Presenting The Pipettes

words by Janine Trinidad
photos by Randy Cremean

Brighton, England natives The Pipettes (a.k.a. Becki, Rosay, and Gwenno) demurely enter stage right at The Parish in matching polka-dotted party dresses and get into position for their first dance-friendly song of the evening. Less than two beats into the 1950s hop-inspired “Your Kisses Are Wasted on Me”, The Pipettes prove they are not mimicking the girl groups of the Golden Era of pop for mere retro kitsch, but reinventing them for the contemporary culture. The Pipettes are a caricature of popular culture, manufactured and molded to fit into a make-believe world built around forces that, in the past, were mutually exclusive: they write classic pop songs with a smattering of indie, punk, and reggae; they are a girl group with four male members; they are at once perfectly innocent and unmistakably bold. Above all, they are a product, a brand, a public commodity meant for mass consumption, and they intend it to be that way.