preschool, but I’ve always kind of been in awe of the guitars that our dad has, the drums and keyboards. It’s amazing that we now get to put music out into the world. We put out an EP last December and we’ve been writing so much. We want to put out more songs this summer.
Bela: My parents aren’t musicians, they’re more visual artist types. Basically I just decided I wanted to play guitar—everyone else had a lot more exposure.
Lucia: Bela was the only one who knew how to play her instrument going into this, though.
Lucia: Before the pandemic, we got an email asking for us to write a song for a short Netflix documentary about Claudia Kishi of the Baby-Sitters Club books. That gave us a real push to start actually writing original music, and then the pandemic really pushed us to start writing new songs. Eloise wrote a few about the pandemic.
Mila: The process is different for each one. Sometimes we write it on our own and then bring it to the group and see if they have any changes.
Lucia: Sometimes we have a riff, and we need help on it—we don’t know where we want it to go. That’s why it’s so helpful to have other people.
Mila: We have a voting song, and a song about her Bela’s cat.
Bela: My cat is just a mess. She’s crazy—[turns toward the others] is that a word I can use? No? She’s bizarre.
