It’s about becoming better, it’s about educating people on what you should not do, it’s about making sure we all become better. The girls said they weren’t sure if the boy who inspired the song had heard it he hasn’t apologized. It’s pretty cool to see the thousands of people in our DMs telling us that it really touched them,” said Bela. The reaction has been overwhelming: “People are feeling heard. The Linda Lindas are: Mila, 10 her sister Lucia, 14 their cousin, Eloise, 13 and their friend Bela, 16. “We wanted to tell a story about something that actually happened to a nine-year-old girl – so it becomes impossible to ignore.” “We made it less about intelligence and more about being a bully,” added Lucia. “The song was to fight back against the racist, sexist boys, but we didn’t want to be the racist, sexist boys,” said Eloise. Initially, the song was called Idiotic Boy and talked about “dumb and stupid” boys, but the girls said they learned about ableism and how that language could be hurtful. “We wanted to use our voice for people who don’t have one,” said Mila. The “racist, sexist boy” chorus came easily, and they pushed to finalize the rest of the song toward the end of the presidential election. We wanted to use our voice for people who don’t have one Mila “I remember I was like, ‘Do you want to stop or take a break?’ And she was like, ‘No!’” Eloise said.
It felt good to write the song … It made us feel better,” said Mila, recounting an early five-hour writing session where she was trying to play bass for the first time and became frustrated to tears. Mila said she was initially confused by the incident that inspired their song but when she discussed it with her family, she began to understand the significance of the hateful comment. They did perform in one of their backyards on Halloween, though a neighbor called the police on them. The girls had a number of live shows lined up last year that were canceled due to Covid. Bela is also right in the middle of finals: “I still have one project that I have not finished, and I’m like, do I do it? Do I not? I’m really grateful this is happening, but I kinda wished it happened next week.”
She is the only member of the band who is on social media, so she has been relaying their viral growth to the others. “When I walked into school to pick up my yearbook, people were cheering,” said Bela, a junior in high school. “We started three years ago and it was just a fun thing – and then we were like, ‘Woah, we just played the Hollywood Palladium!’ And then we were like, ‘Woah, we were just in a movie!’ And now we are viral,” said Lucia. The Linda Lindas – whose name was inspired by a 2005 Japanese film, in which high school girls learn Linda Linda, a song by the Blue Hearts – went on to perform an original song for a Netflix documentary, The Claudia Kishi Club. When the cover surpasses the original The Linda Lindas /jW91rHuSbl- Kathleen Hanna February 25, 2019 I like ‘do-it-yourself’ because it’s whatever you feel like. “I grew up with the DIY culture of punk, going to punk shows, making mixtapes – with the idea that anyone can do whatever,” said Eloise, who is finishing seventh grade. (The parents, listening in on the interview from a distance, shouted their approval of this quote.) “We have cool parents,” said Lucia, seated in her LA backyard, which is also home to their father’s studio. And Eloise’s dad is Martin Wong, who co-founded the Asian American pop culture magazine Giant Robot. The girls’ families have ties to the industry: Mila and Lucia’s father is Carlos de la Garza, a Grammy award-winning mixer and engineer for Paramore and Best Coast.
The girls started playing together in 2018, as part of a pickup band for a Girlschool LA festival, where they connected with Bethany Cosentino from Best Coast and Karen O of the Yeah Yeah Yeahs.
The Linda Lindas’ raw talent, on full display for their AAPI Heritage Month show at the library, had already caught the attention of the music industry long before they went mega-viral. “The song lets people know that they are not alone,” added Mila, who plays the drums while shouting her section: “You say mean stuff / And you close your mind to things you don’t like / You turn away from what you don’t wanna see!” She added: “It’s good because I get to scream a lot in it – all of the anger that builds up, it’s good to let it out. “I hope the song empowers people who have been oppressed,” said Eloise, who sings the chorus of the song, which she co-wrote with Mila (and in her library performance dedicated to “ all the other racist, sexist boys in the world”).